Anger broke through Stuart’s fuzzy brain and he glared at him. “If you’ve touched one hair on her head, I’ll—”
“Do what old man?” The man leaned against the kitchen counter, grinning at them. “Bring me to justice? Fight me?” He strolled over and pulled the phone out the wall. The cellphone on the kitchen table, he popped into the microwave and chuckled as it crackled sending sparks flying.
Stuart looked at his wife, who was panting and shaking her head. “I have cash, over there in the cookie jar. Take it and leave. I won’t say a thing. Just go and leave us alone.”
“Cash, huh?” The intruder sauntered over to the cookie jar, removed the lid, and pocketed the roll of bills. “Thanks, but now I have to go.”
Relieved, Stuart leaned back in his chair. It would be over soon. “Before you go, at least tell me where you have my granddaughter.”
“Do you really want to know?” The man calmly wrapped the tape around Stuart’s mouth. “I killed her. It was an accident; I’d planned to keep her for a while. We were getting on so well together. She was so obedient but I couldn’t allow her to scream.” He looked deep into Stuart’s eyes. “It hurts when someone you love is taken from you, doesn’t it? Can you imagine the terror of being burned alive?”
Sheer panic made Stuart’s heart race in his chest. He couldn’t suck enough oxygen through his nose. He shook his head but the man just smiled at him.
“You’re gonna find out real soon.” The man walked over to the kitchen windows and threw them open to the night air. “Do you have a flashlight?”
Stuart had only one choice and that was to cooperate. He nodded and tipped his head toward the kitchen drawers. He watched with interest as the man placed the flashlight on the table, the beam shining at the refrigerator. What was his game? Had he just come by to boast about killing his granddaughter, if he had at all? The man was obviously delusional but a nagging doubt pulled at Stuart when his gaze settled on the bracelet.
“I’m leaving now.” The stranger walked to the oven, opened the door, and turned on the gas. As he left, he turned off the lights and headed for the front door. “And you’re going straight to hell.”
The door clicked shut and as gas fumes filled the air, Stuart bucked in the chair to get free but the sturdy chairs held him fast. The zip-ties cut deep into his flesh in his attempt to break free. Why open the window and turn on the gas, it made no sense at all? Behind the gag his wife was screaming and fighting to break the tape, her chair rocking back and forth. Gas fumes filled his lungs, but if he could break the chair, he might get free. He struggled for some minutes before he stopped to listen. A soft humming sound filled the air and a dark shape appeared at the window like a huge insect. In the darkness, he made out the outline of a drone hovering at the kitchen window. The flashlight beam reflected in a lens mounted at the front. What the hell was happening now? The drone made a series of mechanical whines and then shot two projectiles into the room. One of them, a soda can, spun across the table and fell to the floor at his feet. The drone hovered in front of his face for a second or two before lifting into the air and vanishing into the moonless night. A bad feeling crawled up his spine and panic gripped his heart so tight he couldn’t breathe. He’d seen similar IEDs placed inside soda cans to kill US troops during his tour of duty many years ago but they were rigged to explode if someone kicked them. These had been dropped, so maybe not an explosive device after all but what?
A flash of light blinded him and then the stove exploded. A blast of hot air and flames smashed into him, throwing him to the floor. He lifted his head just as the second explosion tore a hole through the kitchen cabinets. A wall of flames crawled toward him and thick black smoke filled the air. The curtains caught fire in a whoosh. Through the smoke he made out the body of his wife staring, sightless. Heat seared his clothes in a rush of agony. As flames licked his legs, he screamed behind the tape. He couldn’t breathe. A third explosion lifted him into the air. The smell of his flesh burning seared his nostrils. He didn’t hit the ground. It was as if someone had extinguished a candle, the pain vanished and he fell into merciful blackness.
Thirty-Nine
It never ceased to amaze Jenna how differently people acted away from an office environment. Inside their FBI room at the Black Rock Falls Sheriff’s Department, the team had a more professional attitude to the case, but sitting around the family room, it felt as if she was losing control. She cleared her throat to get everyone’s attention but the conversation carried on as if she’d suddenly become a ghost. Dave and Carter had completely forgotten they were in the middle of a murder investigation and turned the discussion to the merits of different hunting rifles, and Jo was talking to her daughter Jaime, with one finger stuck in her ear to hear over the chatter. At her feet, Duke and Zorro sprawled on the rug in front of the cold fireplace sound asleep. The house smelled of coffee, the chocolate-chip cookies she’d baked and dog. After perusing her notes again, Jenna tapped her pen on the coffee table, piled high with plates of food, a fresh pot of coffee and the fixings, laptops, and phones. “Can we get back to work? It’s getting late and we haven’t made any headway in the case.”
“Sure. Kalo should have updated our files by now.” Carter opened his laptop and scanned the page. “Ah-huh, well, he’s sent a copy of the accident report from Mrs. Suffolk’s car wreck. Give me a second.”
Jenna waited impatiently for Carter to read the documents. It would have been faster to email the files to everyone but he had a way of doing things and although annoying at times, he rarely missed evidence. “Okay, what did he find?” She poured everyone another cup of coffee and sat back in her seat staring at him.
“Something interesting.” Carter glanced up over the screen and shrugged. “Personally, I’d have fully investigated this accident and had the vehicle inspected by someone who knows what they’re doing. The official cause is brake failure due to loss of hydraulic fluid but it doesn’t specify if someone tampered with the lines, or the leak was a gasket failure or whatever.”
“They’d have been looking for a cut in the line but what if the connection was loosened?” Kane added cream and sugar to his cup and stirred slowly. “The fluid loss would have been gradual, so the brakes would have been fine when she left home but gotten worse the more she used them until they failed.” He met Jenna’s gaze. “It would be easy to see if someone had loosened the cable. There’s a ton of dust on our roads and if the connections were clean, there’s a good chance someone tampered with them.”
Recalling all the engine parts and other motor connected paraphernalia Jenna had noticed at The Crazy Iron Forge, it was obvious that Suffolk had knowledge of vehicles. “You’re saying Suffolk could have tampered with his wife’s brakes, say the night before she left to drive to Blackwater, knowing that she’d have an accident?”
“It’s possible.” Kane sipped his coffee. “It would be very convenient for him if she died. He’d lost control of her and she’d humiliated him in the eyes of his church.”
“We know Suffolk was raging mad with Wood. I wouldn’t put it past him to kill his wife and the Woods family and then take Sophie out of spite.” Jo’s brow wrinkled into a frown.