Honest Intentions (The Safeguard Series, Book Five)

by Kennedy Layne

  Brett wanted more than anything to tell Louise who Coen really was and the reason he was here, but she’d made a promise. She couldn’t risk his investigation, nor put herself in any more danger than she might possibly be in, given the circumstances. The bottom line was that it was better to keep Coen’s presence here at the house under wraps.

  “I don’t think you have anything to worry about. Chad’s first priority is your safety, so he never would have tipped Martin off that the police are about to show up on his doorstep.” There was nothing like losing a friend at the hands of another to put things into perspective. Heidi’s death had done that and more. Chad had set aside his foolish pride over a beaten down issue that he and Louise had argued about for longer than the time they’d actually been together. “Besides, the sheriff has to be on his way over there right now with an arrest warrant. It’s been hours already.”

  Brett and Louise had spent most of late afternoon talking to the police and filling them in on the secrets Louise had been privy to in regards to Heidi and Martin’s brief affair. He had no idea that anyone else knew about their argument, and he was probably even more confident when no one brought it up when the group had been questioned last weekend.

  “And don’t you think if Martin were to try something like that, he wouldn’t come after me too? We both called the sheriff.” Brett paused a moment as what she said triggered another worry that she didn’t want or need. She let the curtain fall back into place before stepping away from the window. What if the accident outside her house hadn’t been genuine? What if Martin had figured out that she and Louise had turned him into the police? “Louise, hold on for a second, would you?”

  Brett stood in the middle of her living room with the phone in her hand while she debated what to do. Coen should have been back by now. This was one of the reasons why she wanted to join him outside. There was always safety in numbers.

  “Shit,” Brett muttered in response to the front door banging open. The unexpected noise had taken her by surprise and put her on edge.

  It was obvious a gust of wind had taken over, causing Coen’s grip to slip from the wood. He quickly gained control before slamming the door behind him and flipping the deadbolt in one motion. His dark hair was damp with snow. He ran a hand over his short beard, getting rid of those flakes that hadn’t melted. He shot her a look of surprise for her expletive.

  “What?” Brett said in frustration, more because he’d scared her than his response to her cursing. “It’s not like I’m Mother Theresa or something.”

  Coen tilted his head and gave a small shrug as if he disagreed. His gaze traveled down before settling on the phone in her hand. Crap. She’d forgotten all about Louise.

  “Sorry,” Brett apologized to Louise, rushing into her next sentence so her friend didn’t inquire about who she was with. “I know that everything points toward Martin as the one who murdered Heidi, but I still have a hard time wrapping my head around it. We’ve all known him for years, Louise. I’m not making excuses, but maybe he just lost it in the heat of the moment. I just can’t bring myself to believe that he would intentionally set out to hurt any of us. Besides, the police already know what we know. It wouldn’t make sense for him to come after either one of us after the fact.”

  “What if you’re wrong?” Louise was hanging on by a thread, and there wasn’t anything Brett could say to ease her concern. “What if—”

  “Louise, it’s going to be fine. Take a moment, crack open a bottle of wine, and relax.” Brett continued to reassure Louise as Coen removed his jacket and boots after having set down the flashlight and what looked to be an envelope full of papers. They most likely came from the glove compartment of the car currently wrapped around one of her favorite trees. “Listen, I’ve got to go. Someone slid off the road and wrecked into my boxelder out front. I need to make sure they are all right.”

  “What’s going on?” Coen inquired with a frown after she was finally able to disengage from her conversation with Louise. He swiped the papers off the side table before he entered the living room. “The sheriff didn’t pick up Eyles yet?”

  “No. Martin called to talk to Chad about emergency generators a little bit ago.” Brett didn’t like all of these loose ends. A shiver passed over her, and she didn’t think it was from the cold air Coen had let in through the door. “Louise is worried that Martin will find out she told the police.”

  “I can make a call to Sheriff Whitney, if you like,” Coen offered as he came to stand in front of her. He smelled of fresh air and pine, but it was his presence that chased away the chill. “I’ll see if that arrest warrant came through, and then also have him check on a gentleman by the name of Lester Koett. I might just have my buddy back home run a check, too. There’s no phone number on this registration, or any of the other papers that I found in his glove compartment.”

  “Lester?” Brett finally had something to smile at, though concern soon settled in. “He’s one of the custodians at the school. I wonder what he was doing out in this weather running around.”

  “Me, too.” Coen was still frowning as he rattled off the address from the registration in his hand. “Isn’t that across town from here?”

  “Yes, it is.” Brett held up her phone in small victory, grateful that something was going their way. “While you’re contacting Sheriff Whitney, I have an emergency contact list in my email for everyone working at the school. I’ll try to reach Lester that way.”

  Brett sat down in her favorite overstuffed chair she used when grading papers while Coen walked into the kitchen. She wondered why he didn’t stay with her, but then figured he didn’t want the two of them to talk over one another. At least, she hoped it was that versus him not wanting her to hear his conversation with the sheriff. Was Coen still hiding something from her about Shepherd Moss or Martin?

