Ten-Gallon Tensions in Texas: A Kate on Vacation Mystery (The Kate on Vacation Mysteries Book 3) (9 page)

“Around the time of death,” José added.

“I don’t know who you saw but it wasn’t me!”

Skip stopped and thought for a moment, visualizing the man he’d seen in his mind’s eye. “I didn’t see a face, but the guy I saw sure was dressed like you, and carried himself like you do.”

“Dressed how?” Bobby Joe demanded.

“Leather jacket with fringe. Beat-up Stetson.”

Bobby Joe tilted his head and looked down his thin nose at Skip. “You’ve been back East too long, Canfield. That ain’t exactly unusual apparel around here. Besides I got an alibi.”

“What alibi?” José said.

“I had a date, with Shelly Adams.”

José paused. “What about the bat? How’d your prints get on it? It’s a wooden one, looks fairly new. Painted dark blue with black–”

“Black vinyl around the handle.” Bobby Joe’s face had paled under his tan.

A beat of silence, then José asked, “Whose bat is it?”

Bobby Joe shook his head and ran a hand through his hair.

José narrowed his eyes. “Talk to me.”

Bobby Joe looked down at the floor, shook his head again. “I gave it to my nephew last Christmas,” he mumbled.

“That would explain your sister’s prints on there, too.”

Skip had wondered when José was going to mention them.

Bobby Joe’s head jerked up. Then he gave a slight nod of his head. “You think Sammy’s been vandalizing this place?”

“Don’t know about the other stuff,” José said. “But I’d bet money he bashed in those windshields.” He turned and walked out the service area door.

