by Maddie Day
A text came in from Danna. I checked it as the guys searched for the flashlight.
What’s happening? she’d written.
“There,” Abe said, pointing to a small blue cylinder. He picked it up and pressed the end. For such a tiny device, it had a superstrong light.
“Let’s go,” Lonnie murmured. “I’ll lead. One of you bring up the rear.”
Abe pointed to his chest. I nodded and pocketed my phone again. I didn’t have time to answer Danna. I was glad my complete attention was on the path, because in a few yards it did widen into a clearing. As Lonnie ran his light along the perimeter on the left and Abe on the right, I let out an involuntary yelp. Abe’s light had caught the shine on Roberto’s distinctly Italian leather shoes.
Let Babbo be alive. Please let him be alive.
Chapter Forty-six
I rushed to my father where he sat with his back to a tree on the periphery of the clearing. Facing the woods, his legs were extended, his hands behind his back. His head didn’t loll, though. He held it erect and his dark eyebrows went way up when he saw me. A piece of gray duct tape covered his mouth. A matching piece bound his ankles together.
He made sounds in his throat like he was trying to talk. It was like listening underwater—I couldn’t understand what he was saying. It sounded desperate. Who had done this to him? Were they still around? Watching? Hair stood up on my arms and the nape of my neck.
I knelt in front of him. “I’m going to take the tape off,” I whispered with a shaking voice. “It’ll hurt.” I licked my suddenly dry lips.
He nodded. My hands were sweating as I tried to peel back a corner to get a grip on it. Abe made it to my side and stood behind me, shining his light down on my task. Babbo’s eyes widened to saucers and he shook his head so hard I lost my hold on the tape. He croaked out a rising and falling sound of urgency, his gaze focused on Abe.
A rustle sounded from the woods and I glanced up. Chase Broward loomed behind Abe. Where had he come from?
“Watch out!” I cried, but I was too late.
He looped a wire around Abe’s neck. Chase’s hands pulled it tighter. Abe’s eyes bugged out. The pool of light hit his foot but he didn’t drop the flash. He clutched at Chase’s forearm with his other hand, trying to pull it away.
Over Abe’s shoulder Chase glared at me with a burning fury. “Damn snoop. You ruined everything. I was all set. Pia was out of the way. I could focus on my campaign. Until you started poking around, that is. I know you were asking questions. I know you were in my room.”
The card. He’d noticed I’d never put the card back in his door.
Chase tugged on the wire. Abe made a gurgling sound.
“Lonnie!” I yelled.
Abe swung the little light up and over his shoulder into Chase’s eye. Chase screamed. Lonnie appeared behind him. He grabbed Chase by both arms, yanked him away from Abe, and then wrestled him to the ground.
Abe fell to his knees, the wire still around his neck. His eyes implored me. In one movement I scooted next to him. Behind his head the ends of the wire were fastened to two short sticks of wood Chase had twisted the wire with. I unwound as fast as I could. The wire fell away from Abe’s throat onto the ground. He brought one hand to his neck.
“Did it cut you?” I asked, the words rushing out.
He brought his hand away and rubbed bloody fingers against his palm. “A little,” he croaked. “Stings. Not too bad.” He poked his hand into each of his back pockets.
“If you’re looking for your handkerchief, it’s on a bush back at the start of the path. We saw it there. But here.” I extended the clean white hanky I often stuck in my own pocket. “Let’s put this on the cut and then I’ll use my scarf to hold it on.” I unwound my jewel-colored turquoise silk scarf.
Abe nodded. I stretched the hanky out on the diagonal and laid it on the thin red line. I drew the scarf over the handkerchief and around his neck as gently as I could, tucking the ends into his shirt. He had given me the scarf a few months ago. I couldn’t think of a better use of it.
“Robbie, see if the duct tape is still around,” Lonnie called. Chase lay struggling facedown. Lonnie had one knee on his back and our attacker’s hands secured in both of his. “My light is behind you.”
I found his light lying a couple yards away. I switched it to white and scanned the area around Roberto. I took a moment to tell my father, “Just a minute, okay? I’ll get the tape off you.”
