Hoaley Ill-Manored (18 page)

“Boss?”

Bud stuck his head around the kitchen door.
“The landscaper is here. Can you walk the property with us?”

“Yeah.” He grabbed a bottle of water from
the fridge. Work was just what he needed to keep his mind off
things.

“I also need to show you something we found
in the cellar. I’m afraid we’re going to have to do some serious
reinforcing down there. There’s water damage and a large part of
the wall will probably need to be rebuilt.”

Watching dollar signs fly away from him like
ugly, green butterflies, Adam sighed. The sound of his wallet
straining was a nearly constant refrain with each day that passed.
“Great.” A gloomy feeling walked with him as he headed out of the
house. It was all he could do to put one foot in front of the
other. But he knew all the bad stuff would eventually pass. He just
needed to take deep breaths and just keep moving forward. He’d keep
busy until CC got back to him and told him that Teddy Worth was in
custody. Then he could put it behind him and make some decisions
about what he would do with the project.

He might have lost a taste for the Bilsworth
Manor flip, but he wasn’t giving up on it. He just might have to
get creative to get it finished.

CHAPTER
SEVENTEEN

Adam sat on the veranda, sipping a cold
beer. Despite a number of phone messages to CC that afternoon Adam
had heard nothing from the detective. Maddy had called a couple of
hours earlier to tell him she got tied up at the design center and
wouldn’t be coming back to the manor until morning.

Adam was alone in the house. Just him and
Walter. He’d made himself a simple meal of leftovers and taken a
shower, changing into his favorite soft, worn jeans and nothing
else. It felt good to sit outside with bare feet and chest.
Comfortable.

Walter was chasing fireflies on the lawn and
Adam was watching the big dog’s antics, feeling pleasantly tired
from what had turned out to be a busy day. He’d tried calling Dirk
earlier, but the hospital had informed him that Dirk didn’t have a
phone in his room. The doctor wanted him to rest his voice as much
as possible. They’d promised, however, to give Dirk the message
that Adam had called.

His mind ran back over all the things that
had happened to him in the days since he’d been living at the
manor. The details never changed, but his perception of them had
when Dirk was nearly killed. In quick order, events had gone from
just frustrating to nearly lethal.

He thought about the drawing, wondering at
the reason it was in his attic and the person who’d put it there.
If it had belonged to Teddy Worth, why had he left it in the manor?
For that matter, why had Teddy left any of his things at the manor?
He lived on the adjoining property.

And, more importantly, if Teddy Worth were
trying to keep people out of the manor so he could search for the
jewels, why would he have kept his own valuable items—the derringer
and the drawing—hidden? He could have solved his money problems,
assuming he had some, years earlier by selling the items. None of
it made sense. But Adam guessed looking for logic in a psychopath’s
mind was an exercise threaded with frustration.

Adam’s cell rang and his heart twisted as he
saw Dirk’s name on the screen. He pressed the button eagerly. “Hey,
babe. Are you feeling better?”

“Ads…” Dirk’s voice was so raspy it sounded
painful. Adam was torn between wanting to talk to him and the urge
to tell him to rest his voice.

Concern for Dirk won out. “Hey, you should
probably rest your voice.”

“Shut up!” Dirk coughed and Adam grimaced at
the sound. “Listen to me. You’re in danger…” The coughing
overwhelmed him and, for a moment, Adam thought Dirk had hung up.
Then a smoothly cultured voice came on the line.

“Adam.”

Adam cringed. He’d recognize Franklin
Spence’s slick tone anywhere. “Spence. Is Dirk all right?”

“Yeah. Stubborn bastard. I told him not to
try to talk to you himself. He’s really worried about you. The
drugs they’ve been keeping him on finally wore off and his head’s
clearer. As soon as he was feeling more coherent he started asking
for a phone. I had to play hell to get him permission to call you.
The doctor wants him to rest his voice.” The accusation in Spence’s
voice was clear.

“Tell him I’m fine and to just get some
rest. I’ll be there in the morning to see him.”

“No. If I let you off the phone I think
he’ll climb out of bed and walk to the manor with his delectable
ass hanging out. Hold on, he’s scribbling notes as quickly as he
can. Okay, he says…attacker didn’t know me…uh…he called me Hoale.”
Franklin’s confusion was clear in his voice. “Does that mean
anything to you? Sounds like gibberish to me.” Franklin held the
phone away, apparently speaking directly to Dirk, “Sorry,
darlin’.”

