Thrilled To Death

by Jennifer Apodaca

  Bo spotted me, and before I could catch my breath he folded me into his strong arms. “We’ll find him, darlin’.”

  I nodded against his T-shirt. Then stiffened my back and looked up. “Thanks, Bo. How did you know?”

  He let go of me. “Lola called and asked me to help.”

  Lola stood between Blaine and Cal with a large tablet of yellow paper and a pen. It looked like she was matching up teams and writing down cell phone numbers. She looked much more like a resourceful friend in a crisis than a useless sexy siren, as Blaine had accused her of being.

  Another large car crawled down the street, then stopped. Four old people inched out. Hank, one of Grandpa’s coffee and gossip friends, shuffled over. “We’re here to help find Barney.”

  Tears filled my eyes. Did Grandpa know how much he was loved? “Thank you, Hank.” I went up and put my hand on his arm. I felt a tremor, either age or anger at his friend being kidnapped. Lola walked up. “Sam, get going. I’ll get these folks set up to help us.”

  I hugged her and walked a couple feet to Gabe.

  Gabe swept his gaze down my length. “There’s a first aid kit in my truck. Let’s go.”

  I didn’t argue. I went around to the passenger side. Cal was there. He opened the door, then looked down at me. “I’m heading out too. Lola will stay here and coordinate to keep up with Detective Vance. Then she’ll go to Gabe’s house and work from there.”

  I nodded.

  He touched my hand. “Hey, Gabe’ll find him. Your job is to make sure Gabe doesn’t kill Fletch unless necessary.”

  “Shut up, Cal. Get in, Sam.” Gabe was already in the driver’s seat.

  I climbed into the passenger seat.

  Cal leaned in. “Gabe.”

  Gabe had the engine going, but he left the truck in park and turned his full attention on his brother.

  Cal said, “Once you get Barney back, we’ll talk. I’m going to need your help.”

  My heart skipped a beat. Something powerful passed between Cal and Gabe. I could literally feel the emotion, or connection, that made them brothers. Even with all the anxiety and urgency, the air hung still in the truck for a few seconds.

  Then Gabe said, “You got it, Cal.”

  Cal stepped back and shut the door, and Gabe put the truck in gear and took off. “The first aid kit is under the seat. Your stomach is bleeding.”

  I reached down and pulled out my purse that I had set down there before we went into the house. Then I felt around and came out with a plastic first aid kit. “Where are we going?”

  “Your house first. Just in case Fletch goes there.”

  I tore open a couple antiseptic wipes, then pulled up my shirt. Ugh. Scraped and ugly, but not serious. “Then?” I dabbed at the blood and sucked in a breath at the sting.

  “We’re going to look everywhere we can think of. Lola has people spread out all over the city.”

  I put the first aid kit away and looked at Gabe’s profile. “But?”

  “Fletch doesn’t seem stupid or ready to get into a chase with the police. I think that whole scenario at Rosy’s house was just about delaying us and the police long enough to get to a safe place.”

  I thought about that. “If he had wanted to make sure we died, he would have shot us.” That did make sense. “So he had some place ready close by.” My thoughts tripped over themselves trying to figure it out.

  Gabe nodded.

  “Maybe an abandoned house like he killed the hit man in? I asked Vance about that. He said he wouldn’t go back to the same one.” Something else Vance said surfaced. “He said that the motel room was clean and looked like a cover, that Fletch had his guns and other stuff somewhere else.”

  “Makes sense.”

  Dread slammed into me. “Are we going to find him?”

  Gabe turned into the dirt lot in front of my house. Dust kicked up around us as he drove up to the porch, then parked. I heard Ali frantically barking in the backyard. Gabe barely stopped the truck before he opened the door and jumped out. He came around to my side and opened the door, then gently pulled me out of the truck. He looked down at me. “If it’s possible, we are going to find him.”

  His hands were hard and secure on my waist. I could smell the smoke and sweat on both of us. “Fletch thinks I let Grandpa down by not becoming a magician.”

  “That’s bullshit and you know it. You love him. You love him so much you are afraid I’m going to make you choose between him and me.”