He tilted his head to the left a couple times.
“The tape is over there?” I asked.
“I can see it.” Abe pointed.
I stepped over my father’s legs and found the roll of wide gray tape. I gingerly extended it to Lonnie, being careful to stay clear of Chase’s kicking legs, although he didn’t have a chance with Lonnie’s bulk on top of him.
Finally, I got back to my father and knelt once again. “Ready?”
He nodded, and I peeled back the tape.
He winced, but “Thank you, daughter,” were his first words.
I struggled to keep my overflowing emotions from doing exactly that. My father easily could have been lying here garroted and dying instead of being tied up and muzzled.
“My hands, also.” He leaned forward so I could see his bound wrists.
Between the darkness and my awkward position, I had trouble finding the edge of the tape. Abe, his multi-tool knife out and ready, gently shouldered me aside.
“Let me.” He carefully slit the tape around Roberto’s wrists and did the same to his ankles. Meanwhile, Lonnie had accomplished the reverse with Chase, securing his hands behind his back and taping his ankles together.
Lonnie stood, dusting off his hands. He took two steps and squatted in front of Roberto. “You all right, sir?”
“I am, thanks to my rescuers.”
“O’Neill?” Lonnie checked with Abe.
“I’ll be fine. It’s a surface wound. Nothing that won’t heal.”
“Good,” Lonnie said. “Now, I need to turn this clown over to the county authorities, and I can’t leave him here unattended.” He took out his walkie-talkie and turned it up. “Dinnsen here. Please acknowledge.” But all he got back was static. He looked at the three of us clustered on the ground. “I’m out of range.”
I pulled out my phone. “You can use my cell.”
“Perfect.”
I stood. “I have Detective Henderson’s number. Do you want it?” I swiped it to the home screen and handed it to Lonnie.
“I need to call park headquarters first.” He thumbed in the number with agility despite how thick his fingers were.
Abe stood, too, and extended a hand to Roberto, helping him up. We moved into the clearing. I wanted to get as far away from Chase as I could. As Lonnie turned his back slightly to speak, a nearly full moon peeked over the tops of the trees and lit up the clearing. I half expected fairies to appear and dance in the silver-splashed circle to celebrate our escape from danger.
Chapter Forty-seven
Within what seemed like minutes two all-terrain vehicles bumped toward us, lights on high. The drivers of the ATVs screeching to a halt in the clearing were park employees, wearing shirts similar to Lonnie’s. A sheriff’s sport utility vehicle followed, scraping branches on both sides as it barely made it along the path. Wanda and Detective Henderson climbed out of the SUV after it stopped.
Lonnie stepped forward. “Broward’s over there”—he pointed with his thumb—“and not all that happy with the situation. Fair warning.”
I had filled Lonnie in on who Chase was while we’d waited. I’d also texted Danna to say we were all together and safe, and to tell Maria we’d see her soon. I wanted to tell her Isaac was off the hook for Pia’s murder, but decided to save it for later.
Henderson stepped forward and shook Lonnie’s hand. “Nice work, Mr. Dinnsen.”
“It was a group effort, believe me, ma’am.”
“Ms. Jordan, you folks all right?” Henderson asked.
�
��Abe needs to be looked at,” I said.
Abe nodded, gingerly patting his throat. “Wire cut needs cleaning,” he croaked, his voice not back to normal. “And Broward managed to crack me on the head, too. None of it is urgent.”
“Mr. Fracasso?” she asked, gazing at my father.
“No problems, thank you,” he answered.
The detective and Wanda headed for Chase. Lonnie followed.
A woman on one of the ATVs spoke up. “We can give y’all a ride back to the park. But we can each take only one.”
“Abe, you should go,” I said.
“No, I’m staying with you and Roberto.”
“Babbo, you take a ride,” I urged. “We’ll meet you back there.”
“No. I stay, also.”
“If I don’t have any takers, the least I can do is go slow in front of you all to light the way,” the park employee said.
“Sounds good,” I said. “Thanks.”
Henderson and Wanda emerged from the woods with Chase hobbling between them, duct tape straining between his ankles. Venomous words spewed from his mouth when he saw me.
