The Murder of a Queen Bee (25 page)

But Abby knew it wasn't okay; she was worried. To call for help, she needed her phone. Abby's heart pounded like that of a thoroughbred entering the final stretch in a horse race. Her situation was dire. She had no backup and no partner. First rule of survival: stay calm, clearheaded, and focused. The daypack was on the bed, but she didn't know which direction the shot had come from. Could the shooter see her? Detect movement? Had she locked the house? A shiver shot up her spine. In a split second, she needed to lock the back door, find her phone, and call for help.

“Come, Sugar.” She prayed the dog would follow her. “Let's go, sweetie.” Cautiously, she inched over the shards and reached the hallway without cutting herself. And then . . . the kitchen. The dog sat on her haunches at the end of the hall, quiet and still. “Stay,” Abby commanded as she crawled into the kitchen.

Easing up to a squat, Abby then rose and flattened her body against the wall. Like a silent shadow, she moved past the refrigerator, washer, and dryer until she reached the slider. She realized she had only partially closed the vertical blinds. Too late now. She searched for movement in the blackness beyond the door. Back by the henhouse, she saw a flash of light, like a match to a cigarette . . . and then it was gone.

Feeling for the door latch, she located the metal tab and plunged it down into the locked position. Inhaling and slowly letting the breath go, she crept along the wall to the safety of the hallway where Sugar was waiting. “Good girl.”

Now to get the phone. Abby crept into the bedroom. Keeping her body below the bed frame, she stroked her hand along the top of the mattress, feeling for the daypack. When her fingers touched the rough canvas of the pack, she pinched it and pulled the pack toward her. With the pack on the floor, she remained quiet for a millisecond, listening. The stillness of the night drilled on in her ears like a high-pitched whine from electrical wires. Had the shooter finished his smoke?

Crawling back into the hallway, Abby pulled the zipper across its slide and opened the pack. She pulled out the phone. Pushed the button on the side. The green screen lit up with the time, 3:30 a.m. Abby tapped the icon for contacts and then the entry for police dispatch.

“What's your emergency?” the female dispatcher asked when the call connected.

“Attempted one-eighty-seven,” Abby whispered as loud as she dared. “Two shots. Fired at me through my bedroom window.”

“Is the shooter still there?”

“Think so. Yes.”

“Your address?”

“Henny Penny Farmette on Farm Hill Road.”

“Your name?”

“Abigail Mackenzie.”

“Stay on the line with me.”

Abby assumed that the dispatcher was sending the message out to all cruisers and emergency vehicles in the area.

“Are you in a safe place?” the dispatcher asked.

“Not really. The hallway.”

“Can you safely get to a room with a locking door?”

“Will try.”

“Police are on their way. Don't hang up.”

Abby moistened her lips. “Okay. I know the drill.”

With her gun in one hand and the phone in the other, Abby crawled on all fours down the hallway, with Sugar padding alongside. At the master bathroom, Abby abruptly stopped . . . listened. The patio slider lock jiggled. Her heart raced. In her head, alarm bells sounded. She had only a minute or two to hide somewhere.
But where?
She felt for the handles on the vanity double doors . . . then stopped.
Even if I fit, Sugar won't. Not an option.

The assailant's heavy footsteps clomped beyond the exterior of the broken bedroom window. Paused.

Easy way in. Minutes . . . maybe seconds . . . all I've got, if that.
Abby crawled from the master bath to the hallway's small office area.
Maybe we can hide under the desk.
She inched forward. Found the desk but was blocked by a large cardboard box. Then it dawned on her. The bathtub box. If it held the tub . . . Abby felt for the lid. Lifted it. Laid the phone inside. She hoisted up Sugar, set her inside, and then crawled in.

A loud thud at the front of the house told Abby the intruder had walked on past the broken window to check the front door. He had knocked over a metal chair on the porch. But why hadn't he used the broken window? Maybe worried about getting cut, leaving blood at the scene. Maybe this wasn't some amateur shooter?

