by Aimée Thurlo
Before he could say anything, Leigh Ann came up. “Detective Wells is here. She wants to speak to both of you—in private.”
Jo glanced at Ben. “Let’s go.”
As they walked to the front of the store, Jo saw Detective Wells’s gaze shift to Ben and stay on him. It didn’t surprise her. Ben had something that could only be described as “presence.” Women were naturally drawn to him, even when logic and common sense demanded the exact opposite.
“Good morning, Detective. Can I offer you some coffee?” Jo asked, noticing the dark circles under the woman’s eyes. She looked as tired as Jo felt.
“Yes, thanks. Black and strong with two sugars, if you have it. Then let’s go someplace where I can speak to both of you in private.”
Jo led them into the break room and closed the door. The informal setting would hopefully set everyone at ease. She poured coffee from the corner pot into three cups, grabbed some packets of sugar, and brought them over.
Ben took a seat on one of the chairs, sitting up straight, and wound as tight as a drum.
Jo sat down last. “All right. You’ve got our full attention, Detective.”
“As the new owner of The Outpost, have you come across anything that could explain why Tom Stuart was attacked and killed?”
“No, and I’ve been searching for just that, too,” Jo said.
“We’re not looking at this right,” Ben said. “Whoever killed my father has been manipulating us from the beginning. You said there were no signs of a fight at home, but as I told you before, Dad was a former marine. There’s no way he would have just sat there while someone pointed a gun at his head. He would have put up a helluva fight. It was his nature. The room would have been trashed.”
Katie nodded slowly. “We know more now, and I can tell you he didn’t have an easy death.”
“I need to know how he died,” Ben said.
“The autopsy report is in, but it might be real hard for you two to hear the details.”
“I’m a crewman on a medevac team, and I’ve already served two combat tours in Afghanistan—the first as a sniper. I’ve seen more than most people can even imagine. Don’t hold back on account of me.”
Jo watched Ben. His face was set; his eyes gleamed with an edge of steel. He was holding on to anger, relying on that to give him the added strength he needed. Yet, without balance there was only chaos, and nothing good could ever come from that.
Katie turned to Jo, eyebrows raised.
Jo swallowed hard. “I’m staying.” She clasped her hands together in front of her on the table to keep them from shaking.
As Detective Wells gave them details, Jo felt bile rise to the back of her throat. Without a word, she slid her chair back and walked quickly to the employees’ small bathroom. After splashing cold water on her face, the urge to vomit passed. She took an unsteady breath, then went back in.
Ben was pacing like a caged tiger. “My father was tortured. That’s what it is, plain and simple. I should have seen that before now. It’s the only way he would have given up that safe combination.”
“To catch whoever did this, I’m going to need your help,” Detective Wells said, looking directly at Jo. “You knew Mr. Stuart better than anyone else who worked here, according to what I’ve been told by the staff. Think hard. Who were his enemies and what kind of information could Stuart have had that might have led to his death? Why break into the store safe, and not even try to crack open the cash box? What’s more important than that to a thief?”
The chills that preceded a cold sweat gripped Jo; then her hands began to tremble. It always started with her hands; then her entire body would follow. Fighting the symptoms, she clasped her hands so tightly, her knuckles ached.
“I have no idea what they were looking for. I also don’t know who his enemies were or even if he had any. Ben’s dad didn’t talk to me about things like that.”
Wells never took her eyes off Jo. “Did he recently conduct business with anyone new, maybe someone not quite trustworthy?”
“Not that I know about, but there’s something you need to understand,” Jo said. “My boss held himself to a very high standard, and in his book, things were either wrong or right—black or white. If he knew someone was dishonest, he wouldn’t have anything to do with them.”
“I’ll second that,” Ben said.
“Anyone can be tricked. Maybe he inadvertently got involved with the wrong people, or refused to deal with someone who wouldn’t take no for an answer. It might have also been a personal matter that escalated,” Wells said, watching their reactions. “And it had to involve something that was bigger than a cash box and could end up stored in a safe, if there is a connection between those events.”
“Your guess is as good as mine. I wish I had more of an answer to give you,” Jo said. She’d been ordered not to tell anyone about the threat made over the phone, and maybe keeping that secret had kept her alive. Without knowing exactly what the killer wanted, there was no way to point a finger at a suspect anyway, so why add to the danger she was already facing?
“You told me once before to stay out of police business, but it seems to me you could use some help,” Ben said.
“The situation has changed, so to work the case effectively I’m going to need your cooperation. If you hear anything I can use, or get any vibes, or notice anything that seems out of the ordinary, call me immediately. You have my number.”
Jo nodded and Ben did the same.
“What will you do next?” Ben asked. “You’ve got a plan, right?”
“Yes, but investigations don’t benefit from rigid thinking. I take things one step at a time and change directions as needed. Right now, I’m going to dig hard into your father’s personal life—his activities and contacts. The motive’s out there and I need to find it. I’m also going to need you to give me a list of everyone who has worked here in the past, say, two years.”
“You think one of our people killed him?” Jo argued. “No way.”