  “You knew that?”

  “I know you. And I’d never ask you to leave Barney alone, Sam. If our living arrangements ever change, Barney will come too. We’ll always have a place for him. But right now, we are going to go out there and find him. So take a deep breath and hold it together, babe. We can do this.”

  Something vicious eased in my chest. “Okay, let’s do it.”

  He leaned forward, just brushing his mouth over mine. Then he turned, pulled his gun out of the back of his pants, and headed for the front door.

  Ali’s bark turned to pitiful frustration. I felt for her, but I stayed behind Gabe as we went into the house. I knew no one was there as soon as we reached the living room.

  The house felt empty.

  But Gabe did his cop thing, quickly working his way through the house while I went to the sliding glass door and let Ali in. She came right to me, licking my hand and whining.

  She knew something was wrong.

  I dropped to my knees and hugged her. “I won’t leave you here alone. You’ll come with us.” I stood, and Ali ran off to check in with Gabe.

  I went to Grandpa’s computer and rifled through his notes and printouts. There was the list of magicians whom Shane had victimized with his spoiler shows, along with notes on the financial searches that Grandpa did.

  Nothing indicated some kind of hideaway.

  “Come on, think,” I told myself.

  “Nothing there?” Gabe asked, coming up behind me with Ali.

  I shook my head and said, “Empty buildings, that’s where he’d go, right? Maybe a place he has a car stashed?”

  “Yes.” Gabe stood next to me, looking through the same papers I’d just rifled through.

  But I had an idea. “Then we have to call my mom.”

  Gabe put the papers down. “Would she know what houses and businesses are abandoned?”

  My heart kicked up. “She’s the real estate queen. I’d bet she keeps lists of those to get the owners to sell. My mom is relentless in business.” I pulled out my cell phone and dialed my mom’s cell. I wasn’t sure where she was, but I knew she had the boys with her.

  She answered, “Samantha, any news?”

  “Mom, where are you?” I realized that of all the people Blaine and Lola had called, no one had called my mom. She didn’t know that Fletch had kidnapped Grandpa.

  “At home. TJ and Joel are bickering over what to have for dinner.”

  My stomach lurched. TJ and Joel—they loved Grandpa. As did Mom. But at least they were safe in Temecula. I prefaced telling her the situation with, “Mom, listen but don’t tell the boys, okay?” I launched into the fastest explanation I could manage.

  “That weasel—” She cut herself off, probably remembering the boys. “I see,” she replied in her clipped business voice. “What do you need?”

  I was grateful to her for sparing TJ and Joel from finding out. If we were damn lucky, I’d tell the boys after we had Grandpa back safe with us. Then it would just be a cool story, not a terrifying ordeal. “I need a list of abandoned or foreclosed and empty properties where Fletch could be lying low until he can get Grandpa out of town.”

  “No problem.”

  I looked at Gabe and nodded.

  “Damn,” he said softly in a complimentary voice, then said, “Let’s start with the properties closest to Rosy’s, then fan out.”

  I relayed that to my mom.

  “I’m starting with a five-mile radius. It’ll take a minute to sort the program.”

/>   “You can do that?”

  “Get your real estate license, Samantha. Then you will be able to—here we go. Turn on Grandpa’s printer. I’m going to fax this.”

  I reached over and hit the power button.

  “Thanks, Mom.”

  “Samantha, keep checking in with me.”

  “I will. I’m with Gabe. You can call his cell if you can’t get through on mine.” I gave her the number.

  “Find him.” She hung up.

  I started to shake my head at my mom, but the printer began spitting out the fax.

  Gabe grabbed the first sheet and studied it. Then he looked at me. “Your mom is scary, you know that, right?”

  “Hey, I’ve met your mom. She carries a gun and smacks you with a large spoon.” Good God, I was defending my mother.

  He reached for the second sheet and handed me the first. “What do you think?”

  I looked over the list. “The houses off Machado are very close to Rosy’s, but they are in a tightly packed neighborhood. Too easy to be spotted.” I looked down the list. “Up here by our house, in the old Woodhaven tract, is possible.”

