It was a brilliant question. Even if what Lillian and everyone else said about Avenger was one-hundred-percent true, there were still other fine horses. Some of which were for sale.
"If I find out anything new, you'll be the first to know," I promised Cece.
"Where are you headed today?" she asked.
"To see Lee." I studied the slip of paper Cece had given me. It was just a phone number.
"Better wait until after lunch. Coleman or someone has arranged for her to speak with a psychiatrist."
My gaze snapped up to hers. "Lee?"
She nodded. "Insanity, of the temporary sort, might not be a bad plea for her."
"Lee's not crazy. She's just stubborn."
"Sometimes, Sarah Booth, stubborn just slides right into crazy. You should know."
On my last drive out to Swift Level, I'd failed to notice the beauty of the land. The cotton fields were freshly planted, the brown earth furrowed in long rows that merged in the distance. The smell of the newly turned soil was distinctive. Fertile. The men who farmed it said it smelled like money.
I drove the fifteen miles without passing another car. County Road 11 was narrow and straight, like so many of the Delta roads. Swift Level came up on the horizon like a diorama.
As I turned down the lane, a herd of magnificent horses came running toward the fence. There were at least a dozen of them, and they ran with the grace and spirit of young athletes. As they neared the fence they turned, a choreographed movement of such startling beauty that I stopped the car and watched them continue in the other direction, weaving a pattern that looked deliberately designed, yet was a perfect expression of freedom. Horse dancing. Whatever else Lee had done, she had bred something of beauty.
I parked in front of the house. The plants on the front porch still bloomed perkily, but they hadn't been headed or watered. I made a mental note to do that before I left. There was no one in the house, so I went down to the barn, alert for Bud Lynch. The man could move like a shadow, and I didn't want him sneaking up on me again.
The black truck with four rear tires was still parked at the barn. As soon as I entered the main barn where the office was located, I recognized Carol Beth's demanding tones. She was back at Swift Level and engaged in a shouting match with the trainer.
"You're hired help," Carol Beth fumed.
"That's right. You hired me, and I delivered. At the time, you weren't complaining about my services. In fact, you were mighty complimentary." That little statement was followed by a purely male chuckle, smug and amused.
"You goddamn son of a bitch."
"That's not what you were calling me—"
"You are a dead man. Do you hear me? I'll see to it that you never work again. You won't be able to get a job riding ponies at a fair by the time I finish with you. My husband—"
"Now, Mrs. Bishop, I wouldn't do anything rash. There're a lot of angles to consider here. I can give as good as I get, as you well know. I don't think your husband would enjoy the details of our . . . partnership."
I walked into the office doorway and saw them faced off at each other. Carol Beth had aged well, which meant she hadn't really aged at all. With her hair pulled back in a ponytail and her body encased in skintight riding breeches, a sleeveless white shirt and the de rigueur black boots, she looked as if she might still be the haughty seventeen-year-old who'd refused to date a single Zinnia High School boy. Not only did she refuse to date them, she told them why. She had her sights set higher than Sunflower County. She wanted out of Mississippi, and she managed it, too. She graduated with honors from Ole Miss, and two days later married a Virginia lawyer. From all tales, she was the creme de la creme of Richmond society and the darling of the Bridgeport Hunt there.
Neither of them saw me, so I had a chance to examine the tableau that presented itself. Lynch lounged in the office chair at the desk, and Carol Beth stood two feet away from him, her chest moving rapidly with anger. Her mahogany hair caught window light, and it seemed to glow like the finest old furniture. Her dark gaze was focused on Lynch, and I expected his bones to melt at any moment.
"You bastard. You can't threaten me."
"Oh, I can."
She took a step forward. She was close enough to kiss him. "I will ruin you."
"You can try," he said with a slow drawl and an easy smile.
"You are insufferable."
"You're a greedy bitch. Greedy and completely unprincipled. Don't push me too hard."
"You'll pay for this." She heaved a deep breath.
"Don't think you can play with me." Lynch's smile was gone, and his face lifted closer to hers. "We were together when Kemper was killed. Remember that. You can phrase it any way you'd like, but just don't try to change that fact."
