Bonnie opened her mouth to argue, but Lloyd held up a hand. “Let me finish. The second problem I have with your theory is that Alf isn’t some sly conniver who wants to throw a fox among the pullets and giggle while the feathers fly. He’s the grieving father of a murdered son.”
Bonnie knew her theory had more holes in it than a rusty colander, but she also felt in her heart of hearts something rotten was happening. “Lloyd, this same grieving father knew how many shots killed Dwight Furby.”
“I have to admit that troubles me, but Byron said the man had an alibi.”
“For the murder itself. Not for having a hand in it. He could have hired someone to kill Furby.”
“Because Furby killed Leo?”
“Maybe.” She shook her head, feeling like it was packed tight with bubble wrap. “Damn it. I don’t know.”
She laid a hand on Lloyd’s arm. “Boss, Rattlesnake’s got his finger in a lot of dangerous pies right now, and I can’t get past the feeling he wants me to know it.”
“And this fits together with Jason Dobbs how?”
Bonnie shrugged and shook her head slowly. “I wish I knew.”
“Well, no matter who set this particular scenario in motion, you’ve got to admit you’re better off with Jason at the helm.”
No shit.
The young master Dobbs was making nada demands on her—eulogy or otherwise. Unlike his father, Jason didn’t seem to have an agenda beyond the funeral itself.
You definitely dodged a bullet with that one, Pinkwater. “Is this one of those times you’re going to advise me not to look a gift equine in the mouth?”
“You could say that. Right now you got all the earmarks of someone who’s searching for the dark cloud inside the silver lining.”
“All right, I’ll put aside my suspicions and just think about the eulogy.”
Coming up on the left was the high school. Lloyd’s truck sat alone in the parking lot. A lone figure leaned against the rusted Ford.
“Oh, crap,” Bonnie said.
Lloyd flicked the turn signal in preparation to making a left into the lot. “What is it?”
Bonnie slid down in her seat. “Don’t you dare turn! It’s Superintendent Divine.” She reached across Lloyd and flipped off the signal, as if this simple act would transport Alice to another quadrant of the space-time continuum.
Lloyd veered hard, going straight instead of turning. “This is ridiculous. He’s already seen us, Bon. Lord in heaven, the man is waving at us.” Like it had a will of its own, Lloyd’s right hand in turn lifted from the steering wheel and waved back. A frozen smile painted itself on Lloyd’s craggy face.
“What are you doing?” Bonnie asked through clenched teeth.
“Just being polite,” he said. “Bon, you’re only forestalling the inevitable. There’s no way to avoid Xavier in a school district as small as ours.”
Doesn’t mean I can’t try. “Humor me. I will not subject myself to those beady little eyes right at this moment. And I definitely am in no mood for a lecture.”
Her phone rang. She checked her call-waiting and saw the name Xavier Divine plastered across the screen.
Double damn. She stared at the ringing phone like it was a coiled snake ready to bite. “Should I answer it?”
“Interesting question. If it was me, I would say an immediate hello to our esteemed boss and listen to what he had to say, but we’re not going to do that, are we?” Lloyd gave Bonnie a wide-eyed innocent stare. “Answering the phone would be too simple. We need to complicate matters by making Xavier angry. Isn’t that how these things go?”
She turned off the phone. Not exactly crossing the Rubicon, but the water’s rising. “You think you’re so smart. Aren’t you worried I’m getting you in trouble?”
“Another interesting question.” Lloyd pursed his lips and sighed. “Under normal circumstances I might be, but these are hardly normal circumstances, what with Marjorie gone and folks turning up dead. Nope, I think I’m going to grab the wheel and hang on to the Pinkwater Express.”
A flash of guilt immobilized Bonnie, and she considered telling Lloyd to turn the car around.
Lloyd must have read either her mind or the expression on her face. “Don’t sweat it, but I will demand one concession in return for going along with this insanity.”
“Name it.”
Lloyd rolled down the window and spit a large goober of tobacco into the wind. “You don’t give me a hard time about my chew.”
The mathematician in Bonnie was already extrapolating the inadequate arc Lloyd’s tobacco missile had traveled. She could picture a slimy brown streak racing the length of Alice’s already filthy door.
