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She grabbed the laptop and spun around to sit on the edge of her bed, then toed off her shoes and curled her feet beneath her.
Throughout her nine weeks in town, she’d maintained her surveillance as ordered. She’d sent regular reports to the DEA office in Minneapolis and the local office in Fargo about the activity she observed, but had heard little back in return.
This message was from Special Agent Allen Larson, and it was typically brief:
BCA reports ballistics same on both the Lund and Stark cases. The Colt AR-15 was registered to Vince W. Lund June 15, 2001. Prior to owner’s death, not reported stolen. No criminal record on either of the Lunds.
Also, a Seattle division office report indicates a major shipment is likely within the next month. Will notify you, pending further information.
Grabbing the pillows from the head of her bed, she punched and fluffed them into a soft mound and then flopped back and closed her eyes.
So she’d been right. Except this still didn’t answer all her questions. The Lund obituaries revealed that Vince had worked in the factory for more than a decade and had been an elder at Grace Lutheran for the past several years. Active on numerous other committees in the church and community, he’d been an upstanding guy.
Though he could have fallen on difficult times financially. Or maybe he’d been lured—or coerced—into something he normally wouldn’t do.
On the other hand, perhaps he’d rarely used that rifle, and it had been stolen—maybe even by someone he knew well. There had to be a number of insiders at the factory who’d be only too happy to frame someone else.
Grabbing her laptop from its hiding place in the closet, she hooked it to the phone line by her bed, called up her e-mail program and fired off another message to Allen:
I need financial histories on the Lunds, fast. Outstanding loans, liens, their credit rating, lawsuits—anything you can find that could be a significant stressor.
If the couple had died in a murder-suicide situation, that was terrible enough. If not, the case was a double homicide, and that meant a ruthless killer was still on the loose in Ryansville.
And then it would be time to involve the local law.
* * * *
AS AWFUL AND SCARY as it had been, finding a dead guy in the woods sure made things different for Josh at school. Word had spread about the day Harold had tried to eat the Weatherfields alive, too.
Kids who’d ignored Josh at lunch now jostled with each other to sit at his table. Some of the girls even looked at him with awe. Weird.
The Weatherfield boys hadn’t changed a bit, though. Except maybe for the worse—and that took a lot of doing.
“Hey, frog-face. Been out playing with any dead people lately?” Thad gave him a sharp elbow to the ribs as the entire student body flooded out the main doors of school and headed for home. “Must be pretty bad if your only friends have rigor mortis.”
Ricky, standing at the big double doors, stuck out his foot as Josh passed. Thad shoved the small of his back.
Airborne, unable to control his fall, Josh saw the bright colors of kids’ clothing flash by as the concrete stairs rushed up to meet his face.
His glasses flew off as his backpack hit the back of his head. Pain blasted through him coupled with rage from countless moments like this—two boys ganging up on him and making him feel like a big joke.
All around, he heard kids gasp. One of them snickered.
Being the smallest kid in fourth grade hadn’t seemed like such a bad thing when he’d been offered the chance to skip third, but now he knew the truth. There wasn’t ever going to be a day, for the rest of his endless days in school, that he wasn’t being picked on for being the youngest-smallest-weakest kid in class. Not unless he did something about it.
The scrapes on his knees burned. Something warm and metallic filled his mouth. And...oh, no! One of his front teeth felt different. Sharp and jaggedy.
The Weatherfield boys—one his age, one a year older, and both outweighing him by a whole lot—stood behind some other kids, looking smug.
Without thought, without looking left or right for teachers, or the principal, or anyone else who might try to stop him, Josh threw his backpack aside and barreled toward them, his head lowered and fists clenched.
The other kids immediately scattered. A lot of them started yelling. But none of that mattered. All he could see was Thad’s stupid grin—then his look of disbelief as Josh kept coming.
When he rammed into Thad’s midsection, the older boy folded like a bent straw. The momentum carried them both backward and right over the tubular metal railing along the stairs.
Thad landed on his back in a prickly bush, screaming like a girl, with Josh on top of him. “Don’t ever, ever mess with me again, or you’re gonna be sorry! I’ve had it—do you hear me?” With every word, Josh pummeled him furiously in the ribs, all of his anger and humiliation blocking out everything else.
At the firm grasp of a hand at his collar, Josh belatedly remembered Ricky. With a roar of rage, he twisted around and tried to lunge at his other enemy...
