Double Exposure: Kovak & Quaid Horse Mystery Series (Kovak & Quaid Horse Mysteries Book 1)

by Toni Leland

  Kim closed the phone and looked out the window again. The scene hadn’t changed, but her spirits had. A few days of nothing but free time would be good for her head. And if she knew anything about herself, her brain would offer some revelations at the end of her time off.

  Chapter 28 ~ Texas

  Quaid’s flight to Amarillo took almost two hours, during which time he tried to figure out what might have been going on at the equestrian center. Kovak thought the dark horse in Jasper’s stalls might be that trainer’s horse, but they had no way to prove it. Most of these horses looked alike to Quaid. Big, brown or bay. Put them all together in a show setting and he’d be hard pressed to identify one from the other. Not like the horses he’d become used to.

  The memories flooded in and his chest tightened. Memories of gentle black giants with hearts of gold. God help anyone who so much as said a sharp word to one of them, let alone abuse them the way he’d seen some performance horses treated.

  He leaned his head back and closed his eyes. He’d had enough of this case, though it was far from solved. In just a few days, he’d leave it all and take Ricky to visit a world left behind, a world filled with pain, but also with honor.

  A blast of brutally hot air hit Quaid as he left the Amarillo terminal and, by the time he reached the rental vehicle, his shirt was stuck to his armpits. He tossed his bags into the back seat and started the AC, turning it up as high as it would go. Ohio was hot in the summer, but this was ridiculous. A few minutes later, he relaxed back in the seat, cooler and less cranky. As he drove away from the airport, he scanned the surrounding area. The brilliant blue sky stretched as far as he could see. Flatter than flat in every direction, yet Amarillo was well over 3,000 feet above sea level. If he had time, he’d visit the Palo Duro Canyon. He’d read that it was the second largest canyon in the United States, but he’d never even heard of it.

  Horse Heaven Ranch was nothing much to look at, but it had a huge parking area and two long barns with outside doors and individual turnouts. Quaid pulled up next to the door marked “office” and climbed out of the car. Horses occupied some of the turnout pens, but most were empty. He saw no houses or buildings anywhere nearby, and the road he’d just driven stretched in a straight line both directions. The isolation made his skin crawl.

  A skinny guy wearing a stained cowboy hat looked up. “Ken I he’p ya?”

  “I hope so. I’m doing some research on equine travel facilities in the U.S. and thought I’d stop by and see yours, since it’s listed so prominently in the directories.”

  The man grinned, revealing a missing tooth. “Yep, we do a big business. Folks gotta have a break on a long haul, and the horses do too.”

  Quaid pulled out his notebook, pretending great interest. “So, how many customers do you get in a week?”

  “Oh, ’bout thirty to thirty-five. Mostly folks hauling to big shows in Tulsa or Houston.”

  Quaid wrote and nodded. “What about professional horse haulers? Many of those?”

  “Not too many. They usually plan their trips to avoid any delays.” He chuckled. “’Course if’n they get tangled up in one of our famous surprise storms, they got no choice. C’mon, I’ll show you the layout.”

  Quaid followed him out the door and around the corner of the building to large double sliding doors that opened onto a long packed clay aisle. Stalls lined both sides. The place was clean and bright, illuminated by a row of narrow windows just below the roof line.

  Quaid gestured toward the door they’d just entered. “Is that where horses are unloaded?”

  “Yep, there’s another entrance at the back, but the big rigs can’t get in there, so we just use it for the small trailers.”

  “You have many helpers here?”

  “About five full-time people, and a couple on-call stall cleaners so we can have a break once in awhile.”

  “Do you man the place at night?”

  “Nah, I’m too old for that anymore. I got young bucks to do it.”

  Quaid wrote it all down, even though he was forming a picture in his mind of what might have happened when Butch arrived.

  “You know, it would give my article some special interest if I could interview one or two of your staff. Is that possible?”

  The guy shook his head. “I gave everyone the day off to go to Fourth of July stuff, but a couple of my regulars will be back this evening. You wanna come then?”

