A rickety table in one corner held Edie’s Singer sewing machine, while the flower-patterned spread on the twin bed had long since disappeared under stacks of material and patterns, as well as Edie’s many half-completed sewing projects. One wall of the room was stacked with boxes of books Bob had gathered up in preparation for retirement reading in case retirement ever became a viable option. Another jumble of boxes held the latest assortment of cast-off clothing and household goods that Bob Larson routinely collected and then passed along to anyone who happened to be in need. If a computer-even Edie’s laptop-had somehow been shoehorned into all that mess, Ali had no idea where it would have gone.
Winter, if that really was his name, pulled the.357 out of his pocket and waved it in Edie’s direction. “You go,” he said. “And remember, since your daughter’s here with me, you’d better not try anything.”
Shaking her head in apparent disgust, Edie disappeared into the bedroom/office. Ali was torn. She wanted to edge closer to the hassock, but she didn’t want to risk drawing the man’s attention to either the Taser image on the television screen or the real Taser resting just beyond her reach.
What if she somehow managed to retrieve it? Her mother had shown her how to push the switch cover out of the way, and which button to depress, but would it work? And if Ali did get off a shot, would the darts penetrate the man’s jacket?
A moment later, and much to Ali’s amazement, her mother emerged from the bedroom carrying what looked like part of a very old desktop computer. She lugged it over to the table and set it down. “There you are,” she said.
“What’s that?” Winter asked.
“My computer,” Edie said brusquely. “You said you wanted my computer. I’m bringing it to you.”
“But that thing is ancient,” Winter objected. “You’re telling me that’s what you used to steal my files? Does it even still run?”
“Of course it still runs,” Edie assured him archly. “A computer’s a computer, isn’t it? It takes a while to boot up, but once it does, it’s good to go. If you’ll wait just a minute, I’ll go get the rest of it-the keyboard, the CRT, and the power cords.”
While she returned to the bedroom, Winter moved closer to the table. Clearly expecting the latest and greatest, he seemed both fascinated and appalled by the appearance of this old machine. Taking advantage of his momentary lapse in focus, Ali moved closer to the hassock.
He reached down and touched the computer. “It’s dead cold,” he said when Edie returned with the oversize monitor. “This thing probably hasn’t run in years.”
“Of course it’s cold,” Edie told him. “I’m not the kind to leave something plugged in and wasting electricity when I’m not using it.”
And that was when Ali understood what was going on. Somehow-through B., in all likelihood-Edie had learned that the man’s name was Winter, but the rest of it was all bluff. Edie was making a huge production of dragging this computer equipment from the other room. But Ali knew for sure this wasn’t her mother’s computer and never had been. It was probably an ancient model someone had donated to Bob, one that was so out of date even he couldn’t give it away. And Winter was probably right when he said that if Edie ever did plug it in, it wouldn’t boot up.
A telephone rang. Edie pulled it out of her pocket, answered, and then listened. “I’m really very busy right now,” she said finally. “And I’m certainly not in the market for aluminum siding.”
Sticking the phone back in her pocket, she handed her daughter a tangled power cord. “Here,” she said. “Plug this in. If it’ll reach that far, we’ll have to use the outlet over by the TV set. The one next to the table burned out. And you’ll probably need to unplug the lamp or the TV to make it work.”
Without a word of objection, Ali took the cord and turned toward the television set. Dropping to her knees next to the hassock, she crawled close enough to the wall to reach the outlet. First she unplugged the TV; she was relieved to know that the Taser with the leopard pattern would now have disappeared. She plugged in the cord, then turned back to the table, where Edie was in the process of reassembling the computer equipment.
Winter, engrossed in watching Edie’s every move, was no longer concentrating on Ali. It took only a moment for Ali to pluck the brightly colored C2 out of the cluster of remote controls. As soon as she pulled back on the switch-plate cover, the infared dot appeared silently in the middle of the man’s back. Ali didn’t shout out a warning to him. Instead, she simply pressed down on the switch. Winter immediately crumpled to the floor, screaming as he fell. The gun fell, too. It landed on the hardwood floor and went spinning away from him. Edie pounced on the.357 before it ever came to rest. “Got it!” she crowed. “Now open the door. I called nine-one-one. They should be here any minute.”
Dropping the Taser, Ali raced to the door and flung it open. As soon as she did, she could hear an approaching siren somewhere in the background.
“I’ll go get them,” Edie said. “You take the gun. If he tries to get up, I’m sure you’ll know how to use it.”
CHAPTER 16
Arriving officers burst into the house while Peter Winter still lay twitching and helpless on the floor. Seeing Ali with the weapon in her hand, they immediately misread the situation.
“Drop the gun,” one of them shouted at her. “Get on the floor.”
After having her head held underwater, dropping to the floor was no problem. Ali was only too happy to comply.
“That’s my daughter,” Edie screeched from behind them. “Get him! The guy on the floor. He came in here with a gun. He was going to kill us.”
Just then Bob Larson appeared in the doorway behind his wife. Taking in the room, he paused when he saw the man on the floor. “Oh my God, Edie!” he exclaimed. “What have you done? Did you shoot him? Is he dead?”
But by then the thirty-second burst from the Taser had run its course, and Peter Winter lay whimpering on the floor in a puddle of his own making. Moments later, a pair of uniformed Sedona officers fitted him with a pair of Flex-Cuffs and then hauled him to his feet. The jolt of electricity seemed to have turned his legs to rubber.
While the one officer held him upright, the other turned to Edie. “What happened here?” he asked.
“He came to the door holding my daughter at gunpoint,” she said. “He thought we’d stolen some of his computer files.”
Dave Holman was the next man who darted through the front door and into the crowded room. “What’s going on?” he wanted to know. “What’s happened? Is anyone hurt?”
By then Bob was helping his daughter to her feet. “Leland Brooks may be,” Ali said. “He’s outside, unconscious, in the back of his truck.”
Nodding, Dave turned. “I’ll call the EMTs,” he said on his way out.
Meanwhile, two more Sedona officers edged their way into the room. “Whose Taser?” one of them asked.
“Mine,” Edie said. “My daughter fired it, but it belongs to me.”
Leaving the crowd inside to sort things out, Ali followed Dave. She found him on his hands and knees in the back of the camper shell. By the time she got there, he had pulled Leland to the end of the pickup and was loosening his restraints.
“Is he all right?” Ali asked.
Dave shook his head. “I can’t tell,” he said. “Looks like he’s out cold, but he’s got a pulse, and he’s breathing on his own.” He glanced up at Ali. “And what about you?” he asked. “That looks like a pretty bad cut.”
“It’s nothing,” Ali said. Compared to what it might have been, the injury to her face really was nothing.
A fire truck with a blaring siren arrived in a cloud of dust, followed by an ambulance. As a pair of EMTs raced forward, Ali motioned them toward the pickup. “He’s in there,” she said. She meant to be there with them, but suddenly, her legs were no longer cooperating.
Dave turned to Ali with a look of concern. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine,” she said, but not too convincingly. Taking her arm, Dave led her over to the back of the Sugarloaf and eased her down on the set of cement steps that led up to the back door.
“I should be there with Leland,” she objected.
“Sit,” Dave said.
