Reining in Murder (8 page)

Annie strained to hear the answer, but all she could glean from the other room was silence, for what seemed an excruciatingly long time. Finally, she heard Todos clear his throat. He had not actually
seen
Señor and Señora Colbert fighting, he told Dan. It was not his place to watch such things. But he had heard plenty of shouting, always about the horses. Señora Colbert would not obey her husband and return to California. And there was nothing Señor Colbert could do to change her mind.

Well, I'll give you that much for common sense,
Annie silently told the dead woman.

As far as violence, well, it was possible. Once, when the husband was visiting, Todos had seen Señora Colbert with a badly bruised arm. But she said she had fallen off a horse and who was he to question? He also once had seen Señor Colbert with a black eye, but no explanation was given. Todos was certain it did not come from a horse. Señor Colbert would not know how to even mount a horse.

Even with a wall separating her, Annie could hear the sneer in Todos's voice. The clear implication was that Marcus probably didn't know how to mount anything, including his wife.

“Señor Todos,” said Dan, “you're been very helpful and extremely thorough. And I know you've got a lot to do now that Mrs. Colbert is . . . well, is gone.”

Dan was laying it on a bit thick, Annie thought.

“It make no difference,” Todos said carelessly. “We do the work.”

Annie heard Dan clear his throat. “Well, I know that. But I do have to ask you, Señor Todos, what you were doing from the time you last talked to Señora Colbert on Monday until four o'clock today, two days later.”

“Oh, you need the alibi? Señora Colbert requires only the best hay for her animals. There is no such hay made here, and we have enough for only a week more. So I call a ranch in Eastern Washington and secure a load. Then I drive up to get it.”

“When did you leave?”

“Tuesday morning. I get the hay, spend the night in a motel, and come back today.”

From inside the bathroom, Annie involuntarily hooted in disbelief. Tuesday morning! She'd waited from six o'clock Tuesday morning until she'd locked the barn for the night for Todos to arrive.
And Hilda didn't even have the decency to call to let me know,
she thought.
Some people have all the nerve.

Annie felt a sharp pang of remorse.
Had
the nerve.
Some people
were dead. Come to think of it, the last time Hilda probably had seen her horses was when she was ordering Todos to hit the road for hay. Hilda wasn't going to see her beautiful beasts again. Now
there
was a fate worse than death.

Annie heard the tack room door open. She quickly flushed the toilet and came outside.

“Annie!”

She walked up to Dan, straightening her clothes.

“Now that you're done listening in private, why don't you come in and join the party?”

Annie was happy to comply. Once they were seated at the table, Dan resumed his questions.

“Do you know how to reach Señor Colbert?” Dan asked Todos.

Todos tossed his head toward a printed phone list beside the tack room phone.

“He may be on the list. I never noticed.”

“Well, that's that, I guess. I'll let you get back to your work.”

Todos silently up and walked toward the door, making a point, Annie thought, of not looking at either her or Dan. Maybe he was an undocumented guy. If that was so, she couldn't blame him for wanting to say as little as possible.

“Oh, one more thing.”

Todos slowly turned.

“Did Señora Colbert have any enemies? Anyone you know who might want to wish her harm?”

Todos allowed a small smile to touch his lips.

“Señora Colbert was, how you say, not a friendly person. She don't have enemies, but . . . she don't have friends.”

Todos turned to leave.

“And one more thing,” said Dan. “I'll need proof that you got that hay and spent the night in Eastern Washington. When you have time, of course.”

Todos smiled again. Annie wondered if he was ever capable of injecting even a modicum of warmth into the act.

“
No problemo.
You can see for yourself, right now.”

Todos pulled a crumpled motel bill and receipt for hay out of a pocket of his jeans. He handed them over to Dan, who looked at them and carefully placed both in a folder.

“Right. Thank you, Señor Todos. I'll let you go now. Take my card. If you think of anything, you'll let me know, won't you?”

“Of course.” Todos vanished.

“You didn't read him his rights,” Annie said.

“Didn't need to. We'll check out his alibi, of course, but it seems pretty straightforward. Now I want to talk to the husband.”

Marcus Colbert was second to the last on the phone list—just above the local plumber. Dan jotted down the phone numbers, then looked at Annie.

“I hate doing this,” he said.

“I'll bet you do. That's why you get paid the big bucks.”

