Chapter 3 - Glass on the Checkered Floor
The bullet passed through the front window and struck the wall above the pie display.
Everyone dropped.
Silas grabbed Caleb by the back of his hoodie and pulled him below the table. The glass of water toppled and shattered across the checkered floor.
A second shot hit the chrome frame of the window.
Outside, riders scattered behind motorcycles and parked trucks.
“Kitchen!” Silas shouted.
The woman restraining Garrett forced him down behind the booth.
Her name was Mara Vance, and she had once served as a military police officer. She released Garrett only long enough to draw a compact handgun from beneath her jacket.
“Rear exit?” she called.
“Through the freezer corridor,” Roy answered.
Mary crawled toward the nearest customers.
“Stay down. Everyone stay down.”
Caleb clung to the backpack.
Silas moved beside him.
“Are you hurt?”
Caleb shook his head.
Another shot tore through the menu board.
The black SUV reversed toward the highway.
Two riders started after it, but Silas shouted through the broken window.
“Do not chase!”
The SUV accelerated.
Its rear tires threw gravel against the parked motorcycles. Within seconds, it disappeared west behind a line of cottonwood trees.
The gunfire stopped.
For several moments, nobody moved.
Silas lifted his head slowly.
“Count everyone.”
Mara checked the dining room. One trucker had a shallow cut across his cheek from flying glass. Mary’s left hand was bleeding. No one had been shot.
Garrett remained on the floor.
His face was pressed against the edge of the booth.
Silas crawled toward him.
“Who was in that vehicle?”
“I don’t know.”
Silas grabbed his tie.
“You knew they were coming.”
“No.”
“You told us not to open the bag.”
“Because I knew Elias. He was paranoid.”
“You said you didn’t know him.”
Garrett’s mouth opened.
Nothing came out.
Mara returned from the window.
“The plates were covered.”
Silas glanced toward the parking lot.
“Call the sheriff.”
Garrett laughed bitterly.
“You think the sheriff will help you?”
Silas looked at him.
“What does that mean?”
Garrett wiped blood from his lip.
“It means you’ve been gone too long.”
In the distance, sirens began to rise.
Caleb sat beneath the table, staring at the backpack.
Silas noticed.
“Your mother knew this would happen.”
“She said people would be watching the diner.”
“Who?”
“I don’t know.”
“What exactly did she tell you about Elias?”
Caleb’s eyes moved toward Garrett.
Silas understood.
He stood and pulled Garrett into the kitchen.
Mara followed.
Roy closed the swinging door behind them.
Garrett backed against a metal prep table.
“You’re making a mistake,” he said.
Silas removed the laminated card from his vest and placed it on the steel surface.
Caleb could not see them from the booth, but he could hear every word through the damaged kitchen window.
“This belonged to Elias,” Silas said. “He left it with me the night before he vanished.”
“What does that prove?”
“It proves my brother believed someone inside this county government was using veteran identities to hide property transfers.”
Garrett looked at the card.
Silas continued.
“Elias discovered that dead soldiers were listed as witnesses on land sales. Farms, houses, and businesses changed ownership for almost nothing. The diner was one of them.”
“My father bought this place legally.”
“Your father paid one dollar.”
“It was a family arrangement.”
“Elias was not your family.”
Garrett’s jaw tightened.
Silas leaned closer.
“Anna Ward was.”
Garrett’s face changed.
Caleb stopped breathing.
Inside the kitchen, Roy closed his eyes.
Mara looked at Silas.
“You knew her?”
“I knew an Anna Rourke,” Silas said. “She was Elias’s daughter.”
Caleb stood too quickly and struck his shoulder against the table.
Silas turned.
The kitchen door opened.
Caleb entered holding the backpack.
“My mother’s last name was Ward.”
“It may not have always been.”
“She never said anything about Elias being her father.”
Silas looked at him carefully.
“Then we need to find out why.”
Sheriff’s vehicles entered the parking lot.
Three patrol cars stopped near the diner. Officers stepped out with weapons lowered but ready.
The sheriff arrived last.
He was a tall man named Dean Hollis, with neatly combed white hair and a starched tan uniform. Silas remembered him as a teenager who worked weekends at his father’s hardware store.
Hollis entered through the shattered doorway.
He looked at the glass, the bullet holes, the riders outside, and Garrett standing in the kitchen.
Then his eyes landed on Silas.
“Rourke.”
“Hollis.”
The sheriff’s gaze moved toward Caleb.
“Who’s the boy?”
“Witness.”
“To what?”
“Attempted murder.”
Hollis’s expression remained neutral.
“Anyone see the shooter?”
“Black SUV. Covered plates.”
Hollis nodded to one of his deputies.
“Take statements.”
Silas handed him the laminated card.
Hollis did not touch it.
“You remember this?”
“No.”
“Your father signed the original report after Elias disappeared.”
“My father signed thousands of reports.”
“He ruled it voluntary abandonment after two days.”
“If you have a complaint about a case from twenty-seven years ago, file it with the state.”
“We found new evidence.”
Hollis looked at the backpack.
For the first time, real emotion appeared on his face.
He recovered immediately.
“What evidence?”
Silas watched him.
“The kind someone just tried to kill a child to keep hidden.”
Hollis looked toward the highway.
“Or the shooting had nothing to do with the boy.”
Garrett suddenly spoke.
“I want all of them removed from my property.”
Mary stared at him in disbelief.
“Someone shot through your window.”
“And they came because of him.”
He pointed at Silas.
Hollis turned toward the riders outside.
“Everyone carrying a weapon needs to keep it holstered. We’ll conduct the investigation.”
Mara folded her arms.
“Will you?”
Hollis ignored her.
He looked at Caleb.
“You need a legal guardian.”
“I’m fine.”
“You are a minor traveling alone. I’m contacting child services.”
Caleb stepped behind Silas.
The sheriff’s expression hardened.
Silas picked up the backpack.
“He stays with me until we understand what’s happening.”
“That is not your decision.”
Silas held out his phone.
“Call Judge Avery.”
Hollis paused.
Mara smiled faintly.
Silas continued.
“Tell her Silas Rourke is requesting emergency protective custody for the possible grandson of Elias Rourke.”
Hollis stared at him.
“You don’t know that he’s related.”
“No.”
Silas glanced at the bullet hole in the wall.
“But somebody seems terrified that he might be.”
Two deputies began photographing the diner.
A third examined the bullet lodged above the pie display.
Sheriff Hollis stepped close to Silas.
His voice dropped.
“You should leave this alone.”
Silas’s eyes narrowed.
“Is that advice or a warning?”
Hollis looked toward Caleb.
“It’s the last decent thing I’ll say to you.”
He turned and walked outside.
Caleb watched him go.
“What happens now?”
Silas looked at the backpack.
“Now we open it.”
Roy shook his head.
“Not here.”
Silas looked toward him.
“Why?”
May you like
Roy glanced at the sheriff through the broken window.
“Because the people who buried Elias still own half this town.”
