by K. C. McRae
The sound of metal striking metal rang out from the front of the house.
Olivia whirled and ran, gun at the ready. Merry sprang after her, veering around the opposite side of the house, cutting to the right before she reached the front and angling behind the old garage.
Lotta was parked in the circular drive, the Lamentes’ rust-colored Ford pickup snugged up behind it. No other cars, but someone else had just slid into the equation.
As she reached the corner and prepared to dash across to the rear of the unused chicken coop, Merry heard running footsteps. She froze, watching. A figure, mere shadow, moved under the maple tree by the barn.
“Hey!” Olivia shouted from the direction of the house.
The shadow disappeared around the back of the barn. Olivia went after it.
Who else was here? Friend or foe?
Izzy whinnied from her stall. Fear stabbed through Merry all over again at the sound.
It began to rain, huge drops that raised puffs of dust as they cannonballed to the ground. She ran to the barn entrance, silent on the balls of her feet. It was pitch black inside, the smell of horse strong. Feeling her way along the stalls, she struggled to hear, but the rain on the roof drowned all other sound. As a child, the barn had been her favorite place during rainstorms; now the cacophony was a nuisance.
Or maybe not. If she couldn’t hear Olivia, Olivia couldn’t hear her either.
She touched the wood of the loft ladder. Her hand slipped as she swung up to the first rung, and a chunk of wood slid under the skin of her palm in the same place that she’d taken the splinter moving the wood at the Lamentes’ fire. It stung like a sonofabitch. Climb, she chanted to herself. Climb.
She ascended into a dark that was, if possible, even blacker.
Panic gripped her as she moved into the loft, her eyes wide open but completely blind. She closed them and concentrated on the throbbing furrow Olivia’s bullet had made in her arm.
No time for panic now. She was too close. The shotgun was right … over … here.
Her hand closed on the barrel, and she finger-walked along the crevice until she felt the box of shells. Pulling them and the gun out of their hiding place, she allowed herself a small feeling of satisfaction.
She set about loading the gun. The sound as she slid the antique pump action cracked through the loft, even with the drumming on the roof.
She fumbled a shell out of the box and dropped it. Felt around, but it had rolled beyond her reach. With care, she extracted another and, feeling to make sure the metal cap was on the right end, slotted it into the gun. She couldn’t remember how many shells the Remington would take. Three? Or would it take more? There wasn’t a plug in this old thing, but it had a relatively short barrel. Urgency made her impatient, and when it seemed full at three, she rose from her hunched position to her knees and ratcheted a shell into the chamber.
Armed and more than ready, Merry made her careful, crouching way back to the ladder. She reached the edge of the loft without incident and lay down with her head hanging over. The dim rain-soaked light from the square of open doorway looked like the entrance to nirvana after those long moments of blindness. Still, it didn’t illuminate any of the barn.
Olivia could be down there. Waiting for her.
A chance she’d have to take.
Climbing down the ladder took longer than going up, encumbered as she was by the twelve-gauge. The extra shells she’d slipped into her jeans pocket weighed against the fold of her hip. She lost count of the rungs, wasn’t positive how many there were anyway. She cursed herself. How many times had she climbed them? How many times had she looked at the ladder in passing? Maybe eight rungs. Maybe ten.
Her weak ankle gave out, and her foot slipped on the slick, well-worn wood. Pinwheeling, she fell backwards and hit the floor of the barn’s central aisle with a thump. Izzy snorted from her stall.
She’d only been a couple of rungs up, and while falling had twisted away so as not to stick her foot through and break her leg. The shotgun remained in her grasp.
Things could be worse. Get the hell up.
She rolled to her side, pushed herself to her knees, and stood. At least Olivia wasn’t in the barn; despite the drumming on the roof, she would have heard Merry’s fall and come at her.
