Page 47 of The Woman in the Hollow
“I don’t know if you’ve, you know, done the math. But it’s going to be incredibly expensive to fix this. I mean, the pumpkins alone…”
“The money doesn’t matter.” The place was a front anyway. And it had been incredibly profitable already. “I’m more worried about not being able to get enough supply.”
“I’ve already found a dozen separate places to draw supply from. And that’s just local. There are probably hundreds of places across the state if we need to keep reordering.”
“You’re on top of it already.”
“I’m trying. The straw is easy. But the decorations might be a little harder.”
“I can get on that,” Dom said, giving me a look.
“Yeah, if you could get started on that. And getting someone out here to redo the security system.”
“Got it.” He turned and made his way to his car.
“I can get started on hitting up all the different stores to get the pumpkins.”
“No, that won’t be necessary.”
“But we—”
“I will get some people on that. They can spread out and hit all the places. I think I need you here.”
“It is bad,” she agreed, looking back toward the field.
“I know it’s your day off…”
“No, I’m here and on this. I know this is your place, but it kind of feels a bit like mine too. I’m here more than I’m home.” She paused to kick a flake of hay. “I hate this.”
“On the plus side, we have plenty of hay for the scarecrows,” I said. “Has anyone checked the haunted house?”
“It was the first thing I did when I pulled in. The inside of the building is untouched as far as I can tell.”
“Speaking of, why were you here on your day off?”
To that, her gaze skirted away, glancing past me toward the lot. Following her gaze, I saw her looking at her car.
“I was, uh, passing by. And I saw the damage.”
That… felt like a lie.
But why would she be lying about that?
“Well, I think I’m going to go grab a rake. All the pumpkin guts need to get dealt with before the animals start sniffing around.”
“Good idea. I’ll grab the wheelbarrow.”
“Really? You don’t have people for this?” she asked. “I mean, aside from me.”
“I’m not above some manual labor. Though, yeah, this might be more than a two-person job,” I said, eyeing the sprawling field of destroyed pumpkins.
As we worked, I couldn’t help but wonder what the chances were that this was just a coincidence.
First Big Ed, then someone destroying the place. That said, if it was some sort of professional, why wouldn’t they have broken into the shop? Gone through the records? Found the stashed money?
It could just be a scare tactic.
Someone with a vendetta.
