Chapter 11
Tucker
You never turn your back on the client, and you always know what’s going on with them, no matter what else you’re doing.
That’s why I’m watching Autumn so closely as she smiles and laughs and hugs her sister—which is how I notice the woman who’s tucked herself behind the big, possibly fake plant near the two sisters.
She has a feather duster in one hand, and she dusts the broad leaves of the plant one by one, but her eyes are on the conversation.
Listening. Watching.
“If you’ll excuse me a second,” I say to Lola. I get up from the couch and take a step toward Autumn and Summer, but before I can get any closer, the woman behind the plant clocks me. Her eyes widen, and she hurries away.
I know her.
She works at Blue Iron Mining; I ran into her one time in the records room there. I was digging for evidence that there was some connection between Blue Iron and the sabotage my siblings and I had been experiencing.
I start to follow her through the lodge lobby, but she’s moving fast, and as I get close to the sliding doors at the front, I realize I can’t leave Autumn behind.
Not because I’m afraid she’s in actual danger—not surrounded by her family members—but because we have AirTags on us, and Weggers is watching.
Always watching, Wazowski, I hear Roz from Monsters, Inc. say.
I would like Weggers to be played by Roz in the movie about our lives.
“Hey,” someone says behind me, and I turn to find Autumn there. “What was that about?” She twists one hand in the other, obviously nervous. Of course she noticed.
“Nothing,” I lie.
“Maybe she’s my stalker,” she says.
I shake my head. “She’s not your stalker. She’s local. I recognize her.”
“That doesn’t mean she’s not my stalker.”
I sigh. I have two choices here. I can keep her in the dark—which feels wrong—or I can tell her that her “stalker” isn’t the only potential troublemaker in play.
“There’s some backstory here,” I tell her.
Her eyebrows go up. “Backstory?”
“Yeah. You know how all my brothers have already done their will things?”
She nods.
“Well, every time, there’s been some kind of…sabotage attempt.”
Her eyes widen. “Seriously?”
“Yeah. If we don’t get the land, it goes to Blue Iron Mining. And all of us think that someone there has been trying to undermine our efforts and keep us from holding on to the land. That woman, the one who ran away just now, she works for Blue Iron.”
“And you think she might be—”
“I think she might at least be able to tell me what’s going on.
And this is the first link I’ve found. I haven’t been able to connect Blue Iron with anything that’s happened.
Lately I’ve switched to trying to find a motive—something on our land that they want, some evidence that they pursued buying the land after they first made overtures to Granddad about it ten years ago—anything that would suggest that they have a reason to sabotage us.
So far, nothing.” I sigh. “That said, even if they don’t have explicit designs on the land, it’s worth millions of dollars.
They could sell it, and it would be straight profit.
But even that…I haven’t been able to find any sign that they’re seeking buyers or developers.
Nothing. No link whatsoever between the company and the sabotage. ”
“But you think this woman might know. Why and how—and who?”
“Yes.”
“So let’s go talk to her!” Autumn says.
I stare at her. I wasn’t expecting that. I’m not sure if it’s the suggestion that we confront the woman or the us in let’s that feels more startling.
She throws her arms out. “I mean, you’re not going to let her walk away, are you?”
I had been going to do exactly that, had been intending to send my brother Quinn to talk to her, but now that she mentions it, I would so much rather do it myself.
“Doesn’t your sister need you?” I ask.
“She said she was going to go up and take a long nap so she’ll be in better shape for the welcome party tonight. Now’s the perfect time for us to disappear for a while.” She frowns at me. “What? You’re looking at me like I have two heads.”
If Autumn and I disappear together now, her whole family is going to think we’re upstairs…
I force that thought out of my head. What we won’t be doing upstairs is not important. Finding out who’s fucking with my family is important.
And apparently Autumn is willing to help.
“I wasn’t…I don’t know…I wasn’t expecting you to want to help with this.”
