Lost in Tennessee (32 page)

Kate turned her ice blue eyes on him. “You have something to say?”

Butch smiled wickedly and pulled her against him so their hips crashed. “It’s nice to have you back.” He bent his head and caught her snarling mouth.

She gave a hard push at his chest. “This is a construction site. No kissing. Period. And move your hands.”

Butch tempted fate by moving his hands south and cupping her butt.

A throat cleared. “You wanted to see me?”

Kate spun to face Joel Thompson. The full face, ten years older than his age, hung slack. This man didn’t want trouble with the boss.

“You told the sheriff you saw me last Tuesday.”

“I didn’t have a choice.” Thompson held his hands up in surrender. “Look. I was laid off for a year. You run a good site, and I’m glad for the work. I just told the sheriff what I saw.”

Kate rethought her approach. It took nerve to come to work after fingering the boss for murder. That told her a lot. “It wasn’t me. I was in Kentucky. But someone went through a lot of effort to make it look like it was me. I want to know what you saw.”

Thompson buried his hands in his jeans and studied the rocks. “It was just like I told the sheriff. Waters needed a few men to put in extra hours to be ready for the next day. I volunteered. I could use the money. I went to my car to call my wife. I just hung up when you pulled into the site in your company truck. You waved to me, and you drove off to the left.”

Kate began to pace. “Did you see my face?”

“No. It was dark. The light over the parking area reflected off the windshield but I could tell there was someone in the truck with you.”

“With me? Who?” When Thompson shrugged, she pressed on with her questions. “Did you see my hair?”

Thompson shook his head. “Your arm. You were driving with the windows down and your arm out.”

“Did I have on a short sleeved shirt?”

Thompson shook his head. “The kind that ends around your elbow. It was a really bright pink. The fingernails matched.”

Kate stopped pacing. “What do you mean the fingernails matched?”

“There were pink and long. Shiny.”

“Thompson, sit.” Kate whirled on Butch. “Call your dumbass brother. When he gets here, teach him how to interview a witness.”

B
utch placed the call. “Jeb, I need you at Kate’s project.”

“What’s happened? Is Kate with you?”

Butch looked to where Tom, Waters, and Kate stood twenty feet away. Kate gestured wildly as she spoke. “Yeah, she woke up, so to speak. We’re at the site.”

A second call came in. Hyde. Butch let it go to voicemail.

“Fuck me to hell and back. What is she doing?”

“She wants Waters and Tom to take another look at things—”

“Stop them. Right this minute. Anything they find is useless. I’m on my way.”

“Katie!” Butch shoved his phone in his pocket, yelling across the lot. “Kate. Waters. Wait for Jeb.”

Butch paced on sentry duty, keeping the three accounted for until Jeb could get there. The party huddled around the hood of Tom’s truck, looking at the plans. Butch listened as they speculated how the killer had gotten the body into the wall form. The snap of gravel pulled Butch’s attention away from the group. He met his brother when he parked away from the others. “You don’t show up that fast for anything but dinner, Clyde. What gives?”

Jeb spoke to Butch but looked at the three conspirators. “I was taking another look where the rental car was found. What’s going on?”

“Your witness seemed to remember something new. Kate wants Waters to take a look at the crime scene. She thinks he’ll be able to tell if there is something out of place.”

Jeb snorted as they crossed the parking area. “She thinks she knows more than crime scene investigators?”

Caught between your brother and your lover, there were no good options. “How many construction sites have they worked?”

“Shit. That woman of yours is something else. Glad to see she’s snapped out of it. Thought we might have to bring in electroshock.”

“That’s what Tom did, in some respects.”

“All right, Kate. I’m here. What do you have?”

Jeb listened and then called his crime scene team back out. Butch didn’t know if Jeb did that because he thought something had been missed or as a favor. Either way, all involved took the job seriously. Jeb watched closely as Waters searched. A deputy used cones and bright yellow tape to rope off areas Waters indicated.

Butch waited out of the way with Kate. Per Jeb, Kate’s job was to let the others work. Butch’s was to make sure Kate did hers. Tom and a laborer worked from ladders in the pit on the set wall. They used a magnifying glass to inspect the white dust while a deputy photographed the grains of sand that had been the wall.