Dan snorted and picked up the tack room phone. He called the first number listed for Mr. Colbert. A receptionist answered. Mr. Colbert was not in. Dan thanked her and said he'd try his cell.

Hilda's husband picked up on the first ring with an abrupt “Colbert” loud enough for even Annie to hear. Dan cleared his throat and plunged in.

“Mr. Colbert, this is Dan Stetson, sheriff of Suwana County. I'm afraid I have bad news for you.”

As Annie listened to Dan flailing around for the right words to say, she realized there were no right words. How do you tell someone that his spouse has been brutally murdered?

All Annie could hear were Dan's responses, which sounded positively pathetic judging by the number of questions Mr. Colbert was spewing.

“Mr. Colbert, I know this is a tough thing for you to swallow right now. I'll keep you informed of our progress every step of the way. Right now, it doesn't look like there will be any until tomorrow, when we expect to get the results from the autopsy. And the reports from our evidence technicians.”

“Ask HIM questions. You're getting murdered,” she hissed at Dan.

Dan threw a pained look at Annie. He cleared his throat.

“But I need to know from you now: Did your wife have any enemies? Anyone who might want to hurt her?”

Another inaudible diatribe issued from the phone line. Annie impatiently tapped on Dan's shoulder.

“Ask him about the horse! Did he know about the accident?”

Dan put his hand over the mouthpiece and whispered back, “Why in the Sam Hill would I ask him that, Annie?”

“Hey, you're the one looking for suspects! If he knows about the hauler's murder, maybe he's connected to Hilda's murder, too!”

Dan rolled his eyes but asked, “Mr. Colbert, are you aware that your wife recently purchased a thoroughbred?”

This time, Dan held the phone at a cocked angle, so Annie could hear the response.

“Sheriff, if I kept track of every time my wife bought a new horse, I'd have nothing else to do with my time. If she did, it doesn't surprise me. Why are you asking?”

“Only because one of our local horse rescuers has been taking care of your wife's new thoroughbred for the past few days. The hauler had an accident on the way to your wife's farm three days ago, and the horse was injured.”

Annie noticed that Dan adroitly avoided the news of the hauler's death.

“Well, I'm sorry to hear that. Is the horse going to be all right?”

“Why don't I let Annie Carson, the woman who's been tending to the horse, tell you herself?”

Dan thrust the phone into Annie's hands.

“Mr. Colbert. I'm terribly sorry to hear about your recent loss. Rest assured that your wife's horse is now in excellent health, and in fact, is here at the stables as we speak.”

“Ms. Carson, I wish I could tell you that I really cared about my late wife's most recent acquisition, but truly, I don't. The one time I rode a horse, it tried to buck me off, and I really don't even like to be close to the beasts. But I'm grateful to you for caring for the animal. Tell me—were you friends with my wife? She knew so few people in the community, it seemed.”

For a recent widower
, Annie thought,
he certainly is taking the loss of his wife well. Maybe too well. Then again, maybe losing Hilda is like losing a painful bunion.
Annie swallowed hard and crossed her fingers. “To be truthful, Mr. Colbert, we were only passing acquaintances. But I know that everyone who lives here greatly admired her facility and . . . and the magnificent hunters and jumpers she kept here.”

There was a sigh on the other end of the phone.

“Ms. Carson, I appreciate your praise, but can't help but note it has nothing to do with my wife's personality. I know she was hard to get along with at times. She was a tough nut to crack, and believe me, I know it better than anyone. So I thank you doubly for caring for the horse. Would you mind terribly continuing until I get there?”

This would not be a good time to bring up the issue of the unpaid bill, Annie thought. And what could she say? She might as well continue to care for the bay until the issue of compensation had been resolved.

“I'd be happy to, Mr. Colbert,” she said, and handed the phone back to Dan.

“Mr. Colbert, we're trying to trace some of the more recent phone calls made to your wife. You wouldn't know, by chance, the password to her home phone? Her birth date? Eight-six-seven-zero. Thank you so very much, Mr. Colbert. That helps us a lot. Otherwise, we'd have to do a lot of paperwork to get this information. When will you be flying up, sir?”

Annie winced as Dan signed off. It seemed she was doomed to have her messages to Hilda broadcast to the world, whether she liked it or not.

Dan turned to her.

“Can you believe the stupidity of some people? The password is Hilda's birthday.”

