Roughstock (A Gail McCarthy Mystery) (21 page)

I tried to postulate a new Jack, one who only noticed a woman's looks, never her attitude, who had been more lucky and ambitious than smart. A closed-minded, oblivious man with a petty, vindictive streak. A man who had decided to run a new vet out of town because he perceived him as competition.

Having got this harsh portrait more or less in place I tried to refine the repercussions in the light of Jack's subsequent murder. The only thing that came to mind was the notion that this Jack was more likely to have incurred enmity than the easy-going rancher I'd thought I knew. But there would have to have been a reason to murder him. People are not killed, at least I didn't think so, simply because they're abrasive. And what it still came down to was that the three ex-wives had the motive.

On top of which, Joanna was related to wife number one. But, I reminded myself, the cops had concluded that the gun wouldn't have fit in Joanna's purse. She was innocent, surely.

But there was no getting around the next one. Travis Gunhart was involved with wife number two. Travis had Bronc for an alibi, but Bronc had seemed strangely disturbed about Trav. Was that because he was aware that Travis had been gone that night?

I wiggled my head deeper into the pillow and sighed. I'd always liked Trav. He had seemed such a happy, outgoing kid, with an open-hearted manner that was very appealing. In some ways, he reminded me of Bret. But Trav was no ladykiller. He wasn't attractive in that intense, visceral way that seems to draw females like moths-a trait I'd noticed Bret had to the nth degree. Trav was just nice and talkative and willing to be friends-which made his affair with Laney, if in fact it was an affair, seem all the more calculated.

She could have picked him up at a bar like she tried to do with Bret, I reminded myself He might not have known she was Jack's ex-wife. Now there was an interesting question. Had Travis been working for Jack when Jack was married to Laney? When exactly had Travis started living and working on the Hollister Ranch? Where had he come from and why had he ended up there, more or less permanently? I didn't know the answers to any of these questions.

And Trav had seemed very different since Jack's murder. I'd thought that it might have been grief, but now what did I think?

I groaned into the pillow. I didn't know what I thought, but I couldn't stomach the idea that Travis had killed Jack.

Tara? Tara had an alibi, verifiable by four or five people. If Tara was the killer, I would have to find out who she had bought off or hired. That was the cops' job, I reminded myself, and I hoped they were doing it.

Who else might have a motive? Maybe, I thought suddenly, the money to be gained through Jack's death wasn't inherited. Joanna had said that Jack talked to her about some big land deal that could make him a lot of money. Maybe this business deal would stand or fall based on Jack's removal from the scene. Maybe someone else would win or lose a fortune.

I sure as shit didn't have a clue who that person might be. Still, I knew Jack's real estate agent. She was a horsewoman, naturally, and when Jack had more or less retired, she'd begun using me as her vet. I could at least ask her if she knew about Jack's upcoming deal and try to figure out who it would benefit or harm.

Always supposing, that was, that the obvious didn't happen and Jeri Ward didn't promptly arrest Laney and Trav. Or Tara. Or Joanna. Oh Lord. I turned firmly over in the bed, shoved my face into the pillow, and tried hard to forget the whole situation. God, I was glad I wasn't a cop.

NINETEEN

I
was fast asleep when they came knocking on the door. I was aware at first only that something was wrong, then of loud, noisy banging, then I was awake and someone was pounding on my front door at well past eleven o'clock. Blue barked raspily from his spot by the bed-an old dog's bark, but still vigorous. What the hell? I wasn't on call this week, so that couldn't be it, even allowing for the absurd notion that a frantic client would come banging on my door in the middle of the night.

"Who is it?" I shouted, as loudly as I could.

Since my house is built on two levels, with the bedroom on the lower story and the front door upstairs at street level, the knocker could probably barely hear me. Especially over Blue's barking.

Eventually I made out a return shout, which sounded alarmingly like "Police!"

Climbing out of bed, I sifted through the discarded clothes on the floor; I could hardly appear for the police in my underwear. Jeans and a sweatshirt rendering me decent, I told Blue firmly to stay there and shut up, and climbed my ladder to the upper story.

