“Through the governor’s land? I nearly broke my neck in the daytime. How’d you manage at night?”
She waved the hand not holding the gun. “Paul and I hunted that land for years with the governor. Even so, finding my way down to the parking area where I left my truck hidden under the brush wasn’t easy. I twisted my ankle and got a nasty case of poison ivy. After that I decided to leave the hatpin where it was until the show, when I’d be free to wander around as much as I wanted. I knew I could get it back then.”
“Only we got it first. Face it, Catherine, it’s over. You can’t get out of here. One of Amos Royden’s deputies is down by the road waiting for your car.” Actually, Mutt wasn’t waiting for any special car, but I didn’t tell her that. “You’re trapped.”
“Not if you come with me. He’ll let us through. I’ll put you out on the road somewhere.”
Of course she would. “No.”
“Either that or I’ll shoot you now and say you killed yourself. You’re right. I have nothing to lose.”
“You’re too far away from me for it to look like suicide. Suicides by pistol are hard to fake. Don’t you watch all those forensics shows? They can check the stippling pattern to see precisely how far the gun was from the subject when it was fired. You’re what? Six or seven feet away?”
She frowned, took a deep breath and pulled herself erect. She looked exhausted. “Come closer.”
“Not on your life. Or mine.”
“I can just shoot you where you stand and say you attacked me.”
“As if.”
“Then I suppose I’ll have to come to you.”
She was expecting me to recoil. Instead, I raised both arms under her gun arm and threw myself full force against her.
In that enclosed space, the gunshot through the metal roof sounded like a canon. Kicking a woman in the groin doesn’t do a whale of a lot of good, but whacking her across the wrist with both fists sure can. The pistol went flying.
Catherine screamed. I hoped I’d broken her wrist, but I didn’t stick around to find out. I also didn’t stop to lock the barn. I ran around the stable toward the dressage arena where any moment now they’d start to wonder where she was.
She’d find the gun quickly, but I didn’t think she’d shoot into a crowd. She wouldn’t want to hit a horse by accident. I expected her to try to run away.
I jumped the two foot high dressage arena rail.
“Strong trot!” came Dick’s voice from Casey’s carriage as they warmed up.
I heard Ned’s hooves coming fast and raced to the center of the arena.
“Merry, get out of there!” Geoff yelled.
“Catherine’s behind me! She’s got a gun!” I’m not sure he heard me over the hoof beats. I raced for his side of the arena and did a grande jete across the dressage fence into Geoff’s arm. Only one. The other was already pulling his gun.
He threw me past him. “Get down!” he yelled.
“Geoff, no!” I shouted.
I saw the khaki hat before I saw Catherine. I’d expected her to make a run for her truck in the parking area. Maybe I’d pissed her off so badly she wanted to kill me at all costs. Maybe she’d simply lost it. I threw myself face down into the dirt and heard the whine above me. It’s like a rattlesnake. Nobody had to tell me what it was.
“Stay down,” Geoff dropped to his knees beside me. “I can’t risk a shot. Put it down, Catherine!” he shouted. “It’s over.”
“Jesus!” Dick’s voice.
Catherine ran across the arena toward me and dead in front of Ned. He hit her chest high. The impact tossed her six feet away to land in the dirt on her back. Her gun flew out of her hand, landed butt first in the dirt and fired a single shot straight up.
Maybe if Casey’s carriage hadn’t been so heavy and tough to stop because of her wheelchair, maybe if Dick had grabbed the reins from her and stomped the brake that she couldn’t, maybe if Ned hadn’t spent his first years as a child’s jumping pony, none of it would have happened.
The shot must have sounded like a mortar shell to Ned. He stood on his hind legs, then galloped for the edge of the arena.
Ned jumped the short rail of the dressage area, while Casey hauled on the reins and Dick clung to the fender. Straight ahead the four foot pasture fence loomed.