  Quaid nodded. “I can do that.”

  He tried to imagine the scenario of Butch wrestling a temperamental horse into the barn, and needing some help. With an overnight stay and a sedated horse, the switch would have been easy. But then what? Where had Talisman gone from there?

  An idea popped into his head. “Say, you happen to know if there are any horse auctions around here?”

  “Closest one is Stephenville, but most of ’em are farther south, closer to the border.”

  Quaid cocked his head. “Why’s that?”

  The man’s expression darkened. “The slaughterhouses are in Mexico.” He pushed his hat back. “You want me to tell my people you’ll be here?”

  Quaid nodded enthusiastically. “Yes, please. I’ll see you around six.”

  He hurried to his car, his brain spinning. If the layover ranch was used for switching horses, then it was possible that the valuable horses were being transported into Mexico as “auction horses” to meet up with buyers. Could horses be trucked across the border without any need for veterinarian reports, quarantine, shot records, or registration papers? Another piece of information he’d need to dig up.

  After checking his flight time for the next day, Quaid found a motel, then headed south to see the canyon. A little R&R would be a good thing right now. This case was really beginning to get to him.

  ~~

  Kim woke up slowly. A rough tongue rasped across her chin and she giggled, pulling Miss Kitty close and pressing her cheek against the soft fur. An enticing aroma caught her attention and she blinked. Coffee? Throwing the covers aside, she slipped out of bed and padded down the hall toward the kitchen. The coffee maker hissed and blew out a final puff of steam, then gurgled as the brew finished filling the carafe. A white bakery bag sat on the counter with an orange sticky note attached.

  Welcome home. Call me when you’re conscious. Love, Dixie.

  Kim smiled. How could anyone have a better friend?

  She peeked inside the bag and inhaled the scent of fresh banana nut muffins.

  Settling into her favorite chair on the deck, she sighed. The parking areas were mostly empty, as they always were on a holiday. In the distance, fireworks popped and crackled, reminding her of the celebrations she’d enjoyed as a child in Marietta. Not just Independence Day, but others, including the fabulous Sternwheeler Festival in the fall. She hadn’t been back for that event in over twenty years. It was definitely time to return to her roots. How did time just disappear, leaving gaps that seemed insurmountable? Why did we always think things would remain the same forever? Was she in for a sad disappointment on this upcoming visit to Grandpa’s farm? She swallowed a lump forming in her throat. She simply couldn’t stand it if the place was gone, or abandoned to time, or worse. The only way to avoid that would be not to go, but that was ridiculous. If she was going to change her life, as she’d promised herself on the trip to California, she’d need to face some demons and put them in jail forever.

  Peter’s face popped into her mind and she sucked in a breath. Was the history with him part of the new purge too? She’d vowed she would never let anyone hurt her that way again and, so far, she’d been able to stay disentangled. There’d been a few casual relationships along the way and a couple of outright rolls in the hay just for fun, but always that wariness that kept Kim in control. Men seemed attracted to her, but usually put off by her independent attitude. Most of them didn’t even know she was an ex-cop, they just sensed that she wasn’t someone to screw around with.

  The sound of her cell phone drifted through the screen
door and, leaving the worries and what-if’s behind, Kim hurried inside to get on with the day.

  ~~

  Quaid swung by Jenna’s house on the way home from the airport. Her car was in the driveway and Ricky’s bike lay on its side by the front door. Quaid grinned, remembering how much he’d wanted a bicycle as a boy. Rancher’s kids had horses instead of bikes and, even if he’d owned one, there were few places to ride it. The dusty road that ran alongside the property was riddled with potholes and bumps, obstacles easily maneuvered on horseback, but they’d have been a bitch to dodge on a bike.

  He gazed at the house, remembering that Jenna would move and he’d no longer have the luxury of dropping by. A privilege he’d already squandered for years.

  Ricky appeared at the door and waved, a wide smile brightening his round face. Quaid’s chest tightened. Jenna might not realize it, but her brother-in-law wasn’t the only one who looked like Ben.

