Chelsea Lane (Haunted Hearts Series Book 5)

by Denise Moncrief

  “So what’s your news then?”

  “Shaw Bennett has been named acting sheriff.”

  Ashley’s cup stalled halfway to her lips. “No way.”

  “The governor just declared a state of emergency in Hill County.”

  “No way.”

  Josh grinned. “You said that already.” He wiggled his eyebrows. “Ready for another piece of news?”

  “I’m not sure that I am.”

  Brett watched the two of them as they communicated. He envied their close relationship, envied how easy they were with each other. It seemed as if they’d been together for years, but Brett knew they’d been apart for a long time and had just reconciled.

  Josh bounced on his toes as he continued. “The FBI took Halsey’s case. They interviewed me for two and a half hours before they kicked me out of the interrogation room. I don’t think they’re going to go easy on him. One of them particularly has a thing against police corruption. Halsey doesn’t stand a chance. If there’s more evidence against him, this guy is going to find it and nail Halsey.”

  Ashley sat her empty cup on the kitchen counter. “Have you finished decoding the documents Courtney gave Shaw?”

  “No. They took them and sent them to their lab to process.”

  Ashley dropped into the nearest chair next to the tiny dinette table in the room. “This is getting serious.”

  Josh shook his head. “It’s been serious for a long, long time. Thank God someone is finally trying to fix what’s wrong with this county.”

  “It’s not going to get fixed until Haskins is out of control. You know it.” She shivered. “Did you tell the FBI about our plan?”

  “I didn’t think Shaw or Gray would want me to talk about that. The plan is still in play, and I’m pretty sure they don’t want the FBI messing it up. This is more than professional, Ash. You know it’s personal.” Josh grabbed a couple of cookies off a plate in the center of the table and crammed them into his mouth.

  Brett was about to burst with questions. “What in God’s name are the two of you talking about?”

  Josh seemed to remember Brett was in the room. “Oh…I can’t talk about it.” He wiped his hands on his jeans, still chewing. “If I did, I’d have to shoot you.”

  “Josh! That’s not funny.” Ashley did not appear to be amused. Not at all.

  Brett attempted to regain control of the conversation. “Cherish thinks Haskins will send someone to get her.” He made sure Josh McCord was paying attention. “I wanted to have a little come-to-Jesus meeting with him, but Cherish didn’t want me to. She wants to confront him herself. I think that’s a crazy idea. She’s just a girl.”

  Josh placed a hand on Brett’s shoulder. “You’ve seen Cherish?”

  He steadied his nerves. Why had he opened his mouth?

  “Yeah, she…she’s alive, Josh.”

  Josh’s face lit up with excitement. “Where is she? Where has she been? Is she okay?”

  Brett wasn’t sure which question to answer first or if he should honestly answer any of Josh’s questions. “I’m not exactly sure where she is right now. Probably with Jordan.” He never could remember the guy’s last name. “You know. Bennett’s partner.”

  “What’s she doing with him?” McCord seemed more stunned than anything else. Not shocked. Just genuinely surprised.

  “Probably telling her story. She was kidnapped by James Standridge.”

  Josh’s eyes flashed with sudden interest. “You know James Standridge is dead, right?”

  Brett nodded. Of course, he knew that.

  “Has she been living with him this whole time?”

  Brett nodded again.

  “Well, I’ll be damned.” Josh chewed on what he’d just been told awhile. “So where has she been since Standridge died?”

  Brett shrugged. “I don’t know. She hasn’t told me the whole story yet.”

  Once again, McCord hit him with an uncomfortable question. “So what are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be with your sister?”

  Ashley butted into their conversation. “Josh, he just rescued three other women that James Standridge had kidnapped.”

  “There were others?”

  Brett leaned against the kitchen counter. “James was kidnapping workers for Cooley. He used them in Cooley’s meth labs. No protective masks. No protective clothing. Barely fed them. Beat them if they didn’t work fast enough. All of them exposed to the chemicals. If they had worked the labs much longer, they’d all be dead in a couple of weeks.”

  All of this information he’d either pieced together or had gotten from Jordan on their way to stake out Jake’s shack.

