“Jack.” Abby made an effort to look silly and unconcerned; she rested one hand on her hip and flipped the hair away from her face with the other. “Hey, what’s up? Where are you going?”
Pausing at the door of the barn, Jack held his bike steady. “What’s it look like? I need to get some riding time in, or I won’t be in shape for the trip to D.C.” He smiled. “Will you miss me, Cherie? I will be desolate without you.”
Abby smiled. “You’re so full of it. I came to ask you a favor.” She walked close and looked up at him through her lashes.
Jack leaned against the barn door. “A favor, eh? What kind of favor could my pretty sister want on this warm summer evening?”
“You know how much I miss my dad. And how important his things are to me.” She paused, dredging up helplessness to make him feel important humoring his brainless little sister.
Jack sneaked a glance at his watch. “Right, sure; what can I do for you?” His fingers drummed against the handlebars.
“You told me about shooting my dad’s hunting rifle last night. I want you to teach me how to load it and shoot it. Lisa’s not here, it’s the perfect time. Please?” Abby opened her eyes wide and smiled.
Jack’s eyes shifted left to right before focusing on Abby. “Not a good idea. Someone could get hurt, and I don’t want it to be you. Take some lessons at a firing range, and then when you know what you’re doing, try out the rifle. I have to go.” He started to push the bike past her.
Abby grabbed the handlebar. “Not so fast. If you don’t want me to shoot, at least show me how to hold the unloaded rifle, you know, let me get a feel for it. I’ll grab it; it’ll only take a minute.” She paused, and couldn’t keep the edge from her voice. “Unless there’s a problem. Is there a problem, Jack?”
Jack leaned the bike against the barn and returned to take Abby’s hand. “I didn’t want to tell you, and I know you’re going to be very mad at me, but there is no rifle.”
“No? Then what were you shooting last night?”
“Last night there was a rifle, today there is not.” Jack shrugged an apology. “In town today I sold it, for Lisa. That’s one of the errands I had to do. She wanted to get rid of it, and didn’t want you to be upset. I’m sorry, but don’t be mad at her. She’s only trying to protect you.”
Abby’s stomach cramped, and she experienced a sense of hollowness down to her toes. Her brother: a liar who shot guns at night, a liar who lived in her house, a liar who should be the closest person in the world to her. What else had he lied about?
She pulled her hand away from Jack, repulsed after this latest evidence of his betrayal. “Go ride your stupid bike. Take a good, long ride. I can’t wait until you ride out of here for good.” She turned on her heel and marched back to the house.
“Sorry, Cherie.” Jack’s bike tires crunched over the gravel.
Abby watched him ride away, waited five minutes, and then ran to the barn. “Let’s see what you’ve been up to Jacques. I’m guessing you’ve been a bad boy.”
Once inside the barn, Abby didn’t know where to start. Her dad would have said to start at the beginning. Jack had to have a gun hidden somewhere. She would find it. She surveyed the interior of the barn, wiping sweaty hands on her thighs. The places to investigate seemed endless, and she didn’t know how long Jack would be gone.
For ten minutes Abby searched, stall by stall, storage bin by storage bin, cupboard by cupboard. She ran her hands behind things hanging on the walls and between boards, steeling herself to ignore thoughts of spiders, mice, or snakes. Behind a grain trough and the wall she felt something soft. It couldn’t be a gun, but it didn’t belong. Grasping it with two fingers, she pulled; a stained red cloth emerged. She sniffed it; metallic, oily.
She flashed back to the stormy night when Jack returned from Pittsburgh with a red bundle he protected with his hat. One mystery solved. He went downtown to buy a gun. But why? Why did a long-distance biker need a gun? Protection on the trail? Possible, not probable. And although Jack would never tell her, his journal might.
She looked at her watch and hurried to the rear stall. The smooth floor gave no evidence of which board hid the lockbox. Scuffing at the dirt and hay revealed seamed wood, nothing else. “It has to be here. I saw him hiding it.” She glanced at her watch again. “This is taking too long. And I’m talking to myself.”
After rolling her aching head in a circle to lessen the tension, she backed up and studied the area. Getting down on her hands and knees, she brushed a small space clean and noticed one board not nailed down. She pressed the end, and it came loose.
Abby slid her hand in the opening and pulled out a small, black metal box; it appeared new, even though covered with dirt. On one side a shiny latch connected to a round keyhole, no key. A search of the hiding space revealed nothing, and the box wouldn’t open. The key had to be somewhere, unless he wore it around his neck.
Sitting back on her heels, she gazed around the barn. Nothing but stored junk, bikes, tools. Of course. A hammer and screwdriver would bust it open in a hot second. Damn the consequences and Jack. From the tool box by the barn door Abby grabbed the hammer, a large screwdriver,. and a pry bar. She checked her watch again, and in doing so spilled the remainder of the tools on the floor. She didn’t waste time picking them up, but returned to the rear stall, inserted the screwdriver under the hasp, and reached for the hammer.
“What the—who’s there?” Jack’s voice, strident and angry, filled the barn.
Abby froze for a split second, heart racing, breath caught in her chest. She set aside the tools, inserted the lockbox in its hiding place, and reached to replace the floorboard. The pry bar clattered across the floor and came to rest under the small nightstand.
“Come out of there, or I’m coming in to get you.” The strident sound of Jack’s angry voice came closer, accompanied by the whisper of his bike tires.
“Pop. Hiss …”
“What the hell?” Jack moved closer, his footfalls a soft undercurrent.
Working fast, Abby replaced the floorboard. She kicked dirt and straw over the area, picked up the hammer and screwdriver, and dove for the floor beside a ragged hole in the wall of the stall.
“Abby? What are you doing? Why didn’t you answer me?” The veins on Jack’s neck stood out, pulsating against his red, angry face.
Abby sat back against the stall and took a deep breath. “Oh, Jack, it’s you. I heard someone come in and got scared. With Lisa away and you out on the trail, it could have been anyone. Don’t scare me like that.”
Jack pursed his lips. “You didn’t recognize my voice? That’s strange. And what are you doing back here with those tools?” He walked close to Abby and squatted next to her, so close his breath made the hair dance away from her forehead. “I want the truth.”
“You want the truth?” Abby bit back the retort. The time would come to confront him, but not now. “It’s lame, I guess, but I wanted to surprise you. I thought I’d fix this hole in the stall while you were out. It’s one thing you wouldn’t have to worry about before you leave. I know you have a lot on your mind getting ready for the trip to Washington and the bike rally. I didn’t mean to cause any trouble.”
“You made things worse. I popped a bike tire running over the nails you spilled with the tools. Now I have to replace a tire along with everything else. Don’t help me.” He stared at Abby.
Abby gave him a weak smile, got up, dusted off her shorts, and sidled past Jack, careful to leave space between them. She picked up the fallen supplies by the barn door, noticing how her shaking hands made the tools rattle, hoping he wouldn’t think anything about it.
Jack wheeled his disabled bike past Abby and pointed a slender finger at her. “Do not make me mad. You wouldn’t like it. And I really prefer you aren’t involved in things that are best left alone. Believe it or not, I want to protect you.” He set the bike against the wall and watched while Abby finished with the toolbox and returned to the house.
Once inside, Abby locked the door and ran to her room. She peeked out the window, careful to stay out of sight. Jack stood by the barn door, hands in pockets, staring at the house, at her window. Menace surrounded him like a noxious cloud.
“I don’t like feeling afraid in my own home,” Abby whispered, realizing that’s just what this house had become, her home. “You better not make me mad, Jack. You wouldn’t like it.”