The Kill (37 page)

Out of town on business? So Charles obviously wasn’t going to attend Uncle Richard’s funeral. Abigale knew it was petty to view Charles’s absence as an insult, but she felt slighted nonetheless. Charles had been courting Uncle Richard—had asked him to go out on a limb to support his development—but didn’t have time to show up at his funeral? “When will he be back?” Abigale asked.

“He takes the red-eye back Wednesday night. He’ll be home Thursday morning.”

Abigale said, “Then call Lieutenant Mallory by the end of the day on Thursday.”

M
anning had driven his BMW home from Dartmoor Glebe following the hunt and now was insisting on driving it to the funeral service.

“I’m tired of being chauffeured around by you,” he said, putting an end to the discussion about who would drive.

His words stung and Abigale stepped away, reaching for her coat. “Okay.”

“Hey, Abby, I didn’t mean it that way. I really appreciate that you’ve driven me everywhere. But I’m okay to drive now.” Manning grabbed her hand and drew her close, slipping both hands around her waist. He flashed a crooked grin. “It’s a guy thing. I need a chance to show my masculine side.”

She couldn’t resist a smile. “No problem in that department.”

He pressed his lips tenderly against her forehead and smoothed her hair, his blue eyes growing serious. “We’re going to get through this together, okay?”

Abigale nodded.

“Come on.” Manning helped her slip into her coat, making a show of ogling her bare legs as they walked to the door. “Nice legs.”

She glanced down at the black pumps she was wearing. “I don’t remember the last time I wore a dress. Or heels. I’ll be lucky if I make it through the evening without falling on my face. I was going to buy flats, but the gals at Tully Rector’s shop talked me into buying these.”

“I like them. They show off your calves.” Manning opened the front door, motioning for her to go first. “After you.”

Abigale eyed the tweed coat he was wearing. “Aren’t you going to wear your scarlet?”

“Mother has it. I’m going to wear the one she took to the cleaner last week. My nice one.”

Abigale raised an eyebrow at the red coat that hung on a hook by the door. “That one isn’t nice?”

“Not nice enough for Mother.” As he pulled the door shut, he looked down at his freshly polished boots and clean breeches. “Keep your fingers crossed I pass inspection.”

The church was in Middleburg, about a twenty-minute drive, and Manning handled his sports car the way she’d expect him to—fast and aggressive. It must have hurt like hell to shift gears with his broken arm, but Abigale pretended not to notice when he winced a couple of times. Nor did she comment on how swollen his fingers looked.

Manning tuned the radio to a classical station and Abigale’s thoughts drifted to her confrontation with Tiffanie that morning. She wasn’t at all convinced Tiffanie had told her the truth. At least not the whole truth. She couldn’t square Tiffanie’s story with the notation in Uncle Richard’s journal. If the meeting was truly spur-of-the-moment as Tiffanie claimed, what was the reference in the journal about? Was it a coincidence? Uncle Richard wrote a note to himself, a reminder about something involving Tiffanie, and by chance Tiffanie decided to show up at Longmeadow? Unlikely.

Abigale’s instincts told her she was missing part of the puzzle. Her uncle’s comment about the fox in the henhouse kept running through her head. Did that somehow tie in with their meeting? Could Uncle Richard have wanted to talk to Tiffanie about Charles’s affair? If so, it made sense that Tiffanie wouldn’t want to reveal that to her.

Whatever the reason, she was convinced Tiffanie was hiding something. But why? Was Tiffanie really embarrassed to admit she had pressured Uncle Richard to give Charles his colors? Or about the fact that they’d discussed Charles’s affair? Or had Tiffanie met with her uncle for an entirely different reason?

Tiffanie had feigned disinterest when she’d told Abigale about the subdivision her husband wanted to build on Percy’s property. But was she really so indifferent to the project? The development would no doubt reap substantial financial rewards to the Jenners. And Tiffanie certainly seemed motivated by material possessions. Maybe the meeting had nothing to do with the hunt or Charles’s affair. Perhaps Tiffanie had met with Uncle Richard to put pressure on him to publicly support the development. And if he had refused, or worse yet, told her he was going to oppose it…

She didn’t think it likely that Tiffanie had shot her uncle. But she also wouldn’t rule it out. What was it Margaret had said about Tiffanie, that she “wouldn’t turn her back on her for an instant”? Tiffanie’s voice rang in Abigale’s ears, telling her she’d hacked in early from the hunt on the day of Uncle Richard’s death because her horse had lost a shoe. So Tiffanie had been at the hunt that day; she could have slipped into Uncle Richard’s trailer before the hunt and slit the billet straps on his saddle. Tiffanie had also mentioned being at the tailgate—hearing Uncle Richard mention that he was going to Longmeadow—so after she’d hacked in she must have hung around the trailers waiting for the others to return. She could have sliced the billet straps after Uncle Richard returned from hunting, setting him up for the next ride.

Then a thought struck her like a kick to the gut.
Maybe she was focusing on the wrong Jenner
. What if Charles was the one who’d tampered with the saddle? Or confronted Uncle Richard about the development?
Shot him?
Perhaps Charles’s trip to California wasn’t just a snub to Uncle Richard after all. Maybe Charles had deliberately scheduled the California trip so he’d miss the funeral—and avoid coming face to face with what he’d done.

For that matter, what about Percy? He had as much at stake as Charles if the subdivision wasn’t approved. Perhaps more, if Tiffanie’s remark about Percy being desperate to sell was true. Despite what Manning had said, she still found it suspicious that Percy had known Manning was riding in Uncle Richard’s saddle when he was injured.

