AllFreeNovel
Share Us
Jenny’s eyes widened. “You two were following the creep, weren’t you? You came in right after he and his friend did, and the first thing you did was look at them!”
“We did,” Mel said. “The creep is a bottom-feeding loan shark slash minor thug. What you might call a big fish in a rain puddle by the name of Brody Carp.”
“He came to our attention a while ago, when we were on the case chasing the man who’d stolen Chloe and Carrie Rhodes’s inheritance.” Connor looked at Grandma Kate. “Of course, we’d been keeping tabs on him, hoping to find an opportunity to have him arrested. And of course, it was a simple matter, once we knew he was trying to find Jenny, to call him with an anonymous tip and have him head this way.”
April looked from Kate to Connor. “Is that how Vance ended up here, too? Because I was certain there was no way on God’s green earth that man could have figured out…”
“He obviously didn’t figure anything out since he grabbed Jenny and demanded we give him Marissa.” Grandma Kat looked at the group. “He is a bumbling, odious man.”
“And one who was dangerously close to the edge of sanity, obviously,” Kat Jessop said. “After he broke into his former investigator’s office, and the investigator walked in on him, there was a scuffle. The investigator went down, hitting his head on the corner of his desk. Apparently, Vance was convinced he’d killed the man, and that was enough to send him over that edge.” Kat spread her hands. “I had his car wired for sound and a tracking device. He thought he had nothing left to lose.”
“All these people bumbling around, someone was bound to get hurt.” Grandma Kate looked at Jenny. “I couldn’t see waiting for something to happen when we could drive the herd this way.” She looked at Angela. “I explained the general plan to Angela, and she agreed this would be a good place and time to bring everything to a close. The only concern she had, and rightly so, was that she would likely have a few genuine guests here. She wanted us to protect them. So we hired a few extra bodyguards and did just that.”
Several people present, the ones who Jenny hadn’t recognized but who had been “guests” that day, raised their hands and waved.
“We all agreed things had to end here and now,” Adam Kendall said. “And we had just enough time to do what needed doing. But none of us figured the man would burst in and grab Jenny the way he did.”
“We all thought he’d show up, get a table, and start asking his questions,” Kat said. “Since that investigator didn’t die from his injury, he was willing to testify against Vance. All we had to do was arrest him because the Austin PD had a warrant with his name on it.”
“You need to know, Jenny, I had a bead on Vance. I was moments from pulling the trigger when you did your Flo thing,” Kat said.
“And I was behind you and seconds from doing the same thing,” Adam said.
“Well, I imagine he’s definitely under arrest now,” Jenny said.
“The paramedics took him to the clinic with Matt along for the ride. He’s been charged with unlawful confinement and attempted murder, crimes he committed here.” Adam nodded. “The Austin police have been notified and will arrive shortly to pick him up to face the charges there. It’s safe to say Mr. Vance will be a guest of the state for years to come.”
“What was the purpose of bringing Brody Carp here?” Jeremy Bishop asked. “You said he was looking for Jenny?”
Connor grinned. “Vance had borrowed heavily from Carp. The money he got from his great-aunt was enough to repay that debt, but Vance thought to have the entire estate. He hired an investigator who then told Carp the man was looking for an heiress. We decided to bring him here, too, so he could see Vance fail and get arrested. Also, we wanted him to understand that no one here had ever heard of Marissa Jayne Featherstone.” Then he looked at Grandma Kate. “And to tell him that an entity he’d never heard of, a mysterious group called LTT LLC had enough power to manipulate even an estate lawyer and fake the existence of an heiress. And, of course, to give him an offer he couldn’t refuse.”
