Show Me (Thomas Prescott 4), Nick Pirog [classic children's novels .TXT] 📗

like he took out Tom, Odell, Neil, and Victoria.”

Something about this statement pinged something in my brain, but I didn’t get a chance to ruminate on it before Ramsey belted, “I told you I had nothing to do with any murders.”

Eccleston jerked his chin toward the Blackwater guys, “Just because you pay men to do your dirty work doesn’t mean your hands aren’t dirty.” He took a couple steps toward the two mercenaries. “Which one of you assholes did it? Which one of you strangled my friend?”

I turned to Dolf. “It was you. You broke into his house, came up behind him, and put a garrote around his neck. You had him by fifty pounds, so it wouldn’t have been hard for you to strangle him. And you just happen to be left-handed, which is why the ligature marks were so much worse on the right side of Mike’s throat.”

Dolf moved his tongue around the inside of his bottom lip, took a breath, then asked, “This Mike Zernan, you said he was a military man?”

I nodded.

“If I’d been paid to kill this guy, this would have come up in my research and I never would have taken the job. I would never kill a man who put his life on the line for his country.”

The way he said it was so matter-of-fact I found it hard to believe he was lying.

I said, “But you had no problem killing Lowry Barnes.”

He shook his head and said, “Sorry to tell you, but the worst thing I’ve done contracting with Lunhill is taking some embarrassing photos of a couple politicians.”

“What about my barn?” I asked. “You burned down my fucking barn. You almost killed my two piglets.”

“Again, not us.”

Wheeler shouted, “But you bugged his car!”

“That we did. We were hired to follow you and see who you talked to, then report back to Mr. Ramsey.”

“I told you,” David Ramsey said. “Neither I nor anyone I employ had anything to do with any murders.” He turned to Eccleston and said, “If you would have told me about this Mike Zernan guy, I would have paid him to be quiet. Or found a reason to sue him. Payoffs, bribes, lawsuits, this is what I’ve done for thirty-five years. And guess what? It’s worked. Why would I go and change that?”

He was making good points.

Actually, he was making great points.

Why change your MO when it has proved successful for more than three decades?

He looked at the Mayor, Mallory, then Eccleston, then said, “I’ve paid out twenty-three million dollars to you guys over the past twenty years, why wouldn’t I have paid another half a million to keep a guy quiet?”

Eccleston’s jaw went slack. “Did you say twenty-three million dollars?”

Ramsey nodded.

The Mayor and Mallory turned and glanced at each another. Then both turned and looked at Eccleston.

“How much were you getting?” Eccleston demanded of Greg Mallory.

“Ten thousand a month,” he said.

Eccleston turned to the Mayor and asked, “What about you?”

She glanced at me, then said, “Same. Ten grand a month.”

“Okay, okay.” He turned to Wheeler and said, “And how much was your old man getting?”

“Same.”

Eccleston looked upward, his eyes closed. After a moment he said, “By my math, we were getting collectively seven hundred and twenty thousand dollars a year for twenty years or so, which is roughly fourteen million dollars.” He turned to David Ramsey and asked, “How the hell did you come up with twenty-three million?”

Wheeler leaned into my side and said, “How did he come up with seven hundred and twenty thousand? I thought there were only five of them on the take.”

She was right. Eccleston, Odell, Tom Lanningham, Mayor Van Dixon, and Greg Mallory.

Each getting $10,000 a month was a $120,000 a year, times five, which was $600,000 collectively.

“There was a sixth person,” I said.

“Who?” she asked.

And then it hit me.

It was what had pinged my brain when Eccleston mentioned her name and not Will’s or Peggy’s.

For the first time yet, Ramsey appeared somewhat baffled. He said, “I paid you guys each ten thousand dollars a month for the first couple of years. But then after she came to see me, I upped it to twenty thousand a month.”

“After who came to see you?” asked Mayor Van Dixon.

But I already knew.

The sole survivor.

David Ramsey said, “Victoria Page.”

Thirty minutes later, Wheeler and I watched all the cars drive away.

I’d set up the meeting to prove murder, but all I’d done was prove a twenty-year-old conspiracy, which in all honestly, didn’t hold much weight with me. Sure, some cows died, some people got sick, data was manipulated, payoffs were made, and a corporation profited billions, but no one at the meeting was involved in the Save-More murders.

That’s why I promised the pictures and documents would never see the light of day. Of course, for a price.

Ramsey came prepared to deal, and after I signed several documents promising to destroy all copies of the pictures and documents Darcy Felding had given me, David Ramsey handed me a briefcase with $2 million in it.

My only stipulation was that I be one the one to deal with Victoria Page. All parties begrudgingly agreed.

“What are you going to do with the money?” Wheeler asked me. Though she hadn’t voiced it at the time, I could tell she was embittered, even resentful, that I’d taken the money.

I ignored her question.

I took a few steps toward the school bus across the street and yelled, “You can come out now.”

I hadn’t told Wheeler. I couldn’t risk her glancing in the school bus’s direction.

Blue hair popped up in one of the broken windows of the school bus and Wheeler asked, “Who is that?”

“My friend Bree. She’s Will Dennel’s little sister.”

“How long has she been in there?”

“I dropped her off earlier this morning.”

“How did you know they would stop right here?”

I hadn’t known for certain, but I figured David Ramsey would be in the lead car and he wouldn’t drive past the signs warning of contamination.

Luckily, I’d been right.

Bree exited the school