Give Em Pumpkin To Talk About (Pumpkin Patch Mysteries Book 1) (3 page)

Once she was behind the wheel and on her way back out to Misty River, she continued to berate herself for agreeing to meet this man before dawn at what was left of the farm. The property was a mile off the main road that ran through the middle of town. If the squatter was there, and dangerous, despite Sheriff Morgan’s opinion of him, she was out of luck.

“And definitely out of your element,” she told herself in the rearview mirror as her heart pumped nervously. “You’re not even a criminal attorney. You know this is stupid. But here you are.”

Knowing it could be dangerous didn’t stop her from turning the rental car off the main road toward the farm. The sign for the pumpkin patch that she and her grandmother had drawn had been amusing and nostalgic during the day. In the dim five-thirty morning light, it just looked creepy.

She hoped George Burris might be in a car waiting in the driveway for her with his headlights on. They’d meet, and he’d hand her a package through the window without her ever leaving the relative safety of her car. It would be like a TV movie with a happy ending—there was a terrible mix-up but her grandparents were alive and well.

There was a car in the driveway. It was backed in, but there were no headlights and no one inside as she drove up to it.

“Now what?” She was parked but still gripping the steering wheel.

She rolled open a window and called his name, but there was no reply. She wanted to hit herself in the head for not getting his cell phone number. She didn’t want to walk through a hundred and eighty acres in the middle of the night looking for him.

That’s when she noticed a moving light inside the house. Maybe it was a candle or a flashlight. He had to be in there. Holding her gun in a savage grip, she locked the car and crept warily up to the house.

There was no moon in the clear sky above her. There had been outdoor lights in various spots around the farm when her grandparents had lived here. Now everything was dark. She wished she had a flashlight, but she’d left her cell phone in the car. She started to go back and get it but was afraid she’d lose her nerve and leave.

She followed the old, cracked sidewalk that led to the front door. She hoped the light in the house was George Burris and not Jack the crazy squatter.

It doesn’t matter.
She was ready to confront either of them. She was having a hard time breathing, but she tried to stay focused on the house and the light.

Sarah was near the gazebo where her grandparents had always displayed whatever seasonal produce was available for sale. Her grandmother had liked to dress it up for each time of year—holly and a fir tree for Christmas, pumpkins and skeletons for Halloween. She knew the stairs to the front porch were nearby. She could almost see them in the dim starlight.

Then something large and dark jumped in front of her. She stopped breathing for a moment and almost forgot to bring the gun up in front of her.

“Back so soon?” Jack’s voice was soft. “I see you’re armed again. You’re stubborn, aren’t you?”

“Stay back.” She tried to keep her voice authoritative. “I don’t want to hurt you.”

“I’m not worried about it.” He tapped the gun with a careless finger. “Is that thing even loaded this time?”

“Yes. Get out of my way.”

“I guess you know who’s in the house, huh?”

“I do. Now get out of here. I warned you already. I put the property up for sale. Things are going to be different now. I don’t think the realtor wants you showing up while he’s trying to sell it.”

“I think I was clear that I’m not leaving.”

She couldn’t see his face, but he was obviously certain about his part in all this. Maybe it was time to shake him up. What would it take to get rid of him?

“Sheriff Morgan is interested in talking to you about what happened to my grandparents. You might not want to stick around for a new investigation into their disappearance.”

“It’s about time.” His words were snarky. “Did seeing the old place make you feel guilty, Sarah?”

“I don’t feel guilty. And I don’t have to explain anything to you. But since you were nice enough to tell me that you were here when my grandparents vanished, I can tell you that the sheriff thinks you might be a suspect that was overlooked in the initial investigation.”

It wasn’t true, but it was something she hoped would scare him off. The man really was crazy to stand there arguing with her as she held a loaded gun on him. She longed to ask him if he was the same teenager she remembered from when she was twelve but couldn’t find a way to say it.

He laughed in a slow, non-humorous way. It sounded more like a threat. “Are you scared, Sarah? You should be.”