Creeping to the door, she peered around the edge into the pouring night. The rain was letting up, but the wind whipped at the maple, filling the air with the subtle roar of wet, slapping leaves. If she were Olivia, where would she be waiting? Not inside—too easy for Merry to go cross-country. Someplace where she’d have a good view of the area around the ranch. There were no good options for that, and in this downpour seeing very far was moot. So she’d be on the move, trying to outthink her.
Merry had to find Olivia before she found Merry.
Better yet, wait in the barn until Olivia came looking for her here. Ambush her.
Jamie doesn’t have that kind of time.
As she watched the shadows for any hint of movement, a scream pierced through the wind and rain.
A figure stumbled from behind Lotta. Another strode purposefully behind. Neither was looking toward the barn, and Merry slipped out, running to the thick trunk of the maple. The bulb over the porch, though weak against the heavy night, provided enough light to see them.
“I’ll kill her, Merry,” Olivia called in a rough voice. “Get out here or I’ll do it.”
The figure turned, then. Merry could see the white, frightened face sixty feet away.
Barbie.
Olivia looked wildly around the yard, her face pale under the rain-soaked strands of hair plastered to her cheeks. She grabbed Barbie by the collar of her jacket and pressed the gun against her temple.
“No,” Barbie said. “You don’t know what you’re doing. Olivia, you don’t want to hurt me, I know you don’t. I love you.”
A sob ripped from Olivia’s throat. “I know, honey. I know. But it’s totally out of control now. There’s nothing else I can do.”
The revolver looked huge in Olivia’s hands, and Merry could have sworn they were shaking. Without warning, she switched her hold on the firearm and hit Barbie, an arcing blow of the gun butt on her left shoulder. Barbie cried out and crumpled to the ground next to the truck. Merry brought the shotgun to her shoulder, sighting down the barrel as she steadied herself against the tree trunk.
“Come on, Merry,” Olivia called again and let go of the gun with one hand to wipe at her cheek. “There’s no reason to draw this out.”
Merry pulled the trigger.
Or tried to. Nothing happened.
The safety, stupid, the safety.
As she fingered the button under the trigger guard, she realized it was a good thing the gun hadn’t gone off. In her impatience to get the thing loaded, she’d forgotten to screw a choke on the end of the barrel and Olivia hovered too close over Barbie. A blast from this far away with the unfettered scatter shot would injure, perhaps even kill, them both.
Barbie came up fast, driving her shoulder into her tormentor’s stomach. Olivia spun to the side as Merry crowed in approval and ran toward them.
“Damn it!” Olivia panted through gritted teeth, her face twisted
in pain, but she didn’t fall. She pointed the gun at Barbie.
“No!”
Olivia looked up to see Merry fifteen feet away, pointing the shotgun at her. She turned but kept the huge revolver pointed at the woman at her feet. Regret settled across her features. She grimaced and Merry knew Barbie only had a moment before Olivia pulled the trigger. She took the shot.
Nothing.
Olivia’s eyes widened in surprise.
Barbie grabbed her leg.
Olivia stumbled, and Merry ejected the dud shell, shuffling awkwardly forward and cursing humidity and time for ruining the powder. Olivia raised her gun again
as Merry worked the pump and paused to pull the trigger again, only a dozen feet away.
The sound put all the thunder to shame. A dinner-plate-sized wound bloomed in Olivia’s abdomen, but somehow she staggered backward without falling. A part of Merry marveled; the force of the blast should have knocked her flat.
Olivia looked down, then back up at Merry, a question in her eyes. Barbie scrambled around the back of the truck. Slowly, Olivia looked down at the gun in her hand. Watched it drop from her fingers into the mud. Her eyes rose to meet Merry’s.
She smiled and something like gratitude flickered in her eyes before all the light went out. She collapsed to the ground, a puppet without strings.
Merry crept forward, still leery. But Olivia was thoroughly dead.
Barbie joined her. “Thank God.” Her voice quavered and tears streaked her face. “Thank God.”
twenty-four
Dropping the shotgun, Merry wrapped her arms around Barbie’s. “It’s okay,” she murmured.
