Chapter Fourteen
Cara spotted the enormous luxury SUV parked in the drive from a quarter mile out. She fixed her sights on it, opening up the throttle and clenching her jaw to keep from clacking her teeth on every rut and ridge hidden beneath browning grass and fallen leaves.
Paul Stanton. Paul Stanton. She’d known the man all her days, but for the life of her, she could not form a picture of him. Brown hair—probably grayish brown now. Brown eyes? Probably. Her overriding recollection of the man was he was bland. Handsome enough in a conventional way.
Neat. For some reason, she recalled shirts pressed to a crisp, khaki pants with knife-edge pleats and loafers polished to a high gloss. In other words, the polar opposite of her ruggedly handsome if not a bit rumpled and work-worn father.
It was no wonder her mother had dumped Mr. Permanent Pressed for her father.
“Gah!” she cried when she hit a bump so hard the rear of the gator skittered to the side. She let off the gas until she regained control, then hit it again the moment she felt all four wheels were under her.
The pearly white SUV parked behind her father’s mud-spattered pickup gleamed in the afternoon sunlight. She squinted when the shining chrome trim tossed sunlight back at her. She took pleasure in skidding to a stop right beside the hulking vehicle, sending up a plume of dust and gravel she hoped marred the sparkling paint job.
She killed the engine and leaped from the ATV. She was skirting the back of Paul Stanton’s vehicle when she slid to an abrupt stop. Parked beside the massive car was another. This one low-slung and sleek. A matte silver with an all-too-familiar profile. Hurrying to the rear of the sports car, she knew what she would find.
Missouri plates.
The driver who’d been in such a hurry on the highway had been swerving in and out of traffic, endangering the lives of other drivers so he could get here faster.
Here. To her parents’ little ranch in the Ozarks. Her safe haven. The place she could hide out without anyone knowing where she was. No one except Paul Stanton.
Cara reached into the back pocket of her jeans for her phone but came up empty.
Cringing, she darted a glance at the field she’d sped across to get to them. She had no doubt Wyatt would be hot on her heels, but he would have to come around via the farm and county roads. She couldn’t wait for him. Wouldn’t. She was the one who’d brought this madness to her mother and father’s doorstep. She would be the one to stop it.
Rolling her shoulders back, she circled the corner of the house and came up the front walk. Only then did she register the steady stream of gruff, rhythmic barks. Roscoe, bless him, was standing at attention, his forehead furrowed with concern and the hair on his back standing on end, barking to be let inside to inspect the newcomers.
Walking softly, Cara crooned the old dog’s name as she climbed the shallow steps. She scratched behind his floppy ears, then pressed her forehead to his to calm him. “Who’s in there, boy? Bad guys? Guys with bad hair? Why was Mama talking all funny, huh?”
The dog sat at her feet, his hindquarters hitting the deck with a thump.
“Don’t worry. I’ll get ’em. You stay here and tell Wyatt where we’re at, okay?”
Creeping off the porch, she circled around to the kitchen door. Her mother had hung sheets out to dry in the sun. Cara pictured the state-of-the-art washer-dryer set in the laundry room sitting idle while Betsy Beckett’s linens snapped in the autumn breeze. She could make out the muffled hum of conversation coming from the kitchen, but was too short to catch a peek through the window over the sink.
As quietly as she could, she took the two steps up the back stoop and pressed the button on the screen-door handle.
The click of the latch opening might as well have been a shotgun blast.
Cara froze, tensing every muscle in her body. She listened intently, but no one inside spoke. She bit the inside of her cheek, figuring she’d give it to the count of five before she proceeded.
She only made it to three.
“Well, hello there, Cara.”
She looked up to find Paul Stanton smiling down at her beneficently from the screened back porch. He looked incongruous standing there next to the chest freezer, amid a jumble of discarded boots, rain and cold weather gear and the motley collection of half-dead houseplants her mother refused to give up on entirely.
The man who greeted her lived up to her recollections. His hair was indeed brown, but the close-cropped helmet now sported sleek silvery sidewalls. The buttons on his starched shirt strained across a round drum of a belly. He smiled down at her, but no warmth reached his dark eyes.