"My memory isn't all that good, Bud." Carol Beth smiled.
"Try some ginkgo biloba. I've heard it stimulates the brain. Just do it fast. Remember, Carol Beth, if I don't have an alibi, neither do you."
"And who would a jury in Sunflower County believe—a horse trainer implicated in a Texas murder, or the daughter of Littleton Farley?" Her laughter was cold.
"I've tied up with people a lot smarter, richer, and tougher than you. And I always come out on top." Bud appeared unperturbed.
"We'll see about that." Carol Beth whirled, and then halted dead in her tracks when she saw me.
"What are you doing here?" The question was a spear hurled across the room. "I wasn't aware that Dahlia House was in such dire straits that you'd been reduced to mucking stalls to make ends meet."
Her attack was surprising, but not necessarily unexpected. Carol Beth hadn't changed a bit. "Lynch said he had a way with horses. I guess he doesn't have the touch with a jackass." What the hell, there was no reason for me to hold back. I was rewarded with a crooked grin from Lynch that sizzled with charm. Part of his appeal was the ease with which he established a connection. I felt a desire to move physically closer to him.
"Get out of my way." Carol Beth stormed toward me.
"Wasn't that what Sherman said on his way to Atlanta?" I stepped aside and turned to watch her stalk down the barn aisle. In a moment, there was the sound of a big diesel engine starting, and her rig pulled away. The old man, Roscoe, peeped out of a stall and grinned at me.
"I gather you know Mrs. Bishop," Lynch said in that slow Texas twang.
"Since first grade."
"I'm sorry," he said.
He had a quick wit and a bit of malice. "What was that all about?" I asked as casually as I could manage. The conversation I'd overheard involved more than equines. Bud Lynch and Carol Beth Bishop had only each other for an alibi the night Kemper was killed. Although Kip was my primary suspect, Bud was close behind her.
He shrugged a shoulder. "A woman with regrets is never a pretty sight." Although his attitude was cavalier, his tone belied his worry. "How's Kip?" he asked.
"She's managing." Although his concern seemed genuine, I had my own questions. "What was Carol Beth doing here? Why does she want Avenger and the mares? She has enough money to buy any horse she wants. Why Avenger?"
"That horse is worth a lot more than the bill of sale Kemper signed for him and the mares. After this show season, when his first crop of babies demonstrate their stuff, Avenger will be getting ten thousand a pop for a stud fee, and that's just starters." He shifted one lean hip. "Of course, that's if everything goes as planned. In the horse business, risk is the only certainty."
He motioned me over to a chart on the wall that listed names of horses, breeding dates, foaling dates, sales.
"Avenger's potential is unlimited. The mares who are bred to him carry foals that will bring millions. Four of his babies are on the Olympic team, eight on the Grand Prix circuit. If any were available on the market, they'd command prices up to half a million dollars each. Carol Beth recognizes the possibilities and she has the three hundred grand to seize the opportunity. That's the answer to your first question. In simple terms, she wants what Lee has. Carol Bet
h's eaten up with jealousy of Lee. Everything Carol Beth has, someone else actually owns. She went from her father's largesse to her husband's. Lee's made her own way."
"You make Carol Beth sound just a little psychotic," I said.
"Not psychotic, but certainly obsessed. Ever since she first showed up out here under the guise of taking riding lessons, she's been planning on how to get Avenger. That fool Kemper played right into her hands."
I could buy that explanation. Now for the more unpleasant chore. "I want to see where Kemper was killed."
He motioned me to follow him. As he went through the door, it was impossible not to let my eyes wander down his body. He had a fine butt. Was it riding that made it look that good? I forced my eyes up to his shoulders and saw the good posture, the strength. He was a total package. Remembering the facts I'd dug up on him—not least of all his possible implication in the murder of a Texas rancher—I wondered if all that charm and masculinity were what might be considered a lethal package. It occurred to me that I was alone in a barn with a potential killer, but what was worse was that another suspect was living under my roof. It wasn't exactly what the private eye handbook cited as an example of wise investigating techniques.
