Chapter 26 #2
Gabe might have his hand over Lucy’s ear, but Trent’s voice was out of control, and he didn’t want to risk her hearing the conversation. He lifted his hand. “Why don’t you sing to yourself, sweetie? How about your favorite, Jesus Loves Me?”
Her little voice rang out with her love for Jesus, and Gabe pressed his hand over her ear again then turned his attention back to Trent.
“This is all about you killing Kenna, isn’t it?
You made a mistake, and Lucy saw you. She can testify against you.
You can’t let her do that, but you don’t have it in your heart to end a child’s life, which is why you’ve kept her alive. ”
“Believe it or not, I didn’t really want to end anyone’s life.
Not even Kenna’s, but she wouldn’t leave things alone, and I wasn’t going to prison.
She agreed to meet with me in my office, and I tried to reason with her, but when she wouldn’t listen, I got mad.
Couldn’t let anybody at my office see how I felt, so I had to hold it in and let her go back to work.
Then I planned. Starting with taking Mason’s boat. ”
“You killed him too.”
“So what? He’d come to the dark side to help me and was going to die anyway. What was another month or two?”
Gabe wasn’t surprised by his callous regard for life. It seemed fitting with the selfish man they’d interviewed earlier. “And then you arranged for Kenna to meet you at the lake.”
“And I forced her off the road. Had no idea she’d bring the kid with her.
Added to my anger, and when the accident didn’t do the job for me, I saw red.
Grabbed Kenna by the neck and squeezed until she wasn’t breathing.
Took her to the lake and dumped her in. That’s what she deserved, you know. She should never have messed with me.”
Gabe was seeing red himself now and wanted to charge over and strangle Trent. He sucked in a breath and remained in place with Lucy, but he didn’t do nothing. He took what he hoped was an undetectable look over Trent’s shoulder. Movement. Shadows shifting. SWAT positioning their rifles. Good.
“And now we’re here!” Trent shouted. “Give me the kid or I shoot. Simple as that.”
“Sir, drop the weapon!” a SWAT officer shouted.
“Last warning!” another voice said.
“You don’t want to do this, Trent,” Gabe said, voice steady despite the adrenaline pounding through him. “It’s over.”
Trent’s finger dropped to the trigger.
The guy just might be stupid enough to fire even with multiple SWAT weapons locked on him. A shootout seemed inevitable.
Gabe couldn’t let Lucy be hit. He spun, putting his body between Lucy and Trent’s gun.
Time fractured.
A single crack split the air.
“Shots fired!” the team commander called out.
Knowing what was coming, Gabe dropped to the ground, twisting as he fell, shielding Lucy beneath him.
“Engage! Engage!” the commander shouted.
Gunfire erupted, sharp, deafening, controlled. Echoes of gun reports reverberated across the quiet lakeside property.
Gabe curled over Lucy, one hand cradling her head, the other braced against the ground. “You’re okay,” he muttered, though he couldn’t hear his own voice over the chaos. “You’re okay.”
Then—
Silence.
Abrupt. Heavy.
“Suspect down,” someone called.
“Hold! Hold!”
Boots thundered across the brick. Hands were on Gabe, lifting, checking. “You hit?”
He shook his head, breath ragged. “No. She’s…she’s good.”
Lucy clung to him, still shaking, but alive.
Gabe pressed his cheek briefly to her hair, eyes scanning ahead where Trent lay motionless.
“It’s over,” he said again, sitting up, but facing away from Trent’s fallen body and placing her on his lap. “He won’t come near you ever again. I promise.”
She looked up at him and held up her little finger. “Pinky swear?”
He locked his little finger with hers. “Pinky swear.”
Her expression turned serious. “That’s a forever promise. Mommy told me that.”
“And I mean it, sweetie. Forever.”
“Did that man kill Mommy, and she’s in heaven?”
“Yes.” Gabe couldn’t put off an answer she’d probably wanted for days. “She’s in heaven.”
“Heaven is special, but I’ll miss her.”
“Me too,” Gabe said, trying to keep his emotions in check.
“That means I’m gonna live with you. Mommy said if I couldn’t be with her, you wanted me to live with you.”
“Mommy was right. I do want you to live with me.”
She threw her arms around his neck and hugged him tight. Thankfully, he was already sitting or his legs wouldn’t have held him.
El came charging across the bricks and fell to her knees beside him, her gaze going from one to the other. “Are you both really all right?”