  “Uncle Garrett! I bought you a present!”

  “Well, aren’t you good. I bought you something too.” He held out a package wrapped in brown paper and tied with twine. “I wish you’d been with me. I visited the second largest canyon in the United States. It was awesome.”

  Ricky grinned. “Well, guess what I got to do? They let me sit in the pilot’s seat of a Nighthawk stealth fighter!”

  “Whoa, that’s pretty neat. Do you know how important those planes were in the Desert Storm operation?”

  Ricky nodded vigorously. “They were able to fly over Iraq and not be seen. There was a video about them. I watched it twice.”

  Quaid gazed at his nephew, seeing the future. With a hero father, the boy would be driven to follow in those honored footsteps. Quaid’s chest burned with both pain and pride.

  “Well, open your present, for Pete’s sake!”

  Ricky tore off the wrappings and crowed with glee. “Wow! A geode!”

  The craggy quartz crystals in the hollow center of the rock glittered like diamonds, and Ricky’s eyes sparkled almost as much.

  Jenna appeared and Quaid noticed immediately that her features seemed more relaxed than he’d seen in a long time.

  She patted Ricky’s shoulder. “We had a great time. Looks like you did some sight-seeing too.”

  “Yeah, time to kill, but it turned out to be a welcome respite.”

  Ricky set the geode down and headed for the hall. “Wait here, I’ll be right back.”

  Quaid shifted his weight, not wanting to ask the question, but needing to know the answer. “Are you definitely going to move to Dayton?”

  Jenna looked briefly sad, but nodded. “Yes, I don’t see any other way. I already have a lead on a job and some housing is opening up next month.” She touched his arm. “It’s only a couple hours’ drive. We’ll still see you, at least as much as we always have.”

  “Aw, Jenna, that’s mean. I know I’ve been missing in action a lot, but that’s going to change. I owe it to you and Ricky and my brother.”

  Ricky bounded back into the room and held out a small paper bag. Quaid carefully unrolled the top and reached into the depths, his fingers closing around a flat, square object. A hand-painted wooden plaque showed a soldier on a horse in front of an American flag. The words “Warhorse Soldiers, 1st Cavalry Division” were printed below the image.

  Quaid’s voice cracked. “Rick, it’s beautiful. I’ll keep this right on my desk where I can look at it every day.”

  The boy’s voice was soft, almost a whisper. “Yeah, we can’t ever forget Dad.”

  On his way home later, Quaid reflected on the time he’d just spent with what was left of his family. Jenna would be moving on, getting her life back together, maybe finding love again. Ricky, on the other hand, was clearly having trouble with leaving the past behind. He’s afraid he will forget Ben, afraid of losing that connection.

  Could Quaid replace that male presence in the boy’s life? Gripping the steering wheel, he clenched his jaw. Not from Cleveland, he couldn’t.

  Chapter 29

  After a much-needed shower, Quaid grabbed a soda from the fridge and headed for his small office. He connected his laptop to his main computer and began backing up files. As the transfer progressed, he thought about his meeting with the barn staff at Horse Heaven. The two women who worked at the place full time had been less than helpful, almost to the point of being rude. They’d acted like he was imposing on their time with his questions. One of them had seemed quite nervous about the interview, and he wondered if she might be mixed up in what he suspected was happening to horses in that part of the state. It would only take one cooperative insider at the layover ranch to make the auction-house-to-Mexico theory viable.

  The computer signaled the completed file transfer, and he opened the search database he’d been using to locate Teri Fortune’s brother. Quaid’s brain was stuck on the where, how, and when of Talisman’s situation. How could someone have planned to switch those horses out there in the middle of nowhere, without even knowing for sure that the trucker would stop at the layover ranch? Quaid was positive that Butch had no hand in the plot, but in order for the switch to work, whoever it was would have to know where Talisman was at any given time.

  Jasper Martin could have implanted a tracking device in Talisman before he was loaded on the trailer. If that were true, then Jasper was purposely trying to defraud the insurance company. But suppose Jasper hadn’t been involved...suppose someone had targeted Talisman and had their own way of knowing his whereabouts.

