Page 45 of His Forgotten Colton Fiancee
Chapter 10
The warm South Dakota day promised to be fine. It was a time in August for last-minute vacations, fishing and enjoying the weather before the autumn winds blew in the burning colors of changing leaves, leading to the bitter winter snowfalls. The first hint of fall lingered in the cool breeze sweeping along the streets, fluttering the red and blue petunias in the flowerpots.
As he locked the front door to Quinn’s shop, checking it twice, West tried to keep his sense of calm. He headed for his truck, nodding politely to the pedestrians passing by, glancing with curiosity at Good Eats. People in town knew what happened to Quinn. A couple stopped, asked after her.
He kept his answers brief and vague. Anyone could pass along information to the unsub.
Hell,anyone could be the unsub, ready to strike again. Delivering death with a bomb intended to inflict as much suffering as possible...
Keys in hand, West went to unlock his truck when a flash of memory slammed into him.
Orange tongues of flame inside his home. Fire, too intense to draw near. Screams echoing in the night, coming from him.Had to get inside... Save them. Please, someone savethem...
I’m sorry, West. Your parents and your sisters didn’t make it.
Closed-casket funerals, wood coffins lined up in a row. A seemingly never-ending parade of his father’s fellow cops, friends, neighbors, relatives.
Everyone murmuring sympathy, some weeping as they hugged him. He was a statue, stiff and unyielding. Show no emotion.Be like Dad, strong, stoic. Make them proud.
Only much later, after the funeral, and the cars and the hordes of people had left, did he lock himself into the bedroom given to him by his aunt and uncle...and cry. Scream. Rage.
Never again. Never again would anyone he loved die on his watch.
Memories so thick they become noxious, cloying smoke, threatening to squeeze his throat shut. Leaning against the door, he breathed deeply as histherapist taught him. Every male instinct fought to run upstairs, take Quinn into his arms and promise to stick to her until the killer was found.
Leaving Quinn alone, with only a security guard downstairs, made him nervous. He wanted to stay with her, keep her safe. But he had to return to work and analyze the findings on the crime scene.
Not to mention his own findings, and what he’dfound at the first blast site.
Work offered solace, a way to deal with the ache of grief fisting in his stomach. Catching the unsub meant others would stay safe. He couldn’t bring back his family, or Tia, but he could perform his duty.
You have a clever mind, son. Use it.
Usually the recollection of his father’s voice pinched him with sorrow, but today it galvanized him. The memorymade him smile a little for the first time in thirteen years. West had been fixing his sweet little Mustang, which had coughed out and died in the driveway. He loved tinkering with the car, but that Sunday, he’d only wanted to drive out to the lake, enjoy the summer sun and hang with friends before heading back to school the next day. His father had come outside to help.
The problem’s there.You can find it, his dad had encouraged.
But I can’t figure it out.He’d thrown down the wrench in sheer frustration.
His father had glanced down at the tool, then up at him.You’ll never find the solution by throwing away the key to it.
Ashamed by his outburst, he’d studied the problem again. Analyzed it. Eventually fixed it.
Walking away would have solved nothing.
Find thesolution. Use your brain.
Keys. Cabins. Rentals, million-dollar properties left in the balance. Buildings blown up.
West dropped his keys. Picked them up. Jingled them in his palm.
Planning an explosion took effort, time, caution in using delicate materials that could ignite and turn you from a living, breathing human being into shattered bits of bone and blood and flesh. But it wasthe only way, other than fire, to fully destroy a building.
If the first explosion intended to destroy the abandoned hardware store to test out the TATP explosives used later for Tia’s office, what if the second bomb was a cover-up for the real target?
With all the Red Ridge PD concentrating on the explosion in town and Tia’s death, resources would be limited.
And a third explosionplanned for an expensive vacation spot in Spearfish Canyon, the same property whose sale to the Larson twins fell through, could be rigged to look like a gas leak, garnering much less attention and manpower.
