Ruby by Kathi S. Barton Page A

They’ll contact you.” The
line went dead, and Dwight slowly hung it up. He wasn’t out of
trouble by any stretch of the imagination, but he was closer to
getting this off his back. And Teri too. Leaning back in his chair,
he thought of all the things he needed to get straight in his life
before he was killed. Because as much as he trusted his friend,
Dwight was under no illusions that he wasn’t as good as dead either
way.
    ~~~
    Ruby looked around Josh’s home. Where
her home had been huge, this one was ginormous. There were rooms
inside of rooms bigger than her entire floor. Bathrooms that held
both a shower stall big enough for five people and a bath tub that
you could do laps in. And the yard? Sheesh, it looked like a
national park, it was so well maintained.
    Then there were the boxes that were
everywhere. Plus, there were at least four men to every one box
that had been brought from the garage. Each piece they pulled out
was photographed and logged into a computer. Then it was written
down in a large notebook. These people took better inventory than
they did at the hospital.
    She and Josh had gotten back from
their trip, as he’d been calling it, and Josh had gone out to the
garage when Lila had asked him about something she’d had sent to
his house. Then after that, all hell broke loose. He’d made calls,
people started showing up, and then Lila had entered her life. Ruby
looked down at the woman now. Her smile made Ruby smile back at
her.
    “ You should have a seat,
my dear. He’s going to go insane trying to make sure you’re
comfortable.” Ruby looked at the elderly woman who had come in and
taken over, ordering people around better than her grandmother did.
With her she’d brought all the Feds that were there now, as well as
a few men that had already left to go to Dwight and Teri’s
house.
    “ I’m fine. It’s him I’m
worried about.” Josh looked like someone had taken his heart out
and then tried to put it back in all wrong. “Do you suppose that
Dwight will do as he told him? I’m not sure Josh thinks he
will.”
    “ Yes. The man is not as
stupid as some think. But he’s pretty close. He is a good deal
smarter than Teri thinks he is anyway. She had him all tied up in
knots, led him by his other brain, and he fell for it. Pretty much
as she had poor Josh here at first. Then he…he’d never admit it,
but I think he was tired of her. She broke his heart, sure she did,
but he got over it quickly and moved on. Lucky for him.” Lila sat
down. “I’ll only admit this to you, but I had him come home early
from that fated trip. I told him it was because a client needed
him. No one needs him after he gets them going. But he came home
and caught them. Just as I’d hoped.”
    “ You broke his heart.”
Lila nodded, then shook her head. “I guess you’re right. He needed
to see what she was…what they were before it was too late. Do you
suppose they might have pulled him in had they not gotten caught?
Or do you think it was over before then?”
    “ They were using his plane
for drops and pick-ups. That was how I figured it out. He had asked
me to sell it sometime beforehand and I had scheduled a company go
in and clean it up. It was gone. And the flight pattern that had
been filed was made by Dwight. After that, I kept my eyes on him
and that woman. Teri Parsons was a bad seed, and he needed to see
that.” She looked at Josh as he talked with one of the men in
charge. “I had no idea that this stuff was going on. I just thought
they were having an affair. It wasn’t until later that I figured
out that…. Had I known…well, had I known, I would have taken her
ass out long before this.”
    Blair and Sapphire showed up a little
after noon. Grandmother brought some food with her and a couple of
pack members. They had a nice lunch set up in no time, and then
Grandmother started on dinner. It was going to be a long
day.
    Blair sat down next to Ruby on the
couch after Lila left her to answer