Death Rides Again (A Jocelyn Shore Mystery) (26 page)

“I told him I didn’t. I told him I wanted a divorce,” she wailed between hiccups.

Well, that probably had stung a bit. “I don’t see what choice you had. After all, he hit you,” I reminded her gently.

“Damn it!” she snapped, anger flashing past grief. “How many times do I have to tell you that Eddy didn’t mean to hit me? You and Daddy, you all just don’t listen.”

“You do have a black eye,” I pointed out.

“Yes, yes, okay, he hit me,” she said impatiently. “But not on purpose. Not really. He just has … had a quick temper. He was real sorry right away.”

“He was sorry all right. Sorry when Uncle Kel pulled out that gun. And if you really didn’t think he was an abusive SOB, why weren’t you standing up for him at the time.”

She gave a strangled sound. “I tried. You didn’t get there right away, you know. I’d been arguing myself blue. Then Daddy pulled that gun, and honest to God I thought I was going to faint. I thought it was all over, and everything went all gray. I’m worthless. I should’ve jumped in front of Eddy. I should’ve done something, anything.”

Her voice was full of guilt and regret, feelings that might haunt her the rest of her life. I was reminded again of how young she was, a not very mature nineteen, a kid who could have been one of my pupils. I put an arm around her shoulders.

“None of this was your fault, and if you go blaming yourself for stupid things other people do, you’re going to be miserable your entire life. You didn’t start this thing, you didn’t tell your dad to pull a gun on Eddy, and could’ve, should’ve, would’ve are bullshit statements that’ll just drive you crazy. Things worked out okay, at least right then. But Ruby, if you weren’t mad at Eddy for hitting you, why’d you ask him for a divorce?”

“Because … oh, damn it.” She drew a deep breath and blew it out, reminding me of a horse. “Because Eddy was Eddy. It was like living with a twelve-year-old. He just wasn’t growing up. He wouldn’t take care of anything around the house unless I told him to do it. He’d leave his dirty clothes on the floor, he’d stuff trash into the trash can until it was overflowing, he’d just leave dishes everywhere. He didn’t get along with my family, I knew they hated him, and I hated that. He wouldn’t even get a real job, but he’d do anything Carl Cress told him to do. I hate Carl Cress. Hated, I mean. I’m not even sorry he’s dead—Carl, not Eddy. Nothing was the way it was supposed to be. It was … oh God, I sound so petty.”

I started laughing and squeezed her shoulders. “It doesn’t sound petty at all. I don’t know if it will make you feel better or worse, but I think you pretty much just summed up the first year of married life for ninety percent of marriages. It’s a hell of an adjustment learning to live with someone else, and it didn’t help that you’re both so young. Men don’t grow up as fast as women anyway, and neither one of you had had a chance to be responsible for your own place before you started sharing one. You guys might have worked it out.”

“Maybe,” she said doubtfully.

“I know that Eddy quit his job with Carl Cress. Seems to me like he was trying to do what you wanted.”

“He really quit working for Carl? How do you know?”

“I saw them have a fight myself, and then I talked to his brother. I don’t think Eddy had given up on the two of you.”

She was silent for a long moment, and I could feel her shoulders start to shake with silent sobs again. “I was so mean to him,” she whispered.

I said, “You had to be. You had to say what you said because you were miserable. The thing is, being mean and saying what you said might have saved your marriage. It might have made your life better for both of you. It was sure a wake-up call for Eddy. The first thing he did was take care of the thing that bothered you the most. Who’s to say that he wouldn’t have done other things, and the two of you would have worked things out?”

“Do you really think so?” Wistfulness warred with doubt in her voice.

I thought about my own failed marriage, but decided that this was not the time or place for my own particular brand of cynicism. “There’s no way to know, but I don’t see why not. The real point here, though, is that Eddy hadn’t given up, which means he knew you loved him no matter what the last thing you said to him was.”

This did not have the effect I’d hoped for. Ruby June dissolved into a semi-upright mass of sobs and snot. There was a very good chance I’d be better off throwing away the scarf and letting Kyla think she’d lost it. Also, I was now chilled to the bone and my feet were feeling bruised.

“Okay, okay,” I said, patting Ruby June awkwardly. “Time for us to go in. Listen, Ruby, you don’t know exactly what Eddy was doing for Carl, do you?”

