Dead Set

by Vannetta Chapman

  Which wasn’t true.

  She was overreacting.

  Jonas would provide a work crew. He’d told her as much that morning.

  Sometimes the most frustrating moments were the ones where there was nothing she could do. This was one of those. She didn’t know how to plaster a wall. She couldn’t convince Derrick’s work crew to come back. She couldn’t even calm down her friend and employee who had stormed back inside and was now banging pots and pans around in the kitchen.

  But she could trust that this would work out somehow and that God had a plan. She could be grateful for her friends who stuck by her—through thick and thin, highs and lows, murders and burglaries. Also, she still had two weeks before she was supposed to leave for Indiana. Two weeks was a lot of time. There was no telling what might happen.

  That thought wasn’t as comforting as it should have been.

  Chapter Eleven

  Tony hadn’t visited Love Creek Orchards since before Camila died. He felt bad about that. They’d been close friends with Roger and Liz Stuckey. They’d hiked with them, fished with them, even vacationed with them. How had he let that friendship slip away?

  He could have sent an email or called.

  But that would have been rude after so long a silence, so instead he’d opted to stop by on his way back from Floore’s. Of course, after changing the flat tire, he was dirty and sweaty. Which didn’t put Liz off one bit. She looked up, her mouth broke into a generous smile, and then she was around the counter, hugging him and exclaiming that it had been too long.

  “It has,” Tony agreed.

  She studied him a moment, then nodded, and he knew in the way you could only know with old friends that he’d been forgiven.

  “I wanted to talk to you and Roger.”

  “About?”

  “It’s complicated.”

  Liz laughed. She was tall, nearly six feet, and thin as a reed. She’d let her hair go gray, and it looked good on her—looked natural. Her skin was a deep brown from hours working in the sun, working on the plants they sold.

  “Roger’s picking up a load of chrysanthemums in San Antonio. I expect him back by four.”

  “Okay.” Tony looked out at his truck and weighed his two options. Agatha already knew he’d be late. She was fine—the Rangers were there, Bannister was there, probably half the town was there. She’d be okay. “That tire fix it shop place still on Reed in Medina?”

  “It is. Do you need a tire fix it shop?”

  “I do.” He’d explain that later, when he came back. “I’ll go tend to that, and meet you back here at four.”

  “Make it six, and I’ll invite you to dinner.”

  “It’s a deal.”

  The tire shop was surprisingly busy. By the time he had his tire replaced, it was five o’clock. He stopped by the small grocery store, picked up a bottle of red wine, and headed back out to the Orchard. Roger, like his wife, was tall and thin, but instead of gray hair he was mostly bald. He greeted Tony with the same exuberance that Liz had. They lived in a home on the western side of the Orchard. Liz had popped a King Ranch casserole in the oven. They had salad, fresh bread, the casserole, and the red wine.

  “You remembered my favorite.”

  “I remember most things.” Tony didn’t shy away from the inquisitive look of his friends. These were two people he could trust, and they were also two people he could count on to be honest with him. That was a rare thing, and he realized in that moment how much he’d missed them.

  “First I want to say I’m sorry, for losing contact.”

  “You were grieving.” Liz sipped the wine, but didn’t fill her plate with food.

  “I was, but somewhere in that process I pulled into myself. I decided it was safer to be alone than to care.” He looked at his plate, then back up. “I realize now how foolish that was.”

  “Here, here.” Roger raised his glass, and they all clinked their glasses together. It was that easy. All the unreturned phone calls and emails were forgiven.

  They ate and caught up on mutual acquaintances, the status of the orchard, the changes in the Hill Country. Tony and Roger insisted on doing the dishes. Liz didn’t even try to argue. Twenty minutes later they were sitting on the back patio, an overhead fan cooling the air as they looked out over some of the prettiest land in the state of Texas.

  Tony told them about Agatha, about their growing friendship. He didn’t tell them that it might have changed into something even more personal. He didn’t have to. Liz was grinning broadly.