“Here, Sheriff.” Waters waved Jeb to the edge of cleared land. He pointed to a cone sitting on short scrubby grass. “That plumber’s wrench isn’t ours. It’s an old one. Could be one of the local crew brought their own, but there was no need.”

Kate did a quick dance and pointed her index finger up at Jeb. “I told you there was more. There had to be. See what Tom’s found.”

Jeb crossed his arms, a gesture Butch knew meant he wasn’t moving. “I have a man with him. I’m going to talk to Thompson. You, go sit in your truck.”

“I can’t. You confiscated it. I guess you’re stuck with me.”

Jeb looked over Kate’s head at Butch. “If you want to help, do something with her.”

“Hyde called. His message sounded like nothing but heavy breathing. Let’s run into town and see what he wants.”

“He probably just butt dialed you, and he’s thirty minutes away. If something happens, I want to be here.”

“If you stay here, something will happen. Not in a good way.” Butch took her by the elbow and steered toward the parking area. “Jeb will call. Tom’s here. He’d call, too. Pissing Jeb off is only going to cause more problems.”

“Fine. Gimme your keys.”

“Not a chance.” When Kate’s stubborn chin came up, Butch couldn’t resist pinching it between his fingers and kissing it.

“No. Kissing,” Kate growled.

Butch laced his fingers with hers and pulled her behind him as he walked to his truck.

“And no holding hands. Sheesh. Are you trying to ruin my reputation?”

Butch looked over her head at the busy construction site. “I don’t think you have to worry about that. Judging by how high everyone’s jumped, I’d say your reputation is intact.”

Kate climbed into the truck and buckled her seat belt. “It better be.”

Butch drove out of the site and down the road a few miles, glancing at Kate as he drove. Back to her old self, her head swung left to right taking everything in. “So, my sweet Katie, have you really had thirty-seven lovers?”

“Thirty-seven?” Kate snorted a laugh. “Where did you get that from?”

“You said it to your father. By the way, I can’t believe you said that to your father.”

She wrinkled her nose. “I don’t listen to half the stuff I tell my father. You shouldn’t either.”

“How many?” While no virgin, Butch thought Kate to be the kind of woman that was selective of her lovers.

She angled herself against the door, her bright eyes on him. “I may have exaggerated a little.”

“What’s exaggerating a little? Thirty? Twenty-five?”

“You aren’t going to let this go, are you?” Kate’s crooked smile dared him. “How many women have you had?”

While married, Butch had been devoutly faithful. But in between, there were no rules. Butch used the flat, commanding voice Jeb always used when he’d been trapped. “Enough to know it’s time to change the subject.”

Kate laughed happily, her hair flying around in the wind. “You were a man slut, weren’t you?”

“I was not.” His hot denial only fed her entertainment.

“Trophy man slut. A big time musician. I bet women across the country lost their panties to you. Should I check? Hashtag RocktheButch? You blushing?”

The hell he was. “Don’t matter what was. Only what is.” No truer words, he thought.

Butch parked in a customer space outside the old three-bay garage that proudly read H
YDE’S
S
HOP
. The tow truck Butch loaned him the money to buy sat at the ready next to the shop. Two bay doors stood open, welcoming friends and customers.

“Hyde. It’s Butch and Little Red.” Butch walked between the lifts, calling out again. The only sounds came from the street behind them.

“I don’t think anyone’s here.”

Butch walked around the small garage but found no sign of Hyde. “This isn’t right. When Hyde goes out, he closes the door and puts out his sign.”

Kate walked around the lift that held a white sedan at chest height. “I’m surprised he locks up. I figured around here, he would leave everything open in case someone dropped by and needed to borrow something.”

Butch heard the teasing and tossed it back. “I didn’t say he locked the door. Just that he closed it.
Tsk. Tsk.
City folk.”

Kate knelt to tie her shoe.

“Oh my God. Butch. Call an ambulance.”

Chapter Seventeen

K
ate found the controls and raised the rack on the empty bay. Butch jumped down as he dialed 9-1-1. “This is Butch McCormick. We need an ambulance at Hyde’s Shop.”

Butch had known Silvy Jones, the 9-1-1 operator, since he was a tot, just like everyone else in town. Butch heard her expert fingers flying over the keyboard as she began to question him in that cool and collected voice of hers.

