Stripped Bare

by Shannon Baker

  What fortune that tight-lipped Rope Hayward felt like talking.

  “Baxter was banging on the door. Eldon charged out like he was on a boar hunt. He had his rifle in his hand. I couldn’t hear what they said, but they weren’t friendly. Eldon pulled up the gun and Baxter hightailed it.”

  Glenda had told me about Eldon’s temper. They’d gone head-to-head on more than one occasion. She wasn’t one to back down, either.

  “You said Eldon was going to sell. Why would he pull a gun on Baxter?”

  Rope let out a slow breath, like air escaping from a tire. “Maybe I was wrong about that. Or maybe Baxter didn’t offer enough money.”

  “You need to tell me what you know. Milo is going to charge Ted with Eldon’s murder.”

  Rope reacted like I’d laid a whip to his withers. “They think Ted shot Eldon?”

  “He didn’t. But I’m going to find out who did.”

  He pulled his head back into his neck. “And you’re helping Ted?” His eyes shifted to the house, then back to me.

  “Yeah.” Wouldn’t it be great to let Ted’s confession stand?

  Rope lowered his voice as if someone might overhear. “If Ted didn’t do it, who do you think killed Eldon?”

  “I’m narrowing it down.”

  The porch door opened and Baxter stepped out. He turned around to Roxy, who leaned on the doorjamb. He said something and she laughed.

  Nice, Roxy. Despite declaring my husband the love of her life, she openly flirted with another man. A weaselly, wan, wimpy type. An obscenely wealthy one.

  Baxter lingered another few seconds and then meandered across the porch and down the stairs. For all appearances, he was a man enchanted.

  Barf.

  He made it to the end of Roxy’s yard and then spotted us. A scowl flashed across his smooth features. “I thought you left.”

  I straightened my shoulders. “Just talking to Rope about a visit you made out here a few days ago.”

  Baxter’s mouth turned into a sneer. “Is that right?”

  “I heard Eldon ran you off with his gun.”

  Baxter laughed. “Is that from the moccasin telegraph? Or I guess it’d be the cowboy boot one.”

  “Eyewitness,” I said, with as much venom as I could.

  Baxter walked to his electric car and opened the door. “He was a confused old man. I’m not surprised he got himself shot. If you ask me, the way he behaved, it was only a matter of time.” He lowered himself behind the wheel.

  Rope took a few paces out of the circle of light thrown from Baxter’s open door.

  I grabbed onto the door before he closed it. “Did you kill Eldon because he wouldn’t sell the Bar J?”

  Baxter threw his head back and guffawed. “Nice try.” He pointed at me. “Didn’t your husband confess to the shooting?”

  His laughter took me to the level I’d reached right before smashing my fist into Diane’s braces. “He didn’t do it.”

  Baxter grew serious. “That could be. But he was there and might know something he’s smart enough to keep to himself.”

  His sinister rasp chilled me. “What would that be?”

  He shrugged and looked out the windshield into the darkness. “Information you’d be advised to leave alone. Didn’t you have a car accident recently?”

  I glanced up to make sure Rope was still around. “How do you know about that?”

  His smile looked more like he was passing gas than like a real expression. “I know a lot of things. Haven’t you figured that out?”

  The metal of the car door froze my hand. “But you don’t know where Carly is.”

  “Yet.” He jerked the door from my hand.

  23

  Just before midnight I rolled the pickup to a stop behind my house. Several times that day I’d wanted to call Ted. How was he doing? Had he gained any feeling in his legs? What did Doc Kennedy have to add? But I didn’t want Ted to know I cared. More than that, I didn’t want to care.

  Weariness pushed at the corners of my brain, but my thoughts kept cranking. I had two strong suspects for Eldon’s murder. It all depended on whether Eldon intended to sell the ranch or not.

  If Eldon had balked at the sale, Glenn Baxter was the culprit. He wouldn’t cotton to someone standing in the way of his legacy. His general suaveness made him my first choice. He was too darned assured and determined.

