Flash Flood (25 page)

And, then it dawned on him. He hadn't seen the man, not since the encounter on the front steps. It was unlike Billy Roland not to be involved. He should have been out here. Migraine or no, he'd be checking on Shortcake Dream at the very least.

Dan turned back toward the house, and was just crossing the drive leading to the screened-in porch when he heard it. As quickly as his brain registered what the sound was, he refused to believe it, but started to run, tearing at the back screen door when he reached the porch—the shotgun blast echoing in his ears.

Chapter Nine

The door to the study was closed. Dan hesitated; a moment of trepidation slowed him from throwing it open. He swallowed, took a deep breath and willed himself to reach out and turn the knob. Locked. He twisted it again. Then raced for the front door. He hadn't locked the window to the study last night, just shut it. Hopefully, it was still open. But he knew all the hurrying, all the panic, would not change what he would find.

He pulled the window up, threw a leg over the casement and eased himself into the room. It took a moment for his eyes to adjust to the cool darkness. And then he saw what he had expected to see but the shock of it wasn't any the less powerful. Expectation didn't negate horror. He leaned against the back of a chair, took a few deep breaths before slowly walking to the front of the desk. Even the top of the chair had been blown away by the blast. He could hear someone pounding on the door. The noise seemed far away.

He just stood there, thoughts jumbled, trying to think clearly. Trying to form thoughts of “No, not now. It's not what you think….” Billy Roland's words running through his mind: “You promised…said you wouldn't use it…just our little secret.” Dan closed his eyes and turned away.

The one typed sheet was on a chair. Dan hadn't noticed it at first. He walked over and picked it up.

“I can't stay in a world where my friends, even my loved ones, betray me, suspect me of wrongdoing, ruin my reputation…I want my Premier Exhibitor's banner draped over my coffin….”

Dan couldn't read any more as tears welled up. The pounding at the door was now accompanied by shouting. He walked over and unlocked it. Roger burst into the room followed by Tom and two other agents.

“Oh, Jesus. Oh, God. Who let this happen? Tom, why weren't you with him?” Roger was truly beside himself. Because an old man committed suicide? Or because it would put a serious crimp in his investigation, and someone might insinuate that he'd blown it. Dan guessed the latter.

“I don't have to tell you how this looks. Just as good as a signed confession. I knew it. Could smell it. The old codger had guilty written all over him.” Roger was gingerly picking over papers on the desk, sliding a couple out from under the body with the eraser end of a pencil.

“Looking for this?” Dan offered the note he'd found on the chair.

“Damn it. You know better than to touch anything at the scene. I've had it with you, Mahoney.”

Roger had slipped on a pair of rubber gloves. Must be standard issue for field work, Dan thought sarcastically.

“Tom, I want a team on that clinic soon as it's cool enough to get in there. Sift everything. Go over every inch and have a couple of the guys question that vet.”

Roger was in his element. Giving orders, gleefully surveying what he termed a cop-out. Dan overheard him describe Billy Roland as someone who just “couldn't face the music.” Then Dan left, had to leave, get away to think, mourn in his own way; he walked out to the porch swing. He'd asked Tom about Eric and found out he was in Milford. Even locked up he could wreak devastation. If it hadn't been for Eric, that old man would have lived out his days enjoying the Double Horseshoe, Shortcake Dream, and the Cisco Kid….

“You know where the wife is?” Tom stuck his head out the study window.

“Gone.”

“I know that. When's she coming back?” Roger had pushed Tom aside and leaned out, hands on the sill. His need for control was unbelievable, Dan thought.

“She isn't.”

“You want to explain that?”

No, Dan thought; but I'm probably going to have to. He sighed. “Iris Stuckey-Eklund was asked to leave by her husband after it was discovered she may have attempted wrongdoing in order to collect on an insurance claim for several hundred thousand dollars.” That sounded vague enough but business-like, and it was the truth.

“I'll be dipped. He ran off the little woman. I'll need your statement. In the meantime, you know where we can find her?”

“No.”

“Am I supposed to believe that?”

“Believe what you want.”

“You know, before you get too carried away being uncooperative, I should tell you Eric Linden will testify that you failed to report a cache of contraband drugs, left it to him to turn over the evidence, and then you told us you found it in a truck.”