She was about to go into legal mode, offering arguments about why it was illegal for him to be there, when a loud crack split the morning around them. It was followed rapidly by another loud crack—gunfire—and the sound of shattering glass.

Sarah knew that sound. She’d lived around guns all her life. She’d barely processed the information that someone might be shooting at her when Jack knocked her down to the soft grass and put himself on top of her like a human shield.

“Someone’s shooting.” She was almost as surprised that he would try to protect her as she was about the gunfire.

“Stay down. I don’t think that was meant for you, but let’s not take any chances.”

“Hey!” she complained when he took her gun again. “What am I supposed to use to protect myself?”

“Don’t move. You won’t have to do anything. Let me take a look around.”

“I think the bullet hit the front window.”

But Jack was gone. She argued with herself about listening to him and staying down or going to the house to see what was going on. Why was he so annoyingly arrogant? And why wasn’t he afraid the sheriff might think he was responsible for her grandparents’ disappearance?

The area was quiet again except for the hoot of an owl and a few crickets. Sarah waited impatiently in the dew-damp grass for a minute then got to her knees to look around.

She couldn’t see Jack or any other large shadow that might indicate another human ready to take a shot. The dim light was still in the window. It was probably an off-season hunter whose bullet had travelled farther than he’d expected in the open fields surrounding the house. It wouldn’t be the first time.

Having argued herself into feeling safe, and embarrassed that Jack had pushed her down, Sarah got to her feet and brushed the grass from her jeans and shirt. She kept her head low as she surveyed the yard again. There was only her car and the empty one that had been there when she’d arrived.  It seemed safe to her.  

“I told you to stay down.” Jack was immediately at her side. “I think whoever fired that shot took off, but there’s no way to know for sure if anyone else is out here besides us.”

“Is that George in the house? How did he get inside?”

“Why don’t we go in and ask him? It will be safer for you in there anyway.”

“It was probably just an overzealous hunter,” she told him as he hurried her toward the front door. “Did you find the broken window?”

“I’m afraid so.” He opened the front door. A heavyset man lay on the front room rug. “I guess someone didn’t want you to talk to George.”

Chapter Three

“Someone shot him on purpose?” She gulped as she saw the blood on the thin green carpet in the dim lantern light.

“I’d say so.” He nodded toward the hole in the broken window. “Why was he here, Sarah?”

“He called me at the hotel. He said he knew things about my grandparents that he hadn’t shared with the sheriff. He offered to give me the information.” She didn’t even think not to answer him. There was a dead man on the floor in front of her.

“This must be what he wanted you to have.” Jack scooped a manila folder off the floor and handed it to her. “You’re in luck. Whoever shot George wasn’t worried about you.”

Sarah’s head was spinning. She tried to swallow hard but couldn’t and threw up on the floor next to George Burris. “I’m sorry. This is more than I bargained for.”

Jack led her into the kitchen, using the lantern to find their way. “I suppose so. I can get some water from the hand pump outside. The water in here has been turned off for years. Stay here.”

She wanted to argue with him but literally didn’t have the stomach for it. She stayed where she was in the empty kitchen, staring at the wood floor, until he returned.

“Where’s your phone?” He handed her a wet rag. “You should call this in.”

“In…in the car.”

She wiped the cool rag across her face. Jack had moved the battery-powered lantern to the kitchen table. The glow from it spread around the room. The last time she’d seen this room it had looked as though her grandparents had just stepped away. She still expected it to be the same as when she was twelve—cornbread on the stove and coffee perking.

“Are you okay?” He crouched beside her and looked up into her face. “At least you don’t look like you’re going to faint. You were kind of pale back there. I haven’t caught an unconscious woman in my arms for a while. Not sure I know how anymore.”

“I never faint.” But her head was still spinning, and her stomach threatened to rebel again.

“There’s that angry woman with the gun that I met yesterday.”

She smiled despite herself. “Speaking of which, do you still have my gun? It’s annoying the way you’re always taking it from me.”

