One Hoof In The Grave [Carriage Driving 02] (36 page)

“That’s why they ran us off the road,” I said, warming to his line of reasoning. “If we’d crashed, if we’d been unconscious or dead, whoever ran us off could have searched at leisure.” I shook my head. “But how does that help? We still don’t know who owns the killer SUV.”

“How many dark vans would you say were parked at the Tollivers?”

I shrugged. “Fifteen, maybe.”

“Locked?”

“Probably not. At a private show, most people leave their keys on the front seat or the dashboard in case the vehicle has to be moved to let a trailer go past.”

“So anyone could climb into an SUV, drive it for thirty minutes or so, drive it back, park it in the same spot, and walk off.”

“What if the owner wanted his van while it was gone?”

“Make up an excuse.
I’m so sorry, my truck was blocked in, and I had to pick up a prescription for my sick horse.”

“Lame.”

“Would you question one of your friends?” Geoff asked.

“Probably not,” I said.

“What did you bring home from the Tollivers?”

“The things we took with us in the first place,” I said. “Tack, horses, stable stuff, carriages, feed, hay. We’ve fed the hay. No hat pin.” I hesitated.

“What?” He must have seen something in my face.

“We brought home one thing we didn’t take with us. We borrowed the Tollivers’ little Meadowbrook to drive Don Qui.”

“Where had it been parked?”

“Harry Tolliver moved it out of the way to leave room for the other carriages and trailers. It had been sitting in the back end of his stable by the woods.” I gasped.

“Right. Out the way but close at hand for anyone walking out of the woods.”

“I pulled it to our trailer by the shafts, then collapsed it and slid it under Dick’s big marathon carriage. I didn’t see any hat pins.”

He nodded. “Presumably it was hidden somehow. What did you do with it when you got it home?”

“We left it locked in the trailer. It fit perfectly between the wheels of Dick’s marathon carriage. We didn’t need either carriage right away, so we left them both where they were under Dick’s dust cover in the trailer.” I stared at Geoff. “That cover comes all the way to the ground. Somebody looking in the back window of our trailer wouldn’t have seen the VSE carriage folded up under the big one.”

He began to laugh. “Talk about frustrating. Your killer tries to run you off the road. Doesn’t work. He hunts for your little Meadowbrook here and can’t find it. You almost catch him, so he knocks you into the cellar. Then he comes back, still can’t find the carriage, and we almost catch
him
. Poor guy must be half crazy with frustration.”

“The next time he tries to get in, he finds locked gates, cameras, more lights, deadbolts on every door. I almost feel sorry for him.”

“Don’t.”

“But did the same person kill Gwen or was it the drug dealers?” I asked. “Two separate killers seems pretty far-fetched. Unless it was two people working together.”

“Try this on for size,” Geoff said. “Gwen was up all night at the Tollivers before Raleigh was killed. After she finally cleared her colic, she’d want a few hours of sleep back home. Everyone else would hole up to catch a little sleep in their trailers or inside the stable.

“She swore she didn’t see Raleigh putting to, but maybe she saw his killer. Someone who shouldn’t have been there that early, or later said they weren’t. Eventually she realized what she’d seen and tried her hand at blackmail. She still hadn’t been paid for the coke shipment, remember, because it hadn’t yet been picked up. She could have seen blackmail as a stopgap measure.”

“Or maybe a little windfall she wouldn’t have to share with Brock.”

“She was one greedy woman. As small as she was, she wouldn’t have stood a chance against a surprise attack from someone holding a wire garrote.”

I shivered. “We’ve been calling the killer he, but it doesn’t have to be, does it? I mean, if it really was a hatpin . . .”

“If somebody walked up to Raleigh that morning brandishing a revolver or a kitchen knife, he’d have reacted differently. He wouldn’t consider a hatpin as a weapon, nor a woman as a threat.”

“Why not just abandon the hatpin in the wound?” I asked. But I already knew the answer. “Wait—”

“You said it yourself. Somehow it’s recognizable.”

“So where is it?”

“Where’s the little Meadowbrook?” he asked.

“We set it up to drive Don Qui. Then Dick locked it in Hiram’s barn out of the way.”

“Murderous bastard still can’t get to it.”

“I have the key.” We climbed out of the truck. I pointed three people with questions to Sandi, unlocked the barn, slipped inside with Geoff and twisted the deadbolt behind us. The little Meadowbrook stood like an altar boy beside Dick’s marathon carriage.

Hiram installed lots of work lights when he used this barn as his workshop, so we had plenty of light even with the doors closed. At first glance I couldn’t see where to hide anything like a hatpin around the Meadowbrook. The carriage was all wood except for the two leather seats. I propped the folding left seat up against the fender, used Geoff’s penlight and searched for pin pricks in the upholstery. Nothing.

The right-hand seat was screwed down and couldn’t be lifted. In order to check it out, I had to lie down on my back and look up. I was about ready to give up and let Geoff try, when I saw that there were a couple of loose stitches along the bottom seam of the seat. No stuffing poked through, but there seemed to be a lump under the leather.

“Give me your pocketknife,” I said.

“How do you know I carry one?”

“Don’t be a wiseass.”

He handed me the knife.

“Now hold the flashlight right here.”