Ned tried valiantly to haul the carriage across the pasture fence, too. Instead, he stuck on the far side with his front feet on the ground and his rear end in the air scrabbling for purchase. The front wheels hung on the top rail or the arena, leaving the carriage canted up at a forty-five degree angle, while Dick held on to keep from being tossed out. Casey, thank God, was strapped into the carriage in her wheelchair.
Her chair was hanging at a scary angle, but it wasn’t going anywhere. I could hear her husband Hank yelling at her.
She called back, “We’re all right. What happened?”
Peggy shouted at me, “Go!” and ran toward Dick and Casey.
Geoff and I ran to Catherine.
She’d had all the breath knocked out of her, even if the horse hadn’t crushed her sternum and punctured her heart. I knew that feeling . . . terror that you’ll never breathe again, suffocating in awful pain. I dropped to my knees beside her and grasped her hand. “It’s gonna be okay, Catherine.” What a dumbass thing to say! Of course it wouldn’t be okay.
She gripped my hand and turned frightened eyes to me. Her mouth gaped, but she couldn’t speak.
Our EMT on call shoved me out of the way and put an oxygen mask over her face. I saw her chest heave. The hand I held gripped harder, but her chest lifted once, twice . . .
The EMT slid a cervical collar under her neck and fastened it. Her legs were thrashing, so she hadn’t severed her spinal cord, but the EMT fought to strap her to a body board to keep her still.
“Mamma?” came a male voice, and a moment later Troy knelt beside me. “Mamma, how bad are you hurt?”
She dropped my hand and reached for his.
He wheeled on me. “What the hell did you do?” His face was a mask of fury.
“Move away, son,” the EMT said. “Goes for all of you.”
“Which hospital?” Geoff asked.
“Bigelow General, and we’re moving now. Y’all get out of the way.” He signaled to the ambulance, and no more than a minute later Catherine slid into the ambulance on a body board.
Geoff climbed in behind her and I heard him Mirandize her. That’s all I could hear with the noise around us. I assumed she’d lawyer up. She’d admitted what she’d done to me, but I doubted any of it was admissible in a court of law.
I held Troy back. “You can’t go with her. Come with me.”
Peggy materialized on his other side. “Casey’s all right,” she said. “Dick’s handling it.” She took Troy’s other arm and dragged him to his feet. I thought for a moment he’d fight us, but he seemed to collapse instead. We led him to the in-gate and out. The ambulance blew by us to with its siren blaring. He raised his head and followed it with his eyes—eyes that were spilling tears.
“Why’d she shoot at you?” he asked me. “She could have killed that horse.”
So her indoctrination had worked that far, at least. He didn’t mention killing me.
“I’m afraid she killed Giles Raleigh and Gwen Standish.”
“No way.”
“Your mother . . .”
He blinked and caught his breath. “You know she’s my mother?”
I nodded. But she wouldn’t have told Troy that Giles was his father, even though a dead Giles no longer posed a threat to her relationship with her son.
“But why’d she kill him? The banner thing was barely a misdemeanor. He couldn’t hurt me.”
I looked across at Peggy. Should I tell him?
One look at the confusion on his face, and I decided he ought to know before he saw Catherine.
“Raleigh’d found out he was your father,” I said. “Catherine thought he was trying to take you away from her. Afraid
his money would ruin your life.”
“No way. She’s the one went looking for me.”
“She was also the one who put you up for adoption,” Peggy said quietly. “Raleigh didn’t know you existed until recently.”
I decided not to mention Gwen unless Troy did. He had enough on his plate already. He looked poleaxed. I didn’t blame him.
We led him into the stable and sat him down on a bale of hay. Peggy sat beside him and held his hand. He clutched it, seemingly grateful for the human contact.
“Did she think I’d prefer Raleigh because he’s rich?” Troy shook his head. “Never happen.”
He sounded sure, but would he have felt the same when Raleigh dangled a Ferrari under his nose, gave him a penthouse condo in one of the Raleigh properties, a corner office in Atlanta? Paid for an engineering degree at MIT and made certain he was accepted in society? Catherine, obviously, hadn’t thought Troy would hold out long.