“What’s the problem, Butch?”

“Hyde’s hurt. He’s lying unconscious in one of his pits.”

Hyde lay like a pile of rotten trash in the corner of the pit. His head lay against the concrete at an awkward angle, his arms and legs tangled. Kate had followed Butch down, racing around him to Hyde’s side.

“I feel a pulse. I don’t know how you can breathe like that, but I’m afraid to move you, big man.” Kate held up her bloodied hand. “He’s bleeding, Butch. From his head.”

Even as Butch relayed the information, he could hear the sirens in the background. It was a blessing that the fire station was only two blocks away. The ambulance crowded the small parking lot.

“They’re here, Silvy. Thanks.” Butch climbed halfway out of the pit and waved an arm. “Over here, boys. He’s down here.”

K
ate paced the length of the pit, watching the paramedics work and feeling useless. Butch had gone into Hyde’s office to call Hyde’s mother. Through the office window, Kate saw he paced also. Another siren wailed its approach and abruptly stopped. Moments later, Jeb walked through the wide door.

“How is he?” Jeb squatted at the edge of the shallow pit.

“He hit his head hard, Sheriff. We’re checking for other injuries before we move him.”

Kate went to her knees next to Jeb. “He’s going to be okay, right?”

Jeb patted her knee. “Hyde’s got a thick head. That plays in his favor.”

“Hyde’s mother is going to meet them at the hospital.” Butch jogged from the office. “What are you doing here?”

“I was one my way back from the construction site when I heard the call. Thank the Lord you came to check on him. I hate to think how long he could have been there.”

In a silent vigil, the three watched the paramedics work. A stiff board was lowered into the pit. Careful hands wrapped Hyde’s neck in a brace then uncurled his body, stretching him to full length and rolling him enough to slide the board beneath him. Jeb and Butch jumped up and went to the end of the pit, ready and willing to help their friend. Kate stayed out of the way, saying prayers for the man who’d become her friend. Then she spotted something.

“Guys? There’s something under him.”

The paramedics searched around Hyde. “It’s just keys,” one said. “Rental car,” the other said.

Jeb squatted back down. “Why do you think it’s for a rental car?”

“The key chain is for a rental company. You want them?”

“Leave them. Get Hyde out of there, I’ll take a look at the keys myself.”

“Right, Sheriff. There’s a cell phone down here, too.” The paramedics moved Hyde as smoothly as they could. Jeb jumped into the pit and lent his hands to moving Hyde after he’d been secured. Butch crouched on the floor and took one end of the board, waiting while the paramedics climbed out. Together, they pulled Hyde from the concrete vault.

Blood coated half his face, warping his features into something out of a zombie movie. One eye and ear were indistinguishable from the matted hair.

“Oh. Hyde.” Kate pressed her hand to her heart, looking away, hoping it was just a bad dream. The concrete below held a pool of his blood that snaked in a thin strip across the floor to a center drain. The blood flow had welled up against a cell phone before flowing around.

Jeb focused on the scene. “Kate, run to my truck.” He told her what he needed. “Tell Butch to call Silvy back and get my crew over here.”

Kate ran out of the garage, looking for Jeb’s truck. She found it on the side of the building, unlocked. She opened the small back door and collected the materials Jeb asked for before running to the ambulance where Butch helped settle Hyde on the stretcher. “Jeb wants you to call Silvy back, he needs his crew.”

Butch’s brows pressed down and reached for his phone. He kept the call short, running back into the garage. “What the hell, Jeb?”

Jeb stood at the edge of the pit, waiting to accept the items from Kate. “These keys match the rental company and model of the car Fawn rented. While y’all were outside, I took a quick look around, and that particular model car isn’t here.”

Kate asked the obvious. “How did Hyde get them?”

Jeb shook his head as he activated the screen on the phone. “Y’all happen to know his password? No? All right, I’m labeling this a suspicious scene. Nobody touch anything.” He looked Kate in the eyes. “Don’t touch a thing. I’m serious, Katie.”

The warning in his voice amused her. “Sheesh. You destroy a crime scene or two and people start thinking they have to talk to you in little words.”

Jeb gave her a rare teasing grin before focusing back on Hyde. “I know how fond you are of little words.” He nodded toward the parking lot. “Looks like they’re about ready to go.”