Unbridled Murder

by Leigh Hearon

  “You can just barely see them from here. Look way down on the left.”

  Maria pointed with one arm, and Annie was relieved to see the herd in the same small paddock, which now included the mustang and Eddie.

  “Eddie is going to be unhappy when his new playmates leave without him,” Annie regretfully told Maria. “Promise me you’ll make sure he’s okay until I return.”

  “I promise. And he’ll be fine, Annie. He’s a resilient kind of guy, I can tell. He’s used to rolling with the punches.”

  Annie knew this was true. After all, what other choice did Eddie have? She glanced over to the main paddock to take her mind off the hurt and confusion the Thoroughbred would feel after realizing he’d been left behind, and noticed a tall black-and-white pinto staring at her. She was struck by his eye coloring—one was cobalt blue, the other a typical dark brown. The blue orb was mesmerizing, almost willing her to come over. Then the pinto turned his massive head, and she was shocked to see that three-quarters of his left ear were missing. Annie wondered whether frostbite had been responsible, or if something worse, something violent, had torn so much of the ear away. When she saw how the large white blaze on his face drew apart to create a slightly off-kilter heart shape on his forehead, she could no longer resist the horse’s almost magnetic pull. Walking over to the paddock fence, she stood on one of the bars and reached out her hand. The pinto gazed at her, sighed, and gently laid one massive check on her palm.

  It was too much. Annie knew she was going to start weeping any second, and there was nothing she could do about it. She fiercely wiped her eyes with her arm and stroked the pinto with her free hand. There was nothing she could do. She was doing all she could. There was nothing she could do. She was doing all she could. Annie continued to repeat the words to herself as her own private mantra. It kept her tears from spilling over, but she knew she was still crying.

  Behind her, she heard the ominous rumble of a van on the country road outside the feedlot. Annie’s heart sank. Oh, Lord, this couldn’t be the transport, could it? It would be just her luck to see all the horses in the paddock—including the one she was now stroking—piled into the massive van that would carry them on a long, hot, waterless ride to their ultimate destination.

  She turned her head, prepared to see the worst. But what she saw made no sense, no sense at all.

  It was a caravan of trailers, longer than Annie had ever seen before in her life, and none of them looked anything like what she’d expect from a slaughterhouse. Gleaming in the sun, the vans looked extraordinarily well built and equipped for horse travel. What was going on? She jogged over to the electric gate to get a better look. The dust the convoy created was intense. Putting her hand to her forehead to better shield her eyes, she focused on the first van coming toward her. When it was twenty feet away, she finally could make out the driver. It was a woman, and she looked astonishingly like Jessica, her large-animal vet. Was she hallucinating?

  But no, there was Maria, by the electric fence, waving her through. Her mouth open, Annie watched Jessica send her a cheery wave as she drove by. Annie was too dumbfounded to do anything in return; all her attention was on the second van now coming through the gate. As it rolled in, she recognized Samantha Higgins at the wheel. This time, Annie at least managed to raise her hand in response after Sam threw her a friendly salute. Next in line was a van driven by her good friend LuAnn, who yelled something Annie could not make out over the noise of the caravan. She watched incredulously as more and more trailers rumbled into the feedlot. Annie saw her good friend Sarah, who’d just picked up Layla at her stables, at the helm of the next van. Patricia Winters followed, hauling a spectacularly long trailer with the logo RUNNING TRACK FARMS emblazoned on the side. Annie barely had time to register that the British manager of an elite horse farm was probably seeing a feedlot for the very first time. Next in line was Jessica’s six-slant trailer, driven by—could it be?—Kim Williams, one of Suwana’s finest deputies. Annie doubted Kim had ever driven a horse trailer in her life—but then, she’d led frightened horses out of a burning barn for the first time only six months ago and done an admirable job. Identifying the driver of the final trailer to enter the feedlot was easy. Annie would have known Dan Stetson’s massive head anywhere. And riding shotgun with the sheriff was Travis Latham, chairman of the board of the organization that had authorized adopting—Annie’s brain came to a thudding halt. She knew what the arrival of seven trailers implied. But could it really be so?

