Page 31 of Killer on the Homestead
“I can have you removed, Rosalie.”
She ignored him and turned to face Duncan’s parents. Who looked pale and anxious.
“There’s nothing wrong with letting the police do their job,” she told them gently. “Even if it’s a waste of everyone’s time,” Rosalie continued, smiling at his parents.
She didn’tlookat Detective Beckett, who was scowling at her, but Duncan figured she knew it was happening.
“I’ll get the key,” Mom said quietly.
“I’m afraid I’ll have to go with you, ma’am.”
“Like hell—”
“Stand down, boys,” Rosalie said cheerfully to both Duncan and Dad, because apparently they’d been saying the same thing. “You two sit. I’ll handle it.” She gave Duncan a pointed look, and realized she was putting on that cheerful, breezy demeanor for his parents’ sake.
And since she was, he nodded. Then he nudged his dad into a seat at the kitchen table while Rosalie, Mom, and the detective moved deeper in the house to get to the gun safe.
“What the hell is happening?” Dad muttered, looking at his hands. They suddenly looked old to Duncan, and his heartlurched. The amount of anxiety and stress this was putting on his parents was too much. It just wasn’t fair.
“I don’t know, Dad, but Rosalie will get to the bottom of it.”
Dad took in a deep breath, then let it out. “She’s a smart girl,” Dad said, squeezing his hands into fists then spreading his fingers wide. “I don’t trust that detective, but I trust Rosalie.”
Duncan nodded. On that, they agreed. But when Mom, Rosalie, and Detective Beckett reappeared, Duncan’s entire body went ice-cold.
The detective carried two guns. He wore gloves, and instructed one of the deputies on the porch to put his on before he handed the guns to him. Duncan could only stare in utter shock.
When he looked back at Rosalie, her expression was grave, but she immediately wiped that away into something more blank once she knew he was looking.
Which scared the hell out of him.
“Who has access to this gun cabinet, Mr. Kirk?” the detective asked.
“Myself.”
“And?”
Dad shrugged, looked away. Not because he wanted to lie, Duncan knew, but because he wanted toprotect.
Since Duncan wasn’t about to let Dad take the fall foranything, he continued the list. “Me.”
“Duncan,” Mom said disgustedly. “You couldn’t find the key if I handed it to you on a silver platter.”
“I know where you keep the key,” he insisted. Lying, but he’d lie. He’d do whatever.
“Prove it, Ace,” Rosalie said. Why the hell was she putting him on the spot? Why wouldn’t anyone let him…protect? He remembered what Rosalie had said about letting the cops do their job.
It didn’t soothe him any, but he figured… Well, like Dad said. Rosalie was smart. They trusted Rosalie. He tried to breathe through the anxiety riding high in his chest, and though he was going to try to move forward with cooperation, he scowled at Rosalie, then his mother, for not letting him tell a little protective lie. “Okay, I don’t know where it is, but I could have asked. I could have found it. Anyone could have—”
“You didn’t,” Mom said firmly. Then she turned to the detective. “There are two keys. Norman and I keep one at the house, and only we know where. The second key is with Terry Boothe, our foreman.”
The detective looked at the uniformed officer behind him, the one without the guns, gave a nod. The guy took off. No doubt to round up Terry.
“Now, don’t go harassing my boys in the middle of the night,” Dad said, pushing to his feet and pointing at Detective Beckett. “That’s not how things are done around here.”
“That’s how they’re done in a murder investigation, Mr. Kirk. Two guns registered to you could be the murder weapon. We have a search warrant and the authority to confiscate them so tests can be done. We’ll head down to talk to Mr. Boothe, then we’ll be on our way. I know I don’t have to repeat myself, but it’d be in everyone’s best interest if they stayed put, if they cooperated with the deputies. We all want the same thing, don’t we?”
Duncan figured his answer wasno, because at the moment, he wanted Copeland Beckett to rot in hell. But even he knew he shouldn’t voice that. Though it took biting his tongue not to.