  Rope, with all that submerged rage, ranked a close second. Maybe he’d worked so hard to make me think Baxter killed Eldon to throw me off his own scent. If he thought Eldon was ready to pull the figurative trigger on the sale to Baxter, would he pull the real one on Eldon? Maybe it wasn’t about the buffalo common at all, but about Eldon bypassing Rope and giving land to Danny.

  Jeremy’s pickup wasn’t in sight, so I braced myself for evening chores. After taking care of the cows and horses, I trudged up to the back porch, shed my boots and coat, and padded into the kitchen. I snapped on the light and searched for a note from Jeremy. Good boy. He’d left it tacked to the refrigerator, under a picture-frame magnet holding my favorite shot of Carly: her second-grade school photo, with no front teeth.

  I pulled the note off and propped myself against the kitchen counter, just inside the living room. My gaze stopped on the Sharpie marks showing Carly’s height, with a date written beside them. A blank spot showed between age twelve and age sixteen.

  That was the rough time, starting after Glenda died. I’d quit asking Carly to do anything but the necessary things. We struggled along with the hope that Carly would stop fighting happiness and let life be good again. Over time, the clouds started to lift. Then, on the night Carly moved in with us, a year ago, she had handed me the Sharpie and backed up to the wall. Her old light shone in her crystal eyes, a look so much like Glenda’s it stole my breath. She had said, “It’s about time we get back to living like normal people, don’t you think?”

  Now, emotion bubbled up and tears blurred my vision. I blinked and studied Jeremy’s nearly illegible handwriting. Failing at a third of the words, I pieced together that he’d pulled one calf and had four more with no issues; had fed, kicked out the pairs, and washed the sheets; and that he was sorry he had to leave.

  I cooked two eggs and a slice of toast. I played roles of both mother and child as I told myself I couldn’t leave the table until I’d eaten it all.

  I showered and got ready for bed, but my thoughts stampeded from Ted to Carly to speculation about a baby and back again, never staying in one pasture long enough to make a plan.

  I dragged myself to the bedroom, where the sheets were indeed clean. Unfortunately, they were a tangled heap on the middle of the mattress. I dug a pillow from the pile, wrapped myself in the comforter, and curled up on the bed.

  * * *

  I jerked awake. It wasn’t the slow surfacing of a normal awakening. Light or noise or something unusual had jolted me from sleep, and my heart galloped with the unknown. I sat up and held my breath, staring out the window. Usually, no one but deer and buffalo roam outside our windows, and the buffalo not so much, so we don’t have curtains. The moon wasn’t a big help in illuminating the hay meadow in front of the house. I didn’t see anything moving in the darkness, and no headlights or flashlights.

  I’d been asleep—more like dead—for three hours. I unwrapped the comforter and pushed myself to the floor. My jeans lay in a wad. I grabbed them, found a hoodie on a hook behind the bedroom door, and wandered to the back porch in bare feet. I might as well check the cows, since I was up. If I didn’t, I’d lie in bed and worry about them and wouldn’t sleep anyway.

  My boots were cold, the leather hard on my bare feet, but I’d make a pass through the lot and I’d be back in bed in ten minutes. I was out the door and past the pickup before my body heat warmed the inside of my barn coat. I pulled leather gloves from the pockets, shoved my hands inside them, and slipped through the gate, into the calving lot.

  Frost rimed the damp sand, and lumps of manure caught the scant moonlight.
Fresh hills of hay were scattered around the lot, evidence of Jeremy’s good care. The cows would munch the hay, and their leftovers would spread out, providing bedding. I made my circuit through the untroubled herd, gratified that their numbers had decreased and we’d be through this busy season in short order. In the far northwest corner I spotted a black figure. I shined the light on one of my best mothers. She swung her head slowly toward me, her eyes glowing red in the beam. I moved the light lower.A dark lump lay under her, curled into the hay. I waited a moment, detected small movement, decided all was well, and turned the flashlight to show my way toward the barn.

  Only one cow occupied the whole half of the lot between me and the barn. Something sparked in the back of my brain. I whipped around and shined the light, retracing my path. I moved it over the lumps, those standing and those lying down, and counted. With each beat, my concern grew.