“I heard.” If Annie hadn't still had a 1990s model phone with a built-in answering machine, she probably would have used her birth date as a password, too.

It was now close to five. The evidence team had finally packed up and left. Annie suspected that Hilda's body had arrived at the medical examiner's office and was already being prepared for a thorough dissection. Dan called Esther to cancel the search warrant. Even Annie noticed that Esther seemed disappointed. Esther did perk up when Dan asked her to arrange for a Spanish interpreter for the next day; he intended to interview all of Hilda's other workers tomorrow, starting at eight in the morning.

Kim Williams was the only deputy left on the scene. She, Dan, and Annie returned to Hilda's residence to listen to her voice mails.

Kim got out her digital recorder and gave the okay to Dan to start playing the messages.

Annie kept her head down as the messages started rolling. Sure enough, Annie's voice was the first to be heard, loud and clear. After her second angry tirade had been publicly aired, she began to squirm in her chair. She thought she heard both Kim and Dan chuckling but didn't look up to find out.

But, to her surprise, Annie wasn't the only one who was being humiliated by the replaying of old messages. It appeared Hilda had been slow to pay her vendors. Interspersed with Annie's diatribes were increasingly angry rants from tack and feed stores, and one pleading one from a well-known sports equine vet. Annie felt slightly mollified. She certainly didn't have Hilda's wherewithal, but she did pay her bills on time. People in the country counted on that. A check that didn't arrive on time could mean you didn't eat, or pay your mortgage that month.

The machine announced the next call: “Monday, February 25 at 2:16
P.M.
Caller unknown.” A man with a deep and cultured voice began to speak. The words he spoke chilled Annie right down to her bones.

“I will destroy you. You will be a dead woman before you know it. Consider yourself warned.”

Annie looked up and met Dan's gaze. The man's voice was unmistakable. It was Marcus Colbert.

T
HURSDAY
, F
EBRUARY
25
^TH

Annie rested her muck rake on one elbow and picked up her ringing cell phone. Last night, after unloading Trooper and Trotter back in her barn, her first move had been to change her cell ring tone. She'd decided she'd had about as much of Stephen Foster as she could take. The new one sounded as if it came out of an old-fashioned, hand-cranked telephone box.

“Annie Carson speaking.”

“Ms. Carson, this is Marcus Colbert.”

Annie's throat closed. Nothing like talking to the number one murder suspect of the woman whose body you'd discovered to put a damper on your vocal cords.

“Ms. Carson? Are you there?”

“Yes, Mr. Colbert.” Her voice squawked.

“Call me Marcus. Please.”

I'll be calling you by your inmate number soon,
Annie thought, but politely replied, “How are you?”

“I'm about as well as can be expected, I guess.” A long sigh emanated from the other end of the line. “I hope you don't mind, but I got your number from Mr. Todos, Hilda's barn manager. I'm at the San Jose Airport, waiting to board a plane. I should be arriving in your area around eight tonight. I wondered if I could stop by for a moment before I head out to the ranch.”

“Why?” Annie blurted out the question before she could think.

“Well, I realize you've been taking care of my wife's horse for an unconscionably long time. And I understand a vet bill is involved. I thought I could write you a check.”

For a cold-blooded killer, he sounds quite reasonable,
Annie thought.
And I might as well get paid before he goes to the pokey.

“That's very thoughtful of you, Mr.—I mean, Marcus.”

“Not a problem. In the past twenty-four hours, I've discovered that Hilda wasn't very good at paying her suppliers. I don't know why, since she had plenty in her bank account. I feel it's the least I can do.”

This man is just too kind,
Annie mused.
Maybe he hired a ruthless killer to whack Hilda.

“Well, I appreciate your offer, and I'll take you up on it. Let me tell you how to find me.”

As Annie gave Marcus directions to her farm, she mentally mapped out the conversation with Dan that would follow this one. Ha! Not only was she the one who'd first entertained the idea of Marcus as the killer, she would lead him straight into the sheriff's handcuffs.

Her next call was not quite as thrilling as she'd expected.

“Are you out of your Sam Hill mind, Annie? We know he's coming in on the 5:25 out of San Jose. Don't you think we boys work with our buddies out of state?”

The day before, Dan was worried that his “buddy” from the next county would butt in on his territory. Now that he had a suspect in mind, everyone was his friend, Annie thought sourly. And dollars to doughnuts it was Esther who'd been the one to find out that information.

