Death Rides Again (A Jocelyn Shore Mystery)

by Hamrick, Janice

  “Someone’s coming!” I shouted instead.

  Her head snapped up, blue eyes wide. “Who?”

  “Who cares? We’ve got to get out of here!”

  I manhandled T.J. into a sitting position and gripped him under the arms. I felt a gush of warmth flow over my wrist. T.J. emitted a wheezing gasp.

  “Help me,” I ordered.

  “I say we leave him,” she said, although she gamely seized his boots.

  I heaved with all my might and together we managed to lift him about six inches before dropping him.

  With a small moan, T.J. passed out, which was probably for the best. I gripped his jacket and started dragging him from the stall. I managed to move him about a foot before my fingers slipped and his unconscious head bounced into the dirt again.

  “I’m serious,” said Kyla, straightening. “We should leave him and get the hell out of here.”

  “They’ll kill him,” I protested.

  “They’ll kill all of us if we don’t get out of here.”

  I hesitated. The sound of the engine was closer, and she was right. The smart thing was to leave T.J. and hope whoever arrived would be more interested in pursuing us than in finishing the job their colleagues had begun.

  I couldn’t do it. I gripped his coat and heaved again.

  Kyla slipped an arm under T.J.’s thighs and put her back into it. Together, we somehow hauled his limp form up onto the tailgate, and then with a superhuman effort rolled him in. I slammed the tailgate shut.

  “Get in,” I told her.

  We scrambled into the truck with the grace and speed of crazed squirrels. I started the engine and ground the gears into reverse.

  “Find your phone!” I shouted to her, but she was ahead of me. Kneeling on the seat, she had already retrieved her purse from the back floor where T.J. had thrown it and was digging inside. She removed her hand triumphantly, and from the corner of my eye, I saw she now held her little Glock 19.

  I squeaked with outrage. “Your phone! Not your gun! We don’t want to be in a shootout, we want help! And buckle up!”

  With a glare, she flopped into her seat and clicked her seatbelt, then began digging in her purse again, but I couldn’t wait. I hit the accelerator and the black truck shot backward, its tailgate missing my Civic by less than six inches as I spun the steering wheel. I heard a dull thump from the bed of the pickup and guiltily pictured T.J.’s body sliding backward against the cab. As the truck came around, I saw a dark green vehicle approaching fast, caliche dust streaming behind it like a plume of smoke, and recklessly swung directly into its path. For one awful instant, I braced myself for the crash, then the other driver swerved just in time, careening off the road and down into a steep draw. As the green car plunged downward, a massive tawny body sprang heavenward, soaring up and over the hood of the vehicle just in time. And then we were clear, and I was stamping the accelerator to the floor, fishtailing down the road.

  Kyla twisted in her seat to stare out the back window.

  I wanted to scream at her, and so I did, “What the hell are you doing? Get your phone!”

  “I’m trying to see if the lion is going to eat Monkey Boy,” she said.

  I navigated a sharp bend in the road, the truck sliding on the gravel. I’d never driven so fast or so recklessly in my life. Plus, her words made no absolutely no sense. “What?”

  “You should slow down before you kill us,” she said calmly, turning to face forward again. “And, it’s up to you, of course, but you might want to go back and see if your boyfriend needs any help with that lion.”

  “What the hell are you talking about?”

  “That was Colin in that Jeep. You remember Colin? About six feet tall, dark hair, broken tooth. Crazy about you, no one knows why.”

  I took my foot off the accelerator and the black truck slowed.

  Ahead of us, I could see flashing lights and hear the wail of a siren as a sheriff’s truck approached. I pulled to the side of the road.

  Sheriff Bob slowed as he passed, rolling down his window to say something. He took one startled look at me, but I just pointed the way we had come, and he closed his mouth and drove on.

  I kept my hands on the steering wheel because I’d started to shake and gripping it helped me concentrate on not throwing up. I knew I should turn the truck around and go back, but I just sat where I was.

  “I’m an idiot,” I said at last.

  Kyla grinned at me. “I’ve been telling you that for years.”