  Josh whistled. “Well, that explains a lot. We never could figure out how Cooley could be in so many places at once.”

  Brett’s heart pounded with anger. “He used those women as slaves.” He pointed down the hall. “One of them was so messed up she couldn’t even travel to Little Rock. They were all illegals. Cooley knew no one would report them missing. Not here in Arkansas. Immigration came and took the other two into custody. There’s a guy sitting in Amalia’s room right now to make sure she doesn’t get away. As if she could get out of bed by herself.”

  He shook his head, mostly in disgust at himself. “Do you know how much time I wasted hating Zach Halsey? Cherish has been in Fairview the whole time. Living in the same house with those women. If I had known, I could have rescued her. How come I never saw her around town? How come I didn’t hear anything about her? How come nobody knew what was going on in that house?”

  “Well, now, I can’t say I blame you for hating Zach Halsey. He’s pretty easy to hate,” Josh replied with a knowing expression on his odd features. “His grandpa thought he’d killed your sister too, you know.”

  Zach’s grandfather the High Sheriff of Hill County was no better at being a human being than Fred Haskins was, in Brett’s humble opinion.

  Josh continued his thoughts. “That’s what Haskins blackmailed Halsey with all these years. Wonder what’s gonna happen when Halsey finds out he’s been under Haskins’s control all this time for nothing.”

  Ashley’s excited voice rang around the small room. “Halsey is gonna turn on Haskins. Isn’t that what we wanted? This should be fun to watch.”

  Josh added his opinion. “So far, Halsey has kept his mouth shut and shouted his innocence to anyone who would listen.”

  Thoughts swirled through Brett’s mind faster than he could catch hold of them. “How strong is the case against Halsey?”

  “Strong enough to put him in jail, but whether it’s strong enough to keep him there? Only time and the skills of the FBI agents will tell.” Josh wadded up his napkin and tossed it at the trashcan, missing the rim by an inch or two. “One thing’s for sure…he’ll never be sheriff in this county again. His career is dead. He’ll never get re-elected.”

  Brett wasn’t so sure about that. The bad in Hill County had a way of rising up from the dead. Someone needed to do something to stop it forever. Jailing Halsey seemed like putting a Band-Aid on a hemorrhaging wound.

  ****

  The next morning, Shaw Bennett sat across the kitchen table from Jordan. The distinctive chunk chunk of shovels moving earth filtered up the basement stairs. Jordan couldn’t ignore the sound or drown out the noise no matter how hard he tried. Chelsea stood in the far corner chewing her nails and glancing toward Jordan every one in a while. Clearly, she wanted to leave. So did Jordan.

  “So explain to me why you decided it would be okay to compromise a crime scene.”

  Bennett was not a happy cop. His sarcastic tone ripped through every one of Jordan’s previously planned defenses. Bennett expected nothing less than the absolute truth. Jordan wasn’t sure he could give the man what he wanted. He needed to explain his actions, but the tone of Bennett’s voice made him want to defy the man’s authoritative stance. Bennett was ex-military. An officer. Once he’d earned his stripes, no doubt the military bearing had been hard-wired into him.


  “Before I tell you anything, Bennett, let’s get one thing straight. You might be senior to me, but we are partners. You are not my commanding officer. You’re not in the military any longer. You can’t take the high road with me. You’ve done things behind my back.” He stabbed himself in the chest with his pointer finger. “If you want an explanation, drop the attitude.”

  Truthfully, the man only had a few years of law enforcement experience more than Jordan had.

  Bennett grunted and waved his hand. Jordan rolled his eyes and leaned back in his chair, crossing his arms over his sore chest. His side screamed with sharp stabs of pain where Jake Richards had kicked him. He worried that Richards had fractured one or more of his ribs. He winced and sat up a little straighter to make it easier to breathe.

  “Okay, okay. I’m listening…as a friend and a fellow officer. Just tell me what happened. What are you doing here? You were supposed to stay at Duncan’s place until I came for you.”

  Jordan doubted they would ever be friends. He’d settle for being fellow officers.

