He hated giving up his only weapon, but attempting hand-to-hand combat when she had a gun on Simone was the worst of a bunch of bad choices.
“Put it down, Brax.”
He squatted close to the ground, then let the flashlight slide off his fingers. It rolled a few feet in the direction opposite to where Simone stood.
“I suspected there’d be trouble when the two of you said you were taking a hike. Taking a hike, my butt. I knew you’d end up here. Somehow, some way, you’d end up here.”
Shit. He’d been so busy showing off his prowess to Mommie Dearest that he hadn’t given a thought to what he’d revealed. He’d surrendered Simone to a killer through his own idiocy.
“Della, it’s gold. Carl found gold.” Simone didn’t seem to get it. With Della standing behind the beam, maybe she hadn’t seen the gun.
“Carl found the gold months ago. Three months to be exact.”
About the time Carl starting acting funny and dribbling money out of the checking account.
Brax shuffled his feet, moving imperceptibly farther from Simone, circling round and closer to Della’s right side. Her gun hand.
“Why didn’t he tell anybody?” Simone sounded slightly bewildered but not yet afraid.
“He told me,” Della said. “I was helping him stake a legal claim.”
“Gee, that was awfully magnanimous of you.”
“Sometimes, Simone, I really wonder about you.” Della sighed, the sound shushing around the cavern like the flutter of bat wings. “You can’t be that dumb.”
Brax knew Simone wasn’t. And he got a bad feeling she was planning something.
* * * * *
Simone was stupid for having blundered into the cavern in the first place, but not so stupid she didn’t realize Della had killed Carl. Because of the gold, she’d lured him or followed him up the fantasy trail and pushed him over the edge. Della. Della did it all. Simone wanted to curl into a ball and plug her ears.
The only thing stopping her was Brax. She couldn’t shut down and leave him all alone with Della. Della would kill him, and that was worse than anything. Brax needed her help.
She tried to keep the tremble out of her voice. “Was he going to cut you in on the gold in exchange for your help?”
She’d keep up the stupid questions, hold Della’s attention, take it off Brax for as long as she could. With soft stealthy movements, he separated them so that Della couldn’t easily take them both out at once.
“I wouldn’t make him do that. I didn’t give a flying fuck about the gold,” Della snapped. “I only made him give me money for filing fees so he’d think I was actually making the claim. I’ve still got it all, didn’t use a dime.” Affront hardened Della’s voice. It was okay to be a murderer, but she didn’t want anyone to think she was a thief?
Brax had inched away another few feet. In minutes, he’d be flanking Della.
“That’s far enough, Braxton. You move once more, and I’ll blow your sweetheart’s head off.”
Brax stopped, his fists clenching, unclenching. “You shoot her, Judge, and you die.”
“May I remind you that I have the gun? I can shoot you both.”
“I’ll take you down before you even blink. And you won’t die pretty.”
Darn it, he was baiting Della. This wasn’t happening. It wasn’t real. Simone couldn’t think straight. But she would not let Della harm a hair on his head.
Her only weapon was her big mouth.
“But if you didn’t want the gold, Della, why did you kill Carl?”
“I’ll tell you why.” A silhouette filled the entrance. A tall, lanky silhouette, and there was no mistaking the smarmy voice. Jason Lafoote.
“I’m here to save the day, Simone. Your pretty little sheriff boy here failed miserably. Della, I’ve got a gun at your back, sweetheart.” Jason wasn’t holding a thing. Empty hands dangled at his sides. “You better give your own gun to the nice sheriff, Della. The jig is up.”
“You blackmailing bastard.” Della’s jaw tensed. “I didn’t kill Carl. You did.”
“Right. That’s why you’re the one holding a gun on my sweet Simone here. The perfidy of women. Now you’re not even going to admit throwing Carl to his death and parking his truck at the bottom of the trail.” He nodded at Simone. “I saw her drop the truck off, you know.”
“Shut up, Jason.” Della snarled but didn’t move.
Jason was bluffing; he didn’t even have a gun. They were all going to die the moment Della figured that out. Simone started to breathe hard, harder, faster. Oh my God. Please do not let me panic.