“Well,” she says, smiling, “I have to defy at least some of your expectations.”
The receptionist at Blue Iron is named Maida Stevens. We went to high school together, and now she greets me like a long-lost brother.
If someone at Blue Iron is responsible for sabotaging our bid to keep our land, I would put money on the fact that Maida knows nothing about it.
We weren’t close friends, but I was a football player and she was a cheerleader, so our circles overlapped.
She’s good people, married now to another high school football player, with two kids.
“Maida, this is”—I hesitate, but in for a penny, in for a pound—“my girlfriend, Autumn Sato.”
“Oh, hey, Autumn,” Maida says. “Nice to meet you.”
She listens to my description of the woman (“five-two, blond, dark-eyed, probably works in the records department here”) and shakes her head.
“You’re talking about Sienna Calder. She used to work here, but she doesn’t anymore.”
“Do you know where I could find her?”
Maida shakes her head. “Sorry. I wasn’t close with her.”
“Okay,” I say. “Thanks.”
“Bummer,” Autumn says once we’re outside again. “Dead lead?”
“Not in this town,” I say.
I send a text to the Everyone chat which includes my siblings, their new girlfriends and fiancées and wives, and all of the Wilders—Hanna’s husband Easton’s siblings and their families (in case someone wants to get together a game of soccer or flag football or Wiffle Ball).
Not that I ever participate in those shows of family togetherness—but I do have the thread—muted—on my phone.
Anyone know where we could find a woman named Sienna Calder right now?
Three minutes later, I have a text back with the name of a gift shop in town. It pays to be part of the grapevine, even if most of the time the text threads make me want to drop my phone in the toilet.
“She’s in the back,” Autumn says, peeking into the window of Girls’ Night Out Gifts. “She’s in the corner. If you come up the farthest left aisle and I come across the back, we’ll trap her between us.”
I goggle at her, impressed.
“What?” she asks. “I watch TV.”
“You’re more…sneaky than I was expecting.”
“I have lots of talents,” she says.
I don’t think she means it to be slightly suggestive, but my brain registers it that way anyway. Brains are seriously the worst. Sometimes I think my dick knows the score better.
I stride up the far left aisle, Autumn wraps around, and we come up on either side of Sienna, who appears to be deciding between two different greeting cards.
“What the…?” Sienna asks, then realizes it’s us and sags against the back wall of the shop, caught.
“You know what. What were you doing at the hotel?” I ask.
“Working,” she says. “I have two jobs, and that’s one of them.”
“So you ran away from your job.”
“My shift was over.”
“But you desperately needed to dust that fig tree.”
“Elephant ear,” she corrects. “It was very dusty. Do I need to call the police?”
I shrug. “If you want.”
Bluff called; she sags again. “I have no idea why you’re doing this to me, confronting me in a gift store. But it seems a little—aggressive.”
“It does feel more aggressive than I was expecting it to,” Autumn admits. “But we’re not going to hurt you. Tucker just has some questions for you.”
“Don’t I have the right not to self-incriminate?” she asks.
“I think that’s only for when you actually get arrested,” Autumn says. “And we’re not in any position to do that. Tucker just wants to know about your connection to Blue Iron Mining.”
Sienna looks relieved. “I don’t have a connection to Blue Iron Mining. I used to work there, and they fired me.”
I shift my weight from one foot to the other, weighing how to get information from her without giving away too much of my own. “I’ve been trying to figure out if Blue Iron has any…interest in my family’s land.”
She shrugs. “Nothing that I know of. I never heard anyone at Blue Iron mention your family or the land.”
“Ever see anything in the records in reference to my family or the land?”
“Nope,” she says. “And I practically had those puppies memorized.”
I sigh. Looks like this is another dead end. But I have one more question for her.
“If you were just dusting that plant in the hotel lobby, why did you run away when I approached you?”
Sienna tilts her head up to look me straight in the face. “Have you seen yourself, dude? You’re scary.”