“Now, now, Broward. Let’s be polite,” Wanda scolded. She opened the back door of the SUV and ushered him in, protecting his head from the top of the doorway. A Plexiglas window divided front seat from back, and a wire mesh sectioned off the rear from the molded plastic backseat. Wanda thudded the door shut, turning back to the rest of us.
“I have questions for the four of you, as you might imagine,” Henderson began. “Mr. Dinnsen, is there an office back at the park I can use?”
“Sure.” He explained where it was, and the female ATV driver said she would lead the detective there.
“We’re going to walk back,” I said. “We have to get Maria. We’ll be there as soon as we can.”
“Where is Ms. Fracasso?” Henderson asked.
“Sitting with Danna Beedle and possibly Corrine in the main stage audience.”
“I can take and bring her,” Wanda offered.
“Thanks, but I think she’d be too nervous around a uniform.”
Roberto nodded his agreement with my assessment.
“We won’t be long,” Abe said.
We stood back while Wanda turned the vehicle around. One of the ATVs led the way in front of the SUV, and the other set out slowly ahead of us four. The moonlight helped light our path, too.
“Roberto, how did you end up in the woods with Chase?” I asked.
“I was stupid. Mr. Broward came up to me after I leave the restroom. He say you, Robbie, are in trouble in the trees. I go with him, of course. But then he attacks me. He puts the tape on my mouth and my hands and makes me keep walking. Then he makes me sit and binds my feet, too.”
“I wonder if he was trying to lure you, Robbie,” Abe said.
“He must have been,” I said. “But he lured you first.”
“I’m afraid so. I never even saw him, and I don’t know what he conked me out with. Dumb.”
“I’d say courageous, myself,” Lonnie offered.
“I sure am glad Robbie brought you along, man,” Abe said. “We’d be toast otherwise.”
I was glad, too. Because Queen Dumb would have been me heading into dark woods alone.
We walked without speaking for a few minutes. “You know, Chase only mentioned Pia,” I said. “I bet that means someone else killed Sue.”
“I imagine so.” Abe tucked my arm through his and squeezed me close as an owl hoo-hooted in the distance.
Beth? Glen? Surely not Isaac. All I knew was that we’d had a close enough brush with death tonight to last a lifetime and a half.
Chapter Forty-eight
Twenty minutes later we sat in a comfortingly well-lit employee lunchroom, crowded around a rectangular table in the small space. Detective Henderson faced us, digital tablet at the ready. Beyond her on a counter sat a microwave, a big coffeepot, and a napkin dispenser. A fridge hummed at the end of the counter, and the air smelled like someone had burned popcorn not too long ago. Abe sat next to me, then Roberto and Maria, holding hands. Lonnie stood at the back.
Roberto retold his account of how he came to be taped up in the woods.
“What was it Mr. Broward told you to convince you to go with him?” Henderson asked. “What were his exact words?”
I cocked my head at Henderson. My father had just told her. Did she not believe him?
“He said my daughter is in the woods in some trouble. He made me believe she is there. So I go. Do you have a daughter, Detective?” He spread his hands.
“Actually, I do, sir.” She smiled, but it was a pinched smile. It sounded like she had some kind of problem with her daughter or was estranged from her.
“So you understand,” Roberto continued. “Of course I go. Then he grab my hands, forces tape onto them. He tapes my mouth. We walk more. He makes me sit and tapes my feet. There is no daughter. He lied.”
“Did he then stay there with you?” she asked
“No. He go away, then come back holding a big stick.”
“What he hit me with, no doubt,” Abe said. “I guess I was lucky he didn’t tape me up, too.”
Henderson looked at Lonnie. “Why did you enter the woods with Ms. Jordan? And did you note the time?”
“She asked me for help. I thought it was wise of her not to venture down the path alone.” He glanced at me. “Had Broward tried to get you alone before?”
I thought back. “He didn’t really get a chance. I haven’t been alone that much this week. Although there were those sounds I heard in the night last night.”
The detective nodded.
“What sounds were those?” Abe asked, his voice still hoarse.
