Breakaway (A Gail McCarthy Mystery) (29 page)

"I'm going after him," I said.

In another minute I was outside the barn. I could see him mounting a horse, plain in the light of the high half moon, his leg swinging over the rump of a horse that was turned away. He looked back as he drove the horse toward the hill behind the barn, seeing me there by the corral. I saw only his dark, masked face and the horse's rump. I would never catch him on foot.

I didn't think. I ran for Dixie. She was haltered; the upside-down bucket handy by her side. I untied her and climbed on her in one motion, guided her by the lead rope, holding the pistol with my free hand.

I could hear Jeri's voice, talking to me, as I kicked Dixie forward.

"I'm going after him!" I yelled again, and ducked my head as we trotted through the barn doorway.

Then we were out in the night and I kicked Dixie harder, clinging to her mane with the hand that held the gun. She broke into a lope and we headed for the trail up the hill.

I gripped hard with my thighs and knees and twined my two free fingers tightly in her mane. Kris had told me once that Dixie was a great bareback horse, with a flat back and smooth gaits-thank God for that. I couldn't ride Gunner bareback-his spine cut me in two.

Dixie was easy, but I hadn't ridden bareback in years. She was lunging up the hill now; I clung with every atom of strength I possessed, trying to steer with the lead rope.

But Dixie knew the trail, knew there was a horse ahead of her. She wanted to catch him as much as I did-the herd instinct driving her. All I had to do was hang on.

I could hear him, hear the thudding hooves, hear branches breaking ahead, but I couldn't see him. I couldn't see much. A half moon was up, but its light didn't penetrate down into the forest we were scrambling through.

Up and up, I clung to the mare with my thighs and knees and calves as she lunged through the darkness, both of us hearing the horse ahead. At least I knew where we were going. Up to the ridge, and then, unless I missed my guess, to Lushmeadows. I gave no thought to what I would do if I caught him. I gripped my gun and the mare's mane and hung on.

You will not get away. You will not. My mind chanted steadily. Branches lashed my face and I ducked low over Dixie's neck to shield myself. I could feel her muscles bunch and strain through my jeans, hear her grunt as she plunged upward. Every fiber of strength I possessed went into staying on.

Limpetlike, I stuck to her back as she stumbled, hung on as she drove upward. No room for fear, no room for thought. Nothing but the violent lurching motion, both rhythmic and erratic. The dark forest was a blur of barely discernible tree shapes. I could smell the mare's warm, sweet horsey odor over the earthy tanbark smell of redwoods, feel her sweat starting to soak through my jeans. And I could hear the horse ahead.

A few more lunging strides and we were up on the ridgeline. The ground leveled out; moonlight filtered through the trees in pale gray splotches. I urged Dixie and felt her respond with more speed even as I sensed her beginning to tire.

Down the trail we galloped, through patches of faint light and deeper shadows.

Dixie swerved suddenly to miss a sapling; I barely clung on, my weight lurching precariously over her left shoulder, my legs clutching for all they were worth. In another stride I pulled myself upright again, and drummed my heels on her ribs.

Thank God I had spent hours riding bareback as a teenager. Even though it was years later, that particular skill, so different from balancing in stirrups, came back to me now. I could stay on; I was catching him.

The ground was more open now, the moon threw sharp shadows. I looked down the trail and thought I could see the moving shape of a horse and rider in the distance. I kicked Dixie again and clucked.

He was ahead of me, but I was staying with him. I tried to remember just where this trail went. Back down to the road, I thought.

Sure enough, the level ground was starting to slope downward. Damn, damn, damn. Riding downhill bareback at the gallop was going to be nearly impossible.

But I could see him. I wanted to catch him; I needed to catch him. I dug my knees into Dixie's shoulders, leaned back a little, trying to keep my weight balanced and in the middle of her. I could hear and feel her grunting breaths as she strained forward, wanting to catch the horse ahead.

And then in an instant everything was changing. The horse in front of us stumbled, just visible in the moonlight. The slope threw him forward and he crashed onto his knees, scrambled a stride, and went all the way down onto his right shoulder and rolled, as if in slow motion, in a big somersault. I heard a startled yell from the rider, saw him fall to one side, saw the horse's body come down right next to him with a heavy whump.

In another few strides, we were upon him. I pulled back on the halter rope with all my strength and yelled, "Whoa." Obediently Dixie shortened her stride and lunched to a halt. I half jumped, half fell off awkwardly, clutching my gun in one hand and the halter rope in the other. In the periphery of my vision, I could see the other horse scramble to his feet and trot away, down the hill, no doubt headed home. Dixie nickered and tugged to go after him.

I hung onto the lead rope tightly and pointed my gun at the figure lying on the ground. He was gasping in loud audible grunts; he'd had the wind knocked out of him. Good.

I stared at his helpless form and pointed my pistol right at the center of his body. I'd be sure to hit something vital that way. Given the .357's power, it would be almost certain to kill him. He gasped and wheezed and struggled to get up.

"Don't move," I said, "or I'll kill you."

He turned his face toward me. In the moonlight, I could see the faint sheen of his eyeballs. The dark mask still hid his features, but I knew who I was speaking to. I'd seen his horse.

Once again he tried to rise. I spoke louder. "Stay sitting on the ground and put your hands above your head or I will shoot you."

For a second he hesitated and then continued to flounder to his feet.

Something broke inside me. I raised the gun, sighted down the barrel at his chest, and tightened my finger on the trigger. "You listen, you bastard," I said clearly. "I want to kill you. Move one more time and I will. Gladly."

I meant it and he must have heard it. Slowly he subsided to a sitting position and raised his hands above his head, his face turned to mine. The eyes inside the ski mask looked past the barrel of the gun to my face. I stared back at him.

