Tara Holloway 03 - Death, Taxes, and Extra-Hold Hairspray Read Online Free

took a cursory glance inside the barns, I knelt down next to the fence. “Hey, there, little speckled hen.”
    She tilted her head to the other side.
    “You’re kinda cute.”
    She spread her wings and flapped them once, as if trying to communicate with me.
    I made my best clucking sound at her.
    She clucked back.
    That was it. I’d never eat chicken again.
    “Hey,” Nick called. “Quit flirting with that bird and come here.”
    “I wasn’t flirting,” I called back. “It’s a female bird.” Not to mention that it was a bird .
    Nick stood in front of the last barn. Unlike the others, this barn was closed up, no chickens in sight. The structure was surrounded by four-foot-high loops of barbed wire, a barrier clearly intended to discourage entry and one that just as clearly meant we had to take a look inside.
    “We need wire cutters,” Nick said.
    Another pickup raised a dust cloud at the back of the property while I used my cell to call the Buchmeyers’ house phone again. When Betty answered, I told her we needed to get into the back barn and asked if there were any wire cutters around.
    “I plead the Fifth,” she said.
    “It’s not illegal to own wire cutters,” I told her.
    She hung up on me. Not feeling so sorry for her at that moment.
    I snapped my phone shut. “No luck on the wire cutters. But I can guarantee there’s something in here they don’t want us to find.”
    Ironically, the fact that Betty invoked the Fifth Amendment was an admission on her part. Whatever was stashed away in this barn, she knew about it.
    Nick walked along the barrier, visually inspecting the coils until he found an end. Jenkins and I stepped back as he carefully reached in and grabbed the wire. He slowly pulled back on the fencing, emitting an occasional curse when an errant barb nicked him. Eventually, the sections of fencing separated and an opening appeared. The three of us stepped through and walked up to the door of the barn.
    “Damn,” Nick muttered.
    My partner and I exchanged glances. Like the front gate, this door was secured with padlocks. And, like the deputy, both Nick and I carried a personal weapon in addition to our Glocks. But with Jenkins there as a witness, neither of us was inclined to use our private guns. I could justify my earlier shot at Buchmeyer, but no way could I justify discharging my Glock simply to disable a lock. Internal affairs would deem it reckless. Never mind that it would save us time. Safety over efficiency.
    Jenkins opened her purse and fumbled around, whipping out a .38 special. “Can you two keep a secret?”
    I raised my palms and looked around innocently. “Gun? What gun?”
    Nick positioned the locks and stepped back. “Be my guest.”
    Bang. Bang.
    Once again, two locks dropped to their deaths in the dirt. Score one for efficiency.
    Nick pulled the chain off the door and swung it open. We stepped into the barn, pausing for a moment as our eyes adjusted from the bright outside sunlight to the relative darkness inside the barn. When they did, we found ourselves surrounded by a dozen wooden pallets stacked high and covered with tightly lashed blue vinyl tarps.
    “What have we here?” Jenkins wondered aloud as she stepped forward and worked at a rope securing one of the tarps.
    Nick pulled a Swiss army knife from the front pocket of his pants and cut through the rope. Jenkins worked the rope loose so she could lift off the tarp.
    Under the covering was case after case of Spam. Why the heck would anyone need so much canned meat?
    Under the next tarp sat a tall stack of economy-sized cans of baked beans. The next tarp covered a pallet stacked with toilet paper. Gotta have TP if you’re gonna have beans, right? Cases of bottled water were stacked on another pallet, while another supported radios, flashlights, and batteries, all still in boxes. Yet another pallet contained a dozen pup tents in nylon drawstring bags along with four propane-powered generators and several propane