Sally Berneathy - Death by Chocolate 03 - The Great Chocolate Scam (19 page)

“Was that what I think it was?”

Fred nodded.
“If you think it was a gun shot, then it was what you think.”

“
I guess that’s a good sign. If he’s shooting at Rickie, that surely means he hasn’t killed him yet, right?”

“
Brilliant deduction. I think it came from that direction.”

We started in the direction Fred pointed, but the sound of a car arriving stopped us.

“It’s probably Trent,” I said. I hoped it was Trent.

We hurried back around the building and saw Trent and Lawson getting out of his car. Lawson opened the back door to let two passengers out.

Rick and Grace.

Rick was still alive and safe. No point in my buying a lottery ticket with that kind of luck.

“Lindsay?” Trent looked a little irritated. Okay, a lot irritated. “I thought you were going home.”

“
Eventually I am. Fred found bullet holes inside, and it looks like Rickie escaped. You need our help finding him. There’s a lot of ground to cover out there.”

“
Rickie escaped? He’s okay?” Grace exclaimed, clasping her hands and starting toward me. Lawson restrained her.

“We’ve
got officers coming in to help search. Fred, please take her home.”

“
Okay.”

Well, bless his little heart. Fred had learned something from me.

Another shot came from the same direction as the first.

Grace gasped. Rick flinched and shoved his hands into his pockets.

“Stay here, Lindsay.” Fred loped off in the direction of the shots.

I followed. He knew I would. He was just trying to appease Trent.

“Lindsay!” Trent shouted.

“
Okay!” I called over my shoulder.

“
Damn it, Lindsay! Come back here!”

If he kept talking like that,
we’d never make it to the bedroom. I don’t like being ordered around.

Fred and I crashed into the dense growth of trees, bushes and weeds.

“BRYAN KOLLAR,” Lawson’s voice boomed from behind us, magically amplified by their bullhorn. “WE KNOW YOU’RE OUT THERE. WE HAVE A SWAT TEAM COMING IN. YOU NEED TO RETURN TO THE BUILDING.”

I tripped over a rock.

No, I tripped over a skull.

“
You okay?” Fred asked.

“
Not really. Let’s go.”

“
Watch where you’re stepping.”

“
Actually, I think I’d rather not see where I’m stepping.”

“
BRYAN, PLEASE BRING BACK MY BABY BOY.” Grace’s amplified nasal tones were painful to the ear. “PLEASE DON’T HURT HIM.”

“
Mama!”

Rickie!

Fred took a left turn, moving faster on foot than when he drives. I hurried to keep up.

Someone screamed.

Ahead I could see Bryan Kollar’s famous butt as he bent forward, clutching his groin and groaning.

A small figure sprinted away, darting around the trees and bushes.

“Rickie! Stop!” I called.

Fred charged toward Kollar, but the man sprinted away. He had apparently recovered from whatever injury Rickie had inflicted on him, and he was in good physical shape. Fred was tall and lanky, a little on the thin side, but, as far as I could tell, made of steel. Kollar was in trouble.

Crashing sounds came from behind us. Probably the cops. To be honest, I wouldn’t mind seeing them at that point.

“
Rickie!” Grace’s voice, but she was too small to make that much noise thrashing around. Had to be some cops back there too.

Another shot rang out. I could
n’t tell if it came from in front of us or behind us. Could be Kollar shooting at Rickie or at Fred and me or it could be Trent shooting at Kollar…or Trent shooting at me for ignoring his orders.

I had no idea who was where or what direction we were headed, but I followed Fred.

“Rickie! Baby, come to Mama!” Grace was doing a pretty good job of following us.

Police sirens screamed, moving closer then stopping.

“BRYAN KOLLAR, THE SWAT TEAM IS HERE, AND WE’RE COMING IN AFTER YOU.” Lawson on the bullhorn again.

A small form darted out of the bushes. A larger form shot out, made a flying tackle and grabbed the kid only a few feet away from us.

“Give it up, Kollar,” Fred ordered.

Bryan rolled expertly to his feet with one arm wrapped around
Rickie’s neck, the other holding a gun to the boy’s head. Bryan didn’t look so beautiful anymore. Leaves and twigs intertwined among his once perfect locks of hair. His clothes were torn and dirty, and his face and arms were covered in scratches. His eyes were wild.

“
Rickie!” Grace struggled in. One of her heels had broken, but she was still coming, heading straight for her son.

“
I won’t miss from this distance!” Bryan threatened.

I grabbed Grace around the waist and stopped her progress.