“We are,” Gabe said, feeling that despite the SWAT team rushing around him and the life taken from another man, his life was right for the first time ever. Something he’d wanted for many years, and finally, finally it was going to happen for him.
For them. Forever.
El couldn’t take her eyes off Gabe as he shared the details of Trent’s confession, but he was called away to sit with Lucy in the ambulance as the medics gave her an IV to increase her fluids.
They soon departed for the hospital, Gabe riding along.
Once there, she knew he would also check on his brother.
El promised to join them as soon as she could, but first she needed to question the guy who’d been holding Lucy.
Mina had cuffed and secured him in the back of her car and learned he was named Justin Ward.
Shockers of all shockers, he was the guy who’d broken into El’s house before he took over watching Lucy from another guy.
Now, Mina sat in her front seat, door open as she checked his record.
El joined her. “He have any priors?”
Mina slipped out of the car and closed the door. “Three convictions for trespassing, reckless driving, and burglary. Not the kind of guy who would escalate to accomplice-to-murder and kidnapping.”
“Trent must’ve coerced him somehow.” El stared at the backseat window and wanted to go over and throttle the guy for terrorizing her.
Ward focused out the opposite window, making her want to talk to him even more. “I’d like to interview him. See if I can get something out of him.”
“Knock yourself out. I need to cancel the Amber Alert, call the ME, and get someone out here to transport Ward.”
El looked around at her fellow deputies for someone who could do the transport, and everyone on scene had been involved in the shooting and would need to remain on-site to give a statement to an impartial investigator. “You call OSP to send out an investigator?”
“First thing I did. Someone is being dispatched out of Medford and should be here in a couple of hours.”
A couple of hours to sit around there and wait, twiddling their thumbs. They couldn’t investigate. She shouldn’t really even conduct the interview, but no one would stop her from doing that. “Okay, if I talk to this guy?”
Mina paused for a minute, eyeing El but then clicked her key fob, unlocking the vehicle.
El walked to the back door and opened it. Working hard to control her fury at this man, she waited for him to look at her. When he did, his angry glare gave her pause. Thankfully, he hadn’t turned wrath like this on her the night he’d broken into her home.
“Well, Justin Ward.” She tried to stay impartial and not blurt out that she knew he’d invaded her privacy. “What exactly have you gotten yourself into here?”
His glare remained firmly in place. “I didn’t take the kid, and I’m not in charge of this screw-up. I was just watching her. You want Jonas Trent for all of that. He offed that kid’s mother then abducted her.”
After Trent’s confession, that wasn’t news to her, but it would be good to hear this guy’s side of things. “Do you have any proof of that?”
“I was there. At the ravine and lake. Seen it all.”
She funneled her anger at his lack of caring into clenched fists. “And you did nothing to stop it?”
“What could I do?” Ward shrugged. “I was sittin’ there with the boat like he said.
Waitin’. Then he slammed her van and crashed it right off the road into the ravine.
I thought he was done, but nah…he went after her.
Found her alive in her van. She stabbed him with a screwdriver, and man…
he just lost it. He closed his hands around her neck and squeezed like there was no tomorrow. ”
“And you didn’t try to stop this either?”
“I ain’t stupid. I wasn’t gonna get in the way. Guy’s a freak once his mask drops. Looks like Mr. Nice on the outside, but underneath? Cold, cruel, and nasty. Real vindictive.”
“You willing to put in writing what you just told me?”
“As long as you make sure the DA knows I cooperated.” He challenged her with his gaze.
“Sounds like your previous convictions taught you how to game the system, but in this case, Trent confessed, and now he’s dead, so you’re the only one who’ll be on trial as an accessory.”
“But like I said, I only did what he told me to do.” He narrowed his gaze. “Are you gonna work with me or not?”
“Not,” she said. “Unless you give me a solid reason why you followed Trent’s directions, other than he told you to. Or maybe give up the names of others involved. Otherwise, I don’t really see how we can help you.”
“What else do you wanna know, man? Trent didn’t even tell me why he killed her or why he took the kid.”
His uncertain expression was exactly what El needed to get additional information from him. “Tell me how Howard Mason was involved?”
“That guy? Yeah, I forgot about him. No one wanted to work with him. He was a former cop, and he thought he could boss us all around. Mason was Trent’s favorite. Until he wanted out.”
Now they were getting somewhere. “What exactly did Mason do for Trent?”
“He used the boat for…” He trailed off and looked away. “Transferring kids from the home to illegal buyers. But don’t jam me up in this. I didn’t do nothin’ with those kids. Wouldn’t touch something like that.”