Abby hugged Sugar in a one-arm hold. She reached up and closed the box lid. Pointing the gun straight up, she waited, ready. If the killer lifted that lid, she would shoot. Period. Sugar stopped panting long enough to lick Abby's bare forearm.

Anxiety. We're both feeling it.
Abby heard the lock and the knob on the front door being twisted. Nausea swept through her. The lump in her throat couldn't be swallowed. Her pulse pounded. Holding Sugar snug, Abby hoped she could muffle any bark against her bodice. All was quiet for a moment. Then . . . glass crashed again on the bedroom floor as pieces were kicked out from the window.
So here he comes.
Panic ran riot inside her. Abby's sweaty palm quivered against the gun handle; her trigger finger trembled.

The sound of a heavy foot landing on the floor . . . then the other foot made Sugar's lean body tense. Glass crunched like ice shards crushed under a heavy roller. Sugar jerked her head at the sound.

“No . . . no barking,” Abby whispered. She trained her focus on hearing the footsteps as they walked into the master bath. She heard something else.

A faint siren sounded in the distance. Grew louder. The heavy footsteps returned to the bedroom. Crunched more glass. A man's voice cursed as he banged the wall to scramble out the window. The siren screamed, as if only yards away. Gravel crunched under tire wheels. Rubber screeched to a halt. Abby lifted the box lid. A brilliant light flashed on outside. So the cops had turned on their searchlights. Abby exhaled through pursed lips. Let the weight of the gun relax against her chest.

“Police are here,” she told the dispatcher before laying aside the phone.

More sirens screamed as another emergency vehicle arrived, and pandemonium ensued. She heard multiple voices shouting. “Drop the gun. Drop the gun. Hands up. On the ground. Spread 'em.”

Abby helped Sugar out of the box and then climbed out herself. She put her gun back into the drawer. Slipped a robe over her pajamas and hurried to the front entrance of her farmhouse. Abby took Sugar's panting as a level of high anxiety, but what could she do to assuage the dog while chaos was still going on? She flipped on the indoor and outside lights and saw the suspect being placed in the backseat of the cruiser at the front of her property.

“You okay?” an officer called out to Abby through the screen door she'd opened.

“I am now,” she said, stepping into the pink flip-flops she kept on the front porch. “Heck of a quick response. Where were you? On a stakeout at the pancake house at the end of Farm Hill Road?” she teased.

The cop grinned. “Something like that.”

“I want to see him . . . the idiot who shot out my window.”

The officer led her to the cruiser and opened the door. Dak Harmon, hands cuffed behind his back, glared at her.

“Know him?” asked the officer.

Abby's stomach churned. She had the urge to throw up. She swallowed. “Yes. That's Dak Harmon. Did you find the gun he used?”

“Sure did. Did he assault you, ma'am?” The officer added, “Physically, I mean.”

“Uh, no.”

“That is bruising around your eye, isn't it?”

“Oh, this,” Abby said, touching her eye. “Yes, well, he did do this, but not tonight. That's a whole other story.”

Diverting their attention, a young rookie cop walked through Abby's side gate from the backyard to the front driveway. “Sarge, there's an older-model Harley parked on the other side of the property, behind the chicken coop. The motorcycle engine is still warm,” he said. “And there is a blood trail, indicating the suspect was heading away from her house in that direction.”

Abby locked eyes with Dak, who glowered back at her. “So,” Abby said, “the commune kicks out the smart people and keeps the Neanderthals.” Addressing the senior officer, she said, “Take him away.”

The officer slammed the cruiser door, tapped the hood, and the cruiser pulled away.

Abby walked back to the front door and waited until the sergeant had finished speaking to his rookie. Then she escorted the senior officer into the bedroom to show him the window damage. Pointing to the blood on the sill, she said, “He couldn't shoot me, so I guess he thought he'd come through the window and finish me off. Stupid lout would leave his DNA all over the place.”