"Who is it?" I demanded again, once I was upstairs.

The cool voice on the other side of the door was unmistakable. "This is Detective Jeri Ward of the Santa Cruz County Sheriff's Department."

"Okay," I muttered, unbolting the door with one hand and turning on the light with the other.

There were two of them on my porch when I got the door open and stood blinking stupidly out, my eyes dazzled by the sudden blast of light. Jeri Ward, dignified in a suit of olive wool with pumps, nylons, the whole works, and Claude Holmquist, every bit as formal in an iron gray suit with a dark red tie. I registered these details one by one as I stood there staring in the blank fashion of someone who was snoring soundly one minute before.

"Can we come in?" Jeri Ward asked finally.

"I guess so." Gracelessly, I moved aside and went to sit on the end of the couch.

The two detectives entered the room in the cautious manner of people who are used to unexpected trouble, their eyes taking in the surroundings with quick, careful, impersonal glances. Huddled in my corner of the couch, I felt their rigid presence skewing my comfortable environment into messy chaos.

Suddenly I was aware of the crooked stacks of books on the antique dresser, the fuzzy layer of dog hair on the wingback chair where Jeri Ward was gingerly sitting down. After a distrustful glance at the only other chair, an admittedly rickety-looking rocker, Claude Holmquist seated himself at the far end of the couch, which was, like the chairs and carpet, supporting a fair amount of Blue's excess coat. No doubt, I thought, torn between embarrassment and amusement, a flea would hop onto his nice gray suit. It
would be the crowning touch.

Nobody was saying anything, and I wasn't going to be the one to break the silence. I stared at the three of us, reflected in the mirror over my antique dresser: Jeri Ward looked stiff, Claude Holmquist looked bland, I looked rumpled and sleepy, but all of our expressions were guarded.

Jeri began. "We've been to visit Karen Harding, Gail. Apparently we just missed you."

Her unexpected use of my first name, and the quasi-friendly tone in which she spoke startled me. A second's reflection dissected the tone into exasperation overlaid with sarcasm. I could feel my face shutting down even farther.

Detective Ward went on. "I have to warn you, you cannot go on doing this. You're not a cop, you're not even a PI. We are not going to have some civilian amateur sleuth mucking up a homicide investigation."

Anger flashed in me and I opened my mouth, but she held up a hand. "I know. You have helped us out before. But you need to understand that for me to have you going around questioning suspects and tainting their evidence is the same as if you were operating on a horse in order to save its life and I insisted on sticking my hand in its guts and fumbling around."

That shut me up. Was that what I was-a colossal, possibly life-endangering, pain in the ass? Maybe. But I had helped her out before. And what had happened to the rapport between us? Had it been swallowed by her need to play up to this Nevada cop? Was she so busy being defensive about her position vis-a-vis him that she'd simply forgotten the times when she hadn't considered me a pain?

Her face gave no clue; it was as controlled as ever. For a second I wondered just how she managed to stay so unmussed and unflappable at what must have been the end of a long day-and then I shifted my eyes to Detective Holmquist.

Predictably, he was watching me, that gentle, mild-seeming gaze fixed on my face. "Did you learn anything from Ms. Harding?"

Startled once again, I stared at him, trying to decide what traps this new approach held. Taking a page out of the bureaucratic book, I asked, "Why are you asking me?"

"To see if you can help us," he replied promptly. "I understand Detective Ward's problem with your involvement, but since you are already involved, it seems, I'd like to share your information. "

All this was said with his eyes on my face; he never once looked at Jeri Ward. He's one-upping her, I thought. He's telling her, ever so subtly, that it's his case, he's the senior officer; he's backing her off. Instantaneously I revised this idea. Maybe they were just playing bad cop/good cop. Maybe the whole thing was prearranged.

Either way, I had nothing to lose by telling him what little I knew about Karen. Running my fingers through the messy tangle of my bangs, I thought about it.

