Tick,Tock,Trouble (A Seagrove Cozy Mystery Book 5)

by Leona Fox

  “Mr. Woo, Franklin,” Zack said in a firm but quiet tone, “we have known each other for at least twenty years, so I hope you will believe me when I say this situation will have only one conclusion. The only question in my mind is this, ‘Will you let Brown go and come into custody willingly, or will we have to use force?’ Look around you Mr. Woo, there is no way you are going to escape. You’ve backed yourself into a corner here.”

  “That’s what you think.” Woo flashed a glimpse of a firearm he’d been holding to Brown’s back.

  “I may not be able to get free, but I can take a lot of you with me when I go.”

  He pushed Brown forward and started down the hall toward Zack, Wilson and the other officers. Sadie realized if he got past them there would only be her and Mr. Bradshaw between Woo and the door. This was a little worrisome. She picked up Mr. Bradshaw.

  But as he moved forward the officers on the stairs started down and Woo, realizing he was leaving his back exposed, moved back against the wall. Stalemate.

  Chapter Five

  Mr. Woo was looking a little wide-eyed and unpredictable. Sadie backed around the corner where she could still see, but the chance of Mr. Bradshaw getting shot was eliminated. She knew she should take him to safety, but Zack was in danger and she couldn’t face leaving.

  “Psst.”

  Sadie looked behind her to see the back door of the evidence room cracked open and Officer Smith becking her.

  “In here,” he whispered and took her arm, pulling her through the doorway.

  “It’s bulletproof,” he said locking the door behind them.

  “So you don’t have to worry about gunfire. I’d put money on there being gunfire.”

  He led her to his desk. It was next to the door and faced a window into the hall.

  “Bulletproof glass,” he whispered.

  The lights were off in the evidence room. It was almost like watching TV, viewing the drama behind the glass. Smith held his finger to his lips and flicked a switch. The conversation in the hallway flooded into the room.

  “Franklin,” Zack was saying, “let Ms. Brown go. You’ll never forgive yourself if she gets hurt. Are you okay, Carol?”

  The older woman nodded grimly. The set of her mouth made Sadie think of an old time schoolmarm. Not that you would expect her to be cheerful while being held captive.

  “Are you nuts?” Woo asked.

  “The minute I let her go you all will put a thousand bullets in me. I’m getting out of here in one piece.”

  There was a noise from down the hall and Sadie looked at Smith with her eyebrows raised. He clicked off the intercom.

  “A bunch more officers came in through the back door,” he said.

  “See here? You can see them on the monitor.”

  He pointed to a monitor to the left of the desk that Sadie hadn’t noticed. There were at least ten more officers in riot gear standing where she had been a few minutes before. Smith clicked the intercom back on.

  “Use me as a hostage instead,” Zack was saying.

  Sadie noticed he had moved slightly to Woo’s left. To focus on Zack, Woo had turned slightly away from the stairs. Wilson was there with a taser in her hand. She held it low and to her side so Woo wouldn’t see it.

  “Come on, Franklin,” Zack said. “Let’s make a trade.”

  He reached out toward Carol Brown, which forced Woo to drag her closer to him and the movement served to expose more of his back. Wilson fired. Zack reached out and jerked Carol from his grasp as the electricity coursed from one prong, through his body, and out the other prong. The firearm Woo had been holding dropped from his hand.

  Then Woo collapsed to the ground. Wilson cuffed his hands behind his back while Zack passed Carol off to an officer behind him and retrieved the dropped gun. It was over quickly. Woo was taken away down the hall, to the holding cells, Sadie assumed. Carol Brown was escorted away by a female officer. Zack spotted Sadie in the evidence room when Officer Smith turned on the lights. He motioned her to come out.

  “I thought I told you to stay in the car,” Zack said when he had Sadie alone in the hallway.

  Alone except for Mr. Bradshaw, who didn’t like Zack’s tone and told him so with a quiet growl. Zack raised an eyebrow at Mr. B and the grumbling stopped. Sadie was impressed, although she didn’t say so. She was on Mr. Bradshaw’s side.

  “Come on,” Zack said when Sadie scowled in response to his comment. “Let’s get you home.”

  “Mr. Bradshaw and I can walk,” Sadie said. “We don’t need a ride.”

  She turned away and started quickly down the hall toward the outside exit. Zack trotted along beside her.

  “Sadie,” he said. “Please let me drive you. I want to be sure Hamilton isn’t lurking around.”

  Sadie stopped and Mr. B stopped with her. “Chief Woodstone,” she said, “I am a grown woman. ‘I thought I told you to stay in the car,’ is something you might say to a dog. Not to another adult. Normally, I’d rather walk than get in a car with a person who spoke to me like that. However, I’m even more reluctant to run into Hamilton Cartwright again so I will accept your offer of a ride home.”

  Zack nodded but didn’t say anything. Sadie had the sneaking suspicion that he was trying not to laugh.