Juanita came up and asked, “We don’t have a judge or an EMT. What should I do?”
“Tell everybody I’ll speak to them in ten minutes.”
She disappeared. She could handle an infantry division. A bunch of rowdy carriage drivers would be a piece of cake.
“She was going to tell everybody I was her son.” Troy said.
“When?” Geoff asked. I glanced around. I hadn’t heard him come in, but then he could move like a cat.
“You didn’t ride to the hospital with them?” I asked.
He shook his head. “I wanted to be here.” He grabbed my hand right out in public. “Amos and the Bigelow cops will meet her at the hospital, and Amos is calling Stan to tell him about the arrest. It’s really Stan’s jurisdiction.”
Troy was obviously trying hard to believe Catherine’s motives, but even I could see the doubt behind his eyes. “She had to tell her family about me first. Explain to them. Tell Sandra and Paul, Junior, and her mother.”
Like I could hear that conversation. “Sandra, Paul, may I introduce your half-brother Troy? Mother, meet your grandson. And the best part? His father is that great southern gentleman, Giles Raleigh. How about that gene pool, huh?”
I didn’t doubt Catherine loved Troy, but she loved her reputation and her other family too. No wonder she’d tried to convince me that Troy was Hiram’s son and my half-brother. Everybody knew Hiram had mistresses. Plus he was dead and couldn’t deny it. And everybody loved him. Nobody loved Giles.
How Giles would have gloated. I could hear him now. “Shape up, Dawn, send your polo player back to Argentina and do what I tell you or you’ll be out on your ass while your brother takes over the company.”
“Get your adulterous little tail out of my house and my life, Sarah Beth, honey. I don’t need you to produce a male heir. I’ve already got one. And I know he’s mine.
“Get lost, Brock. You and my wife can ride off into penury together on your mortgaged Harley.”
The list went on and on. Having Troy in his camp, and acknowledged as his son, would checkmate many of Raleigh’s enemies.
But, give Catherine credit, she’d known the risks when she didn’t get an abortion, and even more when she went hunting for Troy as soon as Paul died. What she couldn’t endure was sharing and possibly losing him to a self-serving monster like Giles Raleigh.
She didn’t trust Troy to remain loyal, so she didn’t give him the opportunity to choose. She made the choice for him.
And lost when she might have won.
Geoff jerked his head at me and cut his eyes. “Peggy, can you keep Troy company?” he asked.
She nodded. I followed Geoff out of the tent and leaned back against the front of the stall.
“You okay?” he asked.
“Is it against protocol to ask for a hug?”
He wrapped his arms around me and pulled me tight against him. He rested his chin on top of my head and whispered, “You know how lucky you are not to be in that ambulance on your way to the hospital?”
“Or the morgue.”
“I warned you not to open the barn until I got back.”
“It wasn’t my fault. I had to get some two-by-fours. She was supposed to be in her tent.”
“She tried to shoot you.”
“Will she survive?” I asked.
“One of the shaft ends caught her. Probably at least one punctured lung and some broken ribs, but I’d guess yes.”
“Will she confess? She told me everything, but I didn’t record it or anything. It probably isn’t admissible.”
“I think she’ll confess, but what the actual charges will be, I have no idea. At least two counts of first degree murder. They may ignore the assault on you. My guess is she’d rather go to jail than face the scandal of a trial.”
“I never dreamed she’d fire across the arena that way.” I sniffled. “She might have shot Ned.”
I could feel his chest shake.
“What?” I pulled away from him. “You’re laughing?”
“I ought to know by now—horses first, people second.”
“God, the horses!” I pulled away from him and ran to the judge’s tent. Drivers, grooms and spectators were hanging around gossiping and grousing, not having a clue what had happened. I wasn’t about to enlighten them. Not about Catherine, at any rate.
First I apologized for the uproar and offered to refund their money for their cancelled classes this afternoon and the clinic scheduled for Sunday.