All the blood ran out of Adam’s face and he
clutched the phone hard, so hard it made a creaking sound. Forcing
himself to pull air into his lungs and loosen his grip on the
phone, Adam said as carefully as he could. “Spence, are you staying
at the hospital tonight?”

“I can, why?”

“I can’t explain right now. But I would feel
better if you stayed with him, just in case.”

“Hoale, are you all…”

“Don’t! Don’t say anything that will let
Dirk know I’m worried. Just smile and say goodbye, and then tell
Dirk I’m fine and Walter and I will be staying in a hotel tonight.
Got it?”

“Yeah. Got it. You have a great night too,
Adam. Dirk and I will see you in the morning.”

“Thanks, Spence.”

“No thanks needed, Adam. I hope you know
that.”

Adam hung up and suppressed a shiver,
looking around at the suddenly ominous darkness surrounding him.
The shadows that had been cozy, velvet parentheses around his night
moments earlier were now nothing more than risky hiding spots for
stalkers to lie in wait. He turned toward the house, intending to
get dressed and grab his keys. He would call CC on the way to the
hotel and, if he didn’t reach him, leave yet another message that
told the cop they’d been pursuing the wrong guy.

“Walter! Come on, boy. You want to take a
car ride?” Adam stepped into the house and turned, peering through
the darkness beyond the veranda for his dog. “Walter?”

Pain blossomed between his shoulder blades
as something was jammed into his back. “How ’bout we just leave the
nice doggy outside?” A booted foot shot out and slammed the door
shut just as Walter ran up the outside steps, doggy lips spread in
a wide smile and tongue lolling out the side. When Walter saw the
dark shape of the man behind Adam he started to bark.

Adam stared at the faint reflection of the
man standing behind him in the glass. He’d been right the first
time, the man
did
look a lot like Teddy. “So, I guess Bev’s
in on this with you?”

Pem Wilkins laughed, shaking his big head.
“Bev don’t know nothin’. And I plan to keep it that way too.” The
man’s voice was deep, husky from long-time use of cigarettes, and
throbbing with anger.

“Are you gonna shoot me?”

“Nah. I’m thinkin’ I’ll let the ghost take
care a yun.” His chest rumbled with laughter and the shotgun dug
into Adam’s back. Adam’s fingers twitched on the cell phone he
still held in his hand.

“Come on, Hoale, let’s get you upstairs. I
got a nice rope waiting for you in the attic. I think I’m gonna
enjoy hangin’ your ass once and for all.”

Adam slipped the phone into his pocket,
praying the man didn’t see his fingers moving. “Why? What have I
ever done to you? I never even met you before yesterday…well really
today.” Adam’s hope was to keep the man talking as long as he
could. Then…well…he’d figure that out when he had to.

“You was gonna fix this old beauty up and
sell her. You was gonna change her. I don’t want her changed. I
want her to stay just the way she is so that, when I pull those
jewels from her pretty little hidey hole, I can make her look the
way I want to. Just the way Miss Lolly wanted her to, afore them
white folks stole her dreams away from her.”

“Miss Lolly?”

“Shut up, Hoale and keep walkin’.”

Behind them, Walter was barking up a storm,
scratching hard on the terrace doors in an attempt to get in. Adam
hoped he’d stay right there. He doubted those damn coyotes would
climb up on the veranda to get him.

“So you’re gonna kill me because I want to
fix the house up? Hey, I’ll make a deal with you. I’ll just walk
away today and you can search for those jewels to your heart’s
content. I wanted to resell this house, I’ll admit it, but it’s not
worth dying for.”

“You must think I’m stupid.”

“Not stupid, just really vindictive. What’s
up with all this anyway? You have a beautiful wife, a great
business with the museum, and you live in a beautiful town. Why
can’t you just let this jewel thing go and be happy?”

“Awe shit. I seen the error of my ways. Hand
me a fuckin’ tissue will ya?”

“You know, sarcasm is a tool of the close
minded.”

“Fuck you, Hoale.”

Adam decided he wouldn’t tell Wilkins what
he thought of that suggestion. He’d probably pushed the man hard
enough for the moment. They climbed the shadowed, raw wood
staircase to the attic and Adam stepped onto the plywood that
formed the floor.

