Saddled With Trouble (17 page)

She threw her arms around him. “Thank you so much. Oh God, I’ll pay you back when I can. I will.”

He pulled away and was definitely blushing now. “It’s nothing. You talk to your pop.”

“I will, I promise. Thank you again. I won’t forget it.”

“I better head out. You got a ride home?”

“Don’t worry about me. I’ll get home.”

“I don’t think Mr. Shifty will bother you again.”

They said goodbye. She decided it was time to get a cab home. She’d had just about enough, and tracking down Camden and Kevin wasn’t an option. She was still pretty angry and she was sure Camden’s feelings were mutual.

She headed out of the restaurant, careful not to be followed be Brad or Camden. She didn’t see either of them. Good. It was brisk outside and she buttoned up her jacket.

“Michaela.” Dwayne and Sam walked toward her. “What you doing?” Dwayne asked.

“I’m waiting for a cab.”

“You have a bit of the drink, huh?” Sam asked. She nodded, not wanting to get into all of it. “Well, how far you live?”

“Ten minutes.”

“Ah, ten minutes, cuz, let’s give her a ride home,” Sam said.

“Yeah, definitely. Come on.”

Michaela shook her head. “No guys, that’s okay. Looks like you just got here. Go on in. I’ll be fine.”

“Ah, c’mon.” Dwayne put an arm around her. “Sam don’t need to eat nuthin’, anyway.”

Sam rolled his eyes. “Why you always gotta do that?”

“What?”

“Insult me? Ever since we been kids, you talking about my eating and how big I am. Just ’cause you scrawny.”

Dwayne laughed. At first Michaela wasn’t sure Sam was kidding, but then he started laughing, too, and as the breeze picked up, and exhaustion began wearing on her mind and body, she agreed to a ride home.

Dwayne drove an older Bronco. The car smelled of horses and saddle soap, which was perfect as far as she was concerned. “You doing okay?” Dwayne asked.

“I guess. And you?”

“Me too. Sam and I been talking about it.”

“Yeah, still can’t believe it,” Sam said. “But, let’s talk about something else. We been through a lot.”

Michaela nodded.

“How’s Rocky?” Dwayne asked. “You still wanting to show him?”

“I don’t know. I’m actually thinking that I need to geld him.” She told him about Rocky’s field day.

“He figure out that pastures
are
greener on the other side,” Sam said.

Michaela laughed. “I guess so. But that old place isn’t exactly next door. I mean, he really had to follow his nose.”

“Acting like he had some loving before, by doing that,” Sam replied.

“Nah, like Michaela said, he just following his nose,” Dwayne said.

“Yeah, I s’pose. Stud horse been bred or not still got the instinct.”

“Oh my God,” Michaela blurted.

“What?” Dwayne asked.

“That’s it. Oh, my God. How come I didn’t think of it until now? That’s it.” Her mind reeled.

“What she talking about, cuz? What you talking about, girl—
shit. Goddammit! What the hell!
” Sam yelled. He kicked the back of Michaela’s seat.
Michaela turned around to face Sam. His body stiffened, and his eyes rolled back into their sockets. “Dwayne? Dwayne!” Michaela cried.

Dwayne turned. “Oh no!” He pulled the off the road and braked.

“What is it? What’s going on?” Michaela yelled.

“In the back. Lift the hatch, get his duffel out. Get it!” Dwayne ordered.

Michaela complied as Dwayne climbed into the back seat with Sam. She handed it to him. Dwayne opened the bag, pulled out a bottle of pills and shoved one down Sam’s throat. He held his mouth shut. “Swallow. Swallow. Juice. There’s juice in the front. In the glove compartment.”

Michaela suddenly realized that Sam was having a diabetic seizure. She found the juice and gave it to Dwayne. A few minutes later, Sam seemed to be doing much better.

“Are you okay, Sam?” she asked. “I didn’t know you’re a diabetic.”

“Oh yeah.”

“That’s why I tell him not to eat so much,” Dwayne said, pulling back out onto the highway.

“That’s why I tell you I needed to eat.” Sam laughed, trying to make light of the situation. “Sorry about my cussin’. Happens sometimes when the blood sugar drops.”

“Don’t worry about it. I understand.” They pulled into her place. “Do you want me to make you something to eat?”

“No. I think I should get him home. I’ll take care of him,” Dwayne replied. “You okay?”

“Sure. I’m fine.”