  Chelsea closed the gap between them and put a hand on his shoulder. “Go ahead and tell him, Jordan. You need his help. You can’t keep this to yourself any longer.”

  He stared up at her sympathetic face. “I didn’t keep it to myself. I told you.”

  “I can only listen. I can’t do anything about it. You should know that. Your partner might be able to help.”

  Chelsea had a good point. He swung around to face Bennett and drew in a deep breath. “My sister is one of the women buried in the basement.”

  Bennett didn’t seem to be the least bit shocked. “What’s her name?”

  “Kristie Godchaux. She’s…she’s the one in the far left corner away from the stairs.”

  “Godchaux? Different fathers?”

  “No, different mothers.”

  “Why the different last names then?”

  “I didn’t know he was my father until I was at Tulane. I met Kristie there, and it was like we had this immediate connection. At first I thought my feelings might be romantic, but then I realized they weren’t. We looked so much alike that we knew we had to be related somehow. When Kristie told her mother about me, she wanted to meet me. I’ll never forget her face when I told her my mother’s name. She confronted her husband about the affair and the truth came out. He never knew about me. Momma never told him she was pregnant. And from what Kristie had told me about her father, that was probably for the best.”

  Jordan ran his fingers through his hair and then leaned his elbows on the tabletop. “Vivienne left him, and I blamed myself for their split for a while. I thought Kristie blamed me too, but it wasn’t long before the old man divorced her and married a younger woman, a woman he’d been having an affair with and gotten pregnant.”

  Chelsea slipped into the chair next him. Sympathy oozed from her. No, not pity. More like empathy. She understood the sting of abandonment. No wonder Kristie appeared to her. Chelsea’s heart would be sensitive to the pain in Kristie’s heart.

  “So you came here to do…what?” Bennett’s tone was flat.

  Jordan narrowed his eyes at the jerk. “You should know why I came back here before I told anyone about the place, before investigators started tromping around and disturbing things. Chelsea told me she’d heard Kristie’s voice, had seen her. I was trying to communicate with her. No, actually, I just wanted to feel her presence one more time.”

  He’d wanted more than that. He’d wanted Kristie to explain her cryptic messages—the one she’d whispered to him and the one she’d whispered to Chelsea.

  “Do you feel her presence, Clark?” Bennett’s question was uttered calmly and respectfully.

  “Not now. But I did…we did. We both saw her in the basement. Right before everything went weird and we blacked out. When we woke up, Jake Richards was there and someone…or something had tied us up.”

  Bennett slid his chair back as if he was tired of the discussion and ready to leave. “You know you can’t work this case, right?”

  “Why do you think I wanted to do this before anyone else got here?”

  “I can understand that. But we have a problem now. Jake Richards saw you here.”

  Jordan leaned across the table toward Bennett. “Jake Richards could have brought us here.”

  Bennett bent forward. “But he didn’t.”

  “If he denies it, are you gonna help him prove his side of the story? You just had him arrested for tying us up.” Jordan thought he had a good argument.

  “I have other reasons for wanting to keep him in jail besides sheltering you from embarrassment.”

  Jordan was interested in his reasons and rolled his hand to push Bennett to explain.

  “He was the last known associate of Fred Haskins in the old man’s confidence. The rest of his crew is low-level subordinates. Richards was his chief security guard. Without Richards, Haskins doesn’t have a right-hand man to do his dirty work for him. He’s going to be desperate for help now. Who’s he gonna call?”

  Jordan smiled, anticipating Bennett’s reaction to the lame joke he was about to tell. “Ghost Busters?”

  Bennett laughed. “Funny. But you’re close. He’s going to pressure Grayson to step up and take over his business. He’s gonna want to get that taken care of soon…before he dies.”

  Jordan’s joke had been spot on. Mitchell Grayson, former lieutenant with the Hill County Sheriff’s Department, was not only a local ghost hunter, but also Fred Haskins bastard son. Jordan sniffed back his raw and exposed emotions. He knew exactly what it was like for a bastard son to discover that his biological father was a son-of-a-bitch.

  Bennett nodded toward Chelsea. “We’re going to need her statement. That probably means hours of interviews. Is she up to it?”