Jamie.
She released Barbie and loped to the house.
Jamie still lay slumped on his side. Merry touched his neck and felt a weak, thready pulse. She ran into the kitchen. The phone was gone.
Back in the living room, she eased him back a few inches so she could see the damage, afraid to move him, afraid not to.
Barbie pushed her aside. “Here, let me look at him.”
They’d have to get him in the truck—no, Olivia said she’d taken the keys, too. They’d be in her pocket. Have to go get them. Or, wait—
“Barbie, where’s your car?”
“Down the road a little. I didn’t want Olivia to see it.”
“Give me your keys. We’ve got to get Jamie to the hospital.”
Barbie fished in her jeans pocket. “Moving him right now could kill him.”
“He’ll die for sure if we don’t.” Merry stood and started for the open door, only to see her cousin, now with dark hair, walking up the steps. She had a cell phone clamped to her ear.
“Lauri? What are you doing here?”
“Hello? Yes, someone’s been shot. The McCoy ranch. You know where that is?”
“Tell them a police officer’s been wounded.”
Her cousin’s head jerked up. “Um, and a police officer has been wounded … I don’t think so.” She moved the phone away. “Is it bad?”
Merry, giddy with helpless fear, shot a look at Barbie.
She nodded. “They’d better hurry.”
Lauri said, “Tell them to hurry.”
Merry knelt next to Jamie. The bullet had entered on the right side of his chest. Barbie slid her hand along his back, careful not to move him. Her hand came back slick with red.
A bubble of blood appeared at the corner of his mouth and popped. His shirt was saturated dark maroon where Barbie pressed her palm against his chest.
“What can I do?” Merry asked.
Barbie frowned. “I’m pretty sure his right lung collapsed, but he’s still breathing so the left one’s okay.” She looked up and saw something in Merry’s face that made her say, “Here. Apply pressure here, where my hand is.”
Merry quickly complied. A ghost of a wince crossed Jamie’s unconscious face as she pressed down.
I’m so sorry, baby. I’m so sorry.
“What happened to your arm?” Barbie reached as if to pull her hand away from Jamie’s chest.
“It’s fine,” Merry barked and shrugged away from her.
“I remembered to call 911 this time.” Lauri stared at Jamie, dazed.
“I forgot at Clay’s, but I remembered this time.”
Merry felt the hysterical burble of laughter in her throat, and swallowed it back down. If she started now, she might never stop.
“What are you doing here?” Barbie asked Lauri.
“I followed you. I thought you killed Clay. I never thought …” She indicated the body in the yard with a slight movement of her chin.
“You’ve been here this whole time?” Barbie sounded shrill.
“Yeah.”
“You should have called for help right away!”
“I was way out by the road! I didn’t think anyone was hurt until I heard the shot in the yard. Even then it took three times for the call to go through. Your cell reception sucks out here.”
Merry glanced at her watch. Only a few minutes had passed since Lauri had called. She had a sudden, terrifying thought.
Jamie, what if you were right? What if Olivia and Barbie were partners in carnage?
“Barbie, why are you here?”
“When you called and asked about that gun of your mom’s? You said Olivia had told you Bo taught me how to shoot with it. Well, I’ve never seen it, and she knows that. So I got to thinking about why she’d say that, and I realized what she’d done. I was going out to her ranch to confront her when I saw her turn in on your road. I thought she might be coming after you.”
Merry shifted her position to provide more leverage on Jamie’s chest. “So you figured out that she killed Clay.”
“And gave herself an alibi when she gave me one.”
Lauri squinted. “Where were you that night?”
Barbie looked unhappy. Sighed. “I guess it’ll all have to come out anyway. I was at the clinic. Packaging up drugs for our dealer in Billings.”
See, Jamie? I was right. I told you I was right. Wake up so I can say I told you so.
“You were in on the drug skimming, too.”
“You know about that?”
