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She was already off the island bench and collecting her things. “I’m coming with you.”
I nodded, unable to speak or swallow. We were in the truck within a minute, heading for the construction site as fast as we safely could. When we got there, it was to a flurry of action and inaction. The crew stood mutely near the office building while a handful of police walked around, making notes and picking things up with gloved hands and plastic evidence bags. Another officer was in deep discussion with my foreman, and the two looked up on my arrival with a morbid relief.
The damages were extensive even though none of the equipment was ruined. As the tally climbed, my stomach sank, twisting, into my guts. Ballpark, we estimated somewhere around seventy-five thousand, all done with a pair of bolt cutters, some sand, and a tube of superglue.
Daisy checked on the crew, made coffee, kept everyone calm and cool while the police talked to them all individually, and I stormed straight inside to call my insurance company. My mind raced with accusations and assumptions about who had done it while my mouth answered questions at some distance from the rest of me. Doug, it had to have been Doug and his cronies. We didn’t have a ton of security cameras, just a couple on the corners of the temporary building. But they’d been disabled. Whoever did it came in from the back entrance and disabled them from beneath—all we could see were their hands and the top of a baseball hat.
After the insurance company, I started the arduous process of calling San Antonio and Austin, looking for parts and shops that could accommodate us immediately. Because the bulk of our equipment was here, and with it down, we were shut down. The longer this project went on, the longer it would be until we could move onto something that might pay us better.
The prognosis was not good.
Only two shops had room for us, and we’d have to transport the massive equipment over an hour in different directions to have it looked at. And after waiting for parts and the labor, we were looking at three to four weeks, minimum.
My forehead rested in one hand, my eyes closed, fear and guilt galloping through me. My livelihood, the livelihood of my brothers, and every person who worked for us had suspended indefinitely. And I didn’t know what any of us were going to do.
The coffers were empty but for the money in the trust. And that money wasn’t mine.
Fear turned to panic, the twist in my chest hard and painful. My eyes squeezed shut a little tighter.
When Daisy’s hand came to rest on my shoulder, I snapped up like I’d been whipped. Worry drew her brows, lowered the corners of her mouth.
“Hey,” she said softly.
I turned my chair and pulled her into my lap, wrapping my arms around her. Surprised only for a split second, she threaded her arms around my neck, cradling me. And I held onto her like she was the only thing keeping me tethered. In that moment, she probably was.
After a long moment, my grip on her eased. She leaned back to look down at me, brushing my hair back from my face and holding my jaw.
“It’s gonna be okay,” she promised.
And for the next three days, I did my best to believe her.
Police reports were filed, the equipment picked up and carted off by rigs. Unable to spare anything from other sites, we were shut down. Again.
That third day, I was sitting at my dad’s old desk, trying to make impossible math possible. Daisy was gone for the morning to work their farm, my brothers gone at work, Sophie at school. That deep and painful squeeze in my chest had been present nearly every minute since the shutdown. At times like this, when there was no one around to keep it together for, the feeling overwhelmed me, dragging me under. Once, I’d been unable to keep myself upright, dropping to my knees in the kitchen to try to regulate my breath, wondering if I was having a heart attack. When it passed, I was left shaking and sweating, exhausted for no reason, counting the seconds until someone came home so I could pretend everything was fine again.
It was easier that way.
I rubbed at my sternum, my stomach churning. I tossed a couple of antacids down the hatch to keep it at bay, the chalky taste still in my mouth when the doorbell rang.
On the porch I found Jensen, a football buddy of mine turned local cop, his partner standing behind him. At the matching looks of pity on their faces, my pulse doubled, my mind taking me right back to the spot when two uniformed officers told me my wife had died.