“Last year we had a feed store that was burned to the ground with the owner still in it. One of the clerks he’d fired for theft came back to get even,” Katie said. “The suspect took a plea for manslaughter and is serving time right now.”
“No one’s been fired here, but we had two people who quit last year. I’ll get you their names and addresses.”
“What about shoplifters?” Katie asked Jo. “What’s your policy for handling that?”
“Our losses are usually small. Since our high-end merchandise is under lock and key, the items targeted by thieves are normally food and drink. Most of the time that’s the work of a kid, so we call the parents, square things, and let it go. If the shoplifter is in his late teens or beyond, we always press charges. There have been exceptions to that, but they’re rare. The last one I remember was about six months ago. A homeless woman was caught stealing some food. Instead of having her arrested, my boss allowed her to work here to pay for the things she needed.”
“Is she still here?”
“No. She moved on with her kids, but I have the information on her.” Jo brought out a journal, showing her the records, kept by hand. “As you can see, we write down every name and incident, including staff and other witnesses.”
“This isn’t locked up, maybe in the safe?” Katie asked, speculating.
“Not at all. We keep it here on a shelf,” Jo said.
Katie nodded, then wrote down the names of the adults entered on the list. “You mentioned that high-end merchandise is kept in locked display cases.”
“It is,” Jo said. “It’s an added precaution.”
“Where are the keys kept?” Katie asked.
“After hours in the safe. It’s a new model that’s all but impossible to crack unless you know the combination,” Jo said.
“If my father was drugged so his killer could get the combination,” Ben asked, “then why didn’t the robber go looking for those keys the other day when he opened the safe?”
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br /> “Were they there?” Katie asked.
“No, they were in my pocket, but he never asked for them and I wasn’t about to volunteer,” Jo said.
“This just keeps getting stranger and stranger. Now it’s sounding like some kind of revenge motive. For now I want your list of employees, particularly any who aren’t currently working here. I’ll follow up on those names,” Wells said, looking at Jo.
“One more thing, Detective,” Ben said. “My father didn’t get to finish his fight, so I intend to do that for him. I’ll never let this go until his killer is behind bars. If you can’t track him down, I will.”
Katie met his gaze, and for several seconds neither moved. “I know you’re angry and in pain, but I’m telling you right now—stay out of it unless I come to you with a question. Nothing good can happen if you interfere. Screw up just once, and the killer or killers could walk, or worse, you might target an innocent man.”
Working hard to appear cool and collected, though at the moment she was neither, Jo glanced over at Ben. “All the employee names and addresses, former and current, are in your father’s computer in the folder labeled ‘Personnel.’ Why don’t you print out whatever Detective Wells needs.”
As Detective Wells and Ben left, Jo remained seated. The cold medical terms for what Tom had gone through had shaken her to the core. She couldn’t move. If she stood up now, she was sure her legs wouldn’t hold up and she’d crash to the floor. At least she hadn’t fallen apart in front of the others.
Alone, she felt the tremors spread through her. She didn’t want anyone to see her like this, so she concentrated on keeping her breathing even. With her hand around her jish she fought hard to pull herself together.
“You okay?” Ben said, coming back in after several minutes. “You’re shaking like a leaf.”
“I should have pushed your father until he told me what was wrong,” Jo said, her voice unsteady. “If I had, he might still be alive.”
“This wasn’t your fault. My dad made his own decisions,” he said, gently pulling her out of the chair and into his arms.
The warmth of his body melted the iciness inside her. She wanted to lean against him and allow herself to forget everything but him, if only for a moment. Yet afraid of where it would lead, she reached inside herself for strength, and moved away instead.
“If I’d been more of a friend, I would have found a way to help him. He shouldn’t have had to go through that hell.”
“Don’t second-guess yourself, not now. Take it from someone who has been there.” His voice dropped and darkened. “We all have regrets, but should-haves and could-haves will destroy you one inch at a time. Clamp a lid on those thoughts before they suck the life right out of you.”
Jo sensed the undercurrent of pain behind his words. That hadn’t been just the observations of a man who’d been to war. They’d been the echoes of a boy who’d lost his father long before the man’s death—a loss that couldn’t be reversed now.
“Dad could have gotten help anytime if he’d asked, but he chose to handle things on his own because that’s who he was. He went down fighting, and my guess is that his killer didn’t get what he wanted either, even with the safe combination. A small victory.”
Jo took a steadying breath, feeling calmer now. “He was a strong man. He never fell apart.” She glanced down at her hands. At least she wasn’t shaking. “Unlike me.”
“You have your own brand of strength,” he said. “And you also have me.”
Once again she felt the stirring of desire. She didn’t want to need him like this … but she did. More than anything she wanted to follow her heart and stop being careful. She wanted to lose control, to walk on the wild side without worrying about regrets—but that just wasn’t her.
Jo once again put up the familiar walls that kept her safely out of his reach. “I need a chance to decompress. Let me do some office work, then we’ll continue inventory.”