  I took the second sheet of the houses that were a little farther away from Rosy’s house. I tried to picture Fletch thinking this out. Fletch had a plan all along. Kill Shane, and if no one ever knew, then he would go on as Grandpa’s star protégé. But his backup plan was to grab Grandpa and hide. So he must have scouted out at least two abandoned houses—one house to give the hit man the deadly dose of sleeping pills and alcohol and the other to hide in. The hit man was found up in Elsinore Hills, quiet, rural properties spaced out a little bit more. Several abandoned homes. “Elsinore Hills.” I looked at Gabe.

  He nodded. “Let’s go, we’ll start there.”

  I followed him to the door.

  Ali beat us there and looked at me with her liquid brown eyes.

  I looked up at Gabe. “She knows something is wrong. She’s coming with us.”

  Gabe opened the door, and Ali raced for his truck. She settled between us, and we pulled out. I looked over the list.

  “Should I call Lola and have her send teams to start canvassing these other abandoned or foreclosed spots?”

  “Have her send Blaine and Cal. They both are armed, and they both can handle a bad situation. But Barney’s friends could get hurt.” Gabe turned the truck left out onto Grand and raced up to Lake Street. I called Lola and gave her the information.

  She listened carefully, then answered, “I’ll call Cal and Blaine. We’ve had two sightings, but neither panned out.”

  “Thank you, Lola. I don’t know what we’d do without you.”

  “Anything to help, Sam.” She hung up.

  I set the phone down on the seat under my leg and petted Ali as she rested her head in my lap. We were on Lake Street, and Gabe made a left onto Gunnerson. I had lived in Lake Elsinore all my life, so I knew these hills that overlooked the valley and the lake pretty well. I directed him through the streets, some paved, some still dirt. The homes up there varied in age—some decades old, some completely remodeled, and a few newer ones. There used to be an old country club up there that had been condemned for decades but it burned down, which still made me sad. It was such a telling piece of Lake Elsinore’s history, a grand attempt to turn Elsinore into a resort town back around the 1920s, before the Depression hit.

  “There,” I pointed to a dirt road. “Turn left.”

  Gabe wove through the back roads, easily maneuvering the truck over the uneven hills and road. We came to a stop at the first abandoned house. The driver’s side door faced its driveway. It was a one story crumbling Spanish-style house surrounded by a crumbling wrought iron gate. Chunks of the roof tile littered the grounds. The sides had been tagged by punks with spray paint. I reached for the door handle, but Gabe caught my arm.

  I looked over at him. His eyes were cold and fixed, his mouth tight. I could feel the anger rushing beneath his firm hand. “What?”

  “Ali and I are going in first.”

  “I’m going with you.”

  “You are staying outside with the cell phone.”

  I opened my mouth to argue, but then I remembered the disaster I’d caused at Rosy’s. Gabe might have managed the situation if I hadn’t gotten Fletch’s attention. Guilt twisted my insides. At least if I stayed out here, I could get help. I nodded but I couldn’t say anything.

  “If there’s trouble, I’ll send Ali out to you. Call for help and drive away. Got it?”

  My guts twisted tighter, and I forced out the words pounding in my brain. “I won’t leave you.”

  His face hardened. “Yes, you will. For TJ and Joel, you damn sure will leave. You’ll get help, and you’ll stay safe.”

  Stubbornness wasn’t going to get the job done. “I’ll do what I have to.”

  Gabe put his hand on my face. “I never doubted it. We’ll be back in a couple minutes.” He dropped his hand and said, “Come on, Ali.”

  She barked once, apparently thinking that Gabe had a terrific idea. Gabe left the engine idling and the driver’s side door open as he got out of the truck. Ali jumped lightly to the ground next to him. He pulled out his gun in his right hand, and Ali positioned herself at his left thigh. The two of them disappeared through the broken wrought iron fence to check around the back of the house.

  I sat there for three or four minutes, my muscles clenched into knots as I strained to hear any sound and stared through the opened driver’s side door.

  Then Ali and Gabe walked out through the gate. He met my gaze and shook his head.

  My muscles sagged in disappointment, even though I was relieved that Gabe and Ali were okay.

