A Merciful Fate Page 34
“He contacted Tabitha after my first interview. Something I said must have been relevant—that we missed or didn’t understand—that made him want to warn someone.”
“It could have been anyone Tabitha talked to,” Detective Bolton stated as he looked at Mercy. “Heck, she talked to you.”
Jeff gave a tired sigh. “What do we know about these two women? Could they have known Gamble or some of his gang in the past?” He swayed slightly.
Suspicious, Mercy reached over and placed her hand on Jeff’s forehead. “Dammit, Jeff, it’s got you too! Your forehead is hot enough to fry an egg.” Why is he working while sick? “Go home. Rose has it and so does one of her preschoolers. I don’t want it.”
Truman and Evan both took a step out of their circle.
“You need help—” Jeff started.
“What I need is to not get the flu,” Mercy interrupted him. “Then no one will be able to work this case.”
“I can’t just—”
“Yes, you can. Now leave.” She shot a get-out-of-here glare at him. “You’re welcome to call and email me all you want. Just don’t breathe the same air as me. Or touch the same stuff.” She took the notes out of his hands, glad she still wore gloves. Truman had removed his gloves, and out of the corner of her eye she saw him surreptitiously rub his hands on his pants.
Jeff looked at her a moment longer, defeat in his eyes. “I’ll go. But tell them.”
Truman and Evan’s interest was piqued.
“I will,” she promised. I’d already planned to share our new information with them this morning.
Jeff quietly left the group, making Mercy realize he was sicker than he’d let on.
“Should he be driven home?” she asked the other men.
Both shook their heads.
Men.
“I’m holding the two of you responsible if he gets in an accident.”
Neither looked concerned.
“Okay.” Mercy looked at the notes in her hands. “There’re enough correlations here for the FBI to consider that Bree’s attack might be related to the robbery. Let’s get these notes to the lab. Have we heard anything on fingerprints from the knife he used? Who is working on whittling down red trucks in the area?”
“I have a guy on the trucks,” said Evan. “And I expect to hear from the lab about fingerprints any minute. But first I want to know what Jeff wanted you to tell us.” Truman nodded in agreement.
Mercy cleared her throat. “One of Tabitha Huff’s notes suggests that the driver at the Gamble-Helmet Heist was a woman.”
And now that I know Bree’s attack could be related to the robbery, it makes her a possible suspect.
Their surprise was palpable.
The two men exchanged a glance. “But even Gamble refers to the driver as ‘him’ or Jerry,” said Truman, his eyes skeptical.
“Maybe he had a good reason to do so.”
“He’s been protecting someone for thirty years?” Evan asked. “I can’t see it. Maybe he’d do it for a year or two, but why for so long?”
“Who knows?” said Mercy. “If he has protected her, that means she’s someone very special. All the investigating done in the past didn’t turn up a girlfriend for Shane Gamble. Trevor Whipple had a few, but all their alibis checked out.”
“You think Bree could be that woman?” Truman said faintly.
Mercy saw it was hard for him to wrap his brain around the idea that the petite mother of Lucas could have been involved in one of the biggest heists of the twentieth century.
“Now that I’ve seen this attack, I think she’s a possibility.”
“This is ridiculous. I’ve known Bree—”
“For barely two years,” Mercy said firmly.
“But Lucas—”
“Might know absolutely nothing of his mother’s past.” She sighed. “I know this is difficult, Truman. I want to get Art’s opinion on the female theory.”
Both Evan and Truman frowned. “Wasn’t he removed from the investigation after the shooting?” Evan asked.
“Yes, he’s in bureaucratic limbo. But I can’t let that stop me. No one knows this case better than him.”
“What about female relatives of the thieves?” Truman asked. “Mull had four sisters, right? I assume the other men had some too. Were they even looked at back then?”
“There was extensive investigation into the families and friends of the thieves. I spent hours looking into their last ten years overnight. Twelve women. I checked sisters, cousins, and mothers,” said Mercy. “That’s why my eyes are completely bloodshot. But I can’t find anything that suggests any relatives came into money after the robbery.”
“Maybe she didn’t get paid,” Evan suggested. “Once the plan fell apart, maybe she decided to cut her losses and play it quiet.”