  Eleven? Sure, some had calved in the last few days and Jeremy had turned them out, but that should leave more like thirty head. I spun around and studied the cow by the barn. She was not in a calm, motherly mood. Her ears perked forward and her tail whipped back and forth. She trotted up the side of the barn to the corner of the lot, turned, and ran back along the same track. I checked her back end when she changed direction. Afterbirth trailed from her. She’d had her calf recently. I waved the light over the ground, searching for the calf in the lumps in the frozen sand.

  What the hell was going on? One calf missing and half a lot full of heavies vanished. I dug my toes into the sand, ran up the hill to the west fence line, and cantered along it. There.

  My light had been trained on the three-wire fence, but the wires disappeared at a fence post. I bent over and examined it with my leather-clad fingers.

  Cut. Someone had snipped through the fence, letting the heavies out to the larger pasture. A few escaped cows didn’t mean a catastrophe, because I could round them up without much bother. But having someone on my ranch, tampering with my herd, creating mischief while I slept, felt like cold fingers squeezing my lungs.

  I needed a dog out here. Boomer would never have let a stranger onto the place.

  I whirled around and shined my light up the hill. A few cows milled around, undisturbed by my screeching nerves. I held my breath. Did I hear something? I strained to discern anything beyond the cows’ heavy breathing. My fingers clenched inside the cold gloves. An engine. I was sure I heard the muffled roar of a vehicle struggling over the hills. But in the still air, I often heard the distant BNSF train whistles twelve miles away.

  I trained my light beyond the fence, focusing on the ground. With careful steps I moved through the opening, studying the sand before I placed my feet. A few steps away I saw what I’d been looking for: hoofprints. Not hoofprints that most folks would recognize as a horse, and nothing I could use to prove someone had been here. But they were deeper and wider than a cow’s.

  My theory—and I thought it held water—was that someone had driven a trailer behind the hill, unloaded a horse, ridden over here, cut the fence, and slipped inside. Why? To rustle my cows?

  That would be stupid. There were plenty of cow/calf pairs in the south pasture, easy pickin’s for anyone wanting to steal.

  The tie rod. Someone sneaking up to the ranch. These had to be connected. Someone was targeting me. Trying to hurt me. The only possible reason was because I was messing in their business. Investigating Eldon’s murder.

  Sweat slicked my face, even though my ears tingled with cold. My nerves stretched so tight they vibrated. I surveyed the house and the yard. No movement. I let my gaze travel to the dirt and gravel in front of the barn and equipment shed. All seemed as peaceful as it would at dawn.

  Rooted to the sand, I tried to figure out my next move. Too early to go to the hospital to talk to Ted. Somehow I had to get him to unconfess and then we’d unravel this mystery as we had the cattle rustling case two years ago.

  For now, I needed to repair the fence so at least the rest of the cows would stay put. I normally enjoyed the hours sliding from midnight to dawn. Generally, the peace soothed me. But tonight urgency throbbed too hard. I followed the flashlight beam toward the barn.

  The agitated cow still traveled up and down the outside of the barn wall. It’s possible she’d wandered out into the pasture when the fence was cut, had her calf out there, wandered back, and forgotten where she’d left it. Or maybe the calf had followed another cow out of the lot. Neither scenario was likely. I nudged the hay mounds close to the barn to see if maybe it had snuggled under the hay. No calf.

  Coyotes sometimes attacked newborns. But that’s one reason I kept the heavies locked in the lot. The predators rarely risked getting this close to the house, and even if one had, the herd would put up a ruckus of mooing and bawling.

  I couldn’t work out what had happened to her calf, but I was more worried about Carly, about Ted, and, well, about me—and about who wanted to hurt any or all of us. The same someone who had killed Eldon, no doubt.

  I popped through the steel gate at the edge of the lot and into the corral that led to the barn. The old wooden barn door squealed on its hinges. The welcoming smell I’d expected didn’t hit me. I know most people wouldn’t consider dried sweat on horse blankets, manure, old saddle leather, and musty hay a good smell, but for me it was home and tradition and a life of satisfying work.