Dan didn't say anything.

“That sound about right? How it happened?”

Dan shrugged; he could barely contain his irritation at this man, at the situation, the lies and deceit.

“You know of any other places we'll need to look? Besides the hangar? To find any little surprises that you might know about. Like another glove compartment in a truck.”

“There should be a small container of crystals of unknown origin in the wall safe in the study.” Dan imagined there was a look of surprise on Roger's face, but he didn't turn around to see.

“Should I know how they got there?”

Dan ignored the sarcasm. “I believe they were planted by Eric Linden to do exactly what he's done—get you guys involved.”

“Or expose a drug operation that's been in existence for a number of years.”

“As I said before, believe what you want.”

“I don't think I need to tell you not to disappear.” Roger went back into the house.

***

The rest of the afternoon was bedlam. He couldn't leave but called Elaine from Hank's phone. She wanted to drive out. He didn't want her to be interrogated, but thought everything would be settled down by late evening. He needed to see her, be with someone who knew he hadn't caused this, hadn't gone back on his word to Billy Roland. She said she would be there by nine.

“Want a beer?” Hank stood in the middle of his pullman kitchen with two cans of Coors.

“Sure.”

The two of them walked back into the ten by twelve living room that barely held a couch, TV, and coffee table and smelled of smoke.

“Any idea what will happen to all this? The land and stock.” Dan was curious. He believed Billy Roland when he said that Miss Iris wouldn't get anything—but nothing had been said about after Billy Roland's death.

“If he hasn't changed his will in the last year, the Double Horseshoe will become an Ag station.”

“Ag station?”

“Yeah. Agriculture test area. Run by an extension of New Mexico State.”

“That's great. Neat idea.”

“Take a look.”

Hank walked back to the kitchen, pulled a legal-looking document out of a drawer, and handed it to Dan.

“I'm executor.”

And the director of a multi-million dollar project for as long as you want, Dan thought to himself as he scanned the first page of the will. But it was fitting. Hank was the right choice.

“This is perfect for the ranch. I'm glad to see it go this way.”

“Miss Iris gets the Wings of the Dove, but only if she stays clean. Has to be tested every six months, three consecutive times a week apart, different labs.”

“He thought of everything.”

“Left the Lear to that Linden guy. Guess that will go to his wife now.”

“How much is it worth?”

“The Lear? A few hundred thousand without much fixing.”

Why did Dan feel a rush of elation? It wasn't two million but maybe enough for Eric to start over….

Elaine pulled into the drive a little before nine. There were still agents standing guard, but the body had been removed and some of the household help were cleaning up the study. Word had gotten out when the body reached the funeral home in Roswell, and the first flowers arrived around six-thirty. Judge Cyrus had called and offered his assistance. Dan had thought to call Carolyn and Phillip. They were shocked. But then, everyone was shocked. Billy Roland had seemed exempt, somehow beyond something as mundane as dying. He should have lived forever.

The safe had been opened and the vial of crystals removed. Dan gave a deposition detailing how he'd found them. He didn't need to hide Eric's part in their discovery. He reiterated that he suspected they had been planted, and by whom. He told what he knew about Miss Iris. How the finding of Shortcake Dream figured into the United Life and Casualty claim. By the time he was finished, he was exhausted. The stress of the day caught up with him.

Elaine had fixed a plate of cold cuts and cheese. He'd grabbed a couple of beers and followed her out to the porch. Hank joined them. Supper was quiet, not uncomfortable, but each lost in his own thoughts, Dan decided. Hank ate quickly and went back to the barns.

“There's one more thing I have to do.” Dan stood and took her hand. “Come with me.”

He led her back into the house but stopped by a phone in the hall.

“If you disagree with anything I say, interrupt.” He dialed the number and waited.

The front office at Milford Correctional put him through to Eric without any questions.

“If you haven't heard what happened to Billy Roland by now, you need to know that he committed suicide about four this afternoon.”

Briefly, he recounted what had happened. Apparently Eric hadn't known. His shock seemed real. Real because he saw what he thought was his chance at two million go down the drain once and for all, Dan thought.