Fred eased closer to Bryan. Still about ten feet away, too far to land a kick. “You having trouble hitting your target, Bryan? Never shot a gun before? Bennie made it look easy, but it isn’t, is it?”

Bryan licked his lips, his eyes darting around as if for answers to what had become a no-win situation for him.

Fred moved a few inches nearer. “You don’t really want to do this, buddy. He’s just a little kid.”

Fred could take people out with a well-aimed kick. Trent had a nifty gun that took people out from a long ways away. I had an attack cat who was locked in my house twenty miles away. I was at a distinct disadvantage, so I just did my best to hang onto Grace who was a lot stronger than she looked and very determined to get to her son.

“My baby!” Grace shrieked.

“He’s
a monster!” Bryan flinched as Rickie continued to struggle, kicking against his legs and trying to bite his arm. “This kid is not normal! I left him drugged to the gills, lying on the floor. But I couldn’t find any place to dig a…to dig a place to put him.” He blinked as sweat ran down his forehead and into his eyes. “Those people, my father, they put them everywhere!”

“
But you’re not like those people.” A half step closer. “That man’s not really your father. Walter Kollar’s your father. He had nothing to do with all this.”

Kollar bit his lip and pressed the gun harder against
Rickie’s head. The boy continued his efforts to get away. “I gave him enough drugs to take down an elephant, but when I got back inside, he was wide awake. Look at me! Look at what this brat did to me! I’m bleeding and he kicked me in the balls and my clothes are ruined! He’s nothing but a snotty-nosed kid, and I’m Bryan Kollar, but look at what he did to me!”

“
Kollar! Let the boy go!” Trent came up with a gun, a big gun, pointed directly at Bryan Kollar.

“
Hey! What are you doing?” Rick rushed forward. Fred held out an arm to stop him.

Bryan’s
face went even paler and his grip on Rickie slackened, the gun pressed less tightly to his head. “What are you doing here? I killed you!”

Guess Bryan had
n’t heard the news about Rick’s miraculous return from the dead.

“
This is all your fault!” He turned loose of Rickie and aimed the gun directly at Rick. “If you would’ve sold me back this property, none of this would have happened!”

Trent’s
gun exploded just as Fred launched himself at Bryan.

For an instant I was afraid Fred might have been shot, but immediately blood blossomed from one of
Bryan’s shoulders just as Fred’s heel connected with his chin and the man dropped to the ground.

Grace broke free of my grip and ran to her son, enfolding him in her arms.

Trent strode over to Bryan who lay on the ground cursing Rick and Rickie and Marissa and me and the rock under his head and the world in general. Trent yanked him to his feet and clapped handcuffs on him.

Fred stood to the side. Trent turned to him and smiled.
“Where did that come from?”

Fred shrugged.
“I know a little karate.”

Kollar snarled.

Grace pulled Rick into a group hug. “You tried to save our son!”

Rick looked helpless.

I smiled.

I made it through work the next day in spite of being stressed, scratched from the weeds and brush and generally freaked out. But the people need their chocolate.

My special that day was Cookie Dough Cheesecake Bars. Yes, I know I’d served it only a few days before, but this one was for me. I needed a special treat.

I kept my cell phone on the counter, waiting to hear more news about
Bryan’s arrest, Rickie’s recovery and Rick’s relatives. I was pleased that none of them showed up at my restaurant. A couple of Cokes, a lot of chocolate, no appearances from Rick’s relatives or his would-be killer, and my stress level was going down measurably. I wasn’t sure Rick would follow through on his promise to Fred to sign the divorce papers since the cops had found him anyway, but even if he didn’t, that situation was no worse than it had been…and maybe he would keep his word for once.

“
Why don’t you take off early?” Paula suggested as the last customer walked out the door and she locked up behind him. “I can clean up.”

“
I took off early yesterday and left you to clean, and I have to say, I’d rather have been here scraping crumbs off dirty plates.”

She smiled as she picked up the dishes from the last table.
“So today you stay here and clean, and I’ll go trip over a few skulls and chase after a murderer.”

I dipped my cloth in bleach water and wiped the counter.
“That sounds like a deal.”

Finally my cell phone rang…Trent.
We’d spoken briefly last night after the big take-down, but only to assure each other we were okay. I thought it probably wasn’t the best time to bring up the subject again of how much I needed a gun, and he was smart enough not to bring up the subject again of how I’d disobeyed his orders and ended up in the middle of a takedown.

“
Hey, big cop, want a cookie?” I said in greeting.

“
Yeah, I do.” I could hear the smile in his voice. “Maybe we could grab a burger tonight and talk about those cookies.”

