Theo grabs two buckets out of the back of his SUV, slings one over each shoulder, and looks up at me. “Where do you want these?”
A dark cloud of dread passes over me as I look out across Brant’s property at the barn where the wedding’s gonna be. The buildings are spread out so it’s not close to the house, and I’m not sure if Brant has it locked up, so I can’t send Theo by himself.
“They go in the barn, but you won’t be able to get in. Hang on a minute,” I mutter, turning and heading back into the house to grab the key.
I come back out with a heavy key ring, but I have no idea which key is for which lock. Between the shed, and the shop, and the barn, and the cabin, and the room in the basement, there are more keys than locks I can match them up with.
Theo’s frowning in confusion as I come up beside him with a handful of keys. “He keeps the barn locked?”
“He keeps everything locked,” I state, starting toward the barn with him as I look at the bunch of keys. “I’m not even sure which one it is. Hopefully the right key is on here.”
Scout comes running up beside us, looking up at Theo like he just wants to let him know he’s there. Theo looks down at him. “Hey, you little mutt. You coming with us?”
Scout lets out what he probably hopes is a big, bad, intimidating bark, but he’s too young still and it’s just adorable. I can’t help smiling at the little rascal.
When we finally get to the barn, I see two galvanized buckets already sitting by the barn door. Theo must have brought them over while I grabbed the keys because he is still holding two over his shoulders.
I grab the chain tangled around the door handles and start trying keys.
“He doesn’t even have any animals in here—what’s the point of keeping it locked up so tight?” he asks.
“I don’t know,” I murmur as I try to jam a key into the hole. “I think it has more to do with keeping people out. It’s a pretty big property, wouldn’t be too hard for someone to hide in one of these buildings if he didn’t keep them locked. He wasn’t as worried about it before I came to live here, but since I’m here alone a lot, he’s more careful now.”
“Keeping you safe, huh?”
“Mm-hmm.”
“Maybe it’s that, or maybe this is where he stashes the bodies,” Theo jokes, setting down the big buckets while I give up on one key and switch to the next.
I shoot him a dry look over my shoulder. “He has a murder workshop, Theo—he’s not gonna stash bodies in the barn like an amateur.”
Theo’s dark eyebrows rise. “He has a what now?”
I bite back a smile at the thread of alarm in his voice. Finally, I find the right key. “There we go,” I say as I pull off the lock and start unwinding the chain.
“I’ll take that for you,” he says, shifting his hold on the buckets to free up a hand.
The chain isn’t that heavy, so I don’t really need to hand it to him, but old instincts compel me to go along with whatever before I realize what I’m doing. Once the chain is in his hand, I snap out of it and realize I could have just said ‘no thanks’ and held onto it myself, but it’s too late now.
Clearing my throat, I step inside the barn. There’s no light except the sunshine streaming in through the cracked door, so the farther into the barn I get, the darker it is. We’ve been storing the wedding supplies we’ve already started accumulating in an old, unused storage room in the back.
Theo follows me inside, and Scout follows him. I show Theo to the storage room and he puts the first two buckets down in the wrong place. I move them over to the reception corner (away from the bags full of more delicate items he so carelessly shoved them up against) while he goes back out to grab the other two buckets.
I get distracted going through supplies while I wait for him to come back, but then all of a sudden the barn starts to go dark.
I frown, looking back at the door, and see Theo pulling it closed.
“What are you doing?” I demand, standing.
“Just giving us a little privacy.”
“No. No privacy,” I say, looking around for the flashlight Brant brought in when I first started using this room for wedding storage.
“Relax,” Theo says as he walks closer.
My eyes aren’t adjusted to the lack of light so I can’t where he’s at. I scramble back against the man door along the wall, grabbing for the doorknob.
Theo drops the buckets and comes over to grab my hands and pull me away from the door. “Relax, Alyssa,” he says again, more firmly. “I’m not going to hurt you. I just want to talk.”