In for a penny. “Deal.”
Lloyd wiped his chin and nodded approvingly. “Where to, Holmes?”
“To the fair, Watson.”
Seneca Webb, formerly Seneca Berringer, valedictorian, not to mention prom and homecoming queen, looked beautiful even with sweat pouring down her face and strands of straw plastered to her pink, freckled cheeks. Her auburn hair positively gleamed in the half light of the stall. A checkered western shirt was tied at the waist, revealing a hint of skin. Blue jeans seemed painted on.
Damn, girl, you’re not giving that baby much room to breathe.
Seneca looked up from where she had been currying her quarter horse. Her face broke into a smile. “Missus P! Mister Whittaker!” She dropped the brush and threw her arms around Bonnie. “I thought I saw the two of you in the stands last night.”
She reached past Bonnie and squeezed Lloyd’s hand. “You just missed Caleb.”
Bonnie stepped back. Her gaze went from Seneca’s eyes down to her belly and back up again. “Jason Dobbs tells me you’re expecting.”
“He never could keep a secret.”
“Is it supposed to be a secret?” Bonnie cocked her head and squinted at her former student.
Seneca shrugged. “Not so much a secret as something I don’t talk about, especially around here. Everything’s easier if I don’t make a big deal about being pregnant for the next few months—you know, until racing season’s over.”
The truth was, Bonnie mostly agreed with Seneca’s husband. Barrel racing and the gestation business hardly seemed suited for one another.
Seneca must have caught the glint in Bonnie’s eyes. “Aw, come on, Missus P, not you, too? Nothing’s going to happen to the baby. It ain’t like I’m riding bulls.” The young woman stroked the flanks of her horse. “I’m as safe as in my momma’s arms on the back of Jezebel here.”
There was no changing the girl’s mind even if Bonnie wanted to. Hell, admit it, Pinkwater. This is the sort of reckless stand that you would have taken for yourself in another time and an alternate universe. She sighed. “You win.”
“Of course, I do.” Seneca put her hands on her hips and gave Bonnie and Lloyd a crooked smile. “Besides, you guys didn’t come out to the fair on this hot and dusty day to lecture little old me on the safety of pregnant-lady barrel racing.”
“How’d you ever get so smart, Seneca Berringer?”
“I had a good math teacher, and it’s Webb now.” She bent down and picked up her curry brush. On the way back up, she drew in a sharp breath. Her hand went to her abdomen.
“Oh, my God!” Lloyd panic-danced around the girl.
“Gotcha.” Seneca threw back her head and laughed.
Bonnie wanted to slap her former student. “You’re a sick young puppy, my dear.”
Seneca wiped a tear from her eye. “I’m sorry, Mister Whittaker. I couldn’t resist. I promise I’ll be good now. What can I do you guys for?”
Bonnie waited until she was sure her anger wouldn’t show up in her voice. “I need to talk to you about Leo.”
The smile ran from Seneca’s face. Her cheeks flushed. “I’d rather not.” She took a shuddering deep breath.
Bonnie reached out and clutched her arm. “I know this is hard.”
Seneca regarded Bonnie’s hand as if she
were deciding whether or not to knock it away. Her eyes grew flinty.
“I need to ask you a question or two.” Bonnie pulled her hand away. “It’s important.”
Seneca started in again to curry her horse—short, rough strokes. Without looking at Bonnie, she said, “Ask away.”
The stall felt as if the temperature had dropped ten degrees. Just get on with it, Pinkwater. “The night Leo died, he had my phone number in his pocket.”
Seneca’s arm halted in midstroke. She turned to stare at Bonnie. “You don’t say?”
No, I’m just making this crap up. She recognized the sarcasm as a bit of residual anger left over from Seneca’s “gotcha.” “I was hoping you could shed some light on why he might have wanted to get a hold of me. When was the last time you saw Leo?”
The young woman chewed on her lower lip. “Two days before he died. We went out for coffee.”
“So you two were still close. How did he seem to you?”
“Way down.” Seneca resumed her brushing, timing her words to the strokes. “You know he wanted to see Rattlesnake, and the old man was still stonewalling him?”