“I walk her to the door,” Dwayne told Sam.

Sam nodded and said goodnight. It was nice, especially after everything that had been happening, to have Dwayne make sure she got inside the house okay. When they reached her door, Dwayne turned to her. “You started to say something about you had it figured out, or something like that, right ’fore Sam had his seizure.”

She waved a hand at him. “It’s nothing. It’s crazy, really.”

“What?”

She didn’t know if she could trust Dwayne, but he
had
been in Vegas the morning Uncle Lou was killed, so he hadn’t killed him. That she was sure of; but could he be the one who’d been scamming breeders by selling off sperm that was not Loco’s? Sure, he said that he didn’t have any affiliation to the program, and he was a really nice guy, but she bit her tongue anyway. “Oh, I just figured out why Brad was hassling me back at the restaurant. You weren’t there, but my ex was giving me a bad time.”

“You need me to talk to him?”

She shook her head. “No. But thanks for the lift home. I really appreciate it.” She got inside the door, locked it, and leaned against it. What she didn’t want to tell Dwayne was her theory about who was the father to those foals— her very own Rocky.

TWENTY

MICHAELA WOKE UP THE NEXT MORNING KNOWING that before she could prove her theory about Rocky being the father to those foals, she would have to get his DNA sent over to the AQHA. As she headed out to the barn, she couldn’t help thinking that by doing this she could be implicating herself in a crime that she didn’t commit. Maybe she should speak to an attorney before going ahead with it. Maybe she should go to Ethan with this. She wished Uncle Lou were there. He’d know what to do.

She tossed in a flake of hay for each one of the horses, and when she came to Rocky’s stall, she opened it up. “Hey big guy.” He turned and looked at her. “This won’t hurt. He bobbed his head up and down and then turned back to his breakfast. It was almost as if he knew what she’d said. She loved that horses, like dogs, are social and love to communicate. They like to be around other animals and people for the most part.

She pulled out several strands of Rocky’s mane and placed them in a plastic baggie. Back at the house, she typed up a letter to the AQHA. It wasn’t an easy letter because who in the world would believe it? God, she prayed that it wasn’t true. But she made the decision to take a chance and send it in, along with Rocky’s hair samples.

What had alerted her to the possibility that Rocky could be the father to the foals in Ohio was something Dwayne— or maybe it had been Sam?— had said last night, that the horse had followed his nose. The dairy farm was close by, but not so close that Rocky would have caught a whiff of the mare in season. Yet, he’d beelined it straight to her— as if he’d been there before.

It might seem crazy, but Michaela was inclined to believe that someone was bringing in a mare to the dairy farm while in season, then taking a back trail in to get Rocky out. The barn was far enough away from the house that someone could do this. Leading him to the barn, using him to “breed,” and then returning him. If this were the case, there was quite a bit of nasty business going on. Not the least of which was that someone was stealing her animal time and again. Boy, if she got her hands on that person, she’d . . . well, she’d kill him! How dare someone do that to poor Rocky! Okay, so Rocky probably didn’t mind too much. But, still, it was wrong. Very, very wrong!

Horse owners were being scammed into thinking that they were going to be getting foals with Loco’s pedigree, not Rocky’s. Now, Rocky was no dumpy animal. He boasted those great breeding lines, too. However, Loco had won several championships and earned a wad of cash, and the titles helped to drive his stud fees up.

The question was, if this were true, it had been going on for some time now. She would first have to find out if her theory was correct. Rocky had never been typed with the AQHA because he wasn’t being used to stand stud. She took the letter and the hair specimen down to the Postal Annex and sent it via overnight mail. She’d gone online last night to find out who she should send it to, and she planned to make a follow-up call either later that afternoon or early tomorrow morning. She’d probably sound like a loon, but it made sense to her. Michaela’s gut told her that this was a possibility, and she had to pursue it. Her gut also told her that Brad could very well be the one who had been working the scam. He would have still been living in the house when the initial contracts were signed with the breeders. He could have gotten Rocky in and out of the dairy farm in about two hours’ time. But she would have woken up if he’d gotten out of bed. Maybe it all took place after she’d kicked him out. She’d have to go back and look at the dates. Plus, she wanted to go over the contracts and lawsuits to see if she could learn anything from them. She had a full plate waiting for her after working the horses.

By the time she returned from the Postal Annex, Rocky was finished with breakfast. She got him out and readied him for his morning workout.