We left the main barn and walked down a path of raked gravel to a smaller barn with only a few stalls—all empty—but a lot of sunlight and fresh air. He led me directly to a huge box stall cordoned off with the remains of yellow crime-scene tape. "Help yourself," he said. "The sheriff's come and gone."
I slowly opened the door and found only what I had anticipated. Blood had been spattered everywhere. The shavings were soaked in it. It looked as if a terrible battle had been waged within the confines of the whitewashed boards.
There was nothing for me to learn in the stall except that Kemper had been brutally murdered, but I had other questions. "Are you involved with Lee?"
Instead of answering, he walked into the sunshine. Leaning against the barn, he turned his face to the sun. I caught up with him, growing more annoyed. "I need an answer. After all, this wouldn't be the first time a woman you were involved with ended up with a dead husband."
He ignored the gibe. "Involved can cover a lot of ground. I'm the hired help. Of course I'm involved in part of her life."
Hedging was his specialty. I could be more direct. "Are you in love with Lee?"
"Why do you want to know?"
"It speaks to motive. I won't be the only one asking."
"Kemper was a cruel, sadistic bastard." He looked beyond me, down the aisle to where a horse called a soft greeting to him. "A long time ago, if things had gone differently, she might have fallen in love with me. If Lee had given me a single sign that there was a chance ..." He turned slightly away. "Things would be a lot different now."
He forestalled my next question by pointing down the lane where old Roscoe was leading a huge gray horse. The animal shook his head and called a soft greeting.
"That's Avenger." He straightened up and waved at Roscoe. "Put him back in the stallion barn. Use the spare stall. We'll get his cleaned up tomorrow."
As the horse was led away, I couldn't help but notice how every muscle seemed defined. He was breathtaking. His sculpted head nodded up and down on an arched neck. A forelock of black hair tossed against his gray hide as his hooves beat a tattoo on the gravel. My eyes lingered on him, captured by his magnificence.
"Do you remember Spartacus, Lee's big gray stallion from her teen years?" Bud asked.
"Yes." I had a vivid memory of her riding down my drive on a cold Christmas morning.
"Avenger is his son. Kemper wanted to sell all the horses, take the money, and start some new business. What that actually meant was that he would gamble it away. Lee, of course, refused. It would have killed Kip."
That was a sentiment I questioned. "Kip doesn't seem all that fond of her life at Swift Level."
"That's where you're wrong. Kip loves these horses as much as, or more than, Lee. Her love was always the weapon used against her. Is there anything else you need to know?" he asked, obviously ready to conclude my visit.
"Where were you the night Kemper was killed?"
"I told you, I was with someone."
I merely looked at him. "I heard. Carol Beth. But there seems to be some disagreement there."
He shrugged one shoulder. "Carol Beth is trying to play the odds. If she can implicate me, she'll try it. With Lee in prison and me out of the way, she'd be up here with an eighteen-wheeler and load up everything with four legs."
"Who killed Kemper?"
"Lee didn't."
"Is this a theory or a fact?" My heart was beating fast. Was Lynch going to confess to murder? "It's not so different from Texas."
His chuckle was slow and easy. "Yes, a setup similar enough that it would be very convenient to pin this on me. You're hoping I'll say I did it." His eyes caught the light, a pure, clear blue. "Or maybe you're afraid I'll say I did it."
He let that hang between us, the possibility that he was a killer.
Smiling, he shook his head. "I didn't. Like I told you, I was with Carol Beth. Believe it or not, I'd do anything I could to help Lee." He paused for effect. "Anything."
I arched my eyebrows, waiting.
"I can't confess," he said slowly.
"There's bound to be a good reason here."
"The night Kemper was killed, Carol Beth showed up intending to claim the horses. She showed me the bill of sale. She put it in the glove box of her truck. It was the only evidence she had that Kemper had sold her Avenger."
There was a long pause as he let me work it out for myself. "Once she was asleep, sated with pleasure, you were going to steal the bill of sale."
