“Shit, don’t listen to me. It’s all just so…I dunno. What’s this world coming to? Tyler was helping out, you know? Like he always does. And he gets shot for his trouble. It’s just not fair.”
“Tyler was helping out? How?”
“It’s garbage day,” Glen explained. “Josh and Rachel were working on getting the food out for the guests this morning, and they’d forgotten to put the garbage bins out. Tyler jumped up and offered to put them out. Didn’t even wait for an answer. You know how he is. He was on it in a second. Then we heard what sounded like the backfiring of a car, and Tyler didn’t come back right away. Well…Josh looked out the front window… He saw Tyler lying on the ground.”
“That bullet was meant for me. I know it was.”
That statement came from Josh. He’d slipped into the living room after setting Finn up in the home office.
“Why do you think it was meant for you?” Tate asked. “Has someone threatened you?”
“No,” Josh replied with a shake of his head. “But Tyler was wearing my sweatshirt. Whoever did this must have thought it was me.”
It would depend on how far away the shooter was from Tyler. From a distance, the two men could be mistaken for one another. They had the same blond hair and a similar haircut. They were almost identical in height and frame. Put Josh’s clothes on Tyler…
A case of mistaken identity could be a real possibility.
“We don’t know exactly what happened yet,” Tate cautioned. “Did anybody see anything? Who all was here when it happened?”
“Winnie and Glen showed up first,” Josh said, nodding toward their friend. “Larry and Diane, right after. They like to help in the kitchen. Keith and Tracy showed up just a few minutes after it happened, and Cat, too. She arrived about then. We were expecting Leo and Shelly, as well as Lindsay, but I haven’t heard from them. Maybe they overslept or something.”
“What about Marnie? Isn’t she coming?” Glen asked. “Wait, was she at the party last night? I don’t even remember.”
“She was there but had to leave early. She had work this morning, a meeting at the station. She said she’d try and stop by if it ended in time.”
Marnie was an anchor on the local television station’s morning show. It meant she mostly went to bed at eight and was up by three to be on the air by five. She often joked that she had the hours of an insomniac toddler.
“I have a feeling she’ll be here soon, but in a more official capacity,” Josh said. “This is definitely going to make the news. Not many shootings in our little town.”
The door to the office swung open, and Rachel stepped back inside. Her eyes were still red and swollen, her cheeks damp from recent tears.
“I gave my statement,” she said, her voice thick with emotion. “It’s someone else’s turn. I’m going to make the strongest pot of coffee in history, and then I’m going to the hospital. Has anyone called Tyler’s folks?”
“I can do that,” Glen replied. “I’ll call them now.”
Glen stepped into the kitchen as Finn appeared in the doorway, motioning to Tate.
“Let’s do your statement next,” he said. “Josh, then we’ll do yours. I know you’re anxious to get to the hospital.”
“I can do mine now,” Josh argued. “Get it over with.”
“I think Rachel needs you right now,” Finn said. “Tate’s won’t take long. You’ll be able to go be with Tyler very soon.”
Josh expelled a noisy breath but didn’t argue, instead striding into the kitchen to see about Rachel.
“You okay to talk?” Finn asked.
“Sure,” Tate replied. “I’m good. Yes, let’s get this done.”
They settled on the small sofa under the window. Finn made a few notes in a notebook before holding up his phone.
“I’m going to record this. Any objections? It just makes it easier later for me to refer back.”
“No problem. I’m not sure that I’m going to be any help, to be honest. It all happened before I arrived.”
“How about we start at the party last night?” Finn suggested. “You were there, right? Who else was there?”
“Yes, pretty much the whole gang from school was.”
