Chapter Nineteen
Keisha was fixing breakfast while I sat with coffee and stared into space. When my cell phone rang, caller I.D. said John Henry Jackson. What could he want two days before Christmas? “Kelly O’Connell,” I said sort of abruptly.
“Little lady, I am so glad you’re all right. I read about the attack on you in the newspaper this morning.”
Well, darn. There was publicity I didn’t need. Who trusts a real estate agent who keeps getting involved in crimes?
Keisha was eyeing me sternly, but I blithely ignored her. I thanked John Henry for his concern, assured him I was all right, just scared, and that we were at my mom’s until the police cleared the crime scene tape.
After I hung up, Keisha demanded, “Can’t you ever just say thank you, Merry Christmas and goodbye? Why you
tellin
’ him where we are?”
I was too tired to argue. “John Henry’s just concerned. He’s a marshmallow. He called me ‘little lady’ again.”
“Today, I don’t trust nobody.”
“Wish Mom took the newspaper so I could see the article John Henry mentioned. I’ll go ask Mike to pull it up on the computer.”
Finally I got a laugh from Keisha. “Your mom don’t take the newspaper ‘cause she says this still isn’t her city and she don’t know the people it talks about.”
“Oh, for Pete’s sake.”
“Get everybody in here for breakfast while you’re at it. These eggs gonna get cold.”
Mike pulled up the paper and we found a brief mention in the local news note section. It didn’t have much beside what John Henry had told me. Said there been a break-and-enter incident at a residence and then gave our specific address: street and house number. An open invitation to other no-
gooders
. Mike muttered, “Damn!”
We mostly stared at each other all morning. My mind was on the thousand things I had to do to get ready for Christmas, but oddly I couldn’t focus on any one. Claire called to announce she had worked out a potluck assignment, so everyone else was bringing dinner to my house on Christmas Day. I wasn’t to cook a thing. I’d have my hands full just wrapping Christmas presents, and I guessed we’d have a tree trimming party whenever. Before New Year’s for sure.
About noon Conroy knocked on the door. When Keisha opened it, he said, “Boy, do I have news.” He was more animated than I’d ever seen him and couldn’t bring himself to sit still. He paced, while he told us the morning’s discoveries.
The homicide guys had searched
Lattimore’s
apartment first thing in the morning. It had already been tossed, during the night, by someone looking for something specific. Pillows and sofa cushions were torn open, pictures yanked off the wall and their backings ripped, the computer gone but the flat-screen television and a bunch of cash was left behind. They even theorized that Tom might have been surprised in his apartment and kidnapped. But they found something important that had been overlooked: a safe deposit box key. Opening it required a warrant to force the bank to let them open it, and they had to work fast, since banks would close early because of the approaching holiday. By ten, they were at the bank, warrant and key in hand, and opened the box.
“Damndest thing,” Conroy said. “I think your pal,” he directed that at me, “knew he wasn’t long for this world. He printed out a whole confession—implicated…oh, you’ll never guess. John Henry Jackson, our history-minded lawyer,
was
North Side Properties and also was the brains behind this whole grocery store, which was a front for growing and shipping marijuana. Get it? Wild Things? That temperature-controlled shed was really a growing room. His investors? Non-existent. He wasn’t sharing this cash cow with anyone. He wanted that specific location because of its easy access to trucking routes. Besides, putting an upscale grocery in your neighborhood was a good cover.”
John Henry! My mind refused to grasp that idea. He hadn’t just called to be nice. He wanted to know what I knew—and I told him enough. I confessed to Conroy, who waved my concern away. “John Henry probably already had the computer in his possession and had read the confession. He’s probably on his way out of town. We’ve got an APB out on him and have notified airports, railroad counters, even the bus depot. We’ll get him.”
I felt all the air go out of me as I sank into the couch, deflated, angry, confused. No wonder the landmark commission had approved the project—I wondered if they’d even seen it or John Henry had just rubber-stamped it. Such duplicity was beyond me. And what about Robert Lawler? Did he even know his name was used to give respectability to a fictional list of investors? I doubted it.