“Your mama was under the impression you were headin’ down to Little Rock to catch a flight, but my friend couldn’t locate any information about a flight booked, so we thought we’d hang around a bit to see if maybe you’d changed your mind. Again.” He pressed the flat of his palm to the screen door, and she stumbled back a step as it swung open. “Come on in. We’ve been waiting for you to get home.”
She took two steps back, her sneakered feet crunching the leaves gathered along the side of the porch. “Who’s we?”
He flashed a wide politician’s smile. “Why don’t you come in and we’ll all chat a bit. Your mama has poured us all a glass of her delicious sweet tea.”
Riled by his ingratiating tone, she stood her ground. “Who? What friend? What are you doing here?”
“We came to talk to you, is all. From what I hear, you can be a very difficult young lady to pin down.”
“Cara, honey, you go on,” her mother called from inside the house. “I don’t want you to miss—Oh!”
The surprise and distress Cara heard in her mother’s sharp cry set her in motion. Running up the steps, she brushed past Paul Stanton and his smarmy smile and charged into the kitchen. “Mama!”
Three steps into the room she drew up short. Zarah Parvich was standing in her parents’ kitchen, her feet planted wide and her expression disconcertingly businesslike as she pressed the muzzle of a gun to Cara’s father’s temple. “Hello, Cara. Looks like you missed your flight again,” she said without rancor.
Cara raised both hands in a gesture of surrender. “Zarah? Why are you pointing a gun at my father?”
“Hey, now, no one said anything about pointin’ guns at people,” Paul Stanton said, his forced laugh ringing hollow in the tense room.
The other woman hitched her shoulder in a shrug. “I needed to get your attention.”
“Okay. You’ve got it,” Cara said. “Can you lower the gun now?”
She fixated on the semiautomatic pistol in the woman’s hand. It was strange to see a gun out in the open after living in Southern California for so long. She wasn’t far into her freshman year when she learned to keep her mouth shut about horses, heifers and handguns. Almost everyone she knew was virulently anti-gun. Everyone except Zarah, apparently. Thankfully, the other woman complied.
She choked down the sob of relief squeezing her throat. “You okay, Daddy?”
“I’m fine, sugar,” her father responded, his voice even and steady. “Got work to do, though. Not that he would know a darn thing about an honest day’s labor,” he added, jerking his chin in Paul Stanton’s direction.
“Hey, now—” Stanton began, grabbing hold of his tooled leather belt and hiking his pants as he stepped forward.
“How dare you, Paul Stanton?” Betsy Beckett said in a low, tremulous voice. “What kind of trouble have you brought into my home?”
“Elizabeth, I swear—” Stanton began, but Cara raised a hand to stop him.
“We can get into the hows and whys later.” Turning to Zarah, she scowled at the gun then the sharp-featured young woman who held it. “What do you want?”
“I want what everyone wants,” Zarah said as if the answer should have been obvious. “I want what people have been telling you for weeks. I want you out.”
“What’s it to you?” Cara shot back.
With a huff of impatience, Zarah rolled her eyes. “Oh, I plan to have a vested interest.”
Cara looked everywhere but at the back door. The last thing she wanted to do was tip Zarah off to Wyatt’s imminent arrival. She took in the familiar kitchen, the ancient wood napkin holder bracketed by salt and pepper shakers, the iron skillet wiped clean and waiting on the stovetop, the café curtains Grandma June had helped her make for a Mother’s Day gift.
The refrigerator’s compressor hummed, undercutting the tension in the room. Drawing a steadying breath, Cara forced herself to meet Zarah’s gaze. “What interest?”
“She said she’s engaged to Tom Wasinski,” Paul Stanton chimed in. When her mother shot him a filthy look, the man took an involuntary step back. “I’m sorry, Elizabeth, but Wasinski could be a deep-pockets donor and if I run for Senate, I want him on my side. His company is about to go public.”