"Not my most noble act, but yes. That was my plan. Unfortunately, it seems a succubus doesn't need sleep. I must have dozed off. When I woke up, Carol Beth and her rig were gone, along with the bill of sale."
9
The sycamore trees along the drive were budding out with tight, green leaves. Against the pale blue sky they were almost chartreuse. Sycamores are messy trees, but they're also graceful. I love them at all seasons, even in the winter when their pale trunks rise like ghostly bones into the sky.
My mind was still back at Swift Level. Two things intrigued me. Number one was that Carol Beth had lowered her standards enough to sleep with someone who wasn't landed gentry. Second—that Lynch had survived the experience. "Succubus" was a perfect word to describe Carol Beth.
A little added jolt was Lynch's vocabulary. He was a lot better read than I'd ever thought.
I was halfway down my drive when I saw a man sitting on the front porch of Dahlia House. He held a glass of something, and he was reading a magazine. He looked up as I parked the car. My first thought was that a Flannery O'Connor character had jumped out of the pages of her stories and come to sell me a Bible. His suit was shiny and black, and the thin tie reflected his own physique. There was even a briefcase at his feet. Glass eyes? Wooden legs? What was he after? His slick smile did not bode well.
"You must be Sarah Booth," he said. "I got here as quickly as I could. Your niece was kind enough to give me some sweet tea." He took a sip and smacked his lips. "Perfect."
"I don't have a niece." Very slowly I walked up the steps, taking him in full measure. He was tall, oiled, and impeccably ironed. I was sure his underwear had a crease. His hair, probably a sandy blond, was slicked back in an eighties style, and a pair of aviator sunglasses were folded into his shirt pocket.
"You said to bring a set of tails." He pointed to a suitcase leaning beside the door.
"Who are you?"
He looked puzzled. "Malone."
"Malone?"
"Malone Beasley." He grinned. "You said you were in dire need of a man, so here I am, tails in hand and ready to dance."
"Where did you come from?" I felt as if I'd gotten trapped in a nightmare. Had I conjured him up from the hell pit of my subconscious?
"Wetumpka, Alabama." He was looking at me as if
he were suddenly concerned.
"Wetumpka," I repeated. It was a hole-in-the-road town within driving distance. I looked around and noticed that he didn't have a car.
"I took the bus," he said. "Leave the drivin' to them!" He laughed. "You have a Mercedes." He rolled the word as if it had tremendous flavor. "That's car enough for the both of us." He walked past me down the steps to the car in question. "She's a real beaut." His lips thinned as he said very slowly, "Cher-ry." His fingers trailed over the Chinese red paint in a way that was purely sensual. He was in love with my car.
"Beasley," I snapped.
Hand still proprietarily on my car, he grinned. "You don't have to be formal. You can call me Malone."
Just my luck, a weasel with two last names and suffering from autoerotica. "Why are you here?"
His brows drew closer together, almost meeting in a worried point. "For the ball. You know, I'm your date."
Immediately I detected the fine hand of Cece Dee Falcon. She'd dredged this creature up from the mud of the Mississippi River and expected me to take him to the Chesterfield Hunt Ball.
"I've already got a date," I told him.
Disappointment registered all over his face. "You do? Then why—"
"I don't know," I said. "I have no idea why. But when I find out, I'll send you a postcard. I think you should take the bus back to Wetumpka. Send a travel voucher to The Zinnia Dispatch for reimbursement."
Anger crossed his features like a storm. "You can't do this. There's some kind of law. It's . . . false advertising."
His voice was growing louder, and I saw a curtain move in the parlor. Kip, Jitty, or the spring breeze, I couldn't be certain. Two of them would be enjoying this little scene far too much.
"Leave or I'll call the sheriff. He's a close personal friend."
He walked stiffly back up the steps and picked up his suitcase and the briefcase, hefting them with a huff. "And I brought you a present," he said. "Dang chocolate's probably melted all over my clean underwear."
I felt a momentary pang of guilty horror. It wasn't his fault that Cece had invited him here with the promise of a ball and a date. None of this could be laid at his door. But I knew where the big bad wolf of guilt was going stalking for dinner tonight.
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