He handed it back to her. “If you stay around long enough, I’ll teach you a trick so no one disarms you again.”

That brought Sarah to her senses. What had she gotten herself into?

She hadn’t stopped to consider the wisdom of letting sleeping dogs lie, as her grandfather used to say. Now not only were her grandparents gone, there was a dead man in their living room. She was going to have to call the sheriff and probably be here for an extra day or two at least. What had she been thinking?

“I’m not staying any longer than I have to,” she told him. “Thanks for the offer, but I have a home and a life to get back to. Why would anyone want to kill Mr. Burris because he had sixteen-year-old information about my grandparents? Sheriff Morgan made him sound like a crackpot.”

“Maybe we should take a look at what George brought with him,” Jack suggested. “Are you up to that now?”

“I guess I better be.” She took a deep breath. “But you’re right. I should call the sheriff first.”

“It will take him at least forty minutes to get out here,” he advised as he opened the folder on the table. “Plenty of time to look inside.”

Sarah was torn between leaving him with the folder and going to get her phone. She felt like snatching it from him so he wouldn’t see what George had brought for her. It could be information that implicated Jack in her grandparents’ disappearance. For all she knew, Jack had shot George before she even got there and pretended that they were in danger. The whole thing could be a set up. She certainly didn’t know him well enough to trust him.

She moaned and put her head in her hands. “I’m afraid I’m going to be sick again. Could you get the cell phone? It’s in the front seat.” She tossed him the keys. “Thanks.”

“Sure.”

As he was going out the door, Sarah opened the folder. She barely glanced inside before she felt her stomach roiling again. There had been a few newspaper clippings and pictures in it. Not much. Maybe when she had more time to study it.  

“That’s okay if you take a look without me,” he drawled, setting her cell phone on the table. “I looked at all your phone information before I brought it in. We’re even. But that was kind of sneaky. I like it.”

She called 911 and looked up to see his bearded face close to hers. “Why are you here really? Are you mentally damaged like Mace Nash said? Do you need money to move on?”

He sat at the table with her. “I might be deranged, but I don’t need your money. I’m here because I made a promise to your grandfather that I intend to keep. Until then, this is my home.”

That drove her even crazier. “What kind of promise? Are you the same kid who was here right before they disappeared?”

He slid the file away from her and began sorting through the contents. “Better hope the sheriff gets here fast. He might not believe your story if George is already cold.”

“What about you?” she demanded. “What’s your story going to be?”

“I don’t expect to be here. He and I have talked before. I don’t see any reason to do it again.”

“They’ll think I’m responsible for this.”

“With that little toy?” He grinned at the gun on the table. “Hardly. It sounded like a Ruger to me—maybe a 77. It makes a loud report like the one we heard.”

“The sheriff might think you killed George.” She wanted to see the smug look disappear from his face, but she was disappointed.

“Not if he’s smart.” He put the file back on the table.  “Why would someone want to kill George? What did he know that the killer didn’t want him sharing with you?”

 “I don’t know. Since you claim to know my grandparents, you know they were simple farmers who made a living from this place like a lot of other farmers. I know it seems mysterious that they just left, but I don’t think there are any deep, dark secrets about it.”

His blue eyes stayed on hers. “So you think George is dead because there was no secret to hide. Good observation.”

Sarah bristled at his sarcastic tone. “Okay. If you’re so much smarter, why would anyone kill George over what’s in this almost twenty-year-old file?”

“Because someone has something important to hide that he thought George was about to expose. He didn’t kill you because he doesn’t expect you to understand what it is. He’s not even worried about the sheriff seeing what’s in here. But there’s something we’re missing. People don’t go out in the middle of the night and shoot people for no reason—at least not around here.”

She didn’t know how to counter that and still worried about her involvement in the shooting. “I’ll give everything to the sheriff. He can take it from there.”

“Good plan. Do that. Leave town. You’re bound to be safe. You won’t find out what happened to Tommy and Bess. But you’ll be safe.”