Page 14 of Ambush

He reached behind him and pushed open the screen door. The aroma of catfish and cornbread wafted out, and her mouth watered. She followed him through the small living room into the tiny kitchen with its round table for five. The boys smiled shyly in her direction.

“There you are.” Jenna carried a platter of catfish to the table. “You’re just in time.”

Paradise took a seat beside the older boy. “Can I do anything to help?”

“I’ve got it. It’s nothing fancy, but it’s filling.”

Had she made a mistake tonight? She hadn’t thought about how she’d be looking across the dinner table at Blake, but it was too late to back out now.

Chapter 7

Country music blared from speakers placed around the patio areas that wrapped around the Tiki Hut, just outside Pelican Harbor, and the aromas of burgers and fries blew toward Blake on the breeze. The building had once been a shotgun house, but additions over the years had changed its shape.

Blake spotted McShea at a corner table with a sweet tea and a gigantic burger in front of him. McShea lifted a brow when he saw Blake. Blake hoped he’d listen better than his brainless deputy. He stopped beside the table. “Hey, Rod, mind if I join you?”

Rod set down his glass of sweet tea. “’Course not. Have a seat.” He motioned for the server. “I’ll even buy your lunch. I was going to stop by your place when I left here and see how you were doing. That shooter yesterday probably scared your mama half to death.”

Blake pulled out a chair and settled across from the sergeant. “Yeah, it scared everyone. A server in our snack bar quit.” He ordered a burger and sweet tea when the server arrived, then leaned toward McShea. “Any leads?”

“Wish I could say yes, buddy, but we’re at a loss just yet. We found some spent 9-millimeter bullets, but they were pretty much destroyed from hitting metal. No casings, so you were right about that. Forensics took some prints, but you know better than me how many visitors touched things around there while watching the bears. Wish you had some outdoor cameras in places other than the entrance and the housing areas.”

Blake made a mental note to grab a few. He wouldn’t tell his mom he bought them from his savings. She worried too much about him. “Strange things out our way, Rod. Hank’s death, then the body in the horse trailer. Now we’ve got that shooting and the break-in last night at our house.”

About to take a bite from his burger, Rod closed his mouth and set down his sandwich. “Break-in?”

“Didn’t Creed tell you? Someone rifled through our things. They didn’t take anything, but every drawer in the place was searched—even the kitchen. Whoever it was didn’t take Mom’s jewelry or our laptops. They found the key to the safe and opened it too. The documents were moved around, but they didn’t take the cash we had in there.”

“Any idea what they were searching for?”

Blake shook his head. “I know you don’t believe it, but I think Hank was murdered.”

“Buddy, we’ve talked about this before. There’s no evidence of that. None. No forensics, no sign of a struggle. Why are you so sure it was murder?”

“Hank was the most careful man I ever knew. For him to topple off the haymow is so unlike him as to be impossible. He constructed a barrier up there so his boys wouldn’t fall over easily. He would have had to back up and hit it just right to even fall over. And he always watched where he was going. Idon’t buy it. And he was nearly run off the road a week earlier. Add all these other things after his death, and there has to be a connection.”

“I can see where you’re coming from, but we’ve got no evidence. I’ll take another crack at the file just because you’re asking, but I don’t think I’ll find anything.”

The server brought Blake’s lunch, and he waited until she left before he continued. “Did you hear Paradise is in town?”

Rod put his sandwich down again. “You’re determined to keep me from eating, aren’t you? She’s working for you? Last I heard, she was in Montgomery. Had a run-in with a black panther that nearly took her arm.”

Rod was Paradise’s cousin, but the two had never been close. Rod was twenty years older, and his mother had refused to take Paradise in after her parents died, which had led to a gulf between them as big as Mobile Bay. Paradise might not have wanted Rod to know, but Blake felt her loneliness like a thorn embedded too deep to remove. She needed family, support, people who cared about her. His mom cared, but Blake was a big believer in the power of family. Paradise had felt abandoned most of her life, and he wished he could do something to erase the haunted, lost expression lurking deep in those amber eyes.

“I’m sure she’d be glad to see you.” He took a bite of his burger and the juices hit his tongue. No one could make a burger like the Tiki Hut.

Rod lifted a brow. “She’s a spitfire, that one. Last time I saw her, she told my mom off and said she never wanted to see any of us again.”

“She was fifteen,” Blake pointed out.

“Did she learn to temper that tongue?” When Blake didn’t answer, Rod chuckled. “I didn’t think so. Still, you might be right.I’ll let my mom know and I’ll have Sheila invite everyone to a cookout one night. It might heal things. If she made peace with you, there’s hope.”

Blake forced a laugh, but he felt anything but happy. The way he’d hurt Paradise couldn’t be undone. The damage went deep into her soul, and he saw it every time their eyes met. He finished his lunch and left Rod taking a last gulp of his sweet tea.

As Blake got in his pickup, he stared toward The Sanctuary. A curl of smoke hovered above the trees, and the wail of a fire truck rose above the chatter in the bar behind him.

Something at The Sanctuary was on fire. He stomped on the accelerator and barreled for home, praying all the way.

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