Anyplace But Here (Oklahoma Lovers Series Book 5) (24 page)

Chapter 24

Emily checked all the other drawers in the file cabinet as well as the ones in his desk. Completely cleaned out, not even a scrap of paper or a pencil stub.

Blowing out a frustrated breath, she left his office and tried the door to Mr. Sanders’ room. Amazed to find it unlocked, she crept across the floor to his file cabinet, and winced when the drawer screeched as she slid it open, as if someone was close enough to hear.

She took the list from her pocket and began to compare the names on the paper with the folders in the drawer. After pulling out several files, she settled in Mr. Sander’s chair, her foot tucked under her bottom as she flipped through papers.

Dust motes danced in the stream of sunshine coming through the windows while time passed as she pulled more files, and added papers to the stack on the desk. Her list of those who’d invested a great deal of money was growing. She closed the file in her lap and stretched. A glance at her timepiece told her she’d been at this for over two hours.

Court would already be breaking for lunch and Hunter would be wondering where she was. Wouldn’t he be surprised and pleased when she handed over the stack of papers with the damming information?

As she stood to return the latest files to the cabinet, a noise in the outer office stopped her in her tracks. Her heart pounded as footsteps sounded across the outer room, and the door to Mr. Sanders’ office slowly opened.

“Mrs. Smith!” Louis’s partner stood in the doorway, gaping at her. Then his eyes moved to his desk where the pile of papers rested. “What are you doing in my office?”

“Ah, I, um, came to look for something.”

“What?” He moved further into the office, his eyes taking in the open file drawer, the file in her hand, and the neat stack on his desk.

“I, ah, hoped to find some information on Louis’s finances so I could . . .” Her words drifted off as she fumbled to think of a reasonable explanation for her presence in the man’s office.

“Could what? Your husband saw fit to leave you nothing. I guess he preferred to leave everything to a whore instead of a slut.”

She reared back at his comment as if she’d been slapped. His initial surprise at finding her in the office had turned into something frightening. His eyes narrowed as he came closer. “I suggest you vacate my office, Mrs. Smith.” He nodded to his desk. “And whatever it is you have there, just leave it and go.”

She eased out from behind his desk, keeping her eyes on him. Knots formed in her stomach and her heart continued to pound. She’d only been in Mr. Sanders’ presence a few times, but he always seemed a meek and mild man, the epitome of a gentleman. The man standing in front of her now frightened her as much as Louis had.

As she moved around the desk, she glanced again at the pile of papers. Right there in that stack was evidence that would put Sanders behind bars for a long, long time. And possibly convince the police there were plenty of others who had a motive to kill Louis. She dragged her finger along the desk as she moved forward.

“Mrs. Smith. I suggest you leave now. Right now.”

She licked her dry lips and gave him a brief smile. “Yes, of course. I’m sorry to have disturbed you.”

He seemed to relax at her words.

“Oh, dear,” she said, looking over Sanders’ shoulder. When he turned, she snatched the papers from the desk and ran to the door, slamming it behind her.

“Son of a bitch . . .” The door to the office flew open as she thundered down the stairs, Sanders on her tail. “Stop!”

Taking deep breaths, as much from fear as the run, she kept going, heading straight for the rear of the building.

She burst through the back door and looked wildly around. A short distance in front of her to the right stood a decrepit old building on the verge of collapse. A ‘condemned’ sign hung sideways from the doorway swinging in the slight wind.

“Stop right now, or I’ll shoot you,” Sanders shouted.

“Oh my God.” She glanced behind her and screamed as Sanders pulled a gun from his inside jacket pocket, waving it in her direction. Clutching the papers to her chest, she raced up the few steps to the condemned building and yanked the old wooden portal open, coughing and choking on the dusty air as she darted inside.

Slamming the door behind her, Emily looked frantically around the broken down space. The building was so dilapidated it appeared to be crumbling before her eyes. Light streamed through broken windows and holes in the walls. Animal droppings and dirt covered the floor. On her right she spotted a staircase and made for it.