“Your wish is my command, princess, but put these on before you go monkeying with anything else. You’ve already had your hands all over this cart, so your fingerprints will be on it in any case, but now that we know what we’re looking for, it’s better to take precautions.” He handed me a pair of latex gloves. I’ve never known him to be without several pairs. Must be an occupational thing, like carrying a gun.

I gripped the knife in my teeth pirate fashion while I put on the latex gloves. Then I waggled the knifepoint carefully into the seam to widen it just enough to get two fingers inside. “I feel something,” I said. “It’s lumpy.”

“Hurry up.”

“I’m hurrying.” By the time I had worried the object far enough out of the upholstery to get a grip on it and pull, I was sweating. “Gotcha,” I said. “Give me a hand here.”

Geoff grabbed me around the waist and pulled me up and into his arms. I think he was considering kissing me, but it would have been difficult while I held a lethal weapon in each hand—his knife in one and a six-inch hatpin without a guard in the other.

I tore my eyes from his as he dropped his hands and aimed his flashlight at the pin. It looked rusty.

Not rust. Dried Blood. I recognized it at once. I know whose hatpin it was, although I prayed I was wrong. I looked closer.

I was right.

“Oh, dear God.” I said. “Oh, my.”

“Whose is it?”

I hesitated.

“You know who owns it.” He laid his flashlight on the seat, pulled a clean handkerchief from his pocket, and laid the pin gently in it. I couldn’t take my eyes off it.

“Doesn’t mean the owner is the one who used it. Maybe the killer stole it from her.”

“Dammit, Merry. Who owns the pin?”

I didn’t want to say the name even now. “Look at the end of it. That’s not a bead. It’s an antique topaz. I’ve seen it dozens of times.”

“Who, blast it?”

I sighed. “Catherine Harris.” I cut my eyes at him. “But she has an alibi, doesn’t she? Both she and Troy? And why on earth would she kill Raleigh? I know they didn’t like one another, but . . .”

“Go get Peggy’s hatpin out of your truck. Don’t let anyone see you do it.” He wrapped Catherine’s pin in the handkerchief, then slipped it carefully into his jacket pocket.

I went. He took Peggy’s hatpin from me, bent down and carefully inserted it in the upholstery where Catherine’s had been.

“You’re setting up a sting, aren’t you?” I said.

He nodded. “Worked for Stan and the cocaine.”

“Would you please wait until after the clinic to arrest her?”

His jaw dropped halfway to his belt buckle. “I beg your pardon.”

I drove my hands through my hair. “I’m crazy and selfish, but she’s no danger to anyone here, is she? Think about the money for Casey’s carriage. Think about the bad publicity to the farm. Oh, God, I sound like the mayor in
Jaws
. Don’t warn people about the twenty-foot shark. It might disturb their afternoon at the beach.”

“Even if it is hers,
she
may not have used it. I need to check a few things before I arrest her or anyone else.”

“Don’t you need a warrant?” I asked in a small voice.

He shook his head. “I can arrest without a warrant. You’ll have to act as though nothing unusual has happened.”

Just great. How could I treat Catherine as though I hadn’t a clue she might be a killer? Heck, if Troy really was my half-brother, then she was my kinfolk. Sort of. I dropped my head in my hands. “I wish all these people would go home. I should never have had this show.”

He pulled me against him and propped his chin on the top of my bent head. “Hang in there. You say you’re good in a crisis. Prove it.”

“How?”

“Keep this door locked until I tell you to open it. Stay the hell away from Catherine, Troy, and anyone else who had a reason to kill Raleigh.”

“What are you going to do?” I sounded whiny. I hate that.

“Some elementary police work. I’m headed to Mossy Creek to borrow Amos’s office.”

“What are you looking for?”

“I’m going to try to break an alibi and isolate a motive.” He shoved his flashlight into his back pocket, took my face in both hands and kissed me. He took his time. So did I. The man could
kiss
, I’ll say that for him. I dropped his knife—never a good thing to do with a knife. Since I didn’t spear either of us in the instep, we ignored it for some time. I suspect by the time he let me go, I was cross-eyed. I certainly couldn’t breathe.

“Does that mean I’m no longer a murder suspect?” I gasped.

“In my book you never were, but I still had to avoid the appearance of impropriety. I explained all that last year.”

“Screw propriety.” I took hold of his polo shirt and kissed him again. He responded quite nicely, then held me against his chest. “I’m scared, Agent Wheeler.”

“I know, Merry. I won’t take long. Just act natural.” He bent down, pulled his knife out of the dirt floor, closed it and dropped it into his pocket. He turned away before I did. I didn’t think my feet would work right anyway. He unlocked the door and slipped it open a crack. “Lock this after you leave and don’t open it again until I tell you to.”

And don’t get killed in the meantime. I would definitely try not to, despite what Peggy calls my
speaking countenance
. I’m a terrible liar, which is why I try to tell the truth whenever possible. By the time I locked the deadbolt, Geoff’s Crown Vic was out of sight.

How was I supposed to make nice with Catherine?

How was I supposed to keep my mind on the show and not on that kiss?

How was I not going to tell Peggy?

I forgot to tell Geoff I knew why Catherine wanted Raleigh dead.