“A couple other things. I'm going to find out who was behind the two million—not for you, but to clear Billy Roland's name if he's innocent.” Then he told him about the Lear.

Elaine gestured that she wanted the phone.

“Eric, I'll have the divorce papers at the front desk by noon tomorrow. I have them with me now.” She paused, then continued, “I don't mind the drive over to get this taken care of…I don't want to see you…Eric, I think you
will
sign. My lawyer has suggested that I charge you with having detained me against my will for the last few weeks. They know you had a gun. It would add a few more years…Good, I thought you might see it that way.” She handed the phone back to Dan and walked back out to the porch.

***

Billy Roland had requested that he be buried beside his first wife in a family plot on the Double Horseshoe. The small cemetery in the strand of poplar not far from the house also held the remains of Billy Roland's mother and father, a couple of ranch hands and their families who had died from cholera in the early 1900s. In the corner a small marker rested on the grave of a young woman who had met her death in the woods, on an altar as a sacrifice many years ago.

Judge Cyrus filled Dan in on local lore as they walked between the well-kept mounds. The plots marked with whitewashed crosses paled next to the elaborate marble and bronze statuary that adorned the pink quartz mausoleum behind a picket fence and flagstone walk.

“Ol' Billy Roland used to come out here a lot. Fresh flowers every other day, that sort of thing. Never quite forgave himself for weaknesses of the flesh. Thought his first wife would never understand about Miss Iris.” Judge Cyrus stood with hat in hand. “Well, they're together now. I hope they make their peace.”

The service was held at the mausoleum, Judge Cyrus presiding. More than two hundred people lined the drive, trampled the grass on the knoll and ate from the picnic tables set up around the pool.

Iris arrived with the resident preacher from The Wings of the Dove. Hadn't taken her long to figure out what was hers. Dan wondered if she'd known the terms of the will all along, only now the price was worth it. All eyes were on her as she placed a single white rose at the base of the urn holding Billy Roland's ashes. She stepped back, and bowed her head before Hank placed the urn on a marble shelf above the tomb of Billy Roland's first wife. The fact that Iris was dressed in white added to the drama: white veil to white shoes peeking out from the gossamer skirt.

“The angels are with me now,” Iris informed Dan later over a heaping plate of the ever-present potato salad.

“Come again?”

“I'm being guided. I believe my mission is to save poor souls trapped by their carnal desires and earthly ambitions.” She dropped her voice to a whisper. “There are those among us who serve a false God.”

He couldn't think of anything to say. He wished her well, but didn't miss the look she gave the young minister who brought her. Adoration and lust. Working on carnal desires didn't seem to start at home, Dan thought.

Carolyn and Phillip paid their respects, appropriate tears, lots of hand shaking. It was difficult to look at Phillip and not see the posturing of a gubernatorial hopeful. The bodyguard was still in evidence and ate his weight in fried chicken. He seemed to have a lot in common with good old Sheriff Ray. It might not be anything more than a love of fried chicken, Dan thought, as he watched the two reload their plates. But chummy didn't quite capture it. These guys were inseparable.

Carolyn didn't miss the fact that Elaine was with him, that he had his arm around her shoulders. She gave them a once-over glance when she didn't think he was looking; lingering, it seemed, overly long. Dan hoped his mother would be pleased since she would undoubtedly have the news by morning.

Someone had dug up Billy Roland's Premier Exhibitor banner and several other rosettes and ribbons. The mausoleum was plastered with them but the display seemed fitting, and impressive. Dan was surprised when a number of dignitaries from the cattle judging circuit made it all the way out to the Double Horseshoe for the service. Billy Roland was respected. And it was this respect that Dan wanted to make certain wasn't tarnished. At whatever cost, he would get to the bottom of the promised two million, prove that Billy Roland Eklund didn't set up Eric Linden or anyone else for that matter.

When he had time to reflect on the day, he decided that Billy Roland would have enjoyed himself, and, then again, maybe he did. He wasn't sure that he didn't believe the dead hung around for a while before taking off to wherever.

When Elaine told him that she would be leaving Monday for a month's tour of Ireland, he understood. Understood and envied her and wanted to stop her, keep her with him. But it was all too soon. There was still a lot of work to do. And Dan would be here when she got back. He'd pick up Simon in the morning.