  Roger refilled their glasses. “We’re happy for you, Tony. Agatha sounds lovely.”

  Then he told them about Waynard’s buckle, and the burglaries and the murder of Kolbe Burke.

  Roger let out a long whistle. “You can take the detective out of the job, but...”

  “You don’t know the half of it.” He thought of the previous two murder investigations that Agatha had been involved with, then glanced at his watch. He didn’t have time to go into that. “I saw on Dewald’s website that he’d done a remodel here last year.”

  “He did. His bid wasn’t the lowest that we received, but he had a reputation for good work so we accepted it.” Liz pointed to the outdoor kitchen, the swimming pool, and the sunroom. “I was more than satisfied with his work.”

  “We both were.”

  This was the sticky part. He’d heard the same from the other two stops he’d made on the way down to Floore’s. “What I’m asking is more about the man. Was there anything you noticed? Anything that gave you pause?”

  Liz and Roger shared a look, and Tony felt that spidey sense on the back of his neck.

  “We paid a quarter up front, then the rest in three installments as he completed the work. I travel to Hunt often enough that I dropped off the payment instead of mailing it.” Liz swirled her wine and stared into it. “I had the sense from Debbie that something was wrong, but she didn’t want to talk about it. I tried more than once. The last time, she was very nearly rude, so I backed off.”

  Tony looked to Roger for confirmation.

  “Can’t say as Derrick and I ever had a heart-to-heart, but I can verify what Liz said.” He turned to his wife. “We talked about it at the time, remember?”

  She nodded.

  “Something was bothering him. I was worried it was a problem with the job, but then I ran into him a few months later. Same worried look.”

  “Financial trouble?”

  Roger and Liz shrugged, simultaneously.

  “You know how it is,” Liz said. “Could have been trouble with the kids, extended family, their marriage.”

  “Could have been anything.” Roger raised the bottle of wine which was empty. “Want me to fetch another?”

  “Not on my account. The road back to Hunt is a winding one.”

  Liz and Roger both followed Tony to his truck. They walked around the truck, scrutinizing the tires. Everything looked good. Whoever had monkeyed with him at Floore’s hadn’t followed him to the orchard.

  Roger gave him a hearty handshake, but Liz pulled him into a hug and whispered, “Don’t be a stranger.”

  “I won’t. I promise.”

  “Bring Agatha. I need to meet this woman.”

  “I’ll do that.” He waved as he drove away.

  He didn’t know much more than he had that morning, but he had two additional pieces of information. The Huntsville PD had put an undercover officer on a cold case—which meant it was no longer cold. And something was going on at the Dewalds. It didn’t make them a suspect, but it moved them one step closer to making Tony’s list.

  AGATHA INSISTED ON sleeping in her room that night. She couldn’t stay at Tony’s indefinitely, and she didn’t want to sleep upstairs with Gina. In fact, she tried to convince Gina to go home. Her friend finally agreed, but she returned three hours later with a duffel bag of clean clothes, a paperback novel, and a shotgun.

  “Why are you carrying that thing around?”

  “The duffel ba
g? I needed clean clothes.”

  “Not that.”

  “This book? I thought you were a champion of reading.”

  “The shotgun.”

  “Better prepared, Agatha. Isn’t that what Tony always says?”

  “I believe he says hope for the best...”

  “But prepare for the worst. You know I’m right.” She smiled, then trudged upstairs to her room. When she came back down, still holding the paperback and shotgun but without the duffel bag, she sank onto the couch. “You spoke with Tony?”

  “I did. He stopped by here, caught me up, and then went home.”

  “And?”

  “He verified that something is afoot at Dewald Construction.”

  “You told him that Derrick pulled out today?”

  “He wasn’t surprised.” To Agatha’s dismay, Gina leaned the shotgun against the coffee table, then lay down on the couch, a pillow propped under her head.

  Jiminy crickets. Agatha had been looking forward to a quiet evening. She still needed to finish the sweater she was knitting for her newest granddaughter.