The stairs creaked and a couple split as she stepped around broken boards to the next floor.

Oh my God, this whole building is going to collapse.

Hopefully there would be a place to hide up there until . . . Until what? No one knew where she was, and Sanders had a gun. A gun! When did that meek and mild man become so frightening?

The rotted wooden planks beneath her feet on the second floor also groaned under her weight. She walked on her tiptoes, carefully picking out the strongest looking pieces, not sure if that made it better or worse. The sound of more stairs breaking through signaled the arrival of Sanders. Emily focused on the door straight ahead, which appeared to be a back staircase. If she could make it there, she could leave the building, and scream for help.

“Don’t move!”

Emily stopped and looked over her shoulder. He stood in the doorway, panting heavily, his gun pointed directly at her.

“Turn around, Mrs. Smith.”

Hunter figured the best place to start was at Smith’s office. Emily had been begging him to allow her to help in the investigation ever since Jeremy’s death. Stubborn and protective, he’d refused, and now he was certain she’d gone ahead and gotten herself in deep.

They hopped off the trolley, and with Hunter leading the way, they entered the building that housed Smith and Sanders. Hunter’s jaw tightened remembering the last time he’d been in this building. The day he’d looked into the face of the man he’d spent a good many years searching for.

Taking the stairs two at a time, they sprinted down the hallway to the office. The door stood wide open.

Hunter cursed under his breath as they both moved cautiously into the room. The door to one of the two inner offices gaped open as well. McNeil drew his gun as they peeked around the doorjamb.

The place was a mess. File cabinet drawers stood open and papers were scattered on the floor. A diploma from the College of New Jersey, awarded to Gregory Sanders, hung on the wall behind the desk.

“I’ll bet Sanders was here. And from the look of things, he might have caught Emily going through his files.” Hunter ran his hand down his face. God only knew what Sanders’ reaction to finding Emily might have been.

He tried to remember what he knew of the man. Very little, only that Emily mentioned he’d seemed relieved when told at the reading of the will that he’d inherited the other half of the business.

All this time their focus had been on disgruntled clients. Perhaps they’d overlooked an obvious suspect.

“I think you’re right. If he found her snooping, he could have panicked. I don’t like the looks of this, Henderson.”

Just as Hunter bent to pick up one of the papers, a woman’s scream rent the air, the sound going right to his gut.

“Emily!”

His steps ate up the distance to the window in time to see Emily race into an old decrepit building situated behind them and slam the door. A chunky man, not too fast on his feet, ran after her. He looked familiar, and with what he and McNeil had discovered here, and his memory from the courtroom when he’d testified, it had to be Sanders.

Hunter’s heart dropped to his stomach at the sight of the man waving a gun as he chased Emily down.

Dammit to hell!

Emily turned, the papers she clutched in her hands shaking as badly as her knees. She stared into those black eyes, filled with terror and determination, and in a flash she knew.

Sucking in a breath, she said, “You killed Louis, didn’t you?”

Sanders held the gun with both hands. “Louis needed killing. He refused to shut down the business and give me my half of the money so I could leave. We made a deal at the beginning. Five years, then we would cut out. But no, he got involved with
you
, bought himself a fancy house, started to believe his own story. Except bad blood always shows, doesn’t it? Did you know he was a two-bit bank robber at one time?”

Emily managed to find her voice. The man seemed almost as frightened as she was. Maybe she could talk calmly to him, convince him he didn’t want to make things worse by hurting her. “Actually I did know that. He killed Mr. Henderson’s father in a bank robbery eighteen years ago.”

“Well, what do you know? Small world, wouldn’t you say?” One hand released his grip on the gun and he waved it through the air. “None of that matters. Your boyfriend is going to hang for the murder. I’ve been watching the trial—he’s done for.” Still aiming the gun at her, he said, “Drop those papers.”

The documents slid to the floor, much like she thought she would do if she didn’t get ahold of herself. Her mouth was dry, her heart pounded, and she felt weak all over.

“Emily!”

Sanders jerked and glanced at the window behind him. “Who’s that?”