  She raced to the trailer Jessica had driven in and stood panting in front of the driver’s side, too wound up to speak. She looked up to her vet, and her eyes begged the question she seemed unable to ask.

  “Don’t thank me,” Jessica said blithely. “Thank the man over there. It was all his idea.”

  Annie turned and saw Marcus, now out of the truck, standing by Dan and Travis, grinning broadly as Dan slapped him on the back. In fact, they all seemed to have huge grins on their faces. Only Annie, it seemed, was just a wee bit still in the dark. She caught Marcus’s eye, and he looked back at her.

  “We’re taking them all,” he said simply.

  Later, Annie wondered if Marcus actually had said something more. It was hard to know, since at that moment, and for the second time in her life, she slid to the ground in a dead faint.

  CHAPTER 27

  MONDAY AFTERNOON, AUGUST 15

  Myrna was the one who unwittingly revived Annie. “What the hell are you all doing here?” she snarled at the group as she clumped up the aisle, passing her angry eyes from one group to another.

  The harshness of her voice roused Annie, whom Marcus and Maria were now tending to on the ground. She realized her face was wet. And she was incredibly thirsty. Then she remembered. She’d just watched seven trailers roll into the feedlot and Marcus—that wonderful man, Marcus—had just told her they were taking them all.

  She struggled to get up, but Maria gently shook her head no and motioned that she should go with her over to the aspen trees, where there was a modicum of shade. Marcus stood up, dusting his knees, and looked at Travis. Travis nodded back, and the two men approached the seething feedlot owner, who looked as if she wanted to spit venom at both of them.

  “Mrs. Fullman, my name is Marcus Colbert, and the gentleman with me is Travis Latham. We’d like to purchase every single horse now on your property. We’re prepared to pay you fifty percent more than what you normally would get for the lot, and we’ll pay you in cash. Do we have a deal?”

  Myrna gasped and sputtered. From Annie’s vantage point by the trees, it didn’t appear that Myrna was ready to accept even these remarkable terms.

  “Who are you?” Her tone was decidedly suspicious. “Are you from the Department of Agriculture?”

  “No, ma’am,” Travis interjected. “We’re from a nonprofit organization in Suwana County. We need horses and hear you often sell them to qualified buyers.”

  Trust Travis to coat the truth with a few embellishments intended to soften up the old hag, Annie thought. She wondered if it would work. She knew her friends had no intention of leaving the feedlot unless their trailers were filled with Myrna’s horses. And Myrna was going to make a load of money, a lot more than she’d get from the slaughterhouse. What was her hang-up?

  “Well, that’s all fine and dandy, but how do I know you are who you say you are?”

  Travis calmly removed an envelope from his blazer’s inside pocket and pulled out a number of papers.

  “This is our nonprofit certificate from the state, as well as our status from the Department of Licensing.” He handed them over to Myrna, adding, “If you’d like to see our articles of incorporation, I can provide those as well.”

  Myrna squinted at the documents, then roughly pushed them back toward Travis.

  “You’re not part of the media?”

  “No, ma’am,” Travis and Marcus said simultaneously.

  “You just want to buy these horses.” Myrna stated this as a fact, no
t a question.

  “That’s right, Mrs. Fullman. We just want to buy your horses—all of them.”

  “Four of ’em have already been sold.”

  “I’m glad you remembered that, Mrs. Fullman. Ms. Carson’s horses will be coming with us.”

  Marcus turned his gaze to Annie, now sitting at the base of one of the trees and guzzling water from a plastic bottle Maria had just handed her. Annie nodded emphatically as she swallowed the liquid, which, at the moment, tasted like nectar.

  “What do you want ’em for?”

  Honestly, thought Annie, for a woman who had no issue with selling horses for human consumption, she certainly seemed overly concerned about their future now.

  “They’ll be used for whatever horses typically are used for—riding, driving, light farmwork,” Travis said. “They’ll be very well taken care of, I assure you.”