  “Stop that,” she said, elbowing him in the ribs.

  “What? I’m not doing anything,” he said, indignant.

  “You are laughing on the inside,” she said. “I can tell.”

  “Wow. Tough crowd,” Zack said. “I didn’t know there were rules about what I’m allowed to do in my head.”

  He was trying to sound cranky, but Sadie wasn’t fooled. He liked that she could see through him.

  “What am I going to do with you?” she asked. “You are absolutely incorrigible.”

  “I’m no worse than you are, Sadie Barnett, and don’t you forget it,” he said, but the grin on his face took all the sting out of it.

  Zack drove around the block twice before parking in front of Sadie’s shop. He walked through the entire downstairs with Betty watching, amused, then down the creaking old wooden stairs into the basement and out into the alley before taking the stairs to the second floor. He opened every door in Sadie’s apartment and spent twenty minutes on the balcony overlooking the street before pronouncing the area a Hamilton-free zone.

  “It’s nearly closing,” he said to Betty and Sadie as he was about to leave.

  “Can’t you go ahead and lock up?”

  “It’s two hours until closing,” Betty said, but on seeing his face backtracked, “but we could lock up and put a note on the door. That would work, wouldn’t it?” She looked at Sadie, who nodded in agreement.

  “I’ll be back around nine,” Zack said, his hand on the doorknob.

  “What for?” Sadie asked, confused. She would have remembered if they’d had a date, wouldn’t she?

  “Because I’m spending the night keeping watch.” He looked at her and shook his head.

  “You don’t think I’m going to let Hamilton Cartwright find you alone, do you? Because I’m not.” He left, the door slamming behind him.

  “He’s getting a little high-handed,” Sadie said. “I’m not sure what to do about that.”

  “I think it’s just because he’s worried about you,” Betty said.

  “He’s usually perfectly agreeable. I think it’s just this case has landed particularly close to you and Hamilton has come unglued. What in the world did he think he was going to accomplish by chasing you around the park today?”

  “He wants that pocket watch, and bad,” Sadie said.

  “But you should have seen Franklin Woo at the stationhouse today. He took Carol Brown hostage and was trying to get into the evidence room to get that watch. I don’t understand it.”

  “Maybe there’s a curse on it,” Betty said. “Or a charm. Like everyone who owns it becomes a millionaire. We should research it. Come on.”

  She pulled on the door to make sure it was locked and he
aded into the office. Sadie followed.

  They powered up the two computers in the office and started researching pocket watches. It took about thirty minutes of reading about men dying of heart attacks and other more gruesome stories before Sadie found what she was looking for.

  “Look at this,” she said, “not just one, but a set of charmed watches. Each one is charmed, but bring them all together and they will enable you to control time. Wow, I wonder what that really means?”

  “Shoot me over the link,” Betty said. “I want to read about it.”

  Sadie sent her the link and then grabbed a pen and her notepad and started taking notes. Twelve watches. Twelve enhancements. When used together, on the last night of the year, they allow you to travel through time.

  “Pretty nifty,” Betty said. “Do you think Hamilton and Franklin have some of the other watches?”

  “I don’t know. What amazes me is how these came to either man’s attention. It doesn’t seem like either of their styles. How did they get involved in the hunt for watches?” Sadie asked.

  “And how did they get magic powers?” Betty asked. “Watches don’t normally come with magic powers.”

  “I don’t know,” Sadie said, grinning at Betty, “but I’m going to find out.”

  “How are you going to do that?” Betty asked.

  “Research. Only this time, myths and legends. I think I’ll start with Merlin and work forward.”

  The online article about the watches just talked about their existence and what they were rumored to be. No origin myth, nothing at all, really. Except that they were rumored to exist. And one of them matched the description of the watch sitting in the evidence room of the police station.

  “If you send me a list of links to look into I’ll help with the research,” Betty said. “That way I won’t be duplicating work you’re doing.”

  “Right on,” Sade said, copying some links and sending them to Betty.

  When Zack banged on the door at nine o’clock the women still were absorbed in their research and were startled at the sound.

  “Good Lord,” Sadie said. “It’s after nine, Betty you need to get home.”

  Betty stretched and rubbed the back of her neck. “Who knew reading myths and legends could make time run faster. It must be magic.”

  She closed down her computer, grabbed her coat and followed Sadie out to let Zack in. Zack wasn’t alone. He stepped through the door, followed by Lucy.

  “Hey Lucy,” Sadie said. “Is everything okay?”

  “Hey Sade,” Lucy replied, “Everything is fine. Zack asked me to come.”

  “We’re in the middle of a manhunt for Hamilton Cartwright,” Zack said.

  “And I didn’t want you to be alone here, so I brought Lucy to keep you company.”

  “I’ll stay, too,” Betty said. “Safety in numbers, and all that. As long as that’s okay with you, Sadie?”

  “Don’t be silly. Of course it’s okay,” Sadie said. “We can fill Lucy in on our research.”