“Help me out here,” Mercy asked. “Assume for a moment that Bree was the driver. Which person wrote these threatening notes and what do they want her to do?”
“As I see it,” said Truman, “they’re threatening her life and Lucas’s, so it’s got to be about big money or else the note writer’s own life feels threatened.”
“But if the note writer feels threatened,” continued Mercy, “don’t you think he’d tell her to not do something . . . instead of telling her to do something?”
“You’re leaning toward this being about money, not his life,” added Evan. “Most likely money from the robbery.”
“The writer wants money,” Mercy asserted. “It fits.”
“Why did he wait thirty years?” asked Evan. “Why now?”
Mercy shrugged. “Maybe he recently ran out of money? He’s ordering her to give him money or he’ll kill Lucas . . . or her. And it’s a good possibility he tried last night.”
“If he wanted to kill Bree last night, he had plenty of time to do so,” said Truman. “Her attacker tortured her—he cut off two fingers. I think he wanted information and she wasn’t sharing—or she didn’t know the answer.”
“I bet that information is the location of money. If she was the driver in the robbery, would she still have money after all these years?” asked Evan.
“Maybe she doesn’t have any,” said Mercy, “but he doesn’t believe her. I’m going to request her financial records as far back as I can. See if there are any red flags.”
“Was he involved in the robbery or not? It could have been someone else who heard a rumor that Bree had money.” Truman passed a hand over his forehead, and Mercy sympathized. Her brain hurt from the possibilities too. “We don’t even know who this ‘he’ is that we keep talking about.”
“I’ll request to have the high school photos of Whipple and May aged. I keep thinking of them as young men when they’re closer to fifty.”
“That would help,” Truman agreed.
“We really need to hear what Bree has to say,” she said. “What’s the latest on her condition?”
“Earlier Sandy told me she was still unconscious.”
Mercy pressed her lips together. Sandy again. “Maybe Sandy needs to be kept out of Bree’s room.”
Truman swung his head her way, anger in his eyes. “That’s ridiculous. She’s her closest friend.”
“Close friends share secrets. Maybe secrets about money.”
“Sandy would have said something,” Truman argued.
“I don’t know either of these women,” said Evan. “But what Mercy has suggested is logical. If Sandy knows Bree has a large sum of money, she has motive for Bree’s attack. I’ll call the deputy at the hospital.”
“What about the notes? Sandy’s the one who found them,” Truman pointed out. “Someone threatened Bree and Lucas.”
“Maybe Sandy planted the notes,” suggested Evan. “It takes the focus off of her.”
Truman crossed his arms, clearly wanting to argue. “I know both these women.” He looked at Mercy, disbelief in his eyes. “You do too. This is insane.”
“We’re just speculating, Truman. We have to consider all the possibilities, and I’ll look at Sandy’s background too. That might clear some things up.”
“Her previous name was Jada Kerns,” he offered. “I don’t know what it was before she married.”
“I’ll figure it out.”
“She’s a good person, Mercy.”
“I agree. But good people commit crimes too,” Mercy stated.
He said nothing, but his disappointment settled over her like a heavy blanket.
TWENTY-FIVE
Glass from a second-story window at Sandy’s bed-and-breakfast shattered as a woman screamed. Truman ducked behind his truck, shoving his hat tighter on his head. He had just returned to Eagle’s Nest from the investigation at Bree’s home and immediately he, Samuel, and Ben Cooley had been called to an incident at the B&B.
A guest had reported that a man with a rifle had burst into the old home and waved his weapon around, threatening to shoot unless Sandy came out of the kitchen. When she did, he forced her up the stairs and locked himself and her in a guest room while the rest of the guests evacuated the property.
The officers had barely stepped out of their vehicles when the glass shattered.
“I knew this was going to happen!” Samuel shouted at him, frustration burning in his eyes.
Truman glared at the officer crouching beside him, their backs against his vehicle. Samuel’s face had gone white with anger, and his hand hovered over the gun at his side. He shook with outrage. Exactly what Truman—and Sandy—didn’t need right now.
“No one could have predicted this,” Truman snapped. “Now shut the fuck up and pay attention.” Truman stole a glance at the broken second-story window in Sandy’s bed-and-breakfast, glad he’d parked across the street. Ben was twenty feet to Truman’s left, taking cover behind his own vehicle.