“Oh, Della, you can’t tell me what to do anymore. You can’t hold anything over my head. I’ve got you. I even saw you wipe all the fingerprints off the steering wheel and door handles so that no one would know you’d been there. I was on my way to tell the good sheriff all about it just as I saw you sneaking off again to follow Simone.”
Brax made a noise, a horrible choking sound as he leaned over, bracing his hands on his knees. He was having a heart attack or a stroke or something terrible. He was dying. He was...
My God, he was laughing.
“Stop it,” Della shouted, her flashlight beam sweeping over the cavern walls. “Stop laughing at me.”
Brax raised his head slightly, then went at it harder.
“Stop it.” Della shrieked this time and swung the gun at him.
Oh my God, she was going to shoot him. She was going to shoot Brax.
He moved so fast Simone almost didn’t see it in the wavering beam of Della’s flashlight. He tucked, rolled, and slammed into Della’s knees. The gun flew wide and to the left, skidding across the dirt. The flashlight flew right, smashing against the wall, then Della screamed as her tailbone slammed against the cavern floor.
Brax jammed his knee against her windpipe.
“Get her gun, Simone. Now.”
“No need, Simone. I’ve already got it.”
Brax froze. Only his eyes moved, twin sparks of light in all that gloom. “You know, Lafoote, I really didn’t think this day could get any worse.”
“You obviously think I’m going to shoot you with it.” Jason turned the gun back and forth in his hand, up, down, perusing it from every angle.
Della groaned and wriggled beneath Brax’s choke hold. He reached down, touched her neck, and she stopped struggling, her head slumping with a thud to the ground.
Vulcan death grip? It didn’t matter as long as Brax didn’t have to worry about Della and Jason at the same time.
“Give me the gun, Jason.” Simone held out her hand. He stood between them and the light of day outside the cave.
Between life and death. Della had been terrifying. Jason made Simone’s blood run cold in her veins.
“Your sheriff’s an idiot, Simone, don’t you see that? An inept fool. Della would have killed you if I hadn’t ridden up on my white charger to rescue you.”
“You’re right, Jason. You saved me. I’m eternally grateful. I swear it.”
In her peripheral vision, Brax’s muscles bunched and readied. They made a good team, she did all the talking and snagged the villain’s attention, while Brax plotted the action that would save them. All they needed was a little help from above.
“He’s a brawny caricature off some paper towel wrapper,” Jason said, a whine in his voice.
“He’s a scurvy dog not worthy of licking my boots,” she agreed.
“You’re playing with me.” Jason’s arm shot straight out, and his finger trembled on the trigger.
* * * * *
Brax felt Simone’s miscalculation in his bones. She’d gone too far.
Lafoote went on, sniping and seething over his losses. “You haven’t given me the time of day since I got here. Always lifting your nose in the air and walking away like I smell like bat guano.”
“No. Carl smelled like bat guano. You always smelled like...” Obviously, her colorful phrases deserted her.
Dammit, he was trapped dow
n on his knees on top of Della. Think, man, think. There was a way out. There had to be. He would not let anyone hurt Simone.
Brax eased one knee up until he had a boot planted on the ground. “You can have the resort, Lafoote. Now that Della’s out of the way, you’ve got it made, buddy.”
“I’ll back you,” Simone added. “I promise.”
“You’re a liar, Simone. As soon as we’re out of here, you’ll revert to type and go for Macho Man over there.”
With the other foot and his hands on his knees, Brax readied himself like a springboard even as Lafoote sighted down the barrel. Their gazes met. Brax held, moving into perfect position.
“Please, Jason. Please. I’ll do anything you want. Just don’t—”
A shrieking, screaming flurry of body and motion hurtled through the air and slammed into Jason Lafoote’s right side. “Youkilledhimyoukilledhimyoukilledhim.” Jason and the screaming creature tumbled over and over several feet across the cavern.
Dammit, that was his sister in there. Apparently even his mother hadn’t been able to contain her. Brax threw himself into the middle of the pile for the freaking gun before it went off and killed her.