  Gina glanced up from her book. “Go on and do your knitting. I’m just going to read a little and head to bed early.”

  Huh. They were spending too much time together. Gina was now able to read her thoughts. That didn’t bear...honestly, it did not bear thinking about. She made herself a cup of hot tea and retreated to her room.

  The master room in her B&B was more like a suite. There was a nice-sized sitting area, another space for the bed and dresser, a bathroom, and a large walk-in closet. Since she only owned a few dresses, she didn’t need all of that closet space. It was nice to keep her knitting projects out of sight, though. And she did enjoy all the empty space in the room. It helped her to breathe. The large holes in the walls tended to raise her blood pressure, but she decided to ignore them and focus on her knitting.

  An hour later she was yawning, blinking her eyes, and having to recount her stitches. Stuffing her needles into the ball of lavender yarn, she readied for bed and fell asleep as she often did, saying her prayers. Some people felt that was disrespectful, but Agatha’s mother had taught her differently.

  Your dat loves it when you crawl up into his lap, tell him about your day, and then fall asleep mid-sentence in his arms. It shows how much you trust him, how comfortable you are there in his arms. It’s the same with our heavenly Father, Agatha. Don’t worry about falling asleep while you pray. Worry if you stop praying.

  She fell into a deep sleep that was filled with construction projects and fields in need of harvest, friends and a few shadowy enemies, her cat Fonzi and her mare, Doc.

  Doc was agitated, knocking against his stall.

  She tried to reach him, to soothe her, but the space between the front porch and the barn grew in the way of dreams, throwing up one obstacle after another until she felt she’d never reach the mare.

  Then Doc whinnied an urgent, unhappy sound, and Agatha sat bolt upright.

  The battery clock on her nightstand read four in the morning.

  Doc.

  Something was wrong.

  Why was the mare stirring up such a ruckus?

  Why did it sound as if she were stamping her hooves outside Agatha’s window?

  She grabbed her robe, hastily pulled it on over her night gown, and hurried toward the front door. It stood wide open. Agatha ran out onto the porch in time to see a man leading her mare toward a horse trailer. Doc was putting up the fuss she’d heard earlier, straining against the lead rope, tossing her head, and even baring her teeth.

  As Agatha’s eyes adjusted to the night, she made out a battered horse trailer hitched to an old pick-up truck. Gina stood in the space between the porch and the barn—the same space that Agatha had been unable to cross in her dream.

  “Drop the lead rope.” Gina pumped a shell into her shotgun.

  Agatha remained frozen on the porch steps, torn between needing to run to Doc and knowing she shouldn’t step in front of a loaded shotgun.

  The person attempting to steal Doc looked their way. Agatha couldn’t tell if it was a man or a woman since they were wearing a ski mask, jeans, and an old work shirt. She thought how hot that must be. Wondered why someone would steal her horse. She marveled that she could actually see anything at four in the morning, but then the ground lighting that the Dewalds had installed helped.

  Doc continued to toss her head and had even managed to rise up on her back legs. The thief’s attention split between the horse and the house, which was when Gina raised the shotgun to take aim. The burglar dropped the lead rope and jumped into the passenger seat of the pick-up truck, hollering “Go, go, go.”

  Gina pulled the trigger and the rifle made a tremendous noise that broke the stillness of the night. The left taillight of the horse trailer shattered. The truck pulled out onto the county road, fishtailing, correcting, and finally speeding away, but not before Gina got off another shot. This time it binged off the horse trailer.

  Agatha ran to Doc. “It’s okay, girl. You did well. You’re a gut horse. Calm now. Just be calm.” She ran her hand down Doc’s side, which was slick with sweat. “How about some oats, ya? It’s early yet, but I believe you’ve earned it.”

  She glanced up as Tony skidded around the corner of the house and into the parking area, Glock raised.

  “They’re gone.” Gina practically spit the words.

  “Did you hit them?”

  “Hit the tail light and the trailer.”