Mike and Conroy talked quietly in a corner and then Mike came over to shake my shoulder, jarring me out of my reverie and back into the present.
“He says we can get back in the house this afternoon. I’ll feel better to be on the premises.” He thought for a minute. “Let’s leave the girls here. At least until I feel sure the house is safe.”
Keisha approved our plan. “It’s a pretty day. I’ll take the girls—and Miss Cynthia if she wants to go—to the zoo. If that’s okay.”
Mom declined. “Whoever heard of going to the zoo two days before Christmas? I have too much to do. Besides, it’s December!”
“Mom, it’s going to be seventy today, a perfect day for the zoo.” I turned to Mike. “You think they’ll be safe?”
“With Keisha, of course. As Buck said, Jackson is probably trying desperately to get out of town. Hurting you—or us—won’t do him any good now.”
“Maybe José will drag himself out of bed,” she said. “I’ll go call him. He’s off tonight, has to work Christmas.” She made a face.
It all worked out. José came to Mom’s and the four of them set off, with plans for dinner at the Grill after the zoo trip. I drove Mike and me to the house, and Mom set about baking Christmas pies—pumpkin and pecan.
It was strange to go back in the house. Everything was orderly. The window had been replaced, furniture straightened, blood removed from the doorways, hall carpet torn up exposing lovely hardwood floors that I would not re-carpet. The Christmas tree was still in place, undecorated—we had planned to have our own tree-trimming party last night But still it felt…funny.
“Mike, does it smell different?”
He sniffed. “No. What do you think you smell?”
“Uh, dried blood?”
“That’s your imagination. Get busy and you’ll forget about it. Wrap Christmas presents. Make a grocery list. Do all that stuff you were going to do yesterday. I’m going to check out the guest apartment. I’ll use the ramp in front.”
At the door, he hesitated, threw me a look of defiance, and shoved his walker aside, picking up the cane the doctor had recently okayed for his use. I went back to the bedroom to dig presents out of the closet—having the girls gone for the day was a blessing.
I had wrapped two packages—clothes for the girls—when Mike called from the living room, “Kelly, can you come here?” His voice was so tight it grated on my nerves. Something made me wish for my pistol, but the police still had it. And Mike probably was carrying his.
“Kelly, now!”
Defenseless, I walked down the hall and found John Henry holding a gun to Mike’s back.
“He was hiding in the apartment,” Mike said tightly. “I’ve told him there’s nothing to be gained now, but he wants to use us as hostages to negotiate a clean get-away.”
“Not both of you, just the little lady.” He turned to me, his gun still trained on Mike. “I tried to keep you out of this. But you wouldn’t listen to me, to Bella, probably even to your obliging husband here. Now you’re my ticket to Mexico. You’re going with me. If all goes well, I’ll put you on a plane back to DFW. If not…,” he shrugged. “I’ll do whatever I have to. I’m not going to jail.”
Appalled, scared, you name it. “You can’t be serious!” I could feel the blood rush to my face and my knees went weak again. Damn! I’d been feeling this way too often in the past couple of days. John Henry, the man I dismissed as a marshmallow, was threatening something unfathomable. Mexico? I couldn’t. I wouldn’t. He pointed the gun at me.
“I assure you, I’m deadly serious…and that’s not a play on words.” His usually laughing eyes had gone steel-cold blue, and he alternated his gaze between intimidating me—it worked!—and keeping an eye on Mike.
I was desperately searching every corner of my mind for a way out of this.
“Move,” John barked, holding the gun steadily in my direction. He knew Mike wouldn’t move if I was in danger. “Plane is not pressurized…grab a coat. That’s all, and I’m watching.”
As I turned to the closet, out of the corner of my eye I caught a flicker of movement on the porch. I dared not react with a sigh of relief or a glance. Thank heaven the curtains were sheer—whoever was out there could look in and see the scene we were in the middle of. Stalling for time seemed my best option.