“
Works for me.” I could only hope my newly-incarnated estranged husband wouldn’t show up. “How’s Bryan Kollar? Did he get out on bail yet?”

“
Not yet, and I’m not sure he will. We’ve found over a hundred bodies on the grounds of that flour mill, and even though he claims he had nothing to do with their murders, he knew they were there. He did admit to killing Thomas Akin’s wife, but he’s claiming that was an accident. Says he didn’t know she’d be in that car, and she wouldn’t have been in that car if she wasn’t cheating on her husband, so it’s not his fault.”

“
Ah, the old
not my fault
defense. He said yesterday it was all Rick’s fault he tried to kill him and Rickie, that Rick could have sold him back the property and avoided the whole mess.”

“
Sad thing is, I think he really believes it. If he’d never met his real father, that gangster, and been influenced by the man’s values, he might have turned out to be a different person.”

“
Did Bennie teach him how to make the bomb he used on Rick’s car?”

“
No, he said he got that off the Internet, and he hadn’t meant for it to be quite so powerful. The directions must have been wrong. Again, not his fault.”

“
I feel sorry for his parents. The ones who raised him, I mean. They seem like nice people.”

“
They’re standing by him, but they’re pretty upset. They want him to own up to what he did and take his punishment. However, he’s hired a team of high powered lawyers and keeps protesting that none of it was his fault. We’ll see what happens. I imagine he’ll be spending at least a few years behind bars. He should have plenty of time in prison to work out and stay in shape.”

“
You caught the bad guy and made the streets of Pleasant Grove a safer place. I’ll have an appropriate reward waiting for you tonight.”

He laughed softly.
“Just seeing you will be enough reward. You know, when I order you to do something, I’m not trying to push you around. I just worry about you. You’re a little bull-headed about putting yourself in dangerous situations.”

“
I don’t take orders well. Look at it this way. If I made every chocolate recipe the way it’s already been written, I’d be making mediocre chocolate. I look at the directions and decide how I can make it better. That’s what I do when you order me to do something. I think about it, but I make my own decision.”

He was quiet for a few seconds.
“I’ll see you tonight.”

A wise man. He knew when to give up.

*~*~*

Henry met me at the door, purred loudly, gave me a couple of head butts, allowed me to stroke him once, then led me back to the kitchen to show me his empty food bowl. Life was getting back to normal. The only part of that I
wasn’t crazy about was the part where I was still legally entangled with Rick. I had called him and, no big surprise, he said he didn’t remember making any deal with Fred about signing any papers.

I followed Henry to the kitchen and filled his bowl.
“No more strange people in the house,” I promised him. He didn’t stop eating, but he did switch his tail as if in acknowledgment and approval. “Trent’s coming over tonight, but you like him.” Another tail switch.

I pulled out a chair from the table and flopped into it.
“However, it’s probably still going to be just you and me tonight. As long as I’m legally bound to that jerk, Trent’s very likely going to stick to his antiquated moral code.” Though I complained about Trent’s outdated belief, I kind of liked it. The idea, that is, not the reality that came along with the idea.

A knock sounded on my front door, and my heart sank. Had Rick kicked out his relatives and
they’d come back to my house?

Henry lifted his head as if testing the air for…whatever cats test the air for. Scents? Feelings? Auras? He went calmly back to eating, unalarmed, so I felt safe in going to answer my front door.

Fred, looking quite smug and pleased with himself, stood on my porch with a folder in his hand. “We’re going over to see Rick, and he’s going to make you a very happy woman.”

“
You have anthrax in that folder, and he’s going to sniff some of it?”

Fred rolled his eyes.
“You need to get over that blood-thirsty tendency.”

“
I was doing fine until Rick showed up in my shower.”

“
Get your purse and let’s go.”

“Trent’s
coming over. How long will this take?”

“
Not long if you’ll get a move on.”

“
Let me tell Henry we’re leaving and see if he wants to go out now or finish eating first.”

“
You act like that cat can understand you.”

“
That would be because he does.” Fred’s smart, but he still had a lot to learn about cats. “Are we taking my car or yours?”

“
Mine.”

“
Can I drive?”

“
Of course not.”

Henry elected to go out before we left and finish dinner later. I grabbed my purse and we set off for
Rick’s house.

“
Is he expecting us?” I asked as Fred drove slowly down the street.

“
I didn’t want to ruin the surprise.”

“
Are you sure he’s home?”

“
Yes.”