“We'll need your statement,” said the police officer.

“And I'm ready to give it,” said Abby, “but what's the chance that you might share with me the license plate of the motorcycle he was riding?”

Chapter 18

A pawful of honey could mean the wrathful
sting of a thousand bees.

 

 

 

B
y the time the police had collected all the evidence, had removed the crime-scene tape, and had given Abby permission to clean up the broken glass littering her bedroom floor, the sun had left the eastern-facing windows. Breakfast and lunch had come and gone. The cops had pried a bullet from the wall and had bagged and tagged the shell casings. They had arrested Dak Harmon and carted him off to jail. With the gun seized as evidence and the motorcycle impounded, the case against the bodyguard strengthened.

Abby rested in her grandmother's rocker on the patio, sipping from a mug of iced coffee, glad the ordeal was over. She listened to the songbirds' cacophony and watched Sugar's tail wag where it stuck out of the lavender thicket.

“I'll bet you slept better than I did,” Clay called out to her as he rounded the house to reach the patio. He looked like he had come from an all-night party and needed only a shave and a comb-through to restore his sexy good looks.

“Why do you say that?” asked Abby.

“Just that it's always so peaceful here.”

Resisting the urge to detail her harrowing night, she asked a pressing question. “And where did you sleep last night?”

“In my truck at the downtown park.”

“Well, that's just weird. Why did you do that?”

“Lost track of time playing darts at the Black Witch with some of the guys.” He groaned. “We drank way too much whiskey. Somebody—I don't recall his name—gave me a lift back to my truck. I couldn't drive. I figured it was safer to stay put.”

“Why didn't you just park in front of the bar on Main Street?”

“The downtown was packed. No space on Main, and all the action seemed to originate in that downtown park. Leastways, that's where the drinking started . . . at the booths set up to get people interested in going over to the fair. Guess the fair has almost wrapped up its run. Anyway, one of the booths promoted local wine and cheese. They hook you on the samples and urge you to go to the fair, pay the entrance fee, and buy quantities of the wine and cheese you liked.”

“Uh-huh. So you had cheese and a drop of wine, and they convinced you to buy the wineglass etched with the chamber of commerce logo before you could sample more. Am I right?”

“Somethin' like that.” He rubbed a sandpaper cheek and changed the subject. “Any coffee left?” he asked, then darted into the kitchen before she could even answer.

Abby had expected him to be bruising for an argument, but he seemed to be in a cheery mood.
How nice.
She sank deeper into the chair and rocked. He hadn't bothered to inquire about how she'd slept.
Oh, that's right. It's always all about you, isn't it, Clay? And you probably haven't got a clue how tired I am of dealing with your crap.

Her gaze swept across the lawn, past the citrus trees, all the way out to where the white climbing rose scampered up the six-foot chain-link fence and spilled over with thick sprays of blooms. The perfusion of rose blooms partially blocked the view into the wooded acre behind her property. Where the rose ended, the chicken run stretched to the henhouse. It, too, obscured a section of the back fence. Past the chickens' house and run, the fence began again with a metal gate that opened between the two properties. There had never been a need to lock that gate. As she stared at it, Abby figured Dak Harmon must have checked it out and known he could easily slip onto her property from the rear. And showing up at three thirty in the morning could have been a calculation against being seen.

Her attention shifted back to Clay, who had strolled onto the patio and had taken a seat to sip his mug of coffee. “Nice to finally have some time together,” he said. “What do you think of your master bath?”

“I love it.”
That's what you want to hear, isn't it? When you do something for someone else, it's never out of the goodness of your heart, but for the adulation you receive. I get that now.

“Don't worry about ever paying me back. I'll think of something. It's ready to use,” Clay said, grinning. “I've been thinking about getting a piece of teak to wrap around the top edge of the tub. I can cut a track and install a glass enclosure so water spray won't hit the floor.”