The Beckett family turned to glare at him as one. If her expression was one-tenth as incredulous as her father’s, Paul Stanton had to feel lower than an earthworm.
“I always knew you were about as stiff as a fence post, Stanton, but I never realized you were as dense as one,” Jim Beckett grumbled. “Our Cara is an equal partner in their company. Her pockets are every bit as deep as either of those two fellas.”
“Now, Jim,” Betsy began, long accustomed to stepping between the two men.
“Not for long,” Zarah said. She pointed the muzzle of the gun to a plain manila folder on the small dining table. “Cara’s about to get out of the business.”
Cara wanted to bask in the warmth of her father’s pride, but the glint of sunlight off gunmetal made it difficult to enjoy the moment. “You are not engaged to Tom,” she said flatly.
“Well, not technically engaged,” Zarah conceded. “But once you sign these papers, I’ll be able to hook up with him, you know, as an equal, and he won’t have to worry about whether he’s ‘technically’ connected to my employment,” she said, using a single set of air quotes to dismiss the excuse Tom must have used to rebuff her.
But Cara knew the two weren’t and never had been involved. In one of the few confidences they’d shared recently, Tom had confessed he was deeply, but quietly, involved with a woman he’d met on a tech-free weekend yoga retreat he’d attended months ago. One Cara herself had recommended and Zarah had booked. Could it be the mystery woman in Tom’s life actually was Zarah? She racked her memory for a name, but couldn’t recall him disclosing one.
Cara wondered if she’d missed something big in her old friend’s life, or if the young woman she’d trusted with hers was delusional.
“How long have you and Tom been involved?” she asked, her approach cautious.
“We talk all the time.” Zarah smiled smugly, pulling her long ponytail over her shoulder with her free hand and stroking it as if she was settling in for some girl talk rather than holding Cara’s loved ones at gunpoint. “I know he feels like he can’t let things evolve as they stand now, but together, we’re going to take LYYF to the next level.”
Cara could only hope Zarah had forgotten there was a special agent with the Arkansas State Police staying with them.
“What about Chris?” Cara asked, anxious to keep her engaged.
“Chris won’t be a problem. Everyone knows he’s going to take the money and run the minute he can cash in.” She tipped her chin up. “You and Chris never cared about what it took to keep the company going. Tom is the brains behind it all.”
“Tom doesn’t create content,” Cara pointed out.
Zarah gave an indelicate snort. “Like it’s difficult.” She rolled her eyes. “I’ve been helping you churn that stuff out for years. Besides, I’m a better actress. I’ve booked more roles than you have in half the time in Hollywood.”
“I talked to you this morning,” Cara said, stalling for time. “How did you get here so fast?”
The younger woman rolled her eyes. “It’s not like it was difficult to figure out you were stalling. Plus, TSA’s system is ridiculously easy to hack. I’ve been waiting to see if you boarded a plane going anywhere. When you changed your flight, I booked one to Dallas. When you didn’t turn up, I hopped a flight to Springfield, Missouri, and drove down.” She pursed her lips. “I guess it’s pretty enough with the trees and all, but there’s not much around here.” She wrinkled her nose in distaste. “And it’s so run-down.” She glanced over at Paul Stanton. “You might get more people to visit if things didn’t look so...poor.”
Paul opened his mouth to protest, but Cara spoke first. “So what do you expect to happen here today?”
Without missing a beat, Zarah pointed the gun at Cara’s mother’s chest. “I expect you to sign over your partnership.”
Her father half rose from his chair and Paul Stanton bumbled forward with a hearty “Hey, now—”
Zarah swung the gun from one man to the other and they both subsided, hands raised. Moving closer to the table, Cara placed herself between Zarah and her mother. She was the target here, not her parents. Cara had to make certain Zarah kept her eye on the prize.
“Who am I signing it over to? You?” Cara asked, trying to keep her tone curious rather than accusatory.
“Yes. Sign it over to me, and I will let Tom know we can be together now. Equal partners,” Zarah said with a decisive nod. Her pretty face brightened. “I mean, it’s not like this is what you wanted to do with your life, right? And if you still want to be involved, maybe we can pay you a salary or something.”