A bright splotch of yellow caught his eye
immediately. The room was lit only by the candle from the box, its
light flickering over the small bunch of yellow daisies on the
floor beside a chair, which he recognized from Dirk’s bedroom.
Gooseflesh crawled over Adam’s skin. He wondered how long Wilkins
had been inside the house while Adam and Walter ate and
relaxed.

Adam’s terrified mind searched for something
to keep the man talking. In desperation, he risked going to a place
where he knew his sense of humor couldn’t save him. “Why’d you try
to kill Dirk?”

Wilkins laughed. “Thought the dude was you.
If I’d known how sweet you were on the guy I’d have done it sooner
though.”

Adam frowned. He’d never spoken to Wilkins
before that night, how would he know about Adam and Dirk? “What the
hell are you talkin’ about Wilkins?”

“Bev told me she could tell you were a
couple. Somethin’ about the way you looked at each other. Romantic
type drivel. Women have a sense for that kind of thing. It’s a
little scary.”

No, Adam thought, scary was being marched to
a noose in a candlelit attic by a greedy psychopath. “So you didn’t
answer my question. Why are you doing this? Those jewels have to be
long gone by now.”

“Don’t believe them rumors.”

Sensing a thread he could pull, Adam gave it
a tug. “But they might be true.”

“If Delf had found them jewels and given ’em
to Lolly, the Worths wouldn’t have stayed poor all these years.
They don’t have no such shit. It’s all lies.”

Thinking of the simple but well-kept cabin
on the large plot of prime real estate in Brown County, Adam
thought Teddy Worth was far from poor. Not to mention the jeweled
Derringer his family kept buried under their barn. But he didn’t
want to say anything that might turn Wilkins’ wrath toward Teddy.
“You have that drawing. It’s worth quite a bit of money.”

“I ain’t sellin’ that. Those pictures mean
something. They’re representative of white folk’s mistreatment of
black folks. No amount of money in the world would make me sell
it.”

“But isn’t that a picture of a white guy
hanging in that drawing?”

“Tembler Jenks. A scoundrel if ever there
was one. Funny it could have been a picture of Delf Bilsworth too,
decades later. Too bad it isn’t. I hate that man for not havin’ the
cojones to stand up for the woman he loved.”

Adam glanced around, wondering what he could
use to fight Wilkins off. Other than the rope, the chair, and the
candle, there was nothing.
Damn Bud for doing such a good job of
cleaning the attic!

“Now you get up on that chair, no more
yakkin’. I got things to do.”

“Places to go, people to kill?”

Wilkins jammed the gun into Adam’s back.
Pain shot through him like a jolt of electricity. “Shut the hell up
and get moving.”

Thinking about what CC had said about Dirk,
how he’d probably climbed up on that chair because he’d been told
to at gun point, Adam decided he wouldn’t make that same mistake.
He hadn’t just been making words when he told CC he’d rather be
shot dead than hanged. So he shook his head. “No way. Just shoot me
if you want to kill me. It’s much quicker.”

Wilkins swung the gun and slammed Adam
upside the head. He flew sideways and slid across the wood floor,
picking up splinters all along his side as he slid. Pain radiated
across his skull in a jagged wash, bringing bile rising up his
throat as his stomach heaved.

Okay. There was that.

“Drop the gun, Pem!”

Adam’s world was wobbly and gray. Blood ran
down his temple and into his eyes, making it hard to get a fix on
the tall, dark figure standing next to the stairs. The figure
wavered dangerously and Adam’s hand came up to grab him before he
realized the wavering was probably all inside his own head.

“You stay out of this, Teddy.”

“No. This has to stop. These people don’t
deserve what you plan to do to them. There’s no treasure in this
house and you just need to let that go.”

“I’m doin’ it for you, son.”

“You’re doing this for you, you old asshole.
And because you feel guilty for killing George that night. You’re
doin’ this because it’s what he would have done if he’d lived. But
he’s dead and his destructive ways need to die with him. I’m gonna
make sure that happens tonight, Pem. Even if it means putting a
bullet in your brain.

Adam clutched his head and forced himself to
sit upright, bracing himself against the floor, which kept moving
away from his hand. The sound of clicking, nails on wood,
accompanied the deep drone of the two men’s voices and a huge,
fuzzy shape emerged from the stairwell, heading toward Adam.