A foot narrowly missed his groin. An elbow slammed into the side of his head. He groped, twisted, squeezed, wrenched, and finally found cold hard metal. Thrusting his arm aloft, he held it in the air, then rolled right and out from beneath the writhing mass of his sister and Lafoote.
Jumping to his feet, he balanced into a crouch. The gun wasn’t going to do a damn bit of good with his sister on top of the pile. “Maggie, I’ve got him. You can stop kicking him now.”
Maggie screamed, a wrenching cry that tore at him almost as much as the sight of a gun pointed at Simone.
“Youkilledhimyoukilledhim.” Maggie kept on kicking.
Until suddenly she was hauled off her feet by a shadow and clamped around the waist by a pair of strong arms.
“Maggie, honey,” Sheriff Teesdale said so softly Brax almost couldn’t hear over the dull throb of his pulse in his ear. “Let me and your brother take care of the whiny little bastard.”
* * * * *
Simone died a little with every word of Della’s confession. They’d been listening to the story for what seemed like hours. She wished the sheriff hadn’t allowed her to stay. The only interrogation room had been lost to storage boxes years ago, and Sheriff Teesdale had no choice but to conduct the interview in the courtroom. Della’s courtroom. As if she were already on trial.
She was. A trial put on by people she’d called friends. People who had loved her and trusted her. People who believed she loved them just as much.
Simone whimpered softly. Brax touched her hand, but she couldn’t bear it. He’d almost died because she’d walked into the cave as if she hadn’t a care in the world. With that gun quaking in Jason Lafoote’s hand, Brax’s life had passed before her eyes. She couldn’t say if the horrible man intended to kill Brax or if he’d been talking, talking, talking. God. She would never forget those awful moments.
Shaking off Brax’s touch, she stuck her hands between her knees.
“I didn’t mean to kill him,” Della droned on for at least the fifteenth time. “Well, I did mean to, but I didn’t want to. If only he hadn’t insisted on telling everyone about the gold. I couldn’t let him do that.”
Della didn’t mean to, but she had. When Carl stopped on the path near the phallic rock, staring at it as if his mind were a million miles away, Della had whacked him twice with the end of her flashlight. Simone shuddered, wanting to bury her face in her hands. She knew it in her heart of hearts that Carl had stopped to savor the fantasy. The one she’d written. Della seized the opportunity. After making sure he was dead, she’d pushed him over the edge, watching him tumble to the bottom. How long had it taken? How long had Della stood there, her heart in her throat, hoping and praying his body took the full plunge?
Afterward she’d returned to town to sit beside Maggie at the tea party. In that awful cave, Simone hadn’t thought about that. Now, she could think of nothing else. Della had actually sat beside her victim’s wife and repeated over and over how Maggie would be better off without Carl. Somehow that was Della’s worst crime. How she’d tried to justify herself by claiming Maggie was better off. She’d even brought Simone into the fray, going on over strawberry daiquiris about all the reasons she believed Carl was having an affair. All lies. Cosmo, for God’s sake.
She’d betrayed Maggie. She’d betrayed them all.
Simone simply wanted to get away before she threw up.
* * * * *
“Well, that was the cluster fuck of the century,” Teesdale drawled. “S’cuse the language, Simone.”
Simone nodded and gave the sheriff a halfhearted smile. Once Della was in a cell and they were in Teesdale’s office, she’d answered questions when she was asked, elaborated as necessary, but she’d closed in on herself.
Brax wanted to touch her, offer what little physical comfort he could, but she’d withdrawn from him behind halfhearted smiles.
He couldn’t blame her. She’d gone through more life-threatening drama in half an hour than most people saw in a lifetime. Her trusted friend held her at gunpoint. Then everything had gone to hell in a handbasket back at the sheriff’s department.
Della had started blubbering the minute Teesdale seated her at the defense table in the courtroom. Simone had slipped further into her own thoughts, her own darkness, as Della spilled her guts with all of them as witnesses. It wasn’t a regulation interview, but then Goldstone wasn’t a town that lived and breathed by the book. It was as unique as Teesdale, as complicated as Della Montrose’s reasons for killing Carl, as soft in the underbelly as Simone.