  “You scared them off—that’s what matters.” He turned to Agatha. “Are you okay?”

  “Ya.”

  “And your mare’s okay?”

  “Only frightened.” She continued to stroke the horse’s neck and speak to it in a soft voice. Why would someone want to steal her horse? What was happening to her life? It had descended into utter chaos.

  Tony pulled out his phone and punched in the 9-1-1 code. She didn’t see him punch in those three numbers, but she knew that was what he was doing. He paced between the house and the barn, talking to the dispatcher, and finally pocketed the phone. “They’re sending an officer.”

  He crossed the space between them, put one hand on the horse and one on her arm. “Are you sure you’re both okay?”

  “Ya. I was sleeping, thought it was a dream.”

  “Nightmare.”

  “Exactly.”

  Gina had disappeared into the house and returned with two flashlights. Handing one to Tony, she said, “Let’s see what kind of note they left.”

  “What makes you think they left a note?” Agatha still felt as if she were dreaming. Was this really happening? Why did her life resemble a crime novel?

  “They were stealing your horse, and it probably wasn’t because they needed a horse. More likely, they left a ransom note.”

  “We probably shouldn’t go in there.” Tony spoke the last three words to the night air, or maybe to Agatha and Doc.

  “Stay here,” he muttered and followed Gina into the barn.

  Doc was calmer and cropping at grass that grew up along the brick paved walk. Agatha could hear Tony and Gina talking and walking around inside the barn. The beam from their flashlights occasionally splayed through the barn’s door.

  They returned to Agatha’s side as a police cruiser pulled into the drive. Officer Gracen stepped out of the vehicle, and Tony jogged over to explain the situation.

  “You’re not going to believe this.” Gina thrust the paper in front of Agatha, then aimed her flashlight on the words written there.

  Turn over the treasure and we’ll return your horse.

  We’ll be in contact with when and where.

  “Good grief.”

  “Exactly.”

  “I thought the thing with the Texas Rangers would put this to rest.”

  “It should have,” Tony said as he rejoined them. “Officer Gracen is going to put out an APB on the horse trailer. She’ll also set up across the street to deter any other treasure hunters.
”

  “Can I put Doc back in her stall?”

  “Sure. I’ll go with you.”

  “I’ll make some coffee.”

  Both Agatha and Tony turned to stare at Gina. She was quite the sight—hair disheveled, eyebrows nearly meeting in a frown, one hand fisted on her hip, and the other still holding the shotgun. “Do either of you think you can go back to sleep after this?”

  “Probably not,” Agatha admitted.

  “No way.” Tony rubbed a hand over his face. “Some of those granola bars might be good too.”

  “I’ll see what I can dig up.”

  Agatha and Tony walked Doc back into her stall. Agatha dumped a generous portion of oats into the mare’s bucket.

  “They didn’t hurt her?”

  “Nein. She’s fine. Calmer now. Earlier, when they were here, her eyes were rolling up in her head, and the sound coming from her—” Agatha shivered. “She wasn’t going mutely.”

  “Animals have a way of knowing. Don’t they?”

  “Knowing what?” Agatha cocked her head and studied this man she cared so much for, a man who was more comfortable in a truck than on a horse. Still, he seemed to accept her world much as she had accepted his.

  “Who to trust. When they’re in danger.”

  Agatha nodded in agreement. “Horses are simple animals, really. Give them a clean stall, oats and hay, fresh water, and they’ll give you their all.”

  “She’s as faithful as my old truck.” He nudged Agatha’s shoulder.

  “The simplest things in life are sometimes the very best.”

  “Amish proverb?”

  She shrugged. “Something my dat used to say.”

  The mare seemed to be enjoying the oats, untroubled by what had occurred—an attempted kidnapping, shots fired into the night, words on a piece of paper.

  “Why would they think you have any treasure?” Tony sighed and slumped against the barn’s wall. “These people are tenacious.”

  “I don’t know, but I am ready to approach this problem from a different angle.”