"I didn't actually learn much," I said, adding mentally that Karen, like Tara and Laney, used to be curvy and blond, and certainly seemed dumb. "She appeared to be pretty bitter about Jack and said he 'owed' her. Said she didn't get enough money out of the divorce. I don't know if you'd call that a motive for murder. I was wondering if she had an alibi?" I ended on a questioning note, curious as to what he'd do with this.

I could feel Jeri Ward's eyes drilling into the side of my head, but I kept my own gaze fixed firmly on Detective Holmquist. If they were going to play good cop/bad cop, I might as well talk to the one with the sympathetic role.

I had, once again, underestimated the man. He never missed a beat. Cooperation was the name of his game, it appeared, and unhesitatingly he told me. "She has an alibi, more or less. She was seen by her neighbor at five
P.M.,
picking up her newspaper, and this same neighbor reports that her car remained in the carport until she, the neighbor, went to bed. The neighbor said that Ms. Harding's routine was exactly the same every evening and it didn't vary on the night in question. Apparently those condos have pretty thin walls, and the neighbor could hear her moving around the kitchen and living room, and later-about eleven or so-going up the stairs to the bedroom."

"I guess that's an alibi." I said it without thinking, aware only after I spoke that the words-and more, the tone-revealed my continued interest in this case. Before Jeri Ward could snap a putdown, I asked Claude Holmquist, "What land deal was Jack involved in?"

He regarded me quietly, his normal mask of bland neutrality slipping a little so that I glimpsed the hard-edged mind within. I wondered what he was thinking.

Jeri Ward cut firmly across his thoughts, whatever they were. "Do you have any idea who might have killed him?"

Back to the bad cop.

"No," I said bluntly.

"Was he sexually involved with anyone?" Jeri fired the questions at me like tennis balls.

"I wouldn't know," I shot back. After a second, I added, "I saw him with a lot of different women over the last year. No one I knew, and they were always changing. I don't know who, if anyone, he'd been seeing lately."

"Was he involved with drugs?" Jeri's tone didn't change when she asked this question, but, once again, I was shocked.

"Jack? Jack was the last man on earth to be involved with drugs. At least," I paused, "I wouldn't have thought so." Again it occurred to me how little I really knew Jack Hollister. "Do you have some reason to suppose he used drugs?" I asked, thinking of Tara, and Lonny's sense that she had a "habit."

"Just answer the question," Jeri Ward snapped at me, but Detective Holmquist's quiet voice intervened.

"Let's all take it easy." To me, he added, "It's a standard line of questioning. First we concentrate on the immediate family of the victim, and anyone who stands to benefit directly by his or her death. In this case, the ex-wives. If these suspects are alibied out, which they seem to be here, we look around for other motives. Sexual involvement, involvement with drugs-these are key areas."

I nodded, looking at him, avoiding Jeri. "I have no reason to think Jack was involved with drugs," I said carefully. "There is some question about Tara."

At this, both detectives seemed to focus in. Claude Holmquist took out a small notepad and a pen and scribbled briefly. Jeri Ward said sharply, "Could you explain that statement, please?"

I lost my temper. I suppose I felt guilty for bringing it up at all. Whatever the reason, I laid my ears back and lashed out at her. "What the hell is your problem? You come barging in here, wake me up, want to pick my brain, and you're being goddamn rude to me. Where do you get off? Is there some kind of law against my talking to these people? I don't get your attitude at all. "

"Yes, there is a law," Jeri said evenly. "I can put you in jail for obstructing a homicide investigation."

We stared at each other. I knew my own eyes were hot and angry; hers looked cold and hard. "So put me in jail," I snapped.

For a second I thought I'd provoked her too far; I saw a blast of some strong emotion rip across that taut face. "Don't try me too hard, Gail. You're interfering in something you've no business to be involved in.
You're not helping anybody here. It's your duty to assist us, and you'd better be forthcoming with what it is you know about Tara Hollister and drugs, or I may just slap you in jail."