Hunter.
She recognized his voice immediately. Relief flooded her, even though he certainly wasn’t close enough to help. She wasn’t out of danger yet.

“Come over here.” Sanders motioned with the gun. He reached out and grabbed her arm as she came close. Wrapping his arm around her waist, he pushed the gun to her temple and dragged her to the window. Looking down at the two men who stood there, he said, “Henderson. Why the hell isn’t he in court?”

Hunter cupped his mouth with his hands. “Sanders, let her go. That building isn’t safe. It could collapse around you any minute.”

“Well, if it does, she’s going with me.”

Emily’s heart banged against her ribs with the feel of the cold metal pressed up against her head. Sanders’ grip on her waist tightened, and she whimpered as pain shot through her. She looked out the window as nausea welled up from her stomach. Hunter was down there with another man wearing a badge.

They both stared up at her and Sanders in the window. “Emily. Hang on, honey. I’ll get you out.”

“Like hell you will, Henderson. This gal is my ticket out of this town.” Sanders’ voice sounded desperate, like he was trying to convince himself with his words.

“Release her and we’ll let you leave,” the other man said.

“Nope. I’m not that dumb. I want a horse and money brought here. Then once we’re far enough away, I’ll let her go.”

“Hunter, he killed Louis!” Emily grunted as Sanders hit her in the side of her face with the gun.

“Shut up.”

The man with Hunter looked toward the window. “Sanders, we need time to get the money and horse. That building could very well disintegrate under your feet.”

“Then you’d better hurry.”

Almost blinded by rage when Sanders smacked Emily in the face, Hunter took deep breaths to keep from charging into the building and killing Sanders with his bare hands.

“Calm, down, Henderson. Don’t react.” McNeil spoke out of the side of his mouth. “The man’s nerves are already stretched. You can see it in his eyes. One false move and that gun will go off.”

So it had been Sanders who’d murdered Louis. They should have guessed. They were so focused on the killer being one of the partnership’s clients who’d been fleeced of their money, they’d skipped right past the man who seemed so nondescript. As a Texas Ranger, he should have learned over the years that it was the unassuming ones who usually got away with it because they were so unnoticeable.

“I gotta get her out of there. That building is unsafe.”

“I know. But first we have to remove Sanders from the picture.” McNeil paused. “I have an idea. Go with me on this.”

McNeil cupped his hands and shouted. “Sanders. Tell us how much you want and I’ll send Hunter to get the money and horse.”

“What?” Hunter swung to face McNeil. “I’m not leaving.”

“Shut up. Follow along.”

Sanders looked down at them, his eyes shifting back and forth. “Two thousand dollars. And a horse. A fast one.”

McNeil spoke softly, barely moving his lips. “I want you to slowly reach behind me and take the gun I have stashed in my belt.”

“Behind you? I thought your gun was tucked under your arm.”

McNeil tossed him a grin. “Never give away all your secrets, Henderson. You should remember your Texas Ranger days. The gun in my belt is your old Walker Colt. You were always the best shot on the team. Go to the building Sanders’ office is in and you’ll be able to pick him off.”

“Are you crazy?” he hissed. “He’s got a gun pressed up against Emily’s head.”

“I’ll do my best to distract him, have him ease up on his hold. But our best chance of hitting him is with you.”

Sweat beaded Hunter’s forehead as he glanced up at Emily. A bruise had already formed on her face where Sanders had hit her. Tears ran down her pale cheeks, whether from fear or pain, he didn’t know. Everything possessive in him reared up and gripped him like a vise.

Memories flooded him of how he had huddled under a desk and watched his father killed before his very eyes. He’d never gotten over the guilt of not doing something to prevent it, even though he’d been a child and had told himself numerous times there hadn’t been anything he could have done. But this time he could, and the murder of someone he loved would not happen again.

McNeil began negotiations with Sanders, discussing how the money should be bagged, what type of horse he wanted, and how much time it would take to do it all. While Sanders was busy with that, Hunter stealthily withdrew the gun from McNeil’s back and slid it into his belt, underneath this jacket.