Racing From Death: A Nikki Latrelle Mystery

by Sasscer Hill

  Lorna stood in the doorway wearing rumpled pajamas with the words "Natural Born Player" written across the chest. She rolled her eyes as the rooster, apparently on our front doorstep, burst into another round of crowing.

  "God damned chicken." Turning, she stomped across the wood floor, jerked a pillow off the green upholstered couch, drew back the bolt and flung open the door. "Get lost, McNugget!"

  The pillow sailed out the door, the rooster's shrieks diminishing as he rushed away from the cottage. Slippers streaked out the open door after the chicken, and I burrowed into the bed, pulling the pillow back over my head.

  But as I lay there, the lifeless, porcelain doll's face played across my eyelids, then the melted, burnt face on the roadside. Time to make coffee. Think about getting the barn shipshape for Ms. Chaquette and her two incoming horses.

  #

  A few hours later we'd galloped and cooled out the six horses. The morning had been the type I prefer – uneventful. My filly had acted as agreeable as an old school horse, but such pleasant behavior left me suspicious.

  I rubbed her with a clean rag, thinking how the reins had felt like telegraph lines that morning, my fingers receiving subterranean messages. I’d had a feeling she was like a can of gasoline about to take a walk with a match. As I polished her rich coat and massaged her muscles, I hoped she'd keep a lid on it.

  "You gotta see this, Nikki," Lorna said, from outside the stall.

  I stuck my head out. A metallic yellow Cadillac with a brown vinyl top was parked in the dirt-and-gravel path beside our shedrow. A tall, slender woman stood next to the car, rapid-firing what sounded like Spanish at Ramon.

  The groom, his back to me, nodded quickly and shifted his weight from one leg to the other. He whipped his head around, spotted me and made an anxious get-over-here motion with his hand.

  Must be the Chaquette woman. Peculiar hair style. A series of dark brown and platinum blond streaks were slicked back on her skull. The rhinestones encrusting her large aviator sunglasses reminded me of an insect's compound eyes.

  Long slender legs with coppery skin stretched from beneath a short, hot-yellow skirt. A matching yellow jacket with formidable shoulder-pads displayed wing-like epaulets.

  Her attention landed on me, her mouth an angry scowl. "Who are you?"

  I couldn't see her eyes, but fancied I felt them inventorying the dirt and horse hair on my clothes, smudges on my face. I probably didn't smell so good either.

  "Ravinsky's assistant, Nikki Latrelle." I held out a hand. She ignored it, whipping off her dark glasses. Big deep eyes, no doubt pretty when not darkened by anger and disdain.

  "Where are my horses?" Her accent was Hispanic, but whether Spanish, Mexican or South American, I had no idea.

  Ramon threw me a helpless look. "I tell her – "

  "Silencio!" The word shot from her mouth, a stream of venom.

  Ramon took a half-step back. This woman was like a God damned wasp. No. A yellow jacket.

  "Look," I said. "I don't know where you come from, but we don't treat our employees like that."

  "You," she said, "will tell me where my horses are. Now."

  I folded my arms across my chest and glared at her. She threw her hands up and muttered something in a different language, maybe French.

  "Are you the new owner?" I asked.

  "Amarilla Chaquette." She gave me a curt nod.

  That was probably as close to a handshake as I'd get from her. A small breeze stirred up a dust devil near our feet, bringing an exquisite scent of perfume to my nostrils. I wondered if it was French and how many hundreds of dollars an ounce the yellow jacket paid for it.

  "Listen, all I know is Mr. Ravinsky said you were shipping in two horses today. I wasn't given any further information." As if on cue my cell rang – security at the stable gate letting me know a driver was trying to bring two horses in.

  "Is there a problem?" I hunched over the phone, turning away from Amarilla's probing antenna.

  "Yeah, there's a problem." The guard's voice was contentious. "Horses don't have any papers."

  Of course they didn't. "Uh, Ms. Chaquette, you have any papers on your horses?"

  She threw me a disgusted look. "Certainly. I have their documentation. Why you ask?"

  "Your horses are at the gate. Can't get in without papers."

  In about three strides, her long, toned legs had her at the car. Without a backwards glance she peeled off toward the stable gate.

  "Who's on duty up there?" asked Lorna.

  "From the sound of his voice, I'd say it was that obnoxious guy guard from the night we arrived."

  The three of us broke into smiles.

  We finished up stable chores, making sure the two new stalls were ready. Almost half an hour went by before a big commercial horse van rolled up to our barn.