  Chapter 10

  DEATH AND DECISION

  I could have sat there forever, but fortunately for T.J., I finally remembered he was still bleeding in the back of the truck. Kyla called 911 as I drove toward town, and an EMT team met us beside the gasoline pumps at Jo Jo’s Fill ’R Up & Kolache Emporium, transferring our unconscious kidnapper to a gurney and into an ambulance. Then, not quite knowing what else to do, we washed the blood from our hands in Jo Jo’s restroom and returned to T.J.’s barn.

  When we arrived, two more police trucks were on the scene and a tow truck was pulling Colin’s Jeep from the draw. A deputy with a gun held up a hand and tried to talk us into turning around when Colin came out of the barn and waved us through.

  I’ve never been so glad to see anyone. His jacket was draped over one shoulder because of the cast on his arm, his dark hair tousled by the wind, a bandage on one cheek only half concealing a bruise, and I thought no one had ever looked so good.

  I stopped the truck in the grass beside the barn and ran to him, throwing myself into his arms. I heard him suppress a small gasp of pain and tried to release him, but his arms tightened around me and pulled me close. He kissed me, gently at first then with growing passion, holding me hard, one hand sliding up into my hair to cradle the back of my neck, the other an iron band in the small of my back. Far too soon, he lifted his head and pressed his cheek into my hair, just holding me, and I thought I felt him tremble.

  “I thought you were…,” he started, but his voice broke and he didn’t finish.

  “Me, too,” I admitted. “It was bad.”

  I squeezed him again, felt him wince. “Sorry,” I whispered.

  “Doesn’t hurt,” he lied, squeezing back.

  I suddenly remembered that I’d last seen him in the hospital being wheeled away for tests. “What about the internal bleeding?” I demanded.

  “No bleeding. I have a clean bill of health. They were about to release me anyway. Your not coming back when you said you would just speeded up the process a bit.”

  I frowned at this, not convinced he should be out of bed, much less walking around a crime scene. “So, basically you released yourself and came looking for us? And how did you find us?”

  “You can thank Sheriff Matthews for that. When I told him you were missing, he called in favors and got a trace where your phone signal had last been picked up. Then he figured out the closest property with roads and outbuildings. There were two candidates—he took one and I took the other. Luckily, I picked the right one.”

  “Yeah, thank goodness,” I breathed, then remembered something else and winced. “By the way, sorry about running you off the road.”

  “Ah, yes.” He did lift his head at that and looked at me with twitching lips. “Well, you were in a hurry.”

  Kyla joined us then.

  “Damn straight,” she said. “We thought you were more of that Lost Zulu gang coming to kill us.”

  Colin’s eyebrows almost met his hairline.

  “Los Zetas,” I corrected, earning a look of comprehension from Colin and withering scorn from Kyla.

  “Whatever,” she said. “We were tired of having guns pointed at us.”

  “So after you ran me into a ditch—a ditch containing a lion, by the way, which is another subject I’d like to discuss—you had a sudden uncontrollable urge to drive into town? You were gone half an hour.”

  “That’s not fair,” protested Kyla. “We didn’t know it was you until it was too late,
and we had to get T.J. to the hospital.”

  I nodded vehemently. After all, both those things were technically true and sounded much better than “We completely panicked and forgot we had T.J. in the back.”

  Colin frowned. “T.J. was here? And why did you take him to the hospital? What’s wrong with him?”

  “The Zulus shot him,” said Kyla. “I don’t think he’s going to make it. And serves him right if he doesn’t, the bastard.”

  He took a second to process what she’d said, then abruptly released me and shouted for Sheriff Bob. I couldn’t swear to it, but I thought his eye might have been twitching. After that, things started moving very fast. Sheriff Bob, once he understood what we were saying, sent Colin and a deputy to the hospital to check on T.J., then he drove Kyla and me to the police station on the town square. As we passed the hanging tree, I noticed the decorations had finally been completed and an entire herd of electric reindeer were busy raising and lowering their mechanical heads in time to a tinny rendition of “Winter Wonderland” blaring from a hidden speaker in Santa’s sleigh. In Sand Creek at least, Thanksgiving was officially over.