“I need time…tell my girls…take some things with me. A toothbrush.”
“No time. I’ll buy whatever you need when we reach our destination. Come now. We’re through stalling.”
The first coat I grabbed out of the closet was Mike’s ski jacket—no chance he’d left a gun in the pocket. John Henry’s gun was still pointed at me, and he said, in a jokingly gallant tone, “After you, my dear. I’ll be right behind you. Go out the front door. You may say goodbye to your husband from a distance.”
I turned to Mike and saw he had turned to me. Our eyes locked, but John Henry couldn’t decipher the message we sent each other—and the prayer for safety for both of us. Who knew what would happen once I went out that door?
John Henry spoke to Mike over his shoulder, keeping the gun trained on me. “If you value your wife, wait one hour before calling your comrades. We’re taking her car. You’ll find it eventually.” Then, to me, “Open the door, little lady.”
I opened the door with apprehension, wondering who was outside. The thought came too late that it could be an accomplice of John Henry. But when I took that first step beyond the door, I realized that a sudden
norther
had hit. My first thought was that the girls would be cold at the zoo. Before I could worry about that, there was a commotion behind me.
I stood stock still, expecting a bullet in the back. Instead, I felt a sharp stinging pain in my left calf and then wetness. Then I heard Keisha shouting, “Oh my god, you hit Kelly!” Far from being scared or worried about a wound, I wanted to laugh out loud.
Behind me, John Henry lay on the porch, clutching his right wrist, and José stood over him with a gun. Mike was in the doorway and on the phone. Keisha was on her knees, pulling up my pants leg and shouting, “José, go get some paper towels.”
“I can’t,” he replied calmly. “I’m holding the gun on our friend here.”
She dashed off toward the kitchen and returned quickly with paper towels, wet and dry. As Keisha began, sponging at my leg, which now really stung, José explained.
“Keisha got one of her feelings.”
Keisha looked up at me. “I just knew you were in trouble. I told José we had to hotfoot it to your house, but we did drop the girls off with Miss Cynthia first. Looks like we just made it.”
Stunned. Irrelevant thought:
The girls aren’t freezing at the zoo.
“What happened?” I pointed to John Henry who lay motionless and refusing to speak.
José nudged him with a boot. “I karate chopped his gun hand as he came out the door. Think I broke his wrist—least that’s what I wanted to do. Didn’t give him time to shoot, but his gun went off and the bullet grazed your leg. Sorry, but it’s better than the alternative.”
“Definitely,” I agreed, putting most of my weight on my right leg. Keisha had straightened up and announced I needed to go to an emergency clinic or doc-in-a-box or something.
“Not until Conroy gets here,” Mike said, “Kelly, you okay?”
I nodded. It hurt, but not that badly.
“I told you not to trust anybody, even when they talk nice,” Keisha said righteously.
“John Henry, what do you have to say?” I demanded. “Mexico, indeed.”
“You probably wouldn’t have ever come back,” he said, and that sent chills down my spine.
Of course, Conroy led the charge, but it looked like the entire homicide squad arrived to take John Henry downtown. Now he refused to say anything except, “I want a lawyer.”
“You are a lawyer,” Conroy said viciously, “not that it’s going to do you much good.”
The whole story came out slowly, thanks to Tom’s lengthy confession—now I almost felt sorry for him—and the few things John Henry said, after he got a lawyer. He denied killing either Sonny Adams or Tom
Lattimore
, and Conroy said he’d face charges of conspiracy to murder.
“Harder for the prosecution to build its case, but they can do it. They found
Lattimore’s
computer in John Henry’s plane.”
Thinking of the plane ride I almost took, I asked, “Where was it?”
“Private air strip south of town. Owner said he knew John Henry professionally, didn’t think anything of his request to park the plane there a few days ago and then today he got notice that
Jackson’d
be taking off. He figured John Henry would file a flight plan and play it according to the rules. We’re
checkin
’ it out but I think he’s in the clear. Sweating a bit, though. Said he always thought John Henry was most law abiding.”