She gulped a last choking sob and said, “Sure I do. He was transporting stolen exotics and drugs.”

*   *   *

Saturday morning dawned cold, brooding, and dark. Sort of like Kyla’s face when I dragged her out of bed at five in the morning in the pitch black of the bunkroom.

“What the hell are you doing?” she asked in a furious whisper as I tugged on her arm. “It’s the middle of the night. Someone better be dying or on fire or both.”

I was just grateful she had enough self-control to keep her voice down. “Come on. I need you.”

For all her primping, fussy ways, Kyla is capable of swift action if caught in the right mood, which in this case was the half-dazed confusion of someone who was just woken from a sound sleep. She pulled on jeans and sweater in the darkness and followed me down the stairs.

In the car, braced by the frigid predawn air, she said, “Where the hell are we going?”

I started the engine. “Carl Cress’s place. We’re going to break in.”

Give her credit, she didn’t open the door and roll from the moving car. On the other hand, I’m pretty sure the look she gave me was a scorcher, and I was grateful for the darkness.

“So having one Shore in jail isn’t enough for you. You think Sheriff Bob is just going to look the other way?”

“I don’t think he’ll ever know. You saw the place. Carl’s wife has left him. Manuel lives in town. There’s nobody there right now.” I hoped this was true, although I hadn’t had a chance to verify it. Still no point in telling Kyla that.

I stopped at the first gate. Somewhat to my surprise, Kyla got out to open it.

When she returned, she said, “What are we looking for?”

“Paperwork,” I answered. “Ruby June said that Carl and Eddy were selling stolen exotics and drugs. Carl might not have kept any records of the drugs, but exotic animals are a legitimate business. If he was selling to T.J. or to some of the other ranches around here, he’ll have receipts.”

“You think a rancher would buy a stolen animal? That would have to be a huge risk.”

“They might not have known. If we find records, it’s likely that Carl was fooling his buyers.”

“I hate to break this to you, but even if we do find proof that Carl was up to something illegal, it isn’t going to help Kel,” she said. “That is what I’m assuming you’re trying to do, right?”

I nodded.

Kyla went on. “So say we do find what you’re looking for. I don’t think anyone is going to be all that shocked that Carl was a crook. It doesn’t have anything to do with the murders.”

“I think it does. I think someone else was involved besides Carl and Eddy. Someone who had a reason to want both of them dead, and someone who is all too happy to have the blame fall on Kel. I’m hoping we find proof of that at Carl’s.”

“Here’s words I never thought I’d say to you: that’s a really good idea. So good, in fact, that you’re an idiot.”

Offended, I glared at her in the darkness before quickly returning my eyes to the road. We were almost at the turnoff to Carl’s place, and I had to pay attention. “What does that mean?”

“You might actually be onto something useful. So why are we breaking in? Why not just report it to the police and let them handle it?”

“Because I think Sheriff Bob might be Carl’s partner.”

She sat in silence for a minute. “That’s ridiculous.”

“Is it? Do you think he’s been doing a good job around here?”

“I don’t think he could find his ass with both hands and a road map, but being incompetent doesn’t make him a criminal.”

“He didn’t do anything about finding Ruby June. He told Aunt Elaine that Colin had gone into Austin, which was a lie, and then he lied about having said it to Elaine.”

“To be fair, he was looking for Eddy’s killer. Looking for Ruby June wasn’t as important,” said Kyla.

“If he was really looking for Eddy’s killer, the first person he should have been trying to find was Ruby June! I think he wasn’t bothering because he already knew who the killer was.”

“Kel?”

“No! Kel didn’t do it.”

“I know that,” she said calmly, “but Sheriff Bob might think he did.”

I shook my head. “No, Sheriff Bob knows Kel is innocent. At first I thought Carl Cress did it, but now that he’s dead, I think maybe Sheriff Bob killed them both.”

“But why?”

“I’m not sure,” I admitted. “That’s why we’re breaking into Carl’s place.”

“I hate playing devil’s advocate,” she began.

This was a bald-faced lie. She loved playing devil’s advocate, and she was extremely good at it. Her mind, although normally self-serving, was also exceptionally sharp and logical. I had no doubt she could chew enough holes in my theory to make it look like cheap Swiss cheese.