  Under the glow of fluorescent lights in his office at the police station, Sheriff Bob looked old and tired. He looked worse by the time we were finished, and we didn’t look much better. Over the course of the next few hours, Kyla and I had to explain what had happened to us about six hundred times, Bob asking one annoying question after another, scratching notes on a yellow tablet with one hand and drinking truly terrible coffee from the other. I’d taken one sip myself from the Styrofoam cup he’d given me and set it down in a hurry. He offered nothing else, and I was sorry we hadn’t stopped for kolaches when we had the chance.

  At last Kyla exploded. “Look, we’re the victims here. We were assaulted and kidnapped, and now you’re practically water-boarding us. I’m tired, I’m starving, and I want to go home.”

  She rose and glared at him, as though daring him to stop us. I rose, too. I felt exhausted.

  Sheriff Bob looked as though he wanted to object, but finally shrugged his shoulders. “I guess that’s enough for today. But I still don’t understand why…”

  Kyla cut him off. “Anything you don’t understand, you can bet we don’t either. Why don’t you ask T.J.? If he’s still alive, that is.”

  “Is he still alive?” I asked.

  “Last I heard,” said Bob, running a hand over his white mustache as though stroking the ears of a tired and none-too-clean hunting dog.

  “Well, ask him then. Now we’re leaving.”

  Kyla stormed out. I remained where I was a moment longer, eyes narrowed, fixing Bob with my best teacher stare. “You’re going to release my uncle now, right?”

  He sighed. “Already done.”

  * * *

  We spent the rest of the afternoon with our relatives, and their questions made Sheriff Bob’s interrogation skills look amateurish and pathetic by comparison. Fortunately, however, they very seldom waited for a response and filled in details themselves with endless speculation, theories, and innuendo.

  Aunt Gladys shook her head. “Baby doll, you were lucky to get out of there alive. He was going to sell you, that’s what he was going to do. Sell you for you know what.”

  All the younger cousins looked as us with wide eyes, pretty sure they knew what “you know what” was, but not entirely positive.

  “He was not going to sell us, Aunt Gladys,” I said shortly.

  “Oh, I don’t know,” said Kyla, taking a sip of an oversize vodka martini. “What do you think we’d go for on the open market? I’d be worth more than you, of course, but even you’d probably bring in a pretty decent price.”

  “I seem to recall someone once offering five hundred camels for you,” I said slyly, thinking of our trip to Egypt.

  “A thousand,” she retorted. “It was a thousand camels.”

  My brothers Will and Sam, and Sam’s wife, Christy, left shortly after that.

  “Gotta hit the road if we’re going to make Austin before it gets dark,” said Sam. “We’ll have a nice dinner, an early night, then catch the six thirty flight to San Diego.”

  Christy gave Kyla a hug, while Sam patted my shoulder awkwardly. “Glad you two are okay,” he said. “I call you next week for a real update,” he added with a wink.

  “Me, too,” said Will. “I want to hear all about your narrow escape from slavery.”

  I helped haul their luggage to their rental car. “I feel like I didn’t get to see you at all,” I complained.

  Sam said, “If you promise no more murders, kidnappings, and food on a stick, we’ll be back at Christmas.”

  “You know I can’t promise there won’t be food on a stick,” I returned coldly.

  “I can promise,” said Kyla. “Better than that, I can promise there will be beer and barbecue. You all have a safe flight.”

  Kyla and I watched their car rumble up the hill, then returned to the house. Beside the fire, Elaine and Kel sat together on one of the sofas, both looking a little dazed, while next to them in a leather recliner, Uncle Herman sipped on an enormous tumbler of scotch and smacked his lips with satisfaction.

  “It’s the best news we’ve ever had,” Herman proclaimed, glasses glinting in the firelight. “That sumbitch Knoller admitted his own partner shot his jockey. They’ll give us the prize money now. Two hundred thousand dollars.” He rolled the words around on his tongue as though they tasted sweet. “That’s enough to fix what ails you, eh, Kel?”