An hour later she was still at her desk, transferring funds and trying to figure out which bills to pay and which to put off until the last minute. No matter how she looked at it, she needed to step up the cash flow. The trading post’s grocery and dry goods wholesalers would stop delivery if they didn’t get paid on time, and if that happened, their regular customers would stop coming, too. They’d go out of business in a hurry after that.
Jo called Mike Broome, and the attorney answered after she’d spent several minutes on hold. “It’s good to hear from you, Jo. I heard about the robbery. How are things going?”
“Not so good, that’s why I’m calling. Unless business picks up, I’ll only be able to stay open another couple of months. Is there any way you can make more capital accessible to me?”
“You’ve got every penny of Tom’s business assets. The rest of his funds went to his son. Maybe Ben—”
“No. I’ll figure something out,” she interrupted. “Once the transfer of ownership paperwork is complete, I should be able to take out a bank loan, if necessary. In the meantime, I’ll cut back on my own salary a little more. That’ll help stretch things out.”
As she hung up, she saw Ben at the door. “I overheard what you said, and I’ve got an idea if you’re open to another solution.”
She suspected he was about to offer her a loan, but what strings would come attached to that? She waited for him to continue.
“It’s clear from what I’ve been seeing and hearing since I arrived that Dad made the right choice, picking you to continue his dream. I’m not going to stand in your way.”
She smiled. “Thanks for trusting your father, and me.”
“I do. That’s why I want you to let me get more involved. Dad left me with a home that’s already paid off and a fairly large amount of money, so here’s what I propose: Let me buy a share of this place, say a one third partnership or whatever percentage I can afford that’s less than half. You’ll still have controlling interest and can run things on your own when I return to my unit.”
She considered it for a moment. Letting Ben join her would ensure that the trading post would stay open at least for the immediate future. Yet, like the Navajo Way taught, everything had two sides. If they failed to save The Outpost, would he blame her? There was also another matter to consider. Was he making this offer because he believed in the place his father had built from scratch, or did he just feel sorry for her?
“You know our profit margin is … variable. Why are you risking your capital?”
Ben didn’t answer right away. He stared out the window for several moments, then finally glanced back at her. “A lot of GIs have a hard time adapting to civilian life once they leave the service. I don’t want to be one of them. Dad made a place for himself here at The Outpost after serving his country, and I think I can, too.” He managed a quick half smile. “Does that make sense to you?”
“Yes, it does.” She belonged to her tribe, and that connection gave her strength and comfort. The Outpost was Ben’s link to his father, and as that, a symbol of continuity. “It makes perfect sense.”
“So do we have a deal?” he asked her.
“We do.” Although it wasn’t a custom she favored, she reached out and shook his hand. “We’ll have Mike Broome work up a contract. And you know what one of best things about our business partnership is?”
“That you get to have a normal paycheck?”
She laughed. “I think your father would have been pleased by the arrangement.”
TWELVE
Jo woke with a start as a door slammed shut. It was still dark, and the clock said 5:30. Hearing the wind blowing hard outside and feeling a draft inside her bedroom, she sat up. She must have left a window open somewhere. Last time she’d done that, the curtains had tipped over a vase, and the water damage on her rug had been irreversible.
With a groan, she tossed back the covers and got out of bed. As her senses came to life, she picked up an odd scent. Traces of tobacco seemed to linger in the air, but she didn’t smoke.
Her heart beating faster, Jo forced herself to remain still and listen. Over the whistling of the wind she heard a car engine in the distance. The sound receded, then faded away.
She reached over to turn on the light, and the sudden brightness blinded her momentarily. Squinting, she looked around the room and saw that her closet door was open. Someone had been in her room!
As she took a step, something shiny at the foot of the bed caught her eye. It took her a heartbeat to recognize Tom’s silver money clip.
She jumped, stumbled backwards, and nearly fell, bouncing off the side of the bed. Seeing her jish within arm’s reach on the nightstand, she picked it up and clutched it tightly. Jo evened her breathing, struggling to stay calm, and said a short, carefully worded Navajo blessing. Her visitor was probably the same man who’d killed Tom, and the one who’d ordered her to return what was his. He’d promised to contact her once she was ready to give him what he wanted, but she’d been careful not to park out in front of the trading post, the signal he’d asked for. Maybe he’d lost patience. Was this his way of issuing a final warning?
At least he hadn’t harmed her—yet. She turned to get her cell phone from the nightstand, but it was gone. Her heart beating faster again, she looked for it on the bed. Last night she’d decided to keep it close, and 911 was on speed dial.
Finally she saw it on the floor, halfway down the hall. She ran over and picked it up. There was a waiting text message.
If u thnk Im mesng w/u, rmembr he wz shot n rght tmpl. Fnd wht yr ded boss hid. Yr runin out of tme
The guy was for real. None of the news reports had revealed Tom had been shot in the right temple. She saved the message, then inched down the hall toward the living room, phone in hand. The entryway closet door was open a foot, and in the living room the sofa cushions had been tossed to the floor. She glanced in the kitchen, and saw that the cabinet doors were all open as well. She’d been so tired, she hadn’t heard a thing.