I prayed this would be the last time I’d have to go through all the details…at least for tonight. “I told you already. I was tied with my hands behind my back, so I maneuvered around until I managed to get my hands in front of my body and that’s when I untied my feet. Had I known there was—”
I paused when Cowboy shoved open the door and entered the room with someone behind him, though I couldn’t see who it was. Cowboy held up his hand. “Sorry, Sheriff, I just need to interrupt for a moment. Someone wanted to meet Anna.” He stepped aside, revealing the shadow behind him.
“Oh my God!” I covered my mouth in shock. He looked much older than I remembered, but I would recognize his face anywhere. “C-Chief Swanson?”
“What?” Mandy exclaimed, backing up until she bumped into Dan, almost knocking him over. “Y-you’re alive?” Clearly distraught, she braced herself by holding onto the foot railing of my hospital bed and covered her face with her free hand, rocking back and forth. “But…but you’re dead,” she whispered.
Chief Swanson glanced at the rest of us, and his brows furrowed. He stepped forward and put a hand on Mandy’s slumped shoulder. “I’m sorry, but I’m not—”
Mandy reeled back at his touch, stumbling into the silver suture tray beside her. “No! It’s not possible. I saw you!” she shrieked, shaking her head frantically back and forth. “You were dead. I know you were. I set you on fire and…I…I watched you burn.”
A collective gasp sounded in the quiet room. Looks of horror and shock flicked across each of our faces at her confession and only then did Mandy realize her mistake. Her mouth dropped open and her eyes widened.
Cowboy’s eyes cut to Sheriff Wells, but his expression remained bleak. “This man is not Ted Swanson. He’s the chief’s twin brother, Ned Swanson.”
Mandy blinked. “W-what?”
But Ned didn’t miss a beat. “You killed Ted?” he asked in disbelief.
She didn’t say anything, just stood there staring at the man, as if the likeness of him to his brother had thrown her for a loop. The sheriff stood and took a step toward her. “Miss Barlow, I think you need to come with me.”
I couldn’t believe what I was hearing and sat there with my mouth hanging open, blinking and gawking at her in silence. Her bottom lip quivered as she backed slowly away. When she stumbled again into the silver tray behind her, she must’ve realized she was cornered and had nowhere else to go.
That’s when I got a whiff of a familiar, yet unpleasant, odor and realized I’d been wrong the entire time. “Y-you did this? You sent me the notes, wanting me to think it was your brothers, but…you put me in that barn.”
“No, of course not. I—”
“Don’t bother denying it. It’s faint, but I can smell the kerosene on you from here.”
Dan’s head snapped to me. “Kerosene! That’s it!”
Though he couldn’t see it, I nodded in confirmation.
But Mandy shook her head furiously, denying the accusation. “We’re close to the same size. I couldn’t have possibly carried you into the barn—”
“You’re a firefighter, Mandy, which means you’re trained to carry 150-pound manikins out of burning buildings. That’s thirty pounds more than I weigh. Besides, who said I was carried into the barn?”
Panic flashed in her eyes. “I…guess I just assumed.”
“Or you were there. I’m betting your whereabouts around the time I disappeared can’t be verified.” The last pieces of the puzzle linked together in my mind. “This was all you. That first night at the library, you weren’t driving past when you saw the flames. You set the dumpster on fire and let me take the blame, didn’t you?”
She stared at me with an unresponsive expression.