Chapter 10 - The Shot
Glass exploded across the chapel.
Eleanor screamed.
The deputy shoved Richard behind a pew while Ethan pulled me to the floor. A second shot struck the wooden beam above us.
“Stay down!” the deputy yelled.
Dad crawled toward Eleanor.
Ghost was barking wildly outside.
The shooter fired once more, then an engine roared below the ridge.
By the time the deputy reached the doorway, the vehicle was gone.
Nobody had been hit.
That felt like luck until we found what the bullet had struck.
The second cassette was shattered.
Richard stared at the pieces.
Too quickly.
Ethan noticed.
“You knew they were aiming at the tape.”
Richard snapped, “I was ducking bullets, Ethan.”
“No. You looked at the recorder before you checked Grandma.”
The deputy stepped between them.
“Enough.”
Sheriff Molina arrived ten minutes later and ordered Richard not to leave the property.
He also asked my father to come to the station for a formal statement.
Dad agreed.
Before he left, he pulled me aside.
“There’s something else.”
I laughed bitterly. “Of course there is.”
“Claire gave me a ledger page the night before she disappeared. I kept it.”
“Where?”
“In your mother’s old recipe box.”
I stared at him.
“Back home?”
He shook his head.
“In my truck.”
We walked to the parking area.
Dad’s truck was gone.
The snow where it had been parked was torn by tire tracks.
His keys were still in his coat pocket.
Ethan checked the security cameras on his phone.
The feed showed a man in a maintenance jacket unlocking the truck with a copied key.
He drove past the camera at 2:41 p.m.
For one clean frame, his face was visible.
Eleanor leaned toward the screen.
“That man worked here when Claire vanished.”
Richard closed his eyes.
I asked, “Who is he?”
Eleanor answered.
May you like
“Caleb Voss.”
Dad whispered, “The man who told police Thomas fell.”