Bonnie decided not to tell the girl she learned that bit of info from the Rattlesnake himself. What would be the point? “And did Leo mention what he wanted to talk to Alf about?”
Seneca gave Bonnie a long stare. “Isn’t reconciliation with his dad enough?”
Don’t try to dazzle me with self-righteous bullshit, girl. “I suppose it is, but you’re dodging the question, sweetie. Did Leo tell you what he wanted to talk to his dad about?”
Seneca looked away. When her gaze returned to Bonnie, the girl’s cheeks were even more flushed than before. “I promised I wouldn’t tell.”
Bonnie glanced at Lloyd. His sympathetic expression made her cringe inwardly, and for a heated moment, she wished she didn’t have her principal in tow. This good man’s first compulsion would be to honor the girl’s desire to keep faith with her dead friend’s wishes. That compulsion was about to get in the way of what Bonnie believed she had to do.
“It’s a little late for that now, isn’t it?” Bonnie asked.
Lloyd touched Bonnie’s arm. “Bon?”
“Not now, Lloyd.” She gave him another glance, hoping he could see she needed him to trust her for the next few minutes and above all not to interfere.
He nodded.
Bless you.
She turned back to Seneca. “Leo’s dead, honey. Someone tied him to a barbed-wire fence and put three bullets in his chest. Whoever did this stole Leo from the both of us.”
The girl’s entire face seemed to collapse. Angry tears welled in her eyes. “You think I don’t know that? But what difference does it make what he was going to talk to Rattlesnake about?”
“Maybe none. We’ll never know unless you tell us.”
Seneca glared at Bonnie skeptically. “People could get real hurt.”
Bonnie recognized the time had come to remain silent. Nothing would be gained by further pushing the young woman. Seneca would either tell all, or she wouldn’t. Bonnie hoped her face conveyed the right mixture of empathy and trustworthiness.
“I haven’t told this to anyone, not even Caleb.” Seneca looked from Bonnie to Lloyd, and finally back to Bonnie. “And it definitely goes no farther than this stall.”
“Count on it, honey.”
Lloyd grunted his agreement.
Seneca nodded in resignation. “All right. How much do you know about Leo’s decision to give that speech at graduation?”
“Just what he told me. He couldn’t live the lie any longer.”
The young woman noticeably grimaced. “Oh, yeah, the lie. I know something about that. I was a big part of that lie.” Seneca made the pronouncement like each word burnt her tongue.
When Bonnie reached out to comfort her, Seneca raised her hands and stepped back. “Don’t.”
You deserved that, Pinkwater. Open up old wounds, and you’re going to get some blood on your petticoat. Just shut your mouth and let the girl say her piece.
Seneca released a lungful of air. “Did he tell you he expected someone else to join him in coming out?”
When Bonnie hesitated, Seneca snorted. “I’ll take that for a no. Come on, Missus P. Don’t look so surprised. How does your generation put it—it takes two to tango?”
Bonnie felt like she was witnessing a car wreck. She was ashamed of herself, but she couldn’t look away or, in this case, stop listening. “But you know, don’t you?”
“I’ve known all along. Kept Leo’s—both of their—secrets for all these years. But two nights before his death, Leo told me he’d made a decision.”
“He planned to tell his father who his lover had been?” Bonnie asked.
Seneca nodded. “Jason Dobbs.”
CHAPTER 10
BONNIE SURPRISED HERSELF WITH HOW LITTLE THE news shocked her. In retrospect, she remembered how close the two boys had been. Or are you just painting a new color on two good friends because it fits?
“And Leo planned to tell his father? Why now? Why after all these years?”
Seneca fixed Bonnie with a wary stare. Evidently, the girl didn’t entirely trust her old teacher. “He felt betrayed. He’d waited around East Plains for three years, hoping Jason would change his mind.”
Bonnie nodded, seeing where this story was heading. “But Jason had chosen his father’s path, had chosen God.”
“Leo had long suspected he was just fooling himself.”
“So what changed?”
“About two months ago Jason put everything to rest, told Leo in no uncertain terms he had no intention of starting back up with him. Leo was devastated.”