“Not all of it. But why else would Olivia kill Clay? He was going to turn her in, wasn’t he?”
Barbie took a deep breath. “Big-mouth Anna found the Billings dealer for us, but then she blabbed to Denny and Clay. Clay lost it when he found out Olivia was involved. Probably wasn’t too pleased with me, either, but I never got a chance to talk to him about it. He called Bo, and he went over there, and they had a big fight about it. Olivia told me about that.”
“Did Bo know about the drugs?”
Barbie hesitated, then said, “Yeah. So I don’t know why she’d kill him.”
Because he found out about Clay. Right, baby?
Jamie sighed beneath her hand. His face swam in her vision, and she bit down hard on her lip.
“She killed her stepson.” She nodded toward Jamie. “She shot a police officer, and she was sure as hell going to kill both of us. But before she shot Jamie she said she killed Bo by accident.”
“By …? But she wouldn’t burn down her barn. The whole reason she got involved in selling narcotics was because she needed the money to make it big in the training business. She really wanted to deal with the high-end horse people.”
The mink-and-manure crowd. But Olivia couldn’t blame Lauri for Bo’s murder, could she, Jamie? She’d needed to cover it up. And I bet she was well-insured.
Lauri cocked her head at Barbie. “So how come you stole drugs?”
“I couldn’t buy back my family’s land on a nurse’s salary. I needed the money, too.”
A siren sounded far away. Merry looked in the direction of the county road, willing them to hurry.
“Would you have killed Clay, too?” Lauri asked her rival.
Barbie’s chin rose. “Of course not.” Tears welled in her eyes as the ranch yard filled with flashing lights.
———
A dank, rotting smell nudged into every crevice of the aquamarine cinderblock walls, every splinter of the smooth-worn bench, and reflected off the dull iron bars. It wafted up from the drain in the aisle between the cells as if the jail had a direct subterranean connection to a massive locker filled with gangrenous meat.
Merry hadn’t been surprised when the sheriff had led her to his car and made her wait in the backseat after she’d answered his initial questions. Barbie and Lau
ri had gone into two other cars. Renegade women. Protect the horses, men.
Suspected of two murders in two days. One she hadn’t committed. One she had.
No. Olivia had been self-defense. There was no question. Except the authorities had questions anyway.
In the cruiser she’d been swamped again by déjà vu. They would decide it hadn’t been necessary to kill Olivia Lamente. Forget her big-ass gun. Forget the string of murders she’d committed. Forget that she’d shot a police officer. They’d decide Merry had used “unnecessary force.” Again.
They’d look at the evidence and somehow know, as she did, that retribution played as large a part in Olivia’s demise as did self-defense.
And until they did, she’d sit here in jail. Rory Hawkins had already visited her once to gloat.
No one would tell her anything about Jamie. She didn’t even know if he was still alive. But he’d been breathing, his skin clammy beneath her hand, when they’d taken him from her, rushing through the mud to the gaping doors of the red and white van that screamed down the road toward the waiting helicopter.
She’d shown the bloody groove in her arm to the sheriff as evidence that Olivia had shot her, then she wrapped it with gauze from the medicine chest without mentioning it to the paramedics. She wanted every bit of their attention on Jamie. Now the wound throbbed as if her heart lay directly under the damage. Her jaw clenched with each painful beat as she stared, unseeing, at the crosshatching of her cage.
Beside her, Lauri sighed. “When are they going to let us out of here?”
The sheriff was talking to Barbie upstairs.
The palm of her left hand had swelled an angry red around the piece of wood still embedded there from the ladder in the barn. It ached, a dull mirroring of her arm.
She unwound the gauze, wincing as it pulled away dirt and dried blood. Her throbbing hand moved to her arm, and she squeezed. Gritting her teeth, she did it again.
“Merry,” Lauri said.
The gash began to bleed freely. She bent her head as tears filled her eyes. A sob broke free and then another. Blood ran between her fingers and dripped onto the gray slab floor, streaking her boots.