  The ringing of her phone had her tearing her gaze away from the doorway to the kitchen. It was an unknown number, but there were times the cell service in this area had issues and couldn’t display where the call originated. They still had those kind of issues in small town America. It was most likely her mother checking in, so Brett accepted the call with a swipe.

  “Hello?”

  There was nothing but static on the other end of the line.

  “Hello? Mom? Are you there?”

  Click.

  Brett brought the phone away from her ear and stared at the lighted display with unease. Chances were it had either been her mother or her father. Well, it would definitely have been her mom first, because her dad didn’t like to use the telephone. She fumbled with her cell when it started to vibrate and ring once more before finally steadying it in her hand.

  “Hello?”

  “Sorry about that,” Louise said, her voice now coming through loud and clear. “I must have butt-dialed you.”

  “That’s good to know.” Brett breathed a silent sigh of relief, not wanting Louise to know how much on edge she really was ever since they’d contacted the police. “I found out that one of the custodians at my school was the one who slid off the road. I was just going to try and call him to see if he was all right.”

  “He didn’t stick around or knock on your door?”

  “No, which is really odd.” Brett had a vision of the older man bleeding from the head and wandering off from the site of the accident. Her life had been comfortingly mundane prior to this past week. She never would have assumed the worst. “I’ll talk to you later.”

  Brett didn’t waste any more time, wanting to make sure Lester was okay and also find out what Coen had learned from Sheriff Whitney. It took her a good minute longer than it would have had she used her laptop to find the information she needed, but she’d left it in her bedroom. She finally found a contact number for Lester, though it took four rings before the call was answered.

  “Hello?”

  “Mrs. Koett?” Brett continued after the older woman confirmed that she was, indeed, Lester’s wife. “This is Brett Lambert. I work
with your husband at the school. I’m one of the second grade teachers. Did he happen to come home this evening yet? I don’t want to worry you, but his car skidded off the road and into a tree on my property. He was gone before we realized what happened.”

  “Oh, dear!” Brett could hear Mrs. Koett yelling for her husband, which on one hand was a relief. Unfortunately, what came after wasn’t something she’d braced herself to hear. “Lester is fine. He wasn’t driving the car this evening. It was my nephew—Martin Eyles.”

  *

  He was cold.

  He slid down farther into the seat of his car, curling into himself to generate heat while he looked through the lenses of the binoculars. Visibility was becoming less and less with each passing minute, but he was still able to follow the shadow underneath the street light.

  It appeared Brettany Lambert had a guest.

  This certainly complicated things.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  ‡

  Coen washed and dried the collection of bowls and pans Brettany had used to bake with earlier. It struck him as odd that she used earthenware mixing bowls and wooden spoons rather than modern aluminum cookware. It was as if she was from an earlier era when it came to baking.

  He’d wanted something to do while trying to reach Sheriff Whitney, so he’d volunteered his services. It was much like he had done when his mother washed the dishes and he’d stood on a stool next to her, drying the heavy pots and cast iron skillets she used to cook with when he was younger.

  The sheriff wasn’t answering his calls. He was either busy with other emergencies created by the storm or serving that arrest warrant on Eyles. The first four attempts, Coen received a prerecorded message that all available lines were in use. The single, local cell tower must have been experiencing a high call volume or the multiplexer was seeing a high error rate between it and the rest of the cell network.

  Coen finally got through to the sheriff’s voicemail to leave a message.

  “Sheriff, this is Coen Flynn. I’m over at Brettany Lambert’s house. There’s been an incident here at her residence that you need to be aware of.” Coen went into detail about the vehicle, the name on the registration, and the fact that Mr. Koett had left his car abandoned with the keys in the ignition. “I’d appreciate it if you had one of your deputies check on his wellbeing. Ms. Lambert has an emergency contact number she’s going to try, but I thought you should know. A tow truck will probably need to be called after the worst of the storm has passed. The vehicle isn’t drivable and is currently sitting in Ms. Lambert’s front yard. I’d also like an update on the service of Martin Eyles’ arrest warrant, when you have a chance. You have my number.”

  Coen ended the call right when he finished stacking the last bowl in the drying rack on the counter. He turned off the faucet after rinsing the sink before facing the island. Brettany never did finish frosting those cupcakes. Had she been on the phone with Louise the entire time he’d been doing a search of the property?

  “I thought you and I had an agreement about these cupcakes.” Coen could sense Brettany’s presence as he reached for the dish towel to dry his hands. “You were supposed to—”

  “Martin was driving the car—not his uncle.”

  Coen turned to find Brettany standing in the doorway of the kitchen, holding her phone to her chest as if it were her sole lifeline. Fear was written all over her features, and there wasn’t a damn thing he could do to ease her panic at having had a suspected killer on her doorstep.

  “How do you know that for sure?” Coen asked cautiously, wanting a hard confirmation that Martin was indeed the driver of the vehicle that had crashed outside of her house. If so, that scenario didn’t make much sense. “Did you get ahold of Lester Koett?”

  “Yes, and his wife,” Brettany whispered, though she finally found her voice when she took a step forward. The way she answered set him edge. “Mrs. Koett’s nephew is Martin Eyles. He asked to borrow their car tonight. It was him in their car.”