  Myrna narrowed her eyes and looked at the stately octogenarian.

  “Some of ’em aren’t in very good shape,” she said. “Might not be up for a lot of riding.”

  “We’re aware of that, Mrs. Fullman. Those horses will enjoy a good retirement.”

  Myrna shuffled her feet and looked from side to side. She appeared not to know what to do. Travis and Marcus continued to stand patiently in front of her, waiting for her to make a decision.

  “Fifty percent more than the Canadian house, you say?”

  Annie assumed she was talking about one of the slaughterhouses north of the U.S. border.

  “That’s right. You tell us what you’d get from your regular buyer, and we’ll increase the price by fifty percent. Paid in cash.”

  Annie’s patience was growing thin. She wanted to rush over, grab Myrna by the shoulders, and shake her until her eyes bugged out, and she managed to say one simple word—Deal.

  Finally, Myrna sniffed. “Suit yourself. You can have them all. Let me figure out how much you owe me. Once I get the money, they’re all yours.” She stomped off toward her office. One would have thought she was more angry than pleased about the way negotiations had worked out.

  Annie felt such a rush of relief flow through her that she felt she couldn’t move a single limb. She felt embedded in the ground, too stunned to do anything except exist. And then she started to sob, convulsively. Maria promptly poured the rest of the water bottle over her head. The impromptu tonic had an astounding effect on the patient. Annie stood up and started hugging everyone she saw, starting with Marcus.

  * * *

  Myrna took her own sweet time devising her buyout price for the feedlot herd. Annie wasn’t the least bit surprised. After all, the money Myrna made today would surpass anything she’d have garnered on any other one, and Annie had no doubt that Myrna was laboriously trying to figure out how much she could pad the bill and still get away with it. She knew all her friends must appear like the most stereotypical horse-loving, tree-hugging group Myrna had ever encountered, and the feedlot owner would want to take full advantage of their generous natures.

  As far as Annie was concerned, Myrna could manipulate the figures as long as she wanted. She knew it would make no difference in the end and that Travis would pay her price. Besides, the longer Myrna fiddled with the numbers, the more time she had to catch up with her friends, all at once. If she’d tried, she couldn’t have planned a better party for herself.

  Which, Marcus reminded her, was what it actually was.

  “As I recall, this is a very special day,” he murmured to Annie, once he’d been able to extricate himself from an embrace that had elicited quite a few whistles and catcalls from the audience. For once, Annie didn’t care.

  “I should say it is! How often are fifty horses saved from a terrible fate, thanks to your remarkable scheming?”

  “Well, true. But I was referring to something else. Do you know what day it is, Annie?”

  “Monday. It’s Monday, August . . .” She tried to count the days she’d been here in her head. “I know I arrived a week ago. That was the eighth. Which makes this—”

  She stopped.

  “It makes it your birthday. Happy birthday, Annie.”

  A roar of cheers and applause surrounded her. She was stunned. It was her birthday. It had always been easy to remember before. But then, her life usually was a lot less complicated in mid-August than it had been this year. She was now officially forty-four. She vowed to make it the best year of her life, ever. And to spend as much time as she possibly could with Marcus and too many horses to count.

  “Did you plan it this way?” Annie asked incredulously. She couldn’t believe Marcus could have orchestrated all of this for her birthday.

  “No, the rescue team’s coming today was just a serendipitous event. It worked out perfectly.”

  Gazing around her, Annie looked at all the people who were so important in her life.

  “But how did you get everyone together?”

  “A lot of phone calls. Many, many phone calls. Not to mention about two hundred texts.”

  Oh. So that was why Marcus’s cell phone had seemed glued to his ear practically as soon as he’d arrived.

  “But why? Why did you decide to do this? I mean, it’s incredibly generous and fabulous and wonderful, but just because I said I wished we could take them all—”

  “About sixteen times.”

  “—I didn’t imagine you’d take me seriously.”

  “Well, I did.”

  Annie let this sink in. Could she really ask any more of this incredible guy? She realized she had to.