"Well, Mike," I said.

THIRTY

Mike O'Hara stared at me from behind his mask and said nothing. But I had no doubt whom I was looking at. I'd seen Sonny's crooked blaze too clearly in the moonlight; I knew his size and shape and bay coat. Like many horsemen, I recognized horses I knew at least as easily as I did people.

Mike's stance, his way of moving and holding himself; it all fit together, though he was still unrecognizable behind the dark mask.

"But why?" I said out loud. "Why?"

Mike's breathing was coming a little more easily now; to my surprise he tried to speak between gasps. "You don't ... under ... stand." He was having a hard time getting the words out.

I could feel the desire that came over me with the words. End his miserable, despicable, worthless life; I could hear the voice in my brain. Rid the world of this evil thing.

"Talk," I said.

"I never meant ... to hurt anyone," was what he got out.

"You managed to kill and rape at least one woman and hit a little girl over the head. I never would have believed it of you."

He was quiet, except for his breathing. "I'll tell you what, Mike," I said conversationally. "I'll just let you know where I'm coming from. I would really like to kill you, shoot you right now in the gut and watch you die. Don't think I couldn't do it. I could. Easily. For what you did. You deserve to die. You and I both know it. Your one chance is to talk to me. So tell me, Mike, how did a good solid citizen like you, an ex-cop, church-goer, the whole nine yards, start wanting to fuck horses?"

I could feel him cringe. Strange as it was, there in the dark redwoods in the moonlight, me holding a gun on him, the ski mask hiding his face completely, yet I could still feel the wince.

And then he spoke, more in his normal voice-quasi-dignified, slow, a little didactic, still breathless. "Gail, you really don't understand."

"So explain."

There was a long pause. Then Mike's voice, sounding hesitant. "My wife is a good woman, but she didn't like sex-never did. She didn't understand how I felt."

"Right, Mike. You feel women don't understand you. No doubt you felt your mother didn't understand you. Let's cut to the chase here. Lots of men are in your position. They get a divorce, or a girlfriend, or they beat off. Why not you?"

Once again, I felt the wince. Then, "I love Hannah." The words seemed to burst out of him. "I didn't want to hurt her. And being unfaithful to her was wrong. I knew that. For a while I did that, what you said last, but I hated it. I couldn't stand myself, the way I felt. And then one weekend, we were visiting a woman friend who had a mare. I went for a walk out in the pasture. I was thinking about, well, sex. And this mare must have been in heat. There was a gelding in the field with her, and he was climbing on top of her, trying to breed her. And I just started thinking."

I could picture it. Many geldings have the impulse to hump mares; some could actually get an erection and penetrate the mare. I'd seen it. I saw it now through the eyes of this frustrated, sex-starved man.

"I caught the mare," he said, "and tied her to a tree." He was quiet again. "It was better," he said at last. "I hadn't hurt Hannah; I hadn't hurt anyone. And I felt better."

"What was better about the mare as opposed to your hand?" I said crudely, and saw him turn his face away.

"She was willing," he said. "She didn't mind. Hannah always hated sex; it always hurt her. She never wanted me to do it. I know it sounds stupid, but my mother was always unhappy with my dad and angry with us kids. What I wanted was a woman to be willing, to accept me."

"This was a horse, not a woman," I said. "She wasn't accepting you in any real sense. What did you do, make up some kind of pretty fantasy?"

"I guess that's right," he said heavily. "Ever since the first time, when I watched the gelding climb on the mare and she just stood there willingly, I've always sort of seen myself as another horse, coming to a mare. And she accepts me."

"Is that why you always rode your horse to these rendezvous? So you could get in the role?"

"I guess. I know you're making fun of me, Gail, but it was terrible for me. It got to where I absolutely had to do it to feel any peace at all."

"Why didn't you just buy a mare of your own?"

"It wouldn't have worked. It had to be a woman's horse. After the first time, I waited a long time to try it again. And then I rode to a neighbor woman's house. I knew she was single, knew she had a mare. In one part of my mind I was always a man going to a woman; I thought about the woman who owned the mare. But I never wanted to hurt them. I never even took my gun. And then there was this other part of me that was a horse going to another horse."

"So how'd you progress to murder, you bastard?" I was not feeling any sympathy for poor, trapped, frustrated Mike. But I wanted to know. "Did you kill Marianne Moore?"

"How did you know?" he sounded shocked.

"I guessed," I said.

"She came out to the barn one night. She saw me. I hit her over the head with my flashlight. I only meant to knock her out, but I caught her too near the temple."

"But you couldn't quit. Not even after you'd killed another human being."

"Gail, I really couldn't. I was almost afraid to. Afraid of how much desire would build up in me. Afraid of what I'd do to Hannah."

This last made me see red. "You lousy fucker," I virtually shouted at him. "I don't care if you screwed your wife till you made her bleed. That was between you and her to work out. But you wouldn't work on it. Instead you had to take out your stupid testosterone-driven needs on other innocent people. You killed Nico, damn you."

I leveled the gun at him. "How could you do that? You go to church; I suppose you believe in God; you spent your life enforcing the law. What could have twisted you enough to make you kill? Tell me."

"I didn't mean to!" His voice rose to match mine. "I just wanted to come to the horse. She caught me. I grabbed her. I had my hands around her throat before I even knew what I was doing. And then, afterward, she was so quiet, so willing."

"You bastard. You absolute, unmitigated bastard. I don't care about your stupid pathetic needs. I don't care about you. I don't feel the slightest sympathy for your desire to protect your goddamn naive frigid wife. You killed one of the finest human beings I've ever met, and now you're going to pay for it."

Rage was bubbling through me, cathartic as tears had been the night I'd watched for dawn. "You went after me at the Bishop Ranch, didn't you," I said. "Admit it."