There was a lot of activity going on.
They noted a large dump truck parked in front of the gates of the family cemetery. Attached to it was an empty flatbed trailer. They watched as a Bobcat sped past the truck and entered the burial ground. Two SUVs were parked next to the dump truck, and through the open gate they could see people moving around inside the burial ground.
Decker skittered forward with the others close behind him. The sounds of the Bobcat covered any noise they made. Decker opened the back door of one of the SUVs and looked inside one of the duffels piled there. It was filled with the same bottles he had found in Ross’s secret closet.
He quietly closed the door and they edged up to the gate and peered inside. A group of people were gathered around the mausoleum. Portable work lights had been set up, illuminating the area around the crypt.
“There’s Ross,” hissed Jamison.
“And Lassiter,” whispered Riley. “But I thought she’d been shot?”
One of the detective’s arms was in a sling and she was moving slowly.
Decker said, “She was, but not nearly as bad as everyone probably thought.”
A large hole had been dug next to the mausoleum and they could hear what sounded like a powerful drill being operated. After a few minutes, Ross took a light and disappeared into the hole, with Lassiter right behind him.
Decker counted ten other men with guns standing around.
A few minutes later, Ross and Lassiter came out of the hole. Neither looked pleased.
“Decker,” said Jamison, pointing to her left.
Off to the side, seated on the ground, their backs against a large gravestone, were Amber and Zoe. They were tied up and gagged.
Decker slipped away and returned a minute later pushing Fred Ross in his wheelchair.
He rolled him past the dump truck and edged the wheelchair into the open gateway of the graveyard. He traded his pistol for the shotgun Baron was holding, and then pressed the barrel against Ross’s neck.
He looked at the others and nodded. Baron and Jamison took up positions on either side of the brick wall, their guns pointed at Lassiter and the others. Cindi Riley peered anxiously over Baron’s shoulder.
Decker called out, “Okay, we’re here for the exchange.”
Everyone next to the mausoleum froze. Then Lassiter and Ted Ross slowly turned and saw the elder Ross with Decker holding a shotgun against the old man’s head.
Ross shook his head, put his hands on his hips, and smiled. He glanced at Lassiter. “How many damn times did I tell you we had to get rid of this guy, Donna!”
Lassiter called out to Decker, “This was not smart coming here.”
Decker used his free hand to point to Amber and Zoe. “It’s the only place we could go. The exchange, remember? You set it up, not me.”
“This is not going to end well for you,” said Lassiter.
Decker said, “You really should have posted some lookouts, Ross.”
“I guess I underestimated you, Decker.”
“I like it when people do that. I assume you have an escape plan. You give us Amber and Zoe. And we give you this piece of scum, and you make your run for it.”
“It’s not that simple,” said Ross.
Decker glanced at the mausoleum. “Because you haven’t found it?”
Ross’s smile faded. “Found what?”
“The treasure that Baron the First left behind.”
“How do you know anything about it?” snapped Lassiter.
“I know all about it. But why do you need the treasure? You haven’t made enough off the fentanyl?”
Ross glanced at Baron. “It has nothing to do with that. It’s about the fact that I can take it from him!”
Fred Ross was wriggling in his wheelchair.
“You want to throw in your two cents?” asked Decker. He reached down and ripped the tape from the man’s mouth.
Fred Ross screamed, “Shoot the son of a bitch, Teddy. Kill his ass!”
“Shut up, Pop,” said his son derisively. He looked back at Decker. “Well?”
“Like I said, I think we can work something out.”
Ross looked at the mausoleum. “Okay, you tell us where it is and you can have mom and the daughter.” He pointed his gun at his father. “And you can keep him too, because I’ve had enough of his crap to last the rest of my life.”
Fred Ross screamed, “You little piece of worthless shit! I was the one that told you about it. You ungrateful bastard!” A long flow of obscenities followed, all directed at the man’s son.
“See what I mean?” said Ted Ross as he raised his pistol. “Shut up, Pop, or I swear to God, I’ll shoot you myself.”
Decker said, “Fred, you’re not that smart, are you?”
“What the hell is that supposed to mean, fatso?”
“You knew about the exchange. But when we got there, nobody would be around to exchange for you. So your son was going to leave your butt high and dry. You go to prison while he jets off to a new life.”
The elder Ross said nothing, but he now glared at his son.
Decker said to Ted Ross, “That was the other reason I knew your exchange request was probably a sham and that you were up here trying to get the treasure.” He glanced at the malignant Fred Ross. “Why would you want him back? The guy who was so cruel to you and your mother? Just so he couldn’t testify against you? Hell, if it were me, I’d take my chances over having to listen to this asshole and I think you would too.”
A fresh burst of obscenities from Fred Ross was only halted when Decker put the duct tape back on.
Decker looked at the hole next to the mausoleum. “You thought it was either under the potting shed or under the crypt? Because of the letter to the O’Reilly company?”
“Not nearly enough concrete for a textile mill addition,” said Ross. “Besides that, old man Baron would not have built one at that point, because the business was going south. But he used it for the foundation under his crypt. We know that now.”
Decker nodded. “Green told me about the textile business petering out when he was giving us a little tutorial on Baronville. Although he couldn’t have known that later I would see a letter that would put that knowledge to good use. So what do you think the treasure is?”
“Precious jewels, maybe. Coins. Cash would have rotted.”
Decker nodded. “Did you find anything down there?”
“A big hollow space inside the foundation they laid with all that concrete.”
“With something other than treasure?” said Decker. “Like some skeletons maybe?”
Ross said, “There are some bones down there. But how did you figure that?”
“Baron was an old man. He didn’t hide the stuff personally. So how could he leave behind the guys who did hide it? They’d just come here and try to steal it after he died, or else they’d tell somebody. And that space would make a convenient burial spot.”
“But where is the treasure?” snapped Ross impatiently.
“The O’Reilly order told you, but you focused on the wrong parts of the letter.”
“Then enlighten me,” growled Ross.
“I read a letter from Baron’s butler, Nigel, to his son. Costa read it too. That was a clue to the treasure.”
“Costa never told me about any letter like that.”
“But he obviously thought it was under the mausoleum.”
“Costa had done a ton of research. He’d read a lot about the history of the estate and he thought he had narrowed down the location, but he wanted to be sure. We needed somebody to come up here. So I called Toby Babbot.”
“Why Babbot?”
“He’d gotten hurt working on the FC. I was throwing him a bone. Anyway, he did some poking around. See, Costa had determined that there were only two new structures put up after Baron wrote the letter to O’Reilly ordering those supplies: the potting shed and this place. So Toby came up here and took precise measurements of both. He figured the footprint of either one pretty much aligned with a concrete foundation built with the materials that Baron bought from O’Reilly’s.”