  “Then I hate to ask this of you, but as long as we’re taking the feedlot horses . . .”

  “It’s already taken care of.”

  “It is?”

  “Maria’s bringing Colin’s herd over right now. She left as soon as Myrna agreed to take the bait. Don’t worry—Jessica knows all about it. We made sure there’s enough trailer space for everyone.”

  After that, Annie couldn’t think of anything else to say. She couldn’t have, anyway; her heart was so full that words were simply not enough.

  * * *

  Fortunately, someone—Annie wasn’t sure who—had been prescient enough to bring food, in the form of several large pizzas and fizzy beverages. Everyone settled down in the sparse shade to eat. Annie knew that each and every person here was going to put in a huge effort to load and transport the horses, and she was glad they’d be doing it well fed.

  Over the early lunch, Annie got a much better idea of how the plan had been executed.

  “It started with a phone call to me,” Travis said, trying to pick up a slice of pizza without dropping toppings all over his creased khaki pants. Annie wondered if he’d ever eaten pizza before. He’d seemed momentarily flummoxed when he realized silverware was not included in the box. Travis gave up the effort and spoke.

  “I realized that taking this many horses would radically change the direction of Alex’s Place if that was their ultimate destination. There’s a big difference between a working farm with an assortment of farm animals and a horse-rescue facility. Both fulfill the mission statement of Alex’s Place. But Marcus and I knew that we couldn’t make the decision without the full support of the board.”

  “We all got a phone call,” Dan Stetson continued, “and agreed, every one of us, that it could and should be done. Jessica was the lynchpin to the decision. She knew better than anyone else just how work intensive it would be to bring this many nags back to health. In the end, we voted unanimously to switch the focus of the ranch to rescue horses. Frankly, I can’t think of better projects for the kids. High time they learned to think of someone’s needs beyond their own, and taking care of any of these nags should get their attention real quick.”

  “Now, Dan. Try to be a bit more humanitarian. A lot of these kids don’t have much of a chance at home. They learn to take care of themselves because they have to. If no one else gives them the attention they need, of course they’re going to think about their own needs first.” The speaker was Kim Willia
ms, a Suwana County deputy and the only African American and one of the few females on the force.

  “I suppose,” was Dan’s response to Kim’s gentle request for a bit of compassion. Dan always had been a stickler for behavioral conformity, Annie thought with some amusement. He thought everyone should just adhere to the laws of the land and be happy about it. He certainly was.

  “Well said, Kim,” Marcus said approvingly. “Our board is greatly enhanced with your presence on it.”

  “Hear, hear,” Travis added.

  “Well, this is all great.” Annie meant it, but she also was a little stung at being left out of the deliberations. “But why didn’t you include me in the discussion? After all, I’m a board member, too.”

  “We tried, Annie,” Marcus said, trying to keep a straight face. “Travis included you on every email he sent to the board. But it seems you don’t check your mailbox very often. Fortunately, we had a quorum, so your vote wasn’t essential. Not that we wouldn’t have loved to have it,” he hastened to add. “But we didn’t think you would have disagreed with anything we were considering.”

  Annie was somewhat mollified. And it had been a wonderful surprise—although she would have been happy to bypass some of the misery she’d felt these last few days, thinking that the rest of the herd, save her five horses, was doomed. She sighed. She knew she had email on her new phone. Hannah had set it up for her and even shown her how to use it. But how many things could you recall after a whirlwind training session with an eight-year-old computer maven? Annie had just assumed she’d catch up on what sparse email she’d received the past week when she returned home.

  Jessica rose to her feet, a determined gleam in her eye.

  “Well, I don’t know what the feedlot owner is doing in there, but it’s time for me to get to work. Annie, do you still have that medical kit I gave you?”

  “I do, plus my own.”

  “Let’s check out the horses who are verifiably sick and injured. We’ve decided I’ll haul the worst cases, and Patricia will take the mares and foals. Her trailer is big enough to load half of the contestants in the Kentucky Derby and has adjustable stalls to accommodate both mother and foal.”