  “She’s right here and she can speak for herself.” Her comeback sort of hissed out of her mouth. “You want me to tell you everything that happened in this house?”

  “No. What happened in this house…those men are dead. I can’t send them to prison. No, ma’am. I want you to search your memory and tell me if there’s any way I can connect the men who lived here with Fred Haskins.”

  She smiled. “I can give you that. But you’re gonna have to do something for me.”

  “Depends on your role in what went on here. I might be able to convince the prosecutor to give you immunity if you give me enough to arrest Haskins.”

  She moved around the table and stood over Bennett. Jordan suppressed a smile when her nearness caused Bennett to squirm in his seat.

  “No, I want more than immunity.”

  “I’m not sure there’s much more I can offer you than that.”

  She placed one hand on each arm of the chair and got right in Bennett’s face. His muscles tensed as if he was trying hard not to flinch. The man wasn’t used to being backed down, and particularly not by a woman.

  “Jordan says that I’ll probably go into protective custody until this is all over.”

  Bennett nodded. “That’s entirely likely.”

  “Then I want Jordan to be my body guard.”

  Bennett snorted his amusement. “Jordan? Are you sure? I’ve had to rescue him twice already because of his association with you.”

  “Don’t be a jerk, Bennett. That’s the deal. Take it or leave it.”

  The intensity of her ultimatum made Jordan’s heart race a bit faster.

  “I don’t have to make deals with you.” Bennett must have thought he had her there.

  Her eyes drilled into his. “You’re gonna need the advice of someone familiar with his operation.”

  “Are you that familiar with it?”

  Her eyes glowed with excitement. “I know enough about it to get myself an invitation to his house.”

  “I’m not going to use you like that.”

  Oh, but Jordan suspected Bennett was just playing hard to get.

  “Well… Good luck with your plans to bring down Fred Haskins then.”

 
“I don’t need luck. I have someone going inside Haskins’s operation.”

  His comment seemed to dismay her. “You’d better hope and pray he’s a good actor. Haskins will kill your guy if he even thinks the man is an undercover cop.”

  Jordan had heard enough of the back and forth. He hated that kind of negotiation between cops and…criminals. Sure, Chelsea had lived with the criminal element long enough that she probably thought like a criminal.

  “Bennett, stop. This isn’t a fair argument, and you know it. There’s no way she could know all the details of your plan to…” He stopped before he said too much and reorganized his argument. “You are right to keep her out it, but she can help us if you let her. Let’s give her what she wants. I’ll hang around here and protect her. She can tell me everything she knows about the operation. That way I stay out of the field investigation so there is no hint of conflict of interest. Why not go at Haskins from two different directions?”

  Bennett stared at Jordan so long without twitching even a muscle that he thought the man might have fallen asleep with his eyes open. “Okay. I agree with you.”

  Chelsea had spent the entire argument leaned over Bennett, practically breathing on him. She cleared her throat. “We can’t stay here.”

  Well, no, they couldn’t. They couldn’t camp out at a crime scene.

  Bennett stood and Chelsea stepped back from him.

  “I was gonna house sit for Laurel Standridge out at Laurel Heights, but I couldn’t talk Courtney into staying there. Not yet. She’s been through too much to face another haunting just yet.”

  Curiosity glowed in Chelsea’s eyes. “Courtney? You mean Courtney Crenshaw?”

  Bennett nodded.

  “I met her. At Cooley’s house. Why is she with you?”

  It was Bennett’s turn to clear his throat. His discomfort was almost tangible. “She’s…we’re…she’s staying with me.”

  Jordan chuckled behind his hand. Chelsea’s lack of diplomacy had struck again. This time at Bennett’s expense.

  “Uh-huh.” She crossed her arms.

  “Anyway…I have a friend who owns some rentals down Ashley Creek. The place is deserted because Ben doesn’t intend to reopen. He wants to sell. So there are plenty of empty cabins to choose from. I put Courtney in the far one away from the highway. Maybe you could stay with her for a while…just until we get things sorted out. It would put my mind at ease knowing I had someone there with her when I couldn’t be there.”