Page 2 of Not the Bodyguard's Widow
The traffic thinned as he drove deeper into Indiana, and soon he found himself on a two-lane highway surrounded alternately by trees and farms and freshly plowed fields. Yellow warning signs cautioned drivers to slow down for buggies and reminded Alex he had yet to visit the Shipshewana Menno-Hof information center, which detailed the history of the Amish and Mennonites in the area. He couldlook at the Amish furniture store to find Mom a unique gift for Mother’s Day. He turned his head to tell his sister his thoughts only to find an empty seat. How often had he done that in the past year? Once or twice a day at least.
Houses soon replaced farms, scattered leaves and branches littering the lawns and driveways of the Art House and other residences on the quiet street.
Before going in, Alex walked the perimeter, assessing the damage. A few twigs lay on the roof, but nothing big enough to trigger an alarm malfunction. A paver near the side door to the garage lay askew. He picked it up and found a small box-shaped indentation in the soil. Alex inspected the door. Three muddy fingerprints. They had not been there three weeks ago when the Ogilvies had come down for Easter. And last night’s storm would have washed away anything old. Candace knew better than to leave a key buried outside. Alex searched around the house again. A small footprint in the soft earth near the AC unit raised more suspicions. Maybe the alarm wasn’t a malfunction.
Alex pulled out his phone and called Alan, the automated system routing his call to Hastings’s reception desk.
“Hey, Elle, it’s Alex. Alan didn’t answer. Is he out of the office?”
“No, Mr. Alexander. Mr. Alan is meeting with Mr. Hastings,” Elle answered, using their business names. With three brothers and his father working at the firm, calling them all Mr. Hastings was confusing.
“Will you see if they’ll take my call?”
“Yes, Mr. Alexander.” The line went silent for a moment,then Elle’s voice came back on the line. “There is a DND code on the meeting. Do you want me to interrupt?”
Do not disturb. His father didn’t use it often. “No, I’ll call back if I need them.” A single small-footed intruder couldn’t be that much trouble. If they had broken in. Alex brought up the Hastings Security app on his phone and tapped in his code, then remotely disabled the alarm to the side door and the door from the garage to the kitchen. Next, he sent a quick text to the local security contractor, telling them he was on-site.
Alex opened the door and drew his gun. If someone had disassembled the house and sold Candace’s stuff on eBay, it would devastate her.
He entered the house noiselessly. A half-filled cup of lukewarm peppermint tea— assuming the discarded wrapper was correct—sat on the table. A single bowl sat in the draining rack next to the sink. How had someone gotten in and stayed in without setting off the alarms? The question could wait until he found the intruder.
Alex worked quickly to clear the rooms. His favorite murals remained untouched. In the back bedroom, the one his sister Abbie had used when she’d worked here last year, the bed was only half made. A suitcase stood by the closet door. A squatter.
Nothing was out of place in the library other than a book or two from the second case where the dust was disturbed. None of the books was worth more than the price printed above the barcode. Alex circled the base of the spiral staircase that led to the loft above the library before climbing up. There was no way to enter the second-floor room carefully. It was headfirst or nothing.
Halfway up the stairs he heard a female voice rang out. “Stop! Drop your gun, or I’ll shoot!”
3
Kimberly knelt between the beanbags,struggling to keep her hands steady. The oversize plush bag in front of her wasn’t much of a protective barrier. The blond-haired man looked like he had fallen out of one of those CIA-based movies. But good looks didn’t mean he was a good guy. How had they found her so fast?
She held her hands steady as he could. “I said to drop the gun.”
The man’s deep-blue eyes studied her for a moment before he raised his left hand above his head, his gun flat on the palm of his right.
“I said to drop it.”Please, please drop it.She’d never fired a gun before.
The man did something with his gun, making it click, then set two parts on the floor next to him. In the process, he came up another step, revealing part of his torso. The logo on his shirt claimed he was with Hastings Security.
“What are you doing here?” This time she held the gun steady.
“I’m Mr. Alexander of Hastings Security. And I should ask you the same thing.”
“I’m not trespassing. The owner gave me a key.” Eight years ago, and it no longer fit in the locks.
“But it didn’t work, did it?”
How did he know? “I’m in, aren’t I?”
Mr. Alexander rose another step, his waist now visible. Definitely one of the drop-dead gorgeous Michelangelo sculptured bodyguards Candace had described the day Kimberly complained about hers. “Stay back or I’ll shoot.”
He shook his head. “I don’t think so. If you wanted to kill me, you would have blown my head off the moment you saw my hair.”
It would be a shame to ruin his sandy-blond hair. What was she thinking? Pregnancy hormones. She needed to be brave for the baby. She’d eluded her father-in-law’s goons. She could shoot him if he came closer, and then she’d run again.
He took another step, and Kimberly simultaneously squeezed the trigger and shut her eyes, but there was only a tiny pop.
Before she knew what was happening, he’d wrenched the gun from her hand, grabbed her wrist, and was pushing her onto the beanbag’s soft fabric with his weight.
