Welcome to Last Chance (Last Chance #1)(38)
Author: Hope Ramsay

Jane was pretty sure she knew what the emergency was. Ruby was about to storm Stone’s jailhouse to spring her middle son from the jail. “Just Haley?” she asked.

“The middle school is open, thank the Lord. Are you decent?”

No, not even close. “Yeah, I’m decent.” She glanced at the mess in her apartment. She needed to move fast to clean up.

“Be there in fifteen, tops.”

Jane had just stepped out of a speed shower when she heard the knocking at her door. “Coming,” she hollered as she pulled on a pair of jeans and a T-shirt that used to belong to Sharon Rhodes. The shirt was faded pink and said something on the back of it, but she didn’t have time to read the words.

Jane had cleaned up the obvious evidence of last night’s activities, but she’d have to keep her eye on Haley to make sure that child didn’t do any more trash-can snooping. She had a feeling Haley had a future in law enforcement or journalism—especially the kind that involved discovering the real juicy dirt and exposing it.

She raced to the door and pulled it open…

Her worst nightmare stood on the other side.

Woody the weasel, aka Woody the peckerwood, didn’t wait to charm his way through the door. He used the brute-force method. Inside of five seconds, the man had her pinned to the wall. He didn’t look like he’d shaved in a solid week, and his jaw was covered in ugly bristles that detracted from his movie-star looks. He didn’t smell too good, either. His Reyn Spooner Hawaiian shirt—the one with the bright orange birds of paradise on it—had a ketchup stain right on the front.

“Where is it?” Woody demanded, tightening his fists on her arms.

Jane didn’t answer. Her throat seemed paralyzed by fear. The Universe had, once again, crapped all over her rainbow.

He slammed her hard against the wall. “I asked you a question, damn it.”

“Where’s what?” she asked, her voice wobbling.

“Don’t play dumb with me,” he bellowed and gave her another violent shake.

No one was going to rescue her from this. Even worse, in a few minutes, Ruby and Haley would come walking through the door and into this disaster.

Jane couldn’t allow that.

That thought brought an odd clarity to her mind. She inhaled deeply and reached for her calming mantra. Then she told her racing heart to slow down, and she forced her mind to work against the fear. She needed to get Woody out of that apartment, and the only way to do that would be to play along with him.

“Okay, Woody,” she said in a surprisingly calm voice. “It’s not here.”

“You gave it to your contact, didn’t you? Who are you working for? Did you and Freddie double-cross me? Or did you double-cross Freddie? Because if you did, honey, your life is toast. I mean Freddie doesn’t mess around with people who double-cross him. You know?”

No, she didn’t know, but she needed to play along. “Look, I handed it off, okay?” It would be nice if she understood what she was supposed to have handed off and who Freddie was, although she had an idea that Freddie was not a legitimate businessman.

“Where is he now?”

Where is who, and what are we talking about? Every ticking second felt like a blow to her middle. Think, think, think, Jane, don’t panic. “In Bamberg,” she said, because it was the only place she could think of. She had no idea where Bamberg was, exactly, only that it was another little town in the next county over.

Woody looked down at her, and she could almost see the cogs turning in his weasely brain. He shook her again, and she bit her tongue. The salty iron taste of blood filled her mouth.

“You’re lying,” he said, then he backhanded her across the face.

The sting of the slap stunned her for a moment. But not as much as what happened next, because Woody pulled a small handgun out of his pocket and put the barrel right up against her temple. He pinned her to the wall by encircling her neck with his left hand.

“Where is it?”

“Woody, I swear, I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said in a whiny voice that telegraphed her fear. She could feel her body going cold. It was hard to breathe.

Suddenly, her brain didn’t want to think about anything except that she was going to die before she ever heard Clay say the words “I love you.” And before she could say them back to him.

Woody squeezed her throat. “I’m talking about the goddamned Cambodian Camel. For chrissake, Mary, what did you do with it?”

The Cambodian Camel? “Are you talking about that piece-of-crap necklace you gave me?”

“Don’t play dumb, Mary.”

“Uh, Woody, I threw that piece of junk away. It’s probably in the landfill by now.” Unless, of course, Haley was wearing it around her sweet little neck.

Hoo boy.

“What?” He lowered the gun and stared down at her with an incredulous look. But he still had her by the neck. “You threw it away? You couldn’t possibly be that dumb. You gave it to that guy they arrested this morning, didn’t you?”

She almost laughed aloud. “No, honest, Woody, I didn’t give it to that guy.”

“You’re lying.” He pulled her away from the wall and began dragging her across the floor toward the kitchen, where her satchel purse rested on the table. “Dump it out,” he directed.

She did as she was told, and he pawed through the contents of her purse in much the same way that Clay had pawed through them last Thursday morning. He picked up her green leather wallet with the flower on it. “Open it.”

She opened the wallet and dumped the contents of the billfold and change purse, which consisted of about thirty dollars and one 1943 wheat penny. Woody picked up the thirty bucks and stuffed it in his pocket. He ignored the penny.