“I have no problem believing Carl was up to his eyeballs in crime. I might even consider the theory that Sheriff Bob is a crook. But what in the world makes you think that Carl would have any evidence in his house that Sheriff Bob wouldn’t already have confiscated?”

“It’s a long shot,” I admitted. “But I just keep thinking that anyone as slimy as Carl probably didn’t trust anyone else. I have a feeling that he’d try to keep some kind of leverage over his partners. Plus”—I thought of something else—“he had a reason for selling Uncle Herman that stupid horse, and he said he had some sort of proof that the land that T.J. is contesting actually belongs to Herman. At the very least we might be able to find that.”

“What are you talking about?” she asked, and I quickly recounted Uncle Herman’s tale.

I couldn’t see her face, but she sounded disappointed. “Damn, I was sort of hoping the old guy was blackmailing Carl.”

I laughed. “Yeah, me, too.”

A possum, beady eyes twin flashes of white, trotted through the beam of the headlights and slipped into the brush beside the road as we reached Carl’s ranch house. As I’d hoped and expected, the place was completely dark and no other vehicles stood in the yard. I made a circle, stopped at the foot of the walkway to the front door, and turned off the engine.

“Shouldn’t you hide the car?” Kyla asked. “What if someone comes?”

“It’s five thirty in the morning, and we’re half a mile from the main road. If someone comes, we’re totally screwed. I’ll trade stealth for a quick getaway.”

“Good point.”

We got out, and I took a flashlight and a tool kit from the backseat.

“What are you going to do with that?” she asked with interest.

“You’ll see.”

Clicking on the flashlight, I led the way to the front door. The darkness was absolute. Five thirty in the morning in November was pitch black even without the help of the clouds overhead blocking out the faint light of the stars, and in the shadows thrown by the porch roof and swaying live oaks, we might as well have been in a cave. I shivered and felt grateful that at least I didn’t have to worry about snakes.

Without any real expectation, I tried the handle of the front door and found it locked. The small window just above eye level was too small for my purposes, and in any event breaking in the back seemed more subtle.

“I’m freezing my ass off here,” said Kyla as she followed me. I could hear her rustling through her pockets. “And where the hell is my scarf? I thought I left it in this coat.”

“Shhh,” I told her. “Keep it down.”

“Why? I thought you said no one would be here.” Now she sounded alarmed.

“No one is here,” I reassured her. “I just don’t want to listen to you bitch.”

We reached the back door, and as I’d hoped it was the standard builder-grade version, which had a very large nine-paned window in the top half. This time Kyla tried the knob.

“What the hell? I thought people in the country didn’t lock their doors.”

“This isn’t Mayberry … or the 1950s.”

I put the toolbox on the ground and took out a hammer and one of Uncle Kel’s pink rags.

“Now what are you doing?”

“I’m going to break one of these panes, then reach in and unlock the door,” I told her. “Look away. You don’t want to get glass in your eyes.”

She turned her back and put her hands over her ears as I lifted the hammer. Holding the rag over the glass to keep the splinters from going into my face, I swung hard.

The hammer made a dull thud against the cloth and rebounded in my hand. Kyla swung the flashlight around and we looked at the window. Not even a crack.

“You didn’t hit it hard enough,” she said helpfully.

“Look away,” I told her and repositioned the cloth. My next swing was from the shoulder. Thump! went the hammer.

Kyla turned back again, and we both stared at the unblemished surface of the glass.

“What is wrong with you? Hit it.”

“I
am
hitting it. It must be the cloth deflecting it.”

“Oh give me that,” she snapped and snatched the hammer from my grip.

I turned away just as she went into the windup. The crack of the hammer against the pane sounded like a rifle shot in the predawn silence. I turned, expecting to see shattered glass everywhere.

The light of the flashlight revealed a single long crack, stretching diagonally from the lower right pane above the door handle all the way up to the top left pane.

Kyla said, “Oh my God. It’s not a bunch of panes. It’s one big pane with wood slats over it. How cheap is that?”

“Not as cheap as I’d hoped,” I said, examining it. “It’s obviously safety glass. We’re never going to get through that.”

“Oh yes, we will,” snapped Kyla, and proceeded to beat on the glass with all her might.