Hard Hat Man (9 page)

“
Don
’
t worry about it,
”
Laura
said.
“
I only want this signed and done with.
”

“
No, Mom.
”

“
But we must...
”

“
I can
’
t clean out all the stuff in the house in a week,
”
Jan said
firm
ly.
“
You saw the whole room full of books and all those boxes of stuff.
And we didn
’
t even get a look at the other rooms upstairs.
Who knows what else is in there?
And there
’
s no electricity, so I can only work in daylight.
”

“
I
’
ll have the power connected
tomorrow
as soon as I move my crew onto the site,
”
Kyle said.
“
We need it for
our
power tools anyway.
It
’
ll be a simple matter to connect the house.
”

“
There, you see?
”
Laura
said.
“
That should help.
”

“
I suppose it will,
”
Jan said.
“
What about water?
If I’m going to spend hours there, it would help if I had water, so I don’t need to keep driving back to town to use the bathroom, you know.
”

“
Of course. My men
will
have a portable toilet on site, but there’s no reason for the house bathroom not to work.
Horace had his own well
and septic system
.
I
’
ll have one of my guys make sure the pump still works.
”

“Thanks,” Jan said. “Everything is very dusty, though if you’re going to tear the house down, I’ll only need to clean the things I plan to save or donate.”

“
I’m sure this will all take time.
How about changing the wording to,
‘
as soon as reasonably possible,
’”
Kyle said, meeting Jan
’
s gaze.
“
Will that be all right?
”
He
’
d
get her some help, or even
help her sort out stuff himself if he had to, but the house had to be ready to go soon.
He was pleased to see her waver, then nod hesitantly.

Laura
smiled and patted Jan
’
s hand.
“
It
’
ll be okay, Jan.
You
’
ll see.
”

Jan
nodded and
Laura
smiled and went back to signing.

Kyle wondered what he
’
d gotten himself into as he listened to John explain the next set of papers.
A wave of pleasure ran through him at the thought of spending time with Jan at the house, helping her clean it out.
On the other hand, she didn
’
t look pleased with the idea at all.
And when would he find time with all the things that kept going wrong with this project?

When they finally finished all the legal details and stepped back outside, rain was falling steadily.
The June day had turned hot and muggy.
As t
hey dashed across the street to his car
,
he
pressed the remote to
unlock it and
quickly opened the doors and
helped them inside.
They stopped at the store in town for cardboard boxes and cleaning supplies, then drove back to the farmhouse.

There,
they
got the supplies they’d bought from the trunk
.
He
helped them carry it all inside. They
thanked
Kyle for the ride
and ducked inside
out of the rain
.
He went back to his car,
watched them disappear in
to the house
and let out a sigh.
Was he going to look back on this day
’
s happenings with deep regret?
He hoped not, but doubt remained.

As he backed out of the drive, he notice
d
Jan’s red Chevy
looked odd. It sat low to the ground. Yikes. All four tires were flat! No way was that an accident!

He eased back into his parking spot and got out to investigate, careful to not get close enough to the car to destroy any possible evidence. Though the rain coming down was sure to obliterate
any tracks the perp might have left. A definite slash in each tire told him this was definitely done on purpose. He pulled out his cellphone and
called the sheriff, who promised to send an officer to investigate very soon.
“Your project is definitely giving me trouble,” he told Kyle.

“Then the sooner you catch whoever is doing this nasty stuff, the sooner you’ll have less work, right,
S
heriff?”

“Humph,” the sheriff said, and hung up.

Kyle went back inside to tell Jan and
Laura
about it while he waited for an officer to respond.

“Bad news,” Kyle told the women. “Someone slashed all the tires on your car.”

“What?” Jan asked. They hurried out to the porch and stood staring at the damage.
“Why would they pick on my car? What do I have to do with all this?”

“I’m sorry,”
Laura
said. “I shouldn’t have gotten you into this.”

“
Is vandalism covered in your insurance policy?” Kyle asked.

“I have no idea. I’ll call my agent and ask.” Jan looked up the number on her cellphone and rang her agent in Chicago. After talking a minute, she hung up and said, “Yes, it’s covered. She says to have a garage replace the tires and send her the bill.”

“Good,” Kyle said. A police car pulled into the farmyard and a slim uniformed young woman stepped out, clipboard in hand.
“I’m Deputy Carol Hendricks.”

After answering all the officer’s questions, Kyle gave Jan the number of the town’s only garage and she called for a tow truck.

The garage promised to put on a new set of tires and return her car by the end of the day. Thank goodness for small town service.

“So who do you think is the perp?”
Deputy Hendricks
asked.

Kyle stared at her. “You
think
I
should know who did this?”

“Well, all these dirty tricks are apparently connected to your project in some way,” she snapped back, her dark eyebrows dipping at him.

“If I knew
who was behind all this
, I’d be happy to press charges so you could lock the guy up.”

“Oh, then it’s a man?”

“How the hell should I know? I just used ‘guy’ to mean person,” Kyle shot back.

“Humph,”
sh
e said.

“Now you sound just like the sheriff.”

“Yeah? Well, if you find any
usable
evidence, let me know,” she s
napped
. “I’ll be in touch.” She nodded at Jan and
Laura
, then strode back to her car and left.

Shaking himself, he
got back in his car and
drove on.
Why was whoever was doing this stuff now expanding it to include Jan? What could he do about it? Success wasn’t worth anyone getting hurt.

Think positive,
m
an.
And take one problem at a time.
That
’
s the only way to do it.

There was little Kyle could do in the rain at the farm, so he drove back to his office to set the details of his project in motion.
He had a lot of details to iron out before
h
e could turn
e
arth
at the site.
But first on the list, he’d get the utilities working at the house to speed progress there.

Chapter 3

First,
Jan and her mother
did another quick walk through
the farmhouse,
looking for any pieces of furniture they wished to keep. Jan found an antique chest of drawers
and a lovely wooden carved jewelry box
she wanted
.
Laura
turned up her nose at
everything she s
a
w
.

“Okay,” Jan said. “Then
except for my two pieces,
let’s leave all the furniture where it is and just let the lady from the Historical Society choose what she wants and then donate the rest. I’m quite sure they’ll be happy to send a truck to pick it up.”

“Sounds good to me. And that will save us a lot of work, too,”
Laura
agreed.