“A metal-scratching-metal kind of sound. I sometimes wear earplugs to sleep, but I didn’t last night. And I found marks on the lock plate on my back door this morning after I remembered the sounds.”
“It probably won’t surprise you that we weren’t able to find any traceable evidence on your door, Ms. Jordan,” Henderson said.
“So I guess he got desperate at shutting me up directly, and figured he could lure me into trouble by using my father and my boyfriend as bait,” I said.
Lonnie nodded. “She seemed very worried for her Italian father. At the entrance of the path she saw a piece of purple cloth she said was the kind of handkerchief Mr. O’Neill carries. We left it in situ.”
“Your car might have knocked it off, though,” I said, remembering what a tight fit the SUV had been for the path.
Henderson tapped into her tablet.
Lonnie went on. “As for the timing, I radioed in my plan. The security office will have the time.”
“So you and Ms. Jordan found Mr. O’Neill unconscious with a head wound. He awoke and jumped up to go farther into the woods?”
“I didn’t exactly jump up, but I self-assessed,” Abe said. “I’m a former military medic, and decided I didn’t have a concussion and my balance was fine. I thought about safety in numbers, too. So I accompanied them to look for Roberto.”
“Which of the three of you saw Mr. Fracasso first?” she asked.
“I did,” I said. “Lonnie and Abe were scanning the edges of the clearing with their flashlights, and I saw my father’s shoes.” I smiled at him. His very Italian leather shoes.
“Then what happened?”
“I was ready to take the duct tape off his mouth when he looked really alarmed at something behind me. Abe was facing us, helping with his light. When I turned to look, Chase had snuck up behind Abe and put the wire around his neck.” I shuddered, remembering the scene. “I yelled for Lonnie. Abe jabbed his light at Chase’s face. In a second Lonnie hauled Chase off Abe and forced Chase to the ground.”
Lonnie nodded slowly. “Correct.”
“Did Mr. Broward speak at all?” the detective asked.
“He was livid with me. Said I had spoiled everything for him. That I’d been spying on him. Poking into his business.”
“He sa
id he’d been all set,” Abe added. “Said Pia was out of the way, so he could focus on his campaign, except Robbie had interfered.”
“Would that be his senatorial campaign?” Henderson poised her raised fingers above the tablet.
“I believe so,” I said.
“So Mr. Dinnsen took down the attacker. Then what?”
“I unwound the wire from Abe. He cut the tape off Roberto’s wrists and ankles. Lonnie taped up Chase. And he called you on my cell because his walkie-talkie was out of range.”
Maria murmured something to Roberto. He addressed her in Italian for several minutes, and her expression grew increasingly horrified.
“May I see your wounds, please, Mr. O’Neill? I’d like photographic evidence.”
Abe unwound the scarf and gingerly peeled back the handkerchief. In the hour since he’d been attacked, the hairline cut had stopped bleeding. Maria gasped and crossed herself at the sight. Henderson took out her phone and snapped a few shots, then came around behind him and took several pictures of the back of his head.
“You probably ought to have those wounds seen to,” Henderson advised Abe.
“I will, thanks,” he assured her.
“Deputy Bird has secured the suspect at our facility in Nashville,” Henderson said.
Roberto translated. Maria nodded.
“Thank you,” Maria said to Henderson. “Thank you.”
“You should be thanking these people, not me, Ms. Fracasso. You can all rest safe now. But I’d discourage further nighttime walks in woods you are not familiar with.” The last bit she directed at me.
“So you aren’t thinking Chase also killed Sue?” I asked.
“That is our current position, yes.” The detective stood, put away her tablet, and sighed. “If you’ll excuse me, I still have a second murderer to track down.”
I followed her out into the hall. “One more thing, Detective?”
She turned. Up close I could see how tired she looked, how the skin around her eyes was strained. “Yes?”
I kept my voice soft. “I ran into Paula Berry at the festival earlier tonight. That is, she and her father had made a short appearance on the main stage. Glen said they were going to start a scholarship in Sue’s name to help a needy young musician come to the festival every year. Then he kind of broke down, and Paula asked for the public’s help in solving the crime.”