“Sounds lovely,” Abby said, thinking that although teak and glass would add a level of elegance, it seemed so unnecessary for such a small bathroom. She knew if she said anything about his idea, he'd take offense, see it as an affront to his creativity, so she said nothing else about it.

“Teak and glass will have to wait.” Clay's expression darkened. He turned to look at the rose on the back fence.

“Why?” Abby asked, wondering what had caused his whole demeanor to shift. Maybe she hadn't waxed effusive enough with her compliments.

A corner of his mouth drew up slightly, the way it always did when he found something difficult to say. “You know I'd never knowingly hurt you, Abby, right?”

She drilled him with a questioning look. “Suppose so. Why? What's going on?”

“When I came here, I thought things were going to be just like the old times. We were always good together. But you've changed. Most days, you're gone.”

“But I tell you when I'm going and where. And when I come back, I tell you what I've been doing. My friend Fiona was murdered. When a victim's family is grieving and needs help, I'm not the type of person to turn my back to them.”

“Yeah.” He took a sip of his coffee. “I guess I was fooling myself, thinking it would be like before between us. It's true what they say. You really can't go back. It's never the same.”

“Oh, come on, Clay. You know as well as I do, relationships take time and effort . . . by both parties.”

“And that's my point exactly.” His expression hardened. “So why do I feel like I am a party of one? You're not the way you used to be.”

“Why do you say that?” Abby asked, her fingers tightening around the coffee mug.

“You really want to know?” He eyed her suspiciously. “It used to be that you were always here, working next to me on the house or in the gardens. Now you are never here. Don't make time for me. I've even had to hire a day laborer just to help get that master bath to where it is.”

“I didn't ask you to build me a master bath.”

“No, you didn't. I was doing it out of the kindness of my heart.”

Abby tensed, swallowed her retort.
Yeah, right.

“I thought it would be nice if we built something new together, and not just that bathroom.”

Abby stared at him. If he was trying to sound hurt, it had come across like sarcasm.
How dare you pick a fight so it seems like your imminent departure is my fault?
Unable to hold her frustration inside, Abby said, “You better take a picture of the tub before you go, because I am moving it out to repair the wiring. I heard arcing in the wall when I turned on the jets. If I didn't know better, I'd swear you were trying to electrocute me.”

“Oh, come on. Are you accusing me of trying to kill you?”

“The alternative is to think that in your haste to get recognition, you aren't careful. Think back, Clay, to when I first bought the place and all the neighbors came round to marvel at your work in the kitchen. Then one morning I went to make coffee and barely missed being buried under the light soffit when it fell from the kitchen ceiling. Apparently, after all the compliments, you'd forgotten to finish screwing it in place. The soffit and the tub are like our relationship—both presentations that serve some obscure purpose of yours but are never meant to be permanent. Well, Clay, hear this. In my world, I need things to function correctly. The soffit didn't. The tub isn't. And we're not.”

He glared at her and set his mug down harder than necessary on the glass patio table. “Forget it. I guess we're beyond talking things through.” He exhaled heavily.

Pushing a wayward strand of hair from her face and tucking it behind her ear, Abby mustered her last bit of strength to return his stare. “You know what . . . ? Just go. I don't need this.”

His expression seemed grim. “Fine.”

Abby looked away; she reminded herself that two couldn't argue if one left. After standing up and stilling the rocker, she started for the kitchen.

Clay reached out and clamped his hand on her forearm. “You never loved me.”

“And you never loved me. Honestly, Clay, I'm tired of playing nice, of tap-dancing around your moods all the time, hoping I haven't said something that's going to set you off. I don't want to live my life that way.” She looked at him coolly. “So go, already. Texas this time . . . right?”

His dark eyes registered surprise. “What makes you say that?”

“You shouldn't surf the Net, looking for your next conquest, Clay, when you've just convinced the person lying beside you that she's the one that rocks your world. She's the one you love.”