Cara glanced down to see her father staring at her intently. He cut his eyes to the window, and it was all she could do to keep from looking over. Wyatt must be out there. Please let him be out there. She needed to buy time.
“It was you, wasn’t it?” she said softly.
“What was?” Zarah asked, squinting as if confused by the non sequitur.
“All of it. The doxing. The messages. All the...stuff.” She closed her eyes, willing herself to hold it together as the pieces fell into place. “You did it.”
“Oh, that,” Zarah said with a dismissive laugh. She shrugged. “I put some info out there, but the rest... I didn’t have to do much.”
“Except have me kidnapped,” Cara interjected.
“Oh, well, technically, you paid for that yourself. Good thing you never look at your account statements, huh?” She wrinkled her nose. “Anyway, didn’t go as expected. He was only supposed to take you somewhere and scare you into signing.”
“Now he’s dead,” Cara said flatly.
“Yeah, well, not my fault. He shouldn’t have taken the job if he couldn’t handle the pressure.” Zarah exhaled in a put-upon whoosh. “I guess I learned a good lesson on outsourcing.”
Cara fixated on the gun dangling from Zarah’s hand like an afterthought. She didn’t look like she had much experience handling firearms. She certainly hadn’t been taught how to handle one safely. She was waving what looked like a small nine millimeter around like it was a water pistol. And what if Wyatt came through the door and startled her? She could accidentally shoot any one of them.
Drawing on every acting lesson she’d ever had, Cara forced herself to look into Zarah’s eyes with what she hoped were eyes filled with hope and optimism. “You know this was never what I expected to do with my life,” she began, faking a quaver into her voice. “I don’t know how I got this far off track.” She bumped her mother with her hip, signaling the older woman to scoot her chair away. She pointed to the folder on the table. “What is this?”
“It’s an agreement to transfer your partnership shares,” Zarah said, her customary chipper efficiency slipping back into place. “And you’ve always been really nice to work with, Cara. I’m not going to leave you high and dry. Once the public offering goes through and prices are up, I’ll cover you. In today’s cash value, of course,” she added.
“Of course,” Cara murmured.
Out front, Roscoe gave a woof of greeting and they all turned. Zarah swung the gun around when a floorboard creaked. “Sounds like your hot cop is still hanging around after all,” she said, turning back to press the muzzle into the dusty folds of her father’s Carhartt jacket. “Tell him to join us,” she called out in a louder voice. “But be sure to tell him I’m holding your sweet daddy at gunpoint.”
“Wyatt, if that’s you, Zarah is here and she has a gun,” Cara called out robotically.
“I’m coming in, and I am not holding a gun,” he announced before stepping into the doorway, his hands raised. To Cara’s disappointment, he wasn’t lying. There was no sign of a weapon in Special Agent Wyatt Dawson’s hand.
“Some cop you got yourself there,” Zarah scoffed. “He’s got a kind of hot-nerd vibe going on. Too bad he couldn’t come in busting down the doors to save you.”
Cara raised her eyebrows. “He’s a cybercrime guy. I’m not sure kicking in doors is their thing. He tells me they barely leave the office.”
She shot Wyatt an apologetic glance and he made a point of scowling at her. But the glint in his eyes was keen and bright. He wasn’t insulted, nor did he seem to be worried. Which made exactly one of them. Had he somehow called for backup? How long would it take someone to get there? Their eyes held for a moment and a veil of calm settled around her shoulders. He wasn’t freaking out over a woman who was clearly suffering some sort of break waving a very real gun around like a toy. She wouldn’t either.
“So what’s the situation?” Wyatt asked, his tone casual, almost disinterested.
“We’re talking business,” Zarah snapped.
“Talking business with a gun pointed at a person?” Wyatt asked smoothly. “Isn’t asking someone to sign legal documents at gunpoint coercion?”
Cara shot him a quelling look. “Don’t you worry about it. Wasn’t I telling you I was thinking about doing something different with my career? Well, Zarah is here and we’re talking about making a deal.”