Skip trailed after, feeling sorry for his friend. The problem with being the law in a small town is that you end up arresting your friends and neighbors on a regular basis.

~~~~~~~~

Kate caught up with her husband and the sheriff on Joellen Bradley’s wide wooden porch. The front door was open and José, his hat in his hand, was talking to Joellen.

Kate stood on tiptoe to whisper to Skip. “Your brother-in-law’s fine. He’s already doctored himself with a medicinal dose of whiskey.”

Skip winced, then gave a slight shake of his head.

Joellen wheeled around. “Samuel Beauford,” she yelled into the house. “You get your sorry butt down here!”

The clatter of feet coming down stairs.

Joellen whirled back around. “Y’all get in here! I’m not discussin’ this business on the porch.”

In the living room, she planted her hands on her hips and leaned into her son’s face. As tall as she was, the boy was already almost as tall. “What the hell have you been up to?”

José stepped forward and put a hand on her arm. “I’ll ask the questions.”

She rounded on him, glaring, her fists clenched.

He held up his hands in front of him, palms out. “Calm down, Joellen.”

She ground her teeth, then took a deep breath and stepped back.

“Sammy,” José said, “where’s your baseball bat?”

The boy blanched. “Uh, I…I guess it’s…uh, out back in the shed?”

“Show me.” José gestured with the hat in his hand toward the back of the house.

They all headed out through the kitchen into the yard. Sammy crossed to a garden shed and opened the door. He stuck his head inside, then pulled it back out again. “It ain’t here. Somebody musta took it.”

José tilted his head at the boy. “May I take a look?”

Sammy just stared at him.

“Of course ya can,” Joellen said.

Skip stepped forward beside José and they both leaned into the shed, Skip’s head a foot above the sheriff’s.

Kate heard Skip whisper, “That’s the bike.”

José gave a small nod. They backed a step away from the shed in unison and pivoted on their heels.

If the situation hadn’t been so serious, Kate would have laughed. They were such an unlikely pair but already, on such short re-acquaintance, they were as in sync as brothers.

“You keep this shed unlocked?” José asked Joellen.

She nodded.

Kate wasn’t surprised. Her mother-in-law didn’t even lock her house, except when she went to bed at night.

For a moment, several emotions waged war on Joellen’s face. Then she seemed to deflate. “Nobody stole the bat.” She turned to her son. “’Fess up, Sammy. You busted up those windshields, didn’t you?”

The boy’s body went rigid. His lips curled back over clenched teeth. “Yes, I did. Mr. Bolton killed Daddy!”

“No he didn’t, son,” José said. “Or at least his gun didn’t.”

Joellen sagged, air whooshing from her lungs.

Odd reaction
, Kate thought. The woman seemed relieved to hear of Jimmy’s innocence. Was her brother-in-law fooling around with the divorcée?

Kate found that hard to believe, but then she wouldn’t have thought Jimmy Bolton was a drunkard either, until this trip.

“Where were you yesterday afternoon, son?” José asked.

The boy looked at him, his eyes wide. ¨What time?”

“Around three.”

“Uh, I was runnin’ an errand for Mom.”

“That was later, Sammy,” Joellen said.

“Oh, well I don’t remember exactly where I was then.”

“Were you ridin’ your bike?” José said.

He shook his head.

José turned to Kate and Skip, his back to Sammy. “You wanna press charges?” he whispered.

Skip glanced at her.

She gave a slight shake of her head. Losing a parent could make adults a little crazy, much less a thirteen-year-old. That trail had been well traveled, the clearing no doubt a favorite spot for quite a few folks. They had come along while Sammy was hanging out there, and in his mind they were associated with the man he believed had murdered his father.

“No,” Skip whispered back to the sheriff. “We’ll let it go.”

“What’s gonna happen to the boy?” Bobby Joe said from behind them.

They all turned. He was standing in the middle of the yard, the Stetson and cowboy boots out of sync with his greasy overalls.

Skip jerked a little beside her. Kate raised an eyebrow at him. He made eye contact and shook his head slightly.

He’s thought of something.

Excitement bubbled in her chest. She tried to suppress it. That didn’t mean he’d solved the murder.

“I’ll make good the damages,” Joellen said. “And Sammy will apologize, and work for free for Bolton Cars for the rest of the summer.”

“Mom!” Sammy protested.

“Shut up, boy,” she said through gritted teeth.

José shrugged. “It’s up to Jimmy, if he wants to press charges or not.” He tilted his head in Skip’s direction.

“I couldn’t begin to tell you what Jimmy’s reaction will be,” Skip said.

Bobby Joe’s expression was grim. He curled his finger in a come-here gesture. “You can start today, boy, with sweepin’ up the glass.”

Kate waited until the three of them were out on the front sidewalk. “What?” she said in a low voice to her husband.

Skip turned to José. “The guy I saw in the men’s room, that I thought was Bobby Joe, he wasn’t wearin’ cowboy boots. He was wearin’ sneakers.”

José stopped walking. “Sneakers?”

“Yeah. They were dirty and worn.”

“Not Bobby Joe then,” José said. “I swear he sleeps in those damn boots.”

“No,” Skip said, “but probably our killer.”

Kate was confused. How did sneakers add up to killer? She looked from one man to the other.

“You can trust her not to blab it around,” Skip said.

José nodded, his face tight. “We found a partial sneaker print on the toilet seat in the stall next to Sam’s.”

CHAPTER TEN

By Thursday morning, the sheriff was no closer to solving Sam Beauford’s murder. Jimmy Bolton was sinking rapidly into full-blown alcoholism. Suzanne was making no pretense about the fact that she was now running Bolton Cars. And Kate was bored silly.

Each day, her mother-in-law took Billy and Edie, often with one or more of their cousins, on some kind of outing. Kate didn’t mind turning her offspring over to their granny, even though she knew it would take awhile once they were home again to get the kids under control.