“Why can’t you teach the clinic?” Harry Tolliver asked from the crowd. “You have the skill and the credentials. I’d value a lesson with you.” He looked around. Several heads nodded. “How about it, people? Same schedule, different clinician?”
Amazingly, everyone agreed, even Marvin Cudlow.
That left the remains of Saturday afternoon’s show. We had no dressage judge, until Peggy stepped up and whispered, “Casey still wants to drive her dressage test. If you’ll drive with her, Dick can judge her hors de concours. He can judge the rest of the afternoon.”
“She wants to drive?” I looked over Peggy’s shoulder at Hank heading Ned. Casey’s carriage only had a couple of scratches in the paint. Carriages have to be tough. All we had to do was to put back the PVC rails Ned had knocked down. I nodded. “We don’t have an EMT.”
“Sandi’s had some training. She can help out in a pinch. Please God we won’t have any other accidents,” Peggy said.
“Then if Dick’s agreeable, have at it.”
I made the announcement, and again everyone agreed.
Geoff walked across the arena with me. “I can see killing Raleigh,” I said. “Heck I could have killed him myself half a dozen times. But trying to run us off the road with Golden and Ned in the trailer?” I shook my head. “There must have been a better way to handle the situation with Troy.”
“Killers can’t see any other way out.“
“In the end, she only made things worse for everybody.”
“Murder frequently does.”
The rest of the show went well. Casey drove Ned brilliantly, and all the clients and spectators seemed happy. I am a good teacher. A number of people asked me to have another fun show and clinic in another couple of months.
We’d see.
Peggy finished feeding the horses in pasture, while I settled the boarding horses down. Geoff leaned against the wall opposite and watched me. We’d agreed to pick up burgers and eat at my little apartment. What would happen during the meal and afterwards—mostly afterwards—I couldn’t guess, but I had hopes.
I was coiling the water hose when I heard his cell phone behind me. He answered, listened, and let forth with a string of cusswords. The ones in English I knew. The Spanish ones, not so much.
“All right, dammit,” he said, flipped his phone off and came to me.
“Problem?” I asked. Stupid question. His face told me he was furious.
He took my arm, guided me into the feed room and shut the door.
My heart sank. “What’s happened?”
; “Some boaters just found a cigarette boat beached on Jekyll Island, full of holes and covered in blood.” He looked grim. “I’m headed down there.” He shook his head. “What is it with us?”
“Bad Karma?”
“Nuts.” He kissed me, and this time there was no tenderness. It was more like a ten round title bout. When we finally separated, he said, “Stay out of trouble until I get back.”
What trouble could I possibly get into?
(Continue reading for an excerpt of The Cart before the Corpse)
How It All Began . . .
The Cart Before The Corpse
Book One
The Merry Abbot Carriage-Driving Mysteries
Excerpt
Sunday Afternoon, Chattanooga, Tennessee
Merry
I should learn to count chickens instead of eggs.
I’d already packed my computer and printer in my truck and checked out of my motel. The scores were posted on all the driving classes except the cross-country marathon. As show manager, I’d passed out ribbons and trophies. Once the marathon ended and the scores were tallied, I could drive away from the horseshow grounds with a happy grin and a fat check.
That’s when I heard the screams. “Runaway!” I turned and raced across the field toward the start of the marathon course. When the screams continued, I knew this was more than a loose trace.
Please God some nervous horse had yanked his lead line from his groom and wandered off to graze, or decided he didn’t feel like being harnessed to his carriage today and trotted away dragging his reins and harness behind him.
Just so long as he wasn’t also dragging a carriage.
A runaway horse harnessed to a driverless carriage is a four-legged missile with no guidance system.
I was still fifty yards from the start of the marathon course when I saw Jethro, Pete and Tully Hull’s Morgan stallion, kick out with both hind feet and connect with the steel dashboard of their heavy marathon cart with a God-awful clang. Terrified, Jethro reared straight up in his traces and tossed both Pete and Tully off the carriage and into the dirt.
One Hoof In The Grave Page 27