Chapter 13 #2
She watched him and asked, “Is he a search and rescue dog?”
“No, but all dogs have an innate ability to do so much more than we do. Believe me that I’m keeping an eye on Khan.” As he went farther through the house and into the kitchen, he stopped and looked at her.
Checking out the whole mess, she nodded. “Looks like somebody was in here, making food.”
He glanced around and replied, “Or it’s leftover from yesterday.”
She shook her head. “That teakettle,” she noted, walking over and placing a hand gently on the side, “it’s still warm.” She heard the stillness come over him as he nodded.
“Now that changes things.” He walked over, checked the teakettle for himself, and then asked, “The dogs, were they out there before? I haven’t been around here much, so you would know more than I do.”
“No,” she replied, shaking her head. “They were locked in the yard, and now they appear to be out in a pasture set back from the yard, and they are still barking.”
Whether it was at them or at something else, she couldn’t tell. Now, as far as he was concerned, with all the animals upset, definitely something was going on.
He looked down at Khan, still glaring at the world around him, as if liking nothing here. He’d stopped growling, but it was obvious he was still not happy. As he studied the dog’s actions, she walked over and checked on the dogs out the window.
“They’re racing back and forth at the gate, but I’m not sure what’s got them disturbed.” Then again her own were not happy either, racing around the two of them as if also unsure of what was happening.
“With Oliver taken from here and all the activity with the deputies and the ambulance,” he explained, “any and all of that could have had a huge effect on the dogs. It doesn’t look like they’re starving, but it also doesn’t look like they have access to their regular food.
” He frowned. “Oliver told me to just put out food on the back deck for them.”
“Which means, as far as Oliver’s concerned, the dogs should be out back,” she declared, turning to him.
“And that, along with the hot teakettle, implies that somebody else has been here.” She looked at him and asked, “You don’t think the deputies would have made themselves at home or would have moved the animals? ”
“No. They may have moved the animals, but they were already outside. So short of their having to go into the backyard, it’s not likely they moved the animals at all.
And they wouldn’t have made a cup of tea.
… Plus, I’m pretty sure they’ve been gone for a while, and there’s no sign of any vehicles around here. ”
“So, whoever is here didn’t bring a vehicle,” she began, “or didn’t park it where we could see it.” He nodded, and she could tell that, whatever this was, Ashton didn’t like it at all.
“Stay here.”
“No,” she snapped. He frowned at her, and she shook her head. “Not happening. This time, you need to make sure that I stay with you. I don’t like anything about this.”
“Neither do I,” he agreed, “but I want to check if a vehicle is outside because that would tell us if anybody is here.”
“Not if they walked,” she pointed out. “I know we can ride over here, but it’s not that far of a walk either, particularly if they go kitty-corner and don’t follow the truck tracks that we followed earlier. That’s what took us a little bit longer.”
“You’re right,” he agreed, as he studied the area.
“So, what we don’t know is whether we have somebody else here or not.”
“Well, we do know that we’ve surprised somebody,” he pointed out, “and that is a concern.”
Just then someone spoke behind them, and he stiffened, recognizing the voice. He turned slowly to see Jenny standing there, with a long-ass rifle in her hands.
Ashton stared at Jenny and saw what he’d been missing all this time.
He felt the pain and shock coming from Crystal right beside him.
Khan growled low and deep in the back of his throat.
Piper walked over casually to Jenny, of course they were long time family so Piper and Joe might not understand who really the viper was here.
Jenny turned the rifle in his direction.
Ashton placed a hand on Khan’s shoulders, the movement telling him to wait.
Ashton’s gaze remained locked on Jenny. “Did you really do that to Grandpa?” he asked, calm and cool.
After what happened to Grandpa and his grandmother wreaking havoc on his life, nothing surprised him much.
But, even after all that, this betrayal cut deep.
Jenny shrugged. “I didn’t have much choice. I am glad you found him though. I wasn’t sure what to do when the ketamine caused him such a problem.”
“What did you expect it to do?”
“I wanted to talk with him and make him see sense.”
“What kind of sense?”
She hesitated, then shared, “He had already told me that the property was broke and that there was no money for me anymore. He went on to say that I wouldn’t get a pension and that I wouldn’t get a home to stay in.