But she was quickly discovering that day-to-day life in small town Texas wasn’t very exciting. To be fair, small town life everywhere was probably pretty dull.

“I’m worried about Jimmy,” Kate said to Skip over their second cup of coffee. “He needs a rehab program.”

Skip nodded. “I’m hopin’ once Beauford’s murder is solved, and Jimmy’s name has been cleared, he’ll settle down some.”

She didn’t say anything, but she was skeptical. She feared her brother-in-law’s drinking had moved beyond just a means to cope with the crap that was happening in his life.

“Let’s check in with José,” Skip said.

Kate shrugged. “Might as well.”

They were scheduled to go to dinner at the sheriff’s house that night. But it would be good to get an update on the case before then–it might minimize the amount of law-enforcement shoptalk the guys engaged in tonight.

They almost collided with José as he was coming out of his office. “Mornin’, Kate,” he said, then turned to Skip. “I was gonna send for you in a bit. I’ve got an idea. I’m gettin’ some men together to do a line-up.”

Skip’s eyebrows went up. “What for?”

“You’ll see. It may or may not work. Can you come back here in about an hour?”

“Sure.”

They strolled through the business district, hand in hand. Even this was getting old. Kate had already window-shopped her way down the main drag plus every side street that had any stores on them.

Skip stopped in front of one plate-glass window. Scattered amongst an array of boots were stands and mannequin heads sporting cowboy hats, in every color, size and fabric imaginable. There was even a black felt one covered in white lace.

“You need that one,” Skip said.

Kate shook her head. “Hardly.”

He dragged her into the store anyway.

A blue-eyed blonde stepped forward to greet them. Kate guessed that she was in her late thirties.

“How can I help you folks today?”

“What have you got in ladies’ hats?” Skip asked.

She tilted her head to one side as she studied Kate. “Be right back.”

Five minutes later, the counter was covered with a dozen large boxes. The woman extracted a cream-colored felt hat from one of them. “Now this is our most budget-conscious model. Very becoming for dark-haired ladies.” She held it out, then turned a mirror on a  stand around so Kate could see herself in it.

She dutifully tried the hat on. It looked fine. “Where the heck would I wear this, Skip?”

“Here, when we come for the Cowboy Festival. The hats will be a lot more expensive then.”

The young woman gave him a mock scowl.

He flashed her his most charming smile.

The woman’s face brightened. “Hey, aren’t you Skip Canfield? You went to school with my cousin.”

“Yeah, that’s me. Who´s your cousin?”

“Bud Townsend.”

Kate recognized the name as one of the men who had stopped at their table Friday night.

“I was just in middle school but I had such a crush on you when you were a senior.” She grinned at him. “You were the most handsome man I’d ever seen.”

Skip’s cheeks turned pink. “I was hardly a man.”

“To me you were. Of course I was only fourteen at the time.”

The pink tide edged toward red. “Uh, this is my wife, Kate.”

The woman didn’t miss a beat. She stuck out her hand. “Pleased to meet ya.”

Kate shook it, mentally adjusting the woman’s age to mid-forties.

“Try on some more hats, Kate. We’ve got an hour to kill.”

She snuck a peek at the price tag as she removed the cream model from her head. The budget-conscious one was fifty-nine dollars.

Skip rolled his eyes at the expression on her face. “I’m paying for it. Miss…”

“Beauford. Carolyn Beauford. I’m married to Sam’s youngest brother.”

“Oh, uh, sorry for your loss,” he said.

Mrs. Beauford shook her head. “I’m not. Sam was the most despicable person I’ve ever known. Whoever killed him did this town, heck the whole universe, a favor.”

Tell us how you really feel.
Kate hid a smile.

Skip leaned forward a little. “Who were his enemies?”

Carolyn Beauford pursed her lips. “It’s a whole lot easier to list his friends. Here try this one, Mrs. Canfield.” She pulled a brown hat out of a box.

Skip held out his hand, blocking Kate from taking the hat. “Don’t let her see the price tags.”

The woman turned away and plucked at a string that held the price tag to the hatband. The tag now closed in her fist, she held out the hat. “Here ya go, ma’am.”

“Call me Kate, please.” She took the hat.

The woman beamed at her. “And I’m Carolyn. Sure is nice to have you all in town. Are you here to stay?” With a practiced hand, she adjusted the mirror to a better angle.

“Just visiting my mother,” Skip said.

Kate tipped the hat slightly to one side on her head. “Is this leather?”

“Yes, ma’am, uh Kate. It is genuine cowhide.”

Kate took it off and rubbed her palm over the butter-soft crown.

Forty minutes later, they left the shop. Kate was wearing a tan leather Stetson, with a dark band that matched her hair.

And she was harboring a strong suspicion that something nasty had gone down between Carolyn Beauford and her brother-in-law. Or perhaps between her husband and his brother.

Skip had tried a couple more times to bring the conversation back around to Sam’s murder, while encouraging Kate to continue to try on hats even after they both knew the tan one was meant for her.

Each time, Carolyn’s back had stiffened and her normally friendly eyes had gone hard. But she declined to comment further, quickly changing the subject to other things. They now knew that she had three sons, her husband was a manager at the plastics plant just outside of town and her cat was getting old, but they had no more information on why she hated her brother-in-law.

~~~~

Skip smiled down at his wife, decked out in her new hat. That color really did look good on her.

“I don’t know what you paid for this thing,” Kate said, “but it was too much. Only chance I’ll get to wear it back home is when I’m gardening.”

He slid his arm around her shoulders. “But you’ll be the best dressed gardener in town.”