  Quaid quickly pulled up another file marked “Paid Claims.” As he scanned the documents, anger rose in his chest. In each case where United Equine Assurance had paid claims for stolen horses, those animals had been at a horse show. Could he prove that the same people were perpetrating these crimes?

  ~~

  Dixie called Kim that night. “What time do you want to leave tomorrow?”

  “How about seven-thirty?”

  “Works for me. So, how did your show and everything go?”

  “Show went okay, the rest of the stuff not so good.”

  “What rest of the stuff?”

  “You remember that horse in Delaware that was switched out? The owner lives near Burbank where I was this weekend, so I did a little snooping.”

  “Kim—”

  “No, hear me out. I didn’t get involved. Much. Here’s the interesting part. That private investigator, Garrett Quaid, was there trying to figure out if the horse owner is involved in an insurance scam.”

  A small pause, then Dixie said, “Huh, so that’s why I haven’t heard from him.”

  Kim’s irritation surprised her. “Were you expecting to?”

  Dixie didn’t respond.

  “Sorry, Dix, I didn’t mean to sound nasty. Anyway, we shared some information and the case is really bizarre. But I’m done with it.”

  “Why is that?”

  “I found out that Teri was murdered. She was dead before she was hanged. This is no longer a simple fraud or larceny, and I want no part of it.”

  As she spoke the words, Kim knew she lied, both to Dixie and to herself.

  “I think that’s a good thing.”

  Kim turned out the lights in the living room and kitchen, then moved to the deck slider. The sky to the west glowed with the lights of Columbus and, while she stood there, several displays of aerial fireworks lit up the night. She watched for a moment, then checked that the door was locked before heading down the hall.

  The two days she’d spent working with Quaid had been energizing, though they’d been fraught with tension and emotion. He was an interesting man, once she got past his macho personality—a mirror of her own, only more muscled. She liked the way he took a problem by the throat and worked it until he could understand what was involved. He smiled a lot, exuding self-confidence. That would be important in his line of work. Talking to strangers about sinister or illegal circumstances could be dangerous, but a sincere smile put most people at ease.

  It had certainly worked o
n her. Most of their tense conversations had ended amicably, except when she let her anger get the better of her. Even then, Quaid had been able to bring her around. The mob scene flashed into her thoughts and a tremor ran through her. Would she ever get over that fear? The moments that had robbed her of the two most important things in her life? She closed her eyes, reliving the experience of being drawn into Quaid’s arms and held away from the crowd, safe from the danger. The heat of his body, the thump of his heart, his soft and reassuring voice. Kim sank into the memory, wondering if those sensations would ever be hers again.

  Stepping into her studio, she gazed at the psychedelic patterns moving slowly across her computer screen, then she sat down to check her e-mail just one more time before going to bed. Nothing important, no orders, no complaints. She clicked on the news feed feature. Three stories popped up, but one caught her eye and she gasped.

  Teri Fortune’s burial would be the next day. Apparently, the brother had appeared to claim Teri’s body.

  Kim grabbed the phone.

  “Dixie, I’m really sorry. Can we go a little later in the day?”

  “Sure. I need to check in with my mother anyway before I leave. She’s not taking kindly to the new arrangements. I’ll talk to you when you get back.”

  Kim hung up and checked the obituary notice again. Quaid would be interested in this information. She glanced at the clock and decided she could at least leave a voice mail.

  He picked up on the first ring and Kim sucked in her breath at the sound of his voice.

  Don’t even go there, lady.

  ~~

  Quaid sat back in his chair. “Hey, you made it home. What’s up?”

  He listened to Kovak’s soft voice, noticing that it had a sultry edge to it. She seemed upset, so he derailed that thought-train and paid close attention.

  “Teri Fortune is being buried tomorrow. Apparently, that brother you’re looking for turned up to claim her body. Reginald, right?”

  “Yeah, one of about forty. That’s good news. Did the obituary give any details about him?”