Jane didn’t.

When the penny hit the Formica tabletop, Jane almost lost whatever shred of composure she still possessed. All she could think about was the day Clay had found that penny and put it in her hand. And ever since then, her luck had changed.

So she picked up the penny and pressed it in her fist like it was a talisman. And since Woody saw it as only a penny, he didn’t give her any crap or otherwise shoot her head off for picking it up.

She squeezed that lucky penny and winged a prayer skyward—not to the Universe, but to the God of the Christ Church Ladies Auxiliary. She prayed to that God to keep Clay and Haley and everyone she cared about in Last Chance—even Stone Rhodes—safe from the menace she had brought down upon them. And just for good measure, she asked God to please, please help her out of this jam.

Woody gave her another head-rattling shake. It reminded her that she had never actually had any kind of relationship with the Almighty, and if she wanted to be rescued, she was going to have to do it for herself. Right now. She needed to get Woody out of this apartment before Ruby and Haley got there.

“Am I going to have to turn this place upside down?” he hissed in her ear.

“No,” she said firmly, willing herself to be calm, to invest her voice with authority and to lie like hell. Jane was a terrible liar, but she bucked herself up and sold her lie with all the straight-faced conviction of a politician running for election. “It’s not here. We put it in a safe place.”

“Where?”

“In Columbia. In a safe-deposit box at the First National Bank.” She was extemporizing, and she hoped there was a First National Bank in Columbia.

“I don’t see a safe-deposit box key here. Where’s the key, Mary?”

Oops—that was a major hole in her story. She thought fast. She just needed to buy a few minutes, and Haley and Ruby would be safe. “The key is hidden outside of town. The tenth hole at Golfing for God.” She said the first thing that came to mind.

She had never been to Golfing for God, of course, but she knew it had a tenth hole depicting the birth of Jesus. Friday afternoon, Haley and Lizzy had given Jane a complete run-down of all the holes at Golfing for God, starting with Adam and Eve and ending with the Resurrection. “The key is hidden in the manger with baby Jesus,” she added for good measure, remembering how Haley had described the crèche scene, and the angel that looked over it.

“Golfing for God?” Woody sounded skeptical.

“It’s a roadside attraction about three miles outside of town on Route 321. I’ll take you there.”

“Okay, baby, but I swear if you’re lying, I’m going to knock the crap out of you and strangle you for good measure.”

Jane tried to think positively about this turn of events, but it was kind of hard. She had convinced him to leave the apartment and save Ruby and Haley. That was a good thing. On the other hand, she figured she had less than an hour to live.

“Okay, baby, let’s go. The Colombian’s goons are on my tail, and I need that necklace quick. You understand me?” He didn’t put the gun away, but at least he stopped pointing it at her head.

Woody snagged Jane by the upper arm, put the pistol up against her spine, and half-dragged her to the apartment’s door. She tried to quell her fears with the thought that her lie had worked. In five minutes—maybe less, depending on where Woody had parked his car—they would be gone, and Haley and Ruby would be safe.

He opened the door, and they headed down the metal fire stairs. And with a predictability Jane had to admire, the Universe took that moment to throw another monkey wrench into the works. Ruby Rhodes had already pulled her Ford Taurus into the alley, and she was just getting out of her car.

Clay’s mother stood by the open car door and looked up at Jane, taking in the disheveled, unshaven, Hawaiian-shirt-wearing Woody West.

“Run like hell,” Jane yelled. “Get Stony, quick.”

Ruby hesitated for one instant. And that little hesitation proved utterly disastrous.

Chapter 19

So if this is all settled, can I go, please? I’ve got some unfinished business to attend to,” Clay said to Stone and Sheriff Bennett. They had just corroborated his alibi with Amy Swallock, and both law officers were looking somewhat chastened.

Apparently Betty Wilkins was missing, and folks were putting two and two together and coming up with a larger number than four. So Miz Miriam had worked some kind of magic and matched up Betty and Ray. It had to be some kind of miracle.

A commotion in the outer office interrupted the interrogation, and Clay reckoned it had to be Momma arriving to the rescue, right on schedule. She probably had Aunt Arlene and Uncle Pete in tow, seeing as the two of them were supposed to have returned from Minnesota yesterday. He had a feeling Uncle Pete would not be amused with Alex.

Clay was feeling especially smug and looking forward to completing his conversation with Jane just as soon as he could hotfoot it back to the Cut ’n Curl.

But instead of Momma and Uncle Pete charging in, Deputy Chief Easley poked his head into the room. “Uh, Stone, we got us a problem out here.”

“It’s not my mother?” Stone asked.

Damian shook his head. “No, it’s a couple of guys from the FBI, and they have a warrant for Jane Coblentz’s arrest, but the warrant says Mary Smith on it. And y’all won’t believe this, but Mary Smith, aka Jane Coblentz, just happens to be the girl in that pinup photo we found in Ray’s locker—you know, from Working Girls Go Wild.”