“Well, I just thought you should know.” Annie's tone was nothing if not haughty. “Just in case you come by and find a trail of blood leading to the bedroom.”

“We'll be at your place no later than nineteen-hundred hours. And if you hear from him before then, give me a call, would you?”

“Oh, your
boys
will probably tell you as soon as he's dialing my number.” Annie abruptly ended the call before Dan had a chance to answer.

Her mood improved a half hour later when she got a call from a friend a ferry ride away, pleading for help in teaching a young colt ground manners.

“He's a sweetheart, Annie, but he needs your magic touch.” Samantha Higgins owned a boarding facility in Arn-dorp, a small Norwegian farming community just west of the Peninsula and about six miles from Annie's farm as the crow flies. Sam was a professional horsewoman, and, in fact, president of the Northwest Trailblazers, the local riding club, but she occasionally took in new horses to train. When she wasn't training animals, she invariably had her hands full teaching six-year-olds how to tack up a horse.

“You're in luck, Sam—I have exactly one stall left. You sound far away. Where are you calling from?”

“The Worden Canal Bridge. I'll be at your place in about fifteen minutes. With the horse.”

* * *

As soon as the lead rope was untied from the hook inside the trailer, the “sweetheart” leapt a full 360 degrees and lunged out of the trailer. The diminutive Arab was soaked with sweat. He'd also been plenty jittery on the forty-five-minute ride over. Annie conservatively estimated it would take Sam a good hour to clean out the trailer bed.

“Whoa, Jeremy! Whoa there, boy!” Sam grabbed the trailing lead rope and tried to stop the colt's propulsion.

“In here.” Annie stood by the wide-open paddock gate. In the remaining minutes before Sam's arrival, she'd emptied the last empty stall of winter vegetables and hustled Trooper and Trotter back into their own stalls, where they now stood, placated by unexpected midday hay.

With Marcus's imminent arrest, Annie realized that Trooper might continue to board with her for weeks or even months to come. If that were the case, then Trooper would have to learn how to acclimate with her other horses out in the pasture. But there was no sense in rushing the process, and right now the paddock had to be free for the new addition to Annie's equine family.

The colt rushed in, and Sam unsnapped the lead line seconds before being trampled underfoot. Annie swung the gate shut as Sam eased out of the paddock. For several minutes, the two women watched the colt race around the fence line without pause.

Annie spoke first. “Jeremy?”

“It wasn't my idea.”

Another minute passed. The colt showed no sign of slowing down.

“Aside from having too much energy, what are his issues?”

“Oh, nothing that you can't cure, Annie. He's just turned three, and his owner has let him be a total baby his entire life. I've watched her feed him. She just brings out a bucket of grain and lets him put his face in it as she lugs it—and him—over to the feed bin. Jeremy thinks everyone is another colt to play with. He rears and bucks just to let you know he's happy to see you. Frankly, I'm surprised his owner is alive to tell me about it.”

“Ever been under saddle?”

“I've barely gotten him under halter. His ground manners are nonexistent. He's a lot of work, Annie. I hope you have time to take him on.”

Annie laughed. “So why'd you bring him out here without knowing the answer?”

“To tell you the truth, I'd loaded him this morning with every intention of taking him back to his owner. I was led to believe that all he needed was a little retraining. This is way too much for me to handle with everything else I do. Then, as I was waiting for the bridge to open, I thought of you and just decided to take the chance that you'd say yes.”

“He looks like a lot of work.”

“He is.”

“It will take a lot of time. And money.”

“That it will.”

“My lambing season is a mere month away.”

“I'll help.”

The colt came to a sliding stop in front of Annie, reared up, and let out a deafening whinny.

“I'll have to rename him.”

“Thanks, Annie. I knew you'd come through.”

* * *

By suppertime, Jeremy had been renamed Geronimo, and was following Annie around the paddock as docilely as a well-fed cat. At first, he'd reared every time Annie turned her back, once even touching her shoulder blades with his hooves, but he quickly learned that every time his front feet left the ground, he was pushed back into the corner. Geronimo was never quite sure how he ended up there, but it occurred often enough that he decided rearing wasn't so much fun when it meant your butt got pushed against the rail.