  Ali jumped in first and settled close to me. I put my hand on her neck as Gabe got in and shut the door. “Next house,” he said.

  I still had the paper in my hand. I looked down and directed him to a two-story house. There were some wood stairs that led from the driveway up to the front door. The house sat on a hill covered in brown weeds and littered with debris. There was a dirt area left of the garage that looked like it had RV access, but I didn’t see a vehicle back there. The front window and the windows of the rooms over the garage were broken. The paint might have once been blue, but now it was a dusty, peeling gray.

  The house looked like it had been abandoned for years.

  Gabe stopped the truck on the street. We were risking being seen if Fletch and Grandpa were in there, but time was a problem. There just wasn’t enough time to sneak up on every house. If Fletch was holed up in a house, he probably had a car ready to escape.

  “Call Lola and see if anyone has called anything in.”

  I nodded.

  “Let’s do it again, Ali,” Gabe said. He left the truck idling for a fast escape, and he opened the door and got out.

  Ali stepped to the seat’s edge to jump out and froze. She sniffed, her long German shepherd nose twitching as she checked out the air. Then she jumped to the ground and ran up to the warped garage door and sniffed again.

  She lifted her head and barked, using her right paw to scratch at the garage door. In seconds she grew increasingly agitated and determined.

  My heart ramped up to high-speed pounding. Had we found Grandpa and Fletch?

  20

  I stared at Ali struggling to get through the garage door of the abandoned house. Was Grandpa in there?

  “Ali, come,” Gabe said.

  She stopped barking and whining and looked back at Gabe with uncertainty confusing her beautiful fur face.

  I leaned across the truck toward the opened driver’s side door. “Ali,” I said softly, knowing full well she could hear my voice. “Come here.” We didn’t want Fletch to hear us if they were in there.

  She paused for one more long second, then turned and ran back to us. She sat down by the opened door of the truck and whined softly.

  Gabe had his gun out. “Keep her here with you.”

  Every cell in my body urged me out of that truck
and into the house to find Grandpa. I didn’t know what to do. “Wait, Gabe.” I had the phone in my hand. What was Cal’s phone number? “Let me call your brother, or Vance or Blaine!” Panic, the need to move, to do something, had my breathing in overdrive. But I didn’t want Gabe hurt or killed either.

  “Let me check it out.” He walked toward the house.

  I scooted over to the driver’s side and watched him. He moved up to the garage, then stayed close to the wall until he got to the stairs. He stood there for a few seconds, looked up the straight flight of stairs, then moved up. He went carefully, one step at a time, keeping to the shadows of the wall with his gun held down in both hands.

  Then he disappeared from sight.

  I put my hand on Ali’s head. She shivered, with her muscles tense and ready to pounce. I knew exactly how she felt.

  A few minutes later Gabe came back down the stairs. His face was grim, set hard with his mouth thin. There was a pumping anger in his walk.

  My heart stopped. I couldn’t breathe. Pain bloomed in my chest, and all I could do was stare at Gabe. He wore a careful mask on his face, but I could read the anger.

  Oh God.

  Helpless, I wanted to run, to escape what he was going to tell me.

  But I couldn’t run. Couldn’t breathe.

  He stopped next to where Ali sat.

  “What?” The word hurt all the way up my throat.

  “They were here. Rosy’s car is in the garage. Fletch used this house to make the bombs he set off at Rosy’s, the vest he forced on Barney. . . .”

  I couldn’t stand it. “Is Grandpa in there?”

  His face shifted. “No. Sam, no. Barney’s still alive. There was no sign of his being hurt. All they did was come here to switch to another car.”

  “They’re gone?” It was a better option than Grandpa being dead, but my mind was trying to catch up. I began to realize Gabe was pissed because we were too late, not because Grandpa was dead.

  I asked, “What now?”

  “We call Vance.” He reached for the phone in my hand.

  I let him have it.

  He made the call. I’m not sure how he got patched through, but he talked to Vance. He described finding gunpowder, wires, and caps . . . things I didn’t understand. No guns, he said. No sign of blood and no sign of any struggle.