He told me that I could blame his wife for that, but, honest to God, I thought he was just lying. ”
Ashton snorted. “He wasn’t.”
“Oh, I know that now, but only after you told me the truth did I realize how wrong I was,” she shared, her hands trembling slightly. There was a hitch in her voice as she realized just how drastic her own actions had become.
He stared at her and sighed. “So, you kidnapped him and got him upstairs in that loft room, all on your own, without any help?”
“I didn’t say that,” she stated. “I didn’t say that at all, but I didn’t have much help.”
Ashton shook his head. “The boys helped you, didn’t they?” When she remained silent, Ashton continued. “You bribed them too with owning this land, didn’t you?”
Jenny snapped, “I was promised a home here forever. I was looking after my own retirement. I took a lesson from Johanna on that.”
Ashton was so disappointed, didn’t want to know the worst about his family. Yet it had to be faced head-on. “And what about Oliver?”
“Oliver doesn’t know a thing,” she muttered, with a headshake. “And I don’t know where all this goes right now,” she added, “but I can tell you that he doesn’t know anything about it.”
“So you drugged Grandpa, then had the twins put him in a truck and drive him over to Oliver’s place?”
Jenny stared at him and smiled. “I may be old, but I’m not weak.
I may be poor, but I am resilient. Oliver had come over to the Nelson home and had quite a fight with Alexander about buying the property in dispute again.
So Oliver stomped off back home but called me almost immediately, asked me over, wanted to chat because he was having a hard time. ”
Ashton asked, “Why? About his brother passing, about Alexander, about the property?”
“Oliver’s got heart trouble,” she said, “takes certain medications, was worried about all this fighting and what it would do to his heart. He knew I used to be a nurse, so I guess he just wanted some reassurance that he would be okay. I made him some tea, settled him down. Oliver mentioned he still had some ketamine from his brother’s illness.
He didn’t know what to do with it, so I told him that I could dispose of it for him. ”
“And?” Ashton asked, frowning at her.
“I returned home and found Alexander half collapsed on the floor. I thought about moving him into the downstairs bedroom and but then realized I had a golden opportunity. I now had Max’s leftover ketamine.
So I gave Alexander a dose, according to his weight.
After all, that was part of my repertoire when I worked as a nurse. ”
“Along with kidnapping?” Ashton asked.
“I didn’t have to kidnap Alexander. I just had to move him,” she snapped, her tone sharp.
“I did enlist the twins to load him into their truck and drive him over to Oliver’s barn, but John refused to climb the ladder into the loft.
Idiot. Did you know that John is scared of heights?
” She harrumphed. “So Glenn got Alexander up the ladder and into that back room up there.”
“And how did you know about the hidden room?” Ashton asked, as he stared at the woman who he didn’t even know anymore. His home had become one giant petri dish of betrayal.
She smiled. “Because Max and I were lovers for a very long time.” He stared at her, and she nodded.
“I know, he’s a lot younger than I am, …
was younger than I am.” Her voice broke at that.
“But he was a good man. Only a few people knew about us, thought the two of us were oddities, and maybe we were. We preferred to be alone more than anything. Kind of like the twins,” she stated, with a nod toward Crystal.
“Max and I were going to move in together. He wanted to buy a big chunk of your grandpa’s place years ago, just for us, but Alexander backed out of it again and again.
At one point Johanna was willing to sell it to him, and we all knew about her gambling.
Max talked her into selling it to him so she could clear her debts, but Alexander blocked it once more.
” Jenny sighed. “Johanna didn’t know that I had anything to do with Alexander going missing. She just knew that he was missing.”
“So you were exacting revenge on both of them?” Crystal asked.
“Maybe I was.”
“But Ashton was taking care of it,” Crystal told her, frowning. Piper nudged her hand with her nose, the tone of voice upsetting her. Crystal instinctively dropped her hand to caress the top of her head, wanting to give reassurance but needing the contact with her dogs herself.
Jenny gave a one-arm shrug and sighed. “Oliver doesn’t know anything about my doing this,” she admitted, with a shrug, “but it was certainly convenient for Johanna to sell him the land.”
“You didn’t tell Oliver it wasn’t hers to sell?” Ashton asked, frowning.
“I wasn’t thinking of anything at that point, except looking for a way out myself.”
“So, you knew before I even told you that the place was mine?”