“A deal in which she fronts zero dollars, and you sign everything over?” her father asked with an incredulous laugh.
“I’m going to pay her once the stock offering is complete. Tom and I can combine our shares, pay Cara for her time and efforts to this point and still have controlling interest in the company.”
“Sounds like you have it all figured out.” Cara nudged her mother with her knee, but Betsy didn’t budge. “Mama, you still keep extra pens in your junk drawer?”
When she looked down, her mother was staring at her with naked disbelief. When she spoke, all traces of syrupy sweetness were long gone from Betsy Beckett’s voice. “You can’t seriously be considering signing those papers.”
Cara shifted so Zarah couldn’t see the silent stare-down between her and her mother. “Mama, I know what I’m doing.” She thought of the old handgun her granddad kept in the kitchen drawer of the old house. Cara knew it made the move to this one along with Grandma June’s cast-iron skillet. She’d seen it in the back of the junk drawer. “I know you and Daddy have never approved of what I do. Here’s my chance to start over. I can have all my time back to pursue acting...real acting. All I need to do is sign on the dotted line and this will be all over.”
“How do we know?” Betsy demanded. “How do we know she won’t shoot us all?”
Zarah looked aghast at the suggestion. “You think I like doing this? I hate it. I’m not one of you hillbilly gun nuts,” she snarled. “All I want is my share of LYYF and I’ll be out of here.”
Cara grabbed the folder again and waved it like a flag of surrender. “Fine. You know what? I’m tired of this. I want my life back. My actual life-life. The one I plan on living.” She flipped over the folder and dumped the papers out onto the table.
She took the seat across from her father and Zarah and pulled the papers closer. “Mama, please grab me a pen, would you? If I know you, you’ve got at least six or seven of them you swiped from Buck’s stashed in there,” she said, naming a local gunsmith’s shop.
It was both a request and a prod. The moment she met her mother’s fiery gaze she knew the message had been received. With a small nod, Betsy rose and walked stiffly to the drawer on the far side of the stove.
It was time to show her know-it-all assistant from California how hillbillies from run-down little towns in the Ozarks settled their disputes.
She pretended to reread the first page of the documents, her shoulders tensing as she heard her mother rustling through the drawer behind her. “So, how will you work the transfer of funds?” she asked, pitching her voice low so Zarah would be forced to focus on her.
“Crypto?” the other woman replied with a cheeky smile.
Cara snorted. “Nope. Cash.”
“I’ll wire transfer it to you.” Zarah flashed a dimpling smile. “It’ll be easy. I already know all your account numbers.”
“Yeah, I may need to rework some of those things,” Cara murmured, keeping her head down as the rummaging continued behind her. “Mama? You find me a pen?”
“Hold your horses. I’m looking for one that works.” To emphasize her point, Betsy tossed a cheap plastic ballpoint to the floor in disgust. “I have got to clean this mess out one day.”
“Sounds like you need an assistant, Mrs. Beckett,” Zarah chirped.
“Maybe so,” her mother murmured. The sifting of clutter finally ceased, and Cara glanced over her shoulder to see her mother reach up and carefully tuck her hair behind her ear, clearing her peripheral vision. “I’m not finding a decent ink pen, but I did find this.”
With one fluid move, Betsy Beckett swung around to face the young woman, her father-in-law’s old service pistol in her hand and a grim expression hardening her pretty features. “Drop the gun.”
Zarah’s eyes widened. “No,” she snapped, jabbing her gun into Jim Beckett’s ribs so hard he let out a soft grunt. “This is my plan. We’re going to do things my way,” she insisted, her voice climbing with agitation.
“Oh, God,” Paul Stanton blurted. Both of his arms raised, he turned toward the front door. Seeing Wyatt in the doorway, he stopped short. “This is too much. It’s all too far out of hand.”
“You think?” Wyatt asked, unperturbed.
Cara looked up as the lieutenant governor switched directions, then dithered, his arms flailing. “I have to get out of here. I can’t be here. I was never here,” he babbled.
“Could have sworn I saw you,” Wyatt replied, his voice a life preserver of quiet and calm amid the melee.