  Coen hadn’t exactly been expecting that answer, but he took it in stride. He’d learned long ago that nothing ever went as planned. There was an old saying in preparing for a combat operation—plan once to plan again, because no operational plan no matter how detailed ever lasted past initial contact with the enemy. It was Murphy’s law that, if at all possible, an errant wrench would most likely find its way into the most critical gear to slow down or reverse any positive progression.

  He asked her a few more questions, keeping her busy while he was able to shoot off a few texts. One was to Sheriff Whitney, with the thought that the man might be reading his messages instead of being in a place where he could answer his phone. The other two were to Brody and Calvert, in that order. There wasn’t a whole hell of a lot either one could do being over two thousand miles away, but this storm would eventually lift and provide SSI the opportunity to aid the local police in hunting down an alleged murderer. Regardless, he needed to make them aware now if things went sideways later.

  “Coen, are you listening to me?” Brettany anxiously stepped forward until she was next to the island. She grabbed ahold of her oven mitts he’d set down there earlier, but not because she needed them. It was just something for her to hold onto. “We should leave. Maybe head to the police station or something. I’ve already texted Louise and told her to be careful. Martin is somewhere out there, and we should—”

  “Brettany, we’re not going anywhere.” It hadn’t taken Coen long to reach that conclusion for a multitude of reasons, the main one being the weather conditions. Getting caught out there in the storm put them at a severe disadvantage. Technically, he could take her over to his rental house, but nothing would effectively change. His presence here was already known had Martin still been somewhere in the vicinity when Coen searched the area around the house for the driver. “Because of the weather, it’s safer for us to stay here. Martin Eyles is a nobody. He has no training. He’s nothing but the scum on the bottom of your shoe. He reacted poorly in a crime of passion because he’s weak, for which he will now dearly pay. I don’t know why he borrowed his uncle’s vehicle or what he thought to gain by cruising past your house, but he crashed into your tree. He’s more than welcome to try and approach your front door. I’ll take that opportunity to make him regret starting any of this crap in the first place. I’m a highly trained, close combat specialist. He has less than zero chance of making it past me, even if he were equipped with a cannon. It won’t end well for him if he does come back, I promise.”

  Coen leaned over the counter and instinctively took her hand in his, wanting nothing more than to reassure her that everything would be okay. He realized his mistake a little too late. It was never a good idea to get too personal in a situation like this, but he didn’t let go. He chalked up his reasoning to the fact that this was a unique situation involving a killer and all.

  “It doesn’t make sense.” Brettany turned her hands over, leaving her cell phone and the oven mitt on the counter so she could tighten her grip on his fingers with both hands. Her green eyes searched his for a guarantee he couldn’t quite give. “The police already know everything about Martin’s relationship with Heidi. Why would he come here and—”

  “There’s no telling why these nut jobs do what they do when things get jumbled up in their heads.” Coen figured she had some idea of the torture Shailyn Doyle suffered at the hands of Shepherd Moss from the news, but there had been quite a bit of detailed information kept from the press. The sad thing of it was that someone like Martin didn’t even come close to a psychopath of Moss’ caliber. “Look, I’ll double check the locks on the doors and windows. We’ll get a fire going in the living room and have a little campout. I’m sure Sheriff Whitney will return my call as soon as he can, just as I’m confident that Eyles will be in custody before morning. It’s not like he can get far in this weather. He’s as trapped as we are, and probably even more so.”

  “That’s what I’m worried about,” Brettany muttered, slipping
her hands from his so she could wrap her arms around her waist. He didn’t like to see her frightened, but he had to remind himself that she didn’t live in his world. It was a place where threats from amateurs like Eyles rated less on a scale of one to ten than the neighbor’s dog did of attacking her. Hers consisted of eight-year-old students, construction paper, and glitter when she wasn’t busy making cupcakes. Her idyllic life is why he joined the service, and he was glad to see that his brothers’ sacrifices hadn’t been made in vain. “What if he’s near the house?”

  “I just got finished checking the perimeter. He isn’t out there.” Coen was one hundred percent certain that Martin Eyles had taken to foot after bungling his drive-by and running the front end of his uncle’s car into a tree. His tracks had been evident, and there had been no evidence to the contrary. For all they knew, the idiot had crashed his uncle’s car into her property with some half-assed intention of luring Brettany out of the house. It might very well explain why he’d taken off down the street when Coen had made an appearance. He only wished he had seen Eyles through the snow and chased his ass down. “There are no tracks outside in your yard besides mine. Hell, those are probably already covered with the way the snow is piling up out there. Eyles is long gone somewhere trying to figure out how to explain what he did to his uncle’s car.”

  Brettany stared at him a few moments longer, as if gauging his honesty. It wasn’t as if she didn’t have that choice, considering the pretense he’d kept up for the last week. It didn’t help that he had come clean about camping out behind her house for three weeks without her figuring out that he’d been out there. Technically, it was he who sounded like some creep sneaking around her home and trying to catch a glimpse of her inside her windows when she was half-dressed.