The beauty of being in the arena with her horse during those forty minutes was that she forgot all her worries . . . everything. She only focused on what she and her horse were doing. They became one together.

“Poetry in motion.”

She brought Rocky to a stop and looked up to see none other than Detective Jude Davis. Oh, no. What now? Why did this guy have the knack for showing up at the worst possible time? “Hello, Detective. What can I do for you? I believe we discussed all we needed to yesterday.”

“Yeah, we did.” He shoved his hands into his pockets and looked down at the ground, then back up at her. “I don’t believe you had anything to do with your uncle’s murder.”

She patted Rocky’s neck. “You don’t?”

“No. And, well . . .” he paused, “I’m sorry about bringing up that you and your ex were

trying to have a baby. I’m sure that hurt and it was why you were so resentful and defensive.”

She stared at him, not knowing what to say. He did look apologetic, but he’d fooled her before when he’d been all nicey-nice while questioning her in her home and then “coming to the rescue,” the other night. Then, he’d turned around and showed up at her folks’ place asking all sorts of questions about her marriage. And yesterday? Well, that had blown her initial impression of him. Was he really sorry?

“Look, I’m going to do something way out of line here. So if you say no, it’s fine, but . . . I was wondering if we could have coffee sometime.”

She almost started laughing. “Coffee?”

“Uh-huh.” He waved his arms in front of him. “I know I was tough on you yesterday. I was, but I’m a good judge of character and the way you reacted, in all honesty, put any doubts I had about you and what happened with your uncle to rest. Not that I ever really thought you might have murdered him, but I have to look at all the possibilities.”

“So now you want to have coffee with me?”

“Okay and a muffin, too, or you know, a croissant.”

Wait a minute. Was he asking her out? Wasn’t there some policy within the police force that made that against the rules? He shouldn’t be asking her out. Should he? Could he? Well, he did preface it by saying that he was out of line. And, he was. Wasn’t he? Heat rose to her cheeks. “Detective, can you do that?”

“Do what?”

“Ask me for coffee?”

He smiled. “It’s not like a date. It’s more of an apology coffee meeting kind of thing. I told you that I feel badly that I was a bit rough on you yesterday. Granted I was doing my job.”

She couldn’t help but smile back at him. She sure did want him to be sorry. She’d been fooled before, but there was also a part of her that wanted to stay angry at him. “An apology coffee meeting thing? Hmmm. And, so what, we go out for coffee and you say that you’re sorry, which you already did anyway, and there you go.”

“Kind of.”

“Kind of. Okay, Detective Davis, you know your apology, the one you just gave me is pretty sufficient. But I have to ask you, you seemed, uh, fairly suspect of me. Why the change of heart?”

“I told you, I can read people. Gut feeling. You know what I’m thinking, let’s forget it. I’ll be in touch about the case.” He pulled a pair of sunglasses out of his front jacket pocket and all of a sudden looked very TV cop-like. And, it made him even more attractive.

“Coffee is good. When? Where?”

“Do you know the bakery on Third? The Honey Bear Cottage?”

“Know it well. Best lattes in town.”

He pointed a finger at her. “Good. Then that’s where, and why don’t we say day after tomorrow? I know that tomorrow will be a rough one for you, so if you want to wait until next week, I understand.” His voice turned far more serious than it had been.

“Tomorrow? What are you talking about? What’s going on tomorrow?”

“Didn’t your uncle’s wife tell you? The coroner’s office released his body and she’s decided to have his services as soon as possible.”

Michaela shook her head, totally confused. “No she didn’t tell me. I assumed it would be the end of the week. Thank you for letting me know. I’ll give her a call.”

“I’m sure she’s planning on letting everyone know today.”

Michaela nodded.

“Would four o’ clock work, then, on Thursday?”

“Four it is.”

“Also, if you need anything tomorrow, please don’t hesitate to let me know.”

“Thanks.”

She watched as he walked down the hill. Why was she feeling so weird about him? Okay, one minute he was nice, the next he was not, and then he was again. Did he really believe that she had nothing to do with her uncle’s murder, or was this some ploy he used to get people “to talk?” Not like she had much to say. Okay, so she did have some interesting theories at this juncture, like someone had killed Uncle Lou because he discovered who was substituting Loco’s sperm with another stud’s— possibly Rocky’s. And why, even with all this horrible business going on, did Michaela hope that his desire to meet her for coffee meant more than some simple apology or the need to drag further information from her? Men!