Bonnie’s heart broke for her former student. It was one level of heartache to fan a dying spark of hope, but a deeper pain when that spark was extinguished, especially by someone you loved.
A random memory ran full-blown across Bonnie’s synapses—Jason Dobbs with a fat lip after going a few rounds with his father. “Did Harold Dobbs know about Jason’s …”
“Preferences? Damn straight, he did. A month before graduation, Pastor Dobbs arranged an”—Seneca made quotation marks with her fingers—“intervention. A cabin up in the mountains. Brought in some folks who specialize in crap like that. I don’t think he ever told his congregation the truth.”
“The intervention must have worked. Jason didn’t come out with Leo.”
“Worked well enough, although Jason kept Leo hanging on with vague promises that he was still making up his mind.”
“Sounds like you’re pretty angry with Jason Dobbs?”
Seneca shrugged, then shook her head. “I was for the longest time, but I got over it. Shoot, Caleb and I are members of the Tabernacle, part of Jason’s young marrieds group. Pastor Dobbs is our counselor.”
Bonnie felt a tug urging her to ask how the counseling was going, but she needed to keep focused. “Something still bothers me. If Leo was putting the Jason Dobbs’s portion of his life behind him, why tell Rattlesnake? Leo sure wasn’t likely to get much sympathy in that quarter.”
The girl shrugged again. “Good question. You’re going to need to ask the old man himself.”
What went unsaid and hung heavy in the air was that there was no asking Leo, now that someone had silenced him forever.
Think about that later, Pinkwater. “Have you talked to Alf lately?”
From the look on Seneca’s face, she was growing tired of answering questions. Or maybe just tired in general.
“Yesterday. I drove out to the range with Caleb so he could practice with his shotgun and rifle.” She held an imaginary rifle to her shoulder. “Hunting season’s coming in a few months.”
“How did Alf seem to you?”
“Come on, Missus P. You know as well as I do, Alf’s pretty screwed up behind Leo’s death. It’s understandable. He wasn’t speaking to his son. Now that son is dead, murdered, probably for the same reason Alf wasn’t speaking to him.” Seneca tossed the
curry brush onto a pile of straw.
“Are we done with the inquisition?” The girl swiped angrily at her eyes and looked away.
“I’m sorry, sweetie.”
When Seneca looked back, her eyes sparkled with new tears. “No, I’m sorry. I shouldn’t take it out on you. It’s just that I miss that gay son of a bitch so Goddamn much.”
Bonnie felt like a heel, but it couldn’t be helped. “Can you handle one more question?”
Seneca chuckled. “You don’t give up, do you?”
“I guess not.”
“What do you want to know?”
Bonnie took a deep breath. “What was Leo doing out on Squirrel Creek Road the night he died?”
“That’s where they found Leo, wasn’t it? I’m sorry. I can’t help you with that one, either.” Seneca’s eyes went wide, and an anemic whimper escaped her lips. As before, she clutched her abdomen. Only this time, she fell to her knees.
Bonnie hesitated a moment. Fool me once, shame on me.
Immediately, she realized the girl wasn’t faking. A heartbeat later, Bonnie, too, was on her knees cradling the young woman in her arms. Blood was seeping into Seneca’s too-tight blue jeans.
“What the hell is going on here?” a deep voice from the doorway demanded.
“Caleb!” Seneca screamed.
Bonnie couldn’t turn, but the sound of clomping boots brought Caleb Webb into sight. A tight-muscled young man in a cowboy hat, white T-shirt, blue jeans, and an immense black handlebar mustache, he squeezed in beside Bonnie.
“Just happened a minute ago.” She handed Seneca off to her husband, who scooped her into his arms and stood.
“The baby!” Bonnie felt like an idiot mentioning the obvious. “We need to get her to a hospital.”
Caleb Webb—his young wife moaning and slumped against his shoulder—ran from the stall.
Lloyd and Bonnie sat on the running board of the lone East Plains fire engine. Caleb had decided to rush Seneca to East Plains’ volunteer fire station rather than drive the thirty-five minutes into Colorado Springs.
Neither Bonnie nor Lloyd had spoken since arriving. She glanced across the station wishing there was something she could do.
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