Chapter Six #2
James couldn’t help it.
“You save me from a bomb, I’ll make you a sandwich.”
Neither law enforcement officer chuckled, smiled or commented on that little joke. Instead, both tensed in unison. Their eyes met and James realized he didn’t like feeling left out.
He didn’t have to sit with the emotion for too long.
“What’s up, Liam?” Rose asked. “What happened while I was in the hospital? What did Darius find?”
James knew she was talking about Detective Darius Williams, the only detective in the McCoy County Sheriff’s Department, but he hadn’t seen the man yet.
Instead, all questioning and statements had been handled by the sheriff and a bomb tech and specialist sent from some city unit to investigate the explosion.
James had wondered if Darius was out of town or simply kept missing him.
Sheriff Weaver leaned forward. He pointed to James.
“Does him being in here with you mean you want him in here or do I need to escort him out?”
A flash of worry went through James. Then he felt a poke at his arm again.
“He’s apparently my plus-one,” she said. “You can just go ahead.”
The sheriff nodded. That flash of worry ebbed and was replaced by focus.
Weaver domed his fingers together as he rested his hands on the tabletop and dove in.
“For once, we found out a lot,” he started. “Instead of having to dig and dig to try and figure out the answer to a million mysteries all wrapped and tangled together, I think we actually have most of the facts now.”
Rose’s chair squeaked as she leaned forward. James knew he wasn’t blocking her line of vision to the sheriff because of where Weaver was sitting, but still James instinctively rolled back a little.
“You mean you know who planted the bomb?” she asked. “And why?”
The sheriff didn’t look like he wanted to nod but he did.
“Darius found one of the men who’d showed up at the garage before the bomb went off. He was hurt and suddenly very worried about life after death and the sins that might affect him after it was all said and done. He was…very forthcoming.”
The sheriff sighed.
There was no more dancing around it.
“You were targeted, Rose,” he said simply.
“Him, and the three other men, were told to follow you but keep their distance. They were also instructed to call a number if anyone looked like they were going to get into your car’s passenger seat.
Then they were supposed to record a video.
They didn’t know about the bomb, though, and only called the man who contracted them when they realized you were headed to the mechanic’s shop and figured he might have had something planned with the car itself.
He was extremely surprised when the bomb went off and the four of them fled the moment they could. ”
James didn’t realize his hand had curled into a fist until pain bit into his palm.
He didn’t dare say anything.
It was Rose’s show.
“Who hired them?” she asked. “And why my passenger’s seat?”
The sheriff’s jaw tensed. It seemed to pain him to bite out the name.
“It was Damon Tillman.”
James didn’t recognize the name, but Rose sure did. Her face seemed to drain of color. It was such a drastic change from what he was becoming used to that James reached his hand out under the table toward her.
His knuckles brushed the fabric of her sweatpants.
She didn’t react to it.
“Damon Tillman,” she repeated.
The sheriff nodded.
James waited for a follow-up explanation. The two of them simply stared in silence for a moment.
“Does anyone know where Damon is now?” Rose said after a moment.
Her calm voice grated on James. It didn’t seem appropriate for the topic, especially not when the sheriff was making no show of hiding his own anger.
“No. That’s what Darius has been doing. Trying to track him down. Four men were working for him and apparently not one of them can point us in any one direction. We just know he’s…around.”
A knock on the door timed eerily with his last words.
A woman with long braids and a very pregnant belly walked in after he called out. Her expression softened slightly as she swung a smile to him and Rose before her gaze fell on Weaver.
“I’m sorry for the interruption, but I need to see you for a minute,” she told him.
Sheriff Weaver seemed to split between alert and soft. He nodded.
“Excuse me,” he told them.
James belatedly recognized the woman as Blake, the sheriff’s wife, after they left.
That, in itself, was a feat considering his attention was so fully wrapped around whatever it was that Rose wasn’t saying.
Once the door was closed and it was just the two of them, James couldn’t stop himself. He fanned his hand out onto the thigh of Rose’s pants and patted twice.
“What’s up?” he asked. “Who is Damon Tillman?”
Rose stared straight ahead. She sighed out short.
“A consequence,” she said. “Mine, actually.”
James raised his eyebrow.
“Your consequence? For what?”
James kept his hand on her as the woman with a big attitude seemed to become incredibly small. He didn’t understand it. He didn’t like it.
If there had been more time, James might have taken a moment to wonder why he had gone from knowing of Wildcard Rose Little to needing to know her in such a short amount of time.
But, for the moment he was in, he gave all thoughts to her.
Rose shook her head. Pain contorted her face.
“For hesitating.”