  As much as I appreciated Jeremy’s excellent care of the herd, I couldn’t give him points for keeping the barn clean. It smelled foul. The sour whiff of blood and wet hay mingled with the sickly sweet odor of death. It curdled my stomach, and I hated that I wouldn’t be able to clean it today.

  I didn’t want to be an investigator. I wanted to stay here on my ranch, tend my cows, clean my barn, plan my branding.

  I pulled off a glove and reached to flip the switch that would brighten the series of bulbs dangling from the center lane. Four stalls were lined up on either side, all empty now, but ready in case of a blizzard or bad weather, when I’d bring in the baby calves.

  I turned from the light, already starting down the lane, heading for the wire stretchers I needed to repair the fence. My next step didn’t hit the ground in front of me; I pulled it back at the same time that I gasped. My foot landed behind me and I fell backward against the barn door. It wasn’t latched, and when it swung outward, I slammed onto my tailbone. The cry I let out wasn’t due to pain.

  I sat with my legs in front of me, my gloved hand over my mouth, the bare hand planted on the frozen ground, propping me up. I couldn’t close my eyes, couldn’t look away. A whimper lifted from my lips and my stomach clenched.

  My natural inclination would be to stay that way forever. But I forced my knees to bend, my arms to thrust me forward. I couldn’t quite make it to my feet, but I crawled until I could register what my eyes had seen.

  The missing calf wasn’t a mystery anymore.

  It was sprawled across the lane. Glassy eyes stared at nothing, the black tongue clamped between white teeth, under lips drawn back in a grimace. Blood had seeped into the trampled hay from the gaping slit across the calf’s throat.

  My knees trembled as I pushed myself to stand. My innards swirled like a washing machine filled with vinegar.

  There was no doubt.

  I was getting closer to finding the real killer.

  24

  Not much stirred in the hospital this late—or was it early? The hall lights blazed, but most rooms I passed clung to a sort of fake twilight. The floor nurse watched my approach. I sounded like a parade marching down the empty hospital corridor. When I got closer, I recognized her as Beth Salzberg, a girl from Danbury I’d played basketball against in high school.

  She met me with a bucktoothed smile, much too perky for someone who’d pulled the night shift. “He’s having a good night,” she said, even though I hadn’t asked.

  Normal Sandhills manners dictated that I ask after her kids or parents, but I didn’t stop. Rolling into Ted’s room like a tank on attack, I said, “W
ake up. It’s time for you to stop this game.”

  “Kate!” He’d been sitting up in bed. “You’re here!”

  I might have been surprised to see him reading a book, something I’d only witnessed a couple of times in our marriage, but I didn’t care. “What the hell is going on?”

  Dahlia wouldn’t be in until official visiting hours, so Ted’s dark whiskers shadowed his face. He raised his hands in surrender mode. It seemed to me he moved quicker than yesterday. “Roxy’s not going to sell to Baxter. She’ll talk to Carly first.”

  Darkness blanked the scene from the window, throwing my stormy reflection back to me. I gripped the rail on his bed. “Tell me why you confessed.”

  His jaw worked. “Let it go. I can plead self-defense and might not spend any time in jail.”

  “Maybe yesterday I might have gone for that. But someone made this personal, and I’m not going to let that stand.”

  Beth Salzberg walked in, chirping like a sparrow. “I need to take your vitals.”

  Ted and I both turned to her and, in a synchronization seldom displayed in our marriage, said together, “Not now.”

  Her mouth dropped open, but she backed out of the room, stammering, “I’ll c-come back later.”

  Ted put his hand next to mine on the rail. “What do you mean, personal?”

  “In the last two days I’ve nearly been killed because someone tampered with Elvis, and someone sent a pretty clear message, via a dead calf, that they don’t want me looking into Eldon’s murder.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  I explained about Elvis and the calf. I told him my theories about Rope and Baxter.

  When I finished, he said, “That doesn’t make any sense.”

  I banged the rail and he jumped. “Why? What are you not telling me?”

  He scowled. “Nothing. I killed Eldon, so no one should be trying to scare you.”