Annie could guess at his thoughts.
This new human is nice, and she smells good, too. Once, she even fed me carrots out her pocket, and all I did was stand there. Now she's leaving, which means it's time to race around the paddock again. But wait! She's coming back, with a very strange horse.
Geronimo whinnied. The strange horse whinnied back, but it was like nothing the colt had ever heard in his life.

* * *

Once Annie was sure that Trotter and Geronimo were going to get along, she set to work getting dinner ready for the horses. With the new addition, the issue of where to put Trooper during the day was paramount in her mind. Geronimo definitely was going to be in the paddock for the foreseeable future, and most likely along with Trotter. She couldn't risk putting the thoroughbred in with such a green horse, but the only alternative was the pasture with her other equines.

I need to remember to ask Marcus if that's okay,
she thought to herself, before realizing that the only decision Marcus soon would be making would be which expensive criminal defense attorney to hire.

The feed bins filled, Annie walked up her driveway and across the street to the stretch of mailboxes. Opening her own battered box, she pulled out bills, bills, circular flyers, more bills—and one letter with distinctive flowery handwriting in, of all colors, magenta—and no return address. Annie sniffed the envelope. Lavender. It could mean only one thing.

Annie sat down inside her kitchen and poured herself a small scotch. Letters from her half sister Lavender always required the help of medicinal beverages. For the past fifteen years, she'd received quite a few epistles from her free-spirited, slightly offbeat half sister, and they all were precursors to the same thing: a visit, without a discernible end date.

Annie sighed as she ripped open the envelope and averted her head to avoid being overwhelmed by the fragrance inside. She picked up her glass, inhaled the fumes of her single malt, and, after a moment's hesitation, bolted down half the contents.

Dearest Sister,
Annie read, and barked derisively. Lavender insisted on calling her “Sister” instead of her given name, which Annie chalked up to her having read too much Jane Austen when she was young. But not only was the sobriquet in itself appalling, it presumed far too much, in Annie's mind. There was nothing she could do about the fact that her father had run off with his secretary in his real-estate business when Annie was a gawky eleven-year-old. Nor could she do anything about the fact that said secretary promptly got pregnant and produced little Lavender. But it was too much to expect Annie to cotton to her unplanned and unwanted extended family with any real warmth or enthusiasm. Since most of her contact with her father consisted of stilted phone calls on birthdays and on Christmas, pretending to be nice wasn't that difficult. After Annie's mother died, the phone conversations stopped altogether, which was just fine with her. Unfortunately, Lavender felt an inordinate desire to keep in touch with a half sister she barely knew.

And Lavender was a lightweight; that's all there was to it. Probably her name didn't help, Annie thought. But since the age of three, all Lavender had wanted to do was to play Cinderella and practice how to look most adorable. With her long blond hair and perfect, small-boned features, it wasn't hard. Annie's father had been a pushover, she'd learned from Lavender's letters. What had been an extravagance in his former household, such as buying Annie a pony, became de rigueur in his new life. Ponies, dogs, cats, bunnies, and whatever other animal captured Lavender's curiosity for the moment were bestowed on her without a thought of what would happen to them once her enthusiasm faded. After the animal craze dwindled, Lavender took up lessons in hip-hop, pop singing, and other such pursuits, sure that she was meant to be the next Lady Gaga. The trouble was, Annie recalled, if anything took more than fifteen minutes of concentration, Lavender quickly lost interest. Even a year in Switzerland—something Annie would have sold her soul for—left Lavender with an atrocious accent and a French vocabulary that any fifth-grade student could top.

Dearest Sister,
Annie began again. She tossed back the rest of the scotch before continuing to read.

A poor imitation of a Celtic cross was inked in below her name.

Annie put down the letter and searched for her address book, pouring herself a hefty refill on the way. This little scheme had to be nipped in the bud. Immediately. Squinting at the many crossed-out numbers in her address book for Lavender, she finally selected the one that appeared most recent and dialed the number.

It was disconnected. Hell's bells. How could she head Lavender off at the pass?

As she avoided thinking of the obvious, she savagely parsed Lavender's letter. “Be in your world soon.” My
ass,
Annie thought.
You're in outer space permanently.
“Natural gifts as a psychic.”
Oh, yeah? Then hear this: STAY AWAY.

Annie sighed and reached for the address book again, this time searching for her father's number. There was simply no one else to call who might know where Lavender was parked at present.