The town would never be the same after the blow Della dealt it. Simone herself might never recover. And what of his sister? After the fray in the cave, he’d returned Maggie once again to his mom’s care. He still had to tell Maggie the villain in her husband’s case was her best friend, not a skanky hotel mogul. Hell, after the number of meetings Carl had with Della over the gold, it was probably her perfume Maggie had smelled on him. The floozy turned out to be a murderer.
Maggie’s world had gone to shit. And looking at Simone, so had hers.
“I’ll take you home.” Brax reached for her. She didn’t so much withdraw as simply let her own hand lie unmoving in his.
“I can walk,” she said.
“It’s not...” He stopped. He’d been about to say it wasn’t safe. Della had stolen that. Simone’s bleak gaze spoke eloquently of the loss of her haven.
He could have lost her in the cave. Now he’d surely lost her to the havoc Della had wreaked. He didn’t have words to comfort her. He didn’t have arms big enough to ease her ache. He’d prayed for the wisdom to help. He didn’t suddenly find enlightenment now, any more than he’d found it for Maggie. He didn’t know how to make everything better.
“You’re tired. I’ll drive you.” There was still Jason to think of. She wasn’t safe, even with the man behind bars for now.
“No. I’ll walk.” She didn’t look at him as she rose from Teesdale’s office chair.
He was about to insist. Teesdale interrupted. “We’re done here for now, Simone. You can go. Walking in the fresh air, alone, will do you good. And you’ll be perfectly safe.” He looked pointedly at Brax as he spoke.
Alone. Brax feared that if he let her go, he’d never find her again in the emotional wasteland that lay between them. But he would never learn the right words. He would never know the right thing to do.
So he let her go. Her dazzle smile would forever live in his memory. As would his abject failure to provide whatever the hell it was she really needed.
“Sit.” Teesdale pointed.
Brax eased back into the chair.
“Let’s review.”
Review his life, his failures, his errors in judgment.
“You’re laying it on a bit thick.”
“What?” Brax hadn’t
said those things aloud.
“Give her time. Women need time. Then they come to their own conclusion even if it’s the same one you told them over and over. Women are like that. They gotta think it’s their own or it doesn’t work.”
Brax remembered saying virtually the same thing to Carl just a few short days ago.
“Thanks for the advice. Now let’s talk about Della.” Though Brax had already heard as much as he could stomach.
“The funny thing is, Della didn’t need to be a lawyer to be the judge,” Teesdale said.
Della had confessed to killing Carl over the gold strike for the same reason she’d fought the resort. Whether they came to town for the gold or the resort, more people meant more scrutiny. She was afraid her lies would come to light. But Teesdale’s comment was still a mystery. “Come again?”
“In this county, the so-called judge is a justice of the peace and doesn’t need to be a lawyer,” the sheriff explained.
“Nobody would have cared that she’d been a showgirl and never graduated with a law degree from Harvard?” While most of Goldstone’s residents appeared to be less than they were, Della was the only one who claimed to be more.
“Nope. And being mayor is only about residency.”
“She killed Carl for nothing?” Brax suddenly felt tired and old.
“Yeah. Ironic, isn’t it? She was afraid the media circus over a gold strike would eventually reveal she’d lied about her background. But she didn’t have to lie in the first place. Last judge was some guy drove in on a Harley, the way I heard it. Before my time.”
Jesus Christ. It almost didn’t bear thinking about. “How are you going to charge Lafoote?”
“Well, now, that’s a sticky issue. The blackmail thing doesn’t work.”
According to Della, Lafoote had blackmailed her into signing his licenses and permits after he saw her drive Carl’s truck to the trailhead, then wipe it clean and throw away the keys. Together, they’d come up with the story that she’d reverse her opinion in order to provide a memorial statue for Carl. Lafoote, of course, denied the blackmail.
Fool's Gold (A sexy funny mystery/romance, Cottonmouth Book 2) Page 28