“I can have your badge,” Paul Stanton threatened, spittle flying from his mouth.
“You can try,” Wyatt challenged. “But from where I’m standing, it doesn’t look good for you, Mr. Stanton.”
“You drop your gun,” Zarah demanded, stepping back from Cara’s father and training her sights on Betsy instead.
You chose incorrectly , Cara thought as her mother released the safety on her weapon.
“You terrorize my daughter, point a gun at my husband and track your muddy shoes on my kitchen floor and you think you get to give the orders here?” Betsy demanded, widening her stance. “I don’t think so, honey.”
Out of the corner of her eye Cara saw Wyatt lowering his hands. He was cool as a cucumber. It gave her the confidence she needed to end this farce once and for all.
Meeting Zarah’s eyes, she spoke slowly and deliberately. “Lower the gun now, or I will never sign this. Mama, you too,” she added. “I mean it. Everyone, lower the guns now.”
“You mean everyone but me, right?” Wyatt asked, drawing his weapon from its holster at the small of his back as he closed the distance between him and Zarah.
Zarah’s head whipped around in surprise, but his aim didn’t waver as he took hold of her wrist with his left hand, expertly squeezing at the precise pressure point to make her release her grip. The gun she’d been waving around dropped to the floor as he twisted her arm behind her back.
“Zarah Parvich, you are under arrest. You have the right...”
Cara sat frozen, unable to tear her gaze away from the sight of Wyatt holding both of Zarah’s empty hands behind her back.
“Cara, can I ask a favor?” Wyatt asked politely.
“Uh-huh,” she said, and nodded.
“I left my coat on the living room floor. I have some zip tie restraints in the inside pocket. Grab a couple for me?”
“Sure,” she replied as she rose.
“I’m leaving,” Paul Stanton announced.
He took two steps toward the front room and without thinking, Cara snatched Grandma June’s skillet from the stovetop and swung. She aimed for his body and not his head, wanting to slow the man, not kill him.
But the lieutenant governor wasn’t the least bit grateful for her forethought. Cursing a blue streak, Stanton fell against the fridge, then crumpled to the floor, clutching his right arm.
“Excuse me, Uncle Paul,” she said with a sneer as she stepped over his legs. “I think we’d like you to stay a bit longer.”
On the opposite side of the room, Jim jumped up from his chair and hurried to embrace his wife. “Girl didn’t know who she was messing with,” he murmured into her hair.
Her mother gave a watery laugh. “I’m a regular Dirty Harriet,” she said, burrowing in.
Cara carried Wyatt’s coat back into the kitchen and her mother looked up, shaking her head. “Holy cow, girl, I can’t believe you remembered this gun.” Betsy wiped her eyes with the heels of her hands. “I doubt it’s had a bullet in the chamber in the last twenty years. How did you know it was still there?”
“I saw it the other day when I was looking for a pen,” Cara said with a smirk. “You’ve got everything in the world in there except a working ink pen.” Holding Wyatt’s jacket by the collar, she turned her attention to him. “What are you carrying in here? It weighs a ton.”
“Nothing much. Flashlight, pepper spray, flex cuffs, extra magazines, a collapsible baton,” he said offhandedly. “Standard desk jockey stuff.”
She pulled two zip ties from the deep inner pocket and handed one over. Zarah stood, unresisting, her head bowed, her lips clamped shut. Once she was cuffed, Wyatt guided her to a spot on the floor against the wall where she sat silently weeping.
Cara watched as he used the end of the other plastic strap to pick the discarded gun up off the floor. He deposited the weapon on the kitchen table, then looked from Cara to the woman on the tile floor.
“I called for backup from state police and the sheriff’s department before I came inside. They should be here shortly. You okay to keep an eye on her while I see to our esteemed lieutenant governor?” he asked.
“I am,” Cara responded. And to her surprise, it was true.
Lowering herself to the floor in front of the woman who’d turned her world upside down, she whispered, “Okay. Okay. Easy. Deep breaths, Zarah. Breathe in...”