  “What research is that?” Zack asked, looking wary.

  “We were looking into the pocket watch, trying to figure out why Cartwright and Woo were so manic about having it. But we can tell you about that later,” Sadie said. “I can tell you are itching to get back out there.”

  “I am,” Zack said.

  “I want this guy off the streets.” He kissed Sadie, leaving no doubt about how he felt about her.

  “Lock the door behind me.” He touched her cheek and left.

  Sadie locked the door. Her stomach growled and she looked at Betty, her eyebrows raised.

  “We didn’t eat dinner,” she said. “Why didn’t you remind me? You must be starving.”

  “I was so caught up in the research that I forgot.” Betty’s stomach growled in sympathy.

  “Usually, Mr. Bradshaw reminds me when I forget,” Sadie said looking down at the little dog. He was stretching in the manner of a canine who had just woken from a long nap.

  “Come on,” Lucy said. “I’ll make the two intrepid researchers some dinner. Really, Sadie, sometimes you are worse than a child at taking care of yourself.”

  “I’m just going to double-check the back door,” Sadie said. “I’ll meet you upstairs. You can continue scolding me while you make dinner.”

  “I’m not scolding,” Lucy said as she disappeared up the stairs with Betty, “I’m just saying.”

  Sadie snorted and made her way through the back room into the back hall where the door to the alley was standing open.

  “What the hell?” she said, slamming the door and throwing the deadbolt.

  But the bolt wouldn’t budge. It was jammed. She left the door and ran for the stairs, knowing where Hamilton must be. They’d been so absorbed by their research they hadn’t heard him break in.

  She took the stairs two at a time with Mr. Bradshaw on her tail and burst into her apartment, almost running right into Lucy and Betty, who hadn’t moved more than five feet from the doorway. Hamilton was sitting in the Best Armchair Ever and Sadie knew she was going to have to give it away. He had turned it around so that it faced the door and he was looking relaxed, his leg crossed over his knee, and in his right hand he held a handgun trained on Lucy, who had been the first through the door. Sadie picked up Mr. Bradshaw and handed him to Betty along with her cell phone.

  “Don’t let him go,” she said and gave Betty a pointed look.

  Betty glanced at the cell phone and nodded. Then Sadie pushed past Lucy and stood between Hamilton and the other women. She needed to keep Hamilton’s attention focused away from Betty so she could dial 9-1-1.

  “I know why you want the timepiece, Hamilton. Do you really think it can help you slow time?” she asked him.

  “So it’s the one that slows time? I thought it might be when I saw the reverse running face. That could be very handy.” His face lit up.

  “It’s rumored to slow time within a six-foot radius. Can you imagine the leisure? The opportunity to get so much more done than the rest of the world? And compared to the rest of the world, I would appear not to age. And the years longer I would live.”

  “And there must be downsides,” Sadie said. “What about those?”

  “Downsides? What are you talking about?” He looked at her crossly. “There are no downsides.”

  “According to legend, you’ll begin having trouble interacting with the rest of the world,” Sadie said.

  “Everything outside of your little bubble will appear to move too fast. You will have slowed down so much that your speech will be perceived as impaired. You will not be able to hold a conversation because the words won’t come quickly enough.”

  “What will that matter?” Hamilton asked. “I’ll keep the important people close to me. We’ll enjoy longer life together.”

  “What makes you think they’ll be willing to give up the rest of the world to live in your bubble?” Sadie asked. “I wouldn’t.”

  “Don’t act as if you don’t know the true value of time, the true potential of all the pieces together,” he said. “I know you want them for yourself.”

  He raised the gun, fired and shattered Sadie’s favorite teapot. The noise hurt and Sadie’s ears rang. She held her hands to her ears trying to make the pain go away. She hoped Mr. B was alright.

  “Now call your boyfriend and tell him to bring the watch,” Hamilton said, punctuating his words with little jabs of the gun.

  “No.” Sadie said as she heard Lucy gasp behind her. “My mother taught me never to reward bad behavior. I’m not calling him.”

  “That is a mistake,” Hamilton said and raised his gun again.

  “If I shoot you I’m sure one of your wide-eyed friends behind you will call Chief Woodstone for me.”

  At that moment there was a noise out on the patio. Hamilton jerked around to see Simon the Squirrel at the door to the balcony, tapping on the glass with a nut. Hamilton cursed and would have shot the creature except the minute his attention was distr
acted Sadie launched herself onto his gun arm. The gun went flying across the room and Lucy went to grab it.

  Betty set Mr. B on the ground and ran to pull Hamilton’s other arm away from Sadie. He’d grabbed Sadie’s hair and was yanking, but Sadie refused to let go of his arm. Betty pried his fingers from her hair as Mr. Bradshaw growled and snapped at Hamilton’s ankles.

  “Get that dog away from me,” Hamilton yelled kicking at Mr. B, but the dog was too quick for the boot to make contact.