A car door slammed. Boots clomped up the front steps and across the porch. The screen door squeaked open. Wyatt stepped into the shadows of the kitchen. His eyes locked onto mine. I tried to sit up straight in the kitchen chair, my best effort to convince him everything was fine.
“Grandpa—”
“I’m fine.”
He crossed the room, chattering with relief. “Thank God. When you didn’t answer your phone, and C.J. said he couldn’t reach you, I had the worst thoughts. Pictured you face down in the yard with a heart attack or something.”
“I’m fine, really. I must’ve been out in the yard when you called the home phone. I left my cell in the bathroom, never heard it ring. Sorry to scare you like that. Go back to work.”
He looked over at the sink and the wet washcloth stained with my blood. His eyes grew wide, and he walked around me, examining my wounds. He gently touched the back of my head and stared at the tacky blood on the tips of his fingers. The color drained out of his face. His voice was low and serious. “What happened?”
I focused on getting him out of the house so C.J. and I could figure out a solution, so I tried to wave him off. “Wasn’t feeling real good. Maybe it was something I ate. I passed out and must’ve hit my head. Not a big deal.”
“Passing out isn’t a big deal?”
That sounded weak. “Maybe it’s a little bit of a big deal, but I’ll call the doctor and make an appointment. Have him run all those blasted tests those vampires like to do.”
He looked at C.J. for answers, but my friend was doing his best to find something on the ceiling to study. “What did you hit your head on?”
I stammered with an answer. “I don’t know. Don’t remember. Maybe the counter.”
Wyatt’s eyes flicked around the room. In his hurry to make sure I was okay, he hadn’t taken in the details, but now he saw everything. His mouth opened into a little o as his gaze settled on the crack running up the middle of the front door. The thud of his boots on the kitchen floor echoed in my head as he crossed the room and ran his hand across the shattered door frame at the latch. He dragged the toe of his work boots through the pieces of wood scattered about the kitchen floor. The sunlight highlighted the clear outline of a boot print beside the doorknob, the tread sharp against the faded white paint. He traced it with his finger. His face clouded with fury as he asked, “Did you fall against the door too? Are you going to tell me you had a shoe on your head, and it made this print?”
I exchanged a glance with C.J., hoping for inspiration for a better story, but nothing came from him. I opened my mouth, closed it, and then shrugged.
Wyatt covered the gap between us and leaned over the kitchen table until his nose was only inches from mine, like a parent scolding a wayward child. “Out with it. What really happened?” When I started to answer, he issued a stern warning. “Don’t even try one of your cockamamie stories on me. No more lies. I want the truth. Who was it?”
What choice did I have? I let the whole story flow. About searching the car at the rest area and finding the money. About debating with myself what the right thing to do was. About dropping the money in the church’s donation box. About the sheriff telling us about the reverend turning the money over to the police. About coming home and the confrontation with the tattooed man. About my plan to get the money back and deliver it at Coogan’s Cove.
I left out only one detail, about giving the money for supplies at the nursing home. The rest of the tale sounded innocent. Stupid, but innocent. If I could get the money back from Bobby, then neither Wyatt nor C.J. would ever have to know about that part. Bobby had said he would go slow to not attract attention, so he probably still had the money locked up there in the shop. I would get it back when I went to the nursing home to have dinner with Shelby and add it to the pile.
When I finished with my tale, I leaned back in my chair and listened to the silence in the kitchen. C.J. remained as still as a statue. Wyatt stared at the ceiling, what he normally did when he was thinking through things. When he lowered his gaze, he asked, “And Noah?”
I shook my head.
Wyatt clenched his hand into a fist and squeezed his eyes shut. When he opened them again, he said, “It’s not safe for you to go alone tonight.”
My gut clenched. This was why I hadn’t wanted to include Wyatt in the first place. “No. I don’t want you involved.”
“Too late. I already am. I was the second I met Noah at the truck stop.”
C.J.’s chair squeaked as he shifted his weight. “So we call the sheriff, right?”
Wyatt looked down at his hands. “I don’t think we should. These guys are dangerous. If we don’t give them the money, they won’t stop looking. They won’t just go away. And they won’t be bothered by some small-town sheriff. That would just buy us some time before they killed us.”
An eyebrow shot up on C.J.’s face. “I thought you said drug dealers didn’t really kill anybody. That was just in the movies.”
Wyatt sighed and raised his head. “I said the dealers, the guys on the street, don’t usually kill their customers. Debts there are so small, it’s not worth it.” Wyatt pointed at the shattered door. “But this ain’t a couple hundred dollars. A hundred grand is killing money.”
I rested my head in my hands. “He’ll kill me if I don’t give it back.”
“Not just you.” Wyatt leaned across the table. “Everybody who helped you. He’ll kill C.J. He’ll kill me. He might just kill the preacher and the sheriff.”
“The preacher?” Numbness crept through my body. “You really think the tattooed man would kill that many people?”
“I don’t know him.” Wyatt turned his head to look out the screen door. “But Rudy the Roach would. And he’d sleep like a baby after doing it.”
I touched Wyatt’s hand with a trembling finger. “You know who that is?”
Wyatt’s tongue ran along his lips. “Never met him, but I sure as hell heard of him. That’s enough.”