His lips thinned into a tight line.... Eyes imparted hurt and hostility. He released his grip on her arm.

Abby summoned all the strength within her. “Just go. We're done here.” She marched back to the kitchen to put her mug in the sink. Holding on to the counter with a white-knuckled grip, she struggled to remain resolute.

Through the open slider, he called out, “Fine. I can make it to Los Angeles in eight hours, two more to Phoenix. I'd like a shower before taking off . . . if that's okay with you.”

“Be my guest. Clean towels are on top of the washer.” Abby busied herself with rinsing the mug and then placing it on the top shelf of the dishwasher.

Clay grabbed a towel. “Why are you so mad?”

“I'm not,” Abby shot back. “I'm worn out by what happened here last night, when you were doing whatever you were doing in town.”

“What happened?”

“Someone tried to kill me. Did you not notice that the bedroom window has been shot out?” She turned to look at him. His expression registered shock.

After a pause, he shot back, “And yet you keep involving yourself with criminal investigations, like you are still a cop.” He slammed the bathroom door.

Abby exhaled heavily.
Yeah, that's right. Make it my fault. Easier to look into the mirror then, isn't it?

Fifteen minutes later, he reappeared in the living room, where Abby sat curled on the couch, sorting packets of seed she'd saved over the winter in labeled envelopes. He had towel dried his hair, shaved, and dressed in khakis, a narrow leather belt with a sleek silver buckle, brown lace-up oxfords, and a tomato-colored polo shirt with a Ralph Lauren label. After stashing his dirty clothes in a white plastic bag, he hoisted it under his arm and carried it, along with his suitcase and laptop bag, out the front door to his truck.

With both anger and sadness surging inside, Abby watched him leave the house. He still had the power to hurt her. And even if they couldn't be a couple, the bonds they'd formed long ago were proving stronger than she had realized. She placed the seed packets in the small cardboard box, rose, and strolled out to the front porch, with Sugar by her side. Her eyes burned, threatening tears, but she fought against them.

In the gravel driveway, Clay slammed his truck door and walked back toward her. His dark eyes locked onto hers; the scent of his soft cologne permeated the air. He stood in front of her, his expression dark and pouty. “Guess this is it.” His tone sounded husky and slightly hostile.

Her chest tightened; her stomach twisted into knots. “Yes,” she said. After a pause, she added, “Whatever it is you are seeking, I hope you find it. I think we know it was never me or the farmette.”

He stared at the tassels on his brown oxfords. When he lifted his gaze to look at her again, his eyes shimmered. “Take care of yourself, Miss Abby Mac.” He swung himself up into his truck and started the engine. A moment later, he drove away . . . out of her life.

* * *

When Kat called in mid-afternoon to see if Abby might want to come into town and meet her for coffee, Abby declined. She hadn't moved for hours after watching the dust settle in her driveway. She had not expected the deluge of tears after Clay had gone nor the conflicting feelings that had emerged after her tears dried. Feeling vulnerable and exposed, she had no desire beyond sheltering herself in solitude and the company of her chickens and bees and Sugar's unconditional love.

“Not today,” Abby said.

“It's because of what happened last night, isn't it? Word of the shooting at your place is all over town. I wanted to make sure you're okay.”

“I am . . . or, at least, I will be,” Abby said, eyes misting up again. She sniffed.

“I heard you were there alone when Dak Harmon tried to kill you.” Kat took a big breath and let it go. “Why wasn't Clay there? Of all nights, where was he?”

“He didn't want to get a DUI. He told me that he spent the night in his truck in the downtown park.”

“And that would be a lie. Sorry to be so blunt.”

“I know,” Abby said. “He should have come up with something a little more creative. Everybody knows about that fence going up around that park when the town hosts the fair. The irony is that if he'd waited one more night, the fair would have been over, the booths in the park dismantled, and the fence taken down.” Abby cleared her throat. “He probably met someone. Oh, well. It's a moot point now.”

“How so?”