Abigale almost groaned with frustration. She needed to hear what Dario Reyes had to say about what he’d seen and heard at Longmeadow. Find out whether he could identify the vehicle Michelle claimed he’d seen leave the racecourse and determine if she thought he was telling the truth.

She had checked her email when Manning was in the shower and found nothing from Michelle de Becque. But the possibility that an email could now be sitting in her in-box nagged at her. She’d hated that Emilio was addicted to his BlackBerry, always thumbing through his messages. Yet, for the first time, she understood his addiction and wished she had a Smartphone, or had at least signed up for email access on her cell.

“Hey, you all right?” Manning asked, squeezing her knee. “You look like you’re trying to solve the world’s problems.”

She forced a smile. “I’m okay. Just going round and round in my head about Uncle Richard’s death.”

“Yeah, I know what you mean.”

Abigale felt a stab of guilt for not confiding in him, telling him what Michelle had said about Dario Reyes. But she’d promised Michelle she wouldn’t tell anyone, including Manning, and she’d keep that promise. At least long enough to give Michelle a chance to talk to her friend. If she didn’t hear something by tomorrow, she’d reconsider.

“There’s Mother,” Manning said, pulling to a stop in front of the ivy-covered brick chapel.

Margaret stood outside the front door, a scarlet coat in dry-cleaner wrap draped over her arm. She was deep in conversation with an attractive, serious-looking woman in a black suit and a dark-haired, handsome man dressed in scarlet hunt attire. He was about Manning’s height, but older, his temples powdered with a blush of gray. Abigale thought she recognized him but couldn’t place him.

“That’s Doug Cummings and his wife, Anne,” Manning said. “Did you meet him at the hunt this morning?”

Ah
. That was why he looked familiar. “I didn’t meet him, but I saw him there. He led the second field, right?”

Manning nodded. “You’ll like him. Doug’s a good guy. He was a close friend of Richard’s. Anne was Richard’s friend, too. And his lawyer. She drafted Richard’s will.”

Abigale’s eyes shot over to Manning. Anne was the one who’d told Margaret that Richard was having second thoughts about his will. That he was going to give Manning an ultimatum.

One corner of Manning’s mouth twitched into a smile. “Don’t worry, I don’t blame her. Don’t kill the messenger, right?”

T
he organ music stopped and Abigale glanced over her shoulder. Every pew in the small chapel was packed with people. Margaret told her a big-screen TV had been set up in the parish house next door to broadcast the service to the overflow crowd.

The six pallbearers marched up the aisle in pairs: Smitty and Manning first, followed by Doug Cummings and a man she didn’t recognize. Thompson and another man brought up the rear. All six wore scarlet hunt coats, white breeches bleached snow white, and black boots spit-polished to a military gleam. One of the men she didn’t recognize had a gold collar on his coat, the other hunter green, the colors of their respective hunts. Manning and the other three members of the Middleburg Foxhounds displayed robin’s-egg-blue collars with navy piping.

Manning took his seat between Abigale and Margaret. Smitty and Doug sat to Margaret’s right. Thompson and the other men sat in the second row. As the reverend asked them to join her in prayer, Manning slipped his hand through Abigale’s, squeezed gently, and slid his other hand over Margaret’s. Goose bumps pricked Abigale’s arms when the vocalist sang “The Lord’s Prayer,” and she saw tears seep down the fine crinkles in Margaret’s cheeks.

Doug rose to deliver the eulogy, pausing briefly as he passed the coffin. His blue eyes misted as he took the podium, and he fiddled longer than was necessary adjusting the microphone. But when he spoke his voice rang strong, echoing off the granite walls of the tiny church.

“We lost a dear friend last week. There are no words that can express the love and sorrow that fill our hearts. And yet we gather here today to honor Richard. Perhaps in so doing we try to deny the fact that he is gone, or at least prolong our farewell, possibly revere him in a way we dared not do in his presence. But the truest testimony to Richard lies not in what we say here today, but in the way he lived his life—with courage, honor, humility, and compassion.

“Richard was a Southern gentleman in the truest sense of the word. He treated those around him with charm—especially the ladies—and with respect. And it was genuine.

“Richard was a leader, in the hunt and in the community. Going places with him socially was like walking in the shadow of a rock star. Every five feet someone would stop him, want his attention. And yet no question, no concern, was too trivial for Richard to spend time talking about.” Doug paused and smiled. His eyes shone with a mixture of sadness and affection. “I often accused Richard of campaigning for mayor of Middleburg, and I’m not so sure he didn’t have designs on serving in that capacity one day.”

A light titter wafted through the church. Abigale felt the heavy weight that seemed to be lodged in her belly ease some. She drew in a long, slow breath. Manning gave her a sideways glance, the barest of smiles.

“Richard loved horses, hounds, and open space,” Doug continued.” He was a foxhunting purist and the finest master I have ever had the privilege to ride behind. He hunted with skill and instinct—keen for great sport, yet ever mindful of the safety and enjoyment of those riding behind him.

“I remember hunting with Richard one day as a child. I was probably eight or nine, and my father had me ride with him near the front of the field, something several of the more senior members took exception to. Richard wasn’t master then, but he was riding up front near us when we approached a jump in the fence behind Stony Bank that was giving everyone problems. It was a brand-spanking-new coop—a good three foot nine, four feet—and a nearby oak tree cast a dark shadow across the fresh boards. The first horse spooked at the shadow, as did the one behind it, and it turned into monkey see-monkey do, with one horse after the other refusing the coop.