  “If they give it to us,” Kel answered cautiously. “But even if they don’t, the lawsuit will be dropped. We’ll be fine.” He squeezed Elaine’s hand.

  She squeezed back, then looked across the room to the corner where Ruby June was talking with Kris. The two had their heads together and looked like the pair of teenagers they still were.

  “It’s been a terrible thing, but Ruby’s back and the girls are safe. That’s what matters.” She smiled at Kyla and me, and if the smile did not quite reach her eyes, I could hardly blame her. I had my own thoughts about Ruby June and Kris.

  Might as well get it over with, I thought, rising.

  “Ruby June, want to help me in the kitchen a sec?” I asked in that special teacher tone that so clearly indicated it was an order, not a request.

  She obediently rose. I felt Kris’s kohl-encircled eyes following us with suspicion and mild alarm.

  In the kitchen, I closed the door behind us. Ruby June looked at me with studied nonchalance, the half smile on her face attempting to give the impression that she was just waiting to be of service.

  “So, are you using?” I asked her bluntly.

  She blinked, a moment of genuine surprise, quickly replaced with calculated evasiveness. I suspected the only real surprise was that I had asked the question.

  “I don’t know what you mean,” she said with an air of offended virtue.

  “You do.”

  Her eyes narrowed, and I could practically see the hamster wheel she called a brain beginning to turn. I quickly held up a hand.

  “Don’t bother. Let me tell you what I think instead. I think that you were Eddy’s partner in most, if not all, of his dealings with Carl Cress—especially the drugs. I saw Eddy selling under the bleachers at the rodeo, and I’m guessing the two of you were the main source for all of your buddies at Sand Creek High School. After all, you both graduated only a year ago, and I’m sure you still have friends there. And I’m sure those friends have friends. Probably a pretty good business for the two of you, even with the cut that Carl took.”

  While I talked, Ruby June reddened, then grew pale, and finally settled down into a sullen defiance.

  “You don’t know anything,” she said.

  “So you won’t mind if I send Sheriff Bob over to your house to take a look around.”

  She swallowed hard. “It’s just weed.”

  “It’s just accessory to murder after the fact,” I said coldly. This sounded quite official. I was pr
etty sure I’d heard it on a cop show, which must make it a real thing.

  “What do you mean?” she squeaked. “I didn’t…”

  “I’m embarrassed by how long it took me to figure it out,” I said. “But let’s be fair—the timing threw me. After all, we thought you’d vanished before Eddy’s murder. But you were just getting ready to leave town, weren’t you? Probably visiting friends, maybe trying to make a few final sales to get some cash? Then, you found out that Carl had killed Eddy, and you were afraid you were next. And instead of going to the police, you hid at T.J.’s.”

  She sat down abruptly on a kitchen chair in a posture that reminded me strongly of the way she’d huddled at this same table while her father threatened her husband. Not a fighter, I thought.

  “He woulda killed me if he found me,” she said in a low voice. “What would you have done?”

  “Call the police! You knew he was a killer, and you knew he was going to come after you.”

  “Like Sheriff Bob could have done anything!” she said scornfully. “He would just have arrested me for the drugs.”

  “If you’d gone to the police, Carl wouldn’t have had a chance to shoot Travis Arledge, who’s going to make it by the way. And Carl would still be alive himself. In jail, true, but alive.”

  “Now why would I want Carl Cress alive?” she asked. “You have no idea what he was like. I guess I’m sorry about the jockey, but that was not my fault. What the hell do you want me to do about it all? Are you going to turn me in?”

  This was the real question. With Eddy and Carl both dead, unless I said anything, I doubted very much if Sheriff Bob would pursue drug charges against a nineteen-year-old widow even if he suspected her involvement. He had enough on his hands with the Los Zetas.

  “No,” I said at last. “I won’t turn you in … on one condition. No more drugs. Not even ‘just weed.’ And if I hear you’ve been giving or selling to anyone in our family, I will not only tell the police, I’ll tell your parents. And you can bet I’m going to be saying a word in Aunt Gladys’s ear to keep an eye on Kris. I know the two of you have been smoking.”