*~*~*

The shiny rental Cadillac and the pitiful battered Ford both sat in Rick’s driveway when we pulled up to his house. I assumed his new car was inside the garage. He’d managed to get the cars out of his house but not the relatives.

Marissa answered the door. She studied us for a moment then decided to go with manners.
“Come in,” she said with a tight smile, stepping back and holding the door open to allow us entrance. “We’re having a barbecue to celebrate the safe return of my son and Grace’s son. You’re welcome to join us.”

“
Thank you.” Fred stepped inside, and I followed.

The place still looked like a disaster area. Whatever happened on this visit, I would always recall with delight seeing Rick in this setting.

Marissa directed us through the kitchen and out to the back yard where Rick, Brad and Clint were presiding over a grill covered in hot dogs and hamburgers.

Rick looked up as we came out the patio door. Charcoal streaked one cheek and his shirt, and he did
n’t look happy. Rickie seemed permanently attached to his side.

Brad and Clint did
n’t look very happy either. Grace, sitting in one of the patio chairs with a glass of wine in one hand, looked positively ecstatic. “It’s your Aunt Lindsay,” she said. Rickie detached himself from Rick and ran over to me.

I was pleased Bryan Kollar had failed in his plan to kill the kid, but that was as far as my good will went. I stood stiffly while he wrapped his thin arms around me.
“Aunt Lindsay!”

“He’s
having such a good time getting to know his uncles and his grandmother and, of course, his daddy.” Grace sipped her wine and beamed.

“
I am not his grandmother,” Marissa said through gritted teeth, moving around to take a seat across the patio from Grace and retrieving her own glass of wine from a nearby table. “Clint and Brad are not his uncles, and Rick is not his father.”

“
Actually,” Fred said, opening his folder and taking out a set of stapled papers featuring graphs and text, “when it comes to Rickie Ganyon, Rick is his father, you are his grandmother, and Clint and Brad are his uncles.”

For a moment nobody moved
or spoke. The birds even stopped singing and the leaves stopped moving in the trees. Well, that’s how it seemed.

“
I told you!” Grace jumped to her feet and ran to throw her arms around Rick.

He stood frozen in place, his hamburger flipper halfway under a patty.
“But,” he protested softly, “that’s not possible.

Fred walked over and handed him the papers.
“Not all vasectomies are successful.”

“
Vasectomy?” Grace exclaimed.

Marissa stepped up and snatched the papers from Fred.
“Yes, he had a vasectomy. I saw to it.” She studied the papers then ripped them in two. Before she could tear them another time, Rick dropped his hamburger turner and grabbed them from her.

“
How competent was this doctor you used, Marissa?” I asked. I have to confess, I was enjoying the scene. “How many vasectomies had he done? What was his specialty? Did he normally take out tonsils?”

“
Well…” Marissa’s smile faltered, and her hands fell to her sides. “He didn’t exactly graduate from medical school, but he had the necessary training.”

“
Apparently not.” I looked around at Clint and Brad to see how they were taking the news. They had gone quite pale.

“
I couldn’t afford a real doctor after your father left me,” she said defensively.

Ah, we were back to his leaving rather than dying.

“Gary Anderson made me a deal,” she continued.

“
Mom,” Rick said softly, calling her
mom
instead of Marissa for the first time I’d heard, “how did you pay Gary Anderson for our vasectomies?”

“
In the only currency I had available,” she snapped. “I was just trying to do the right thing for my boys. I didn’t want you to end up with a bunch of kids to support.”

“
Like you did?”

“
I did what I had to do.” She glared at him defiantly.

What a family.

I made myself a mental note to call my mother and invite her and dad over for dinner then create a special chocolate treat just for them. There are dysfunctional families, and then there are DYSFUNCTIONAL families.

“
I hate to break up this family reunion,” Fred said, “but I need to see you in private, Rick. This will just take a few minutes.”

Like a zombie, Rick moved across the patio and into the house. More entertainment. I followed.

Fred sat down at the small kitchen table and flipped his folder open. I recognized my divorce papers.

“
Where did you get those?” I asked.

“
From Jason.”

“
My lawyer? Is Jason a member of…?” I looked at Rick who was still standing, apparently in shock from becoming a new father. “You know, the Donato people.”

“
Of course not. Please sit down, Rick. We need to go over some details before you sign these documents.”

Rick blinked a couple of times then looked at the papers. He sank into a chair but shook his head.
“No, I’m not signing. I’ve had a lot of time to think, and I realize how important you are to me, Lindsay. Look at my family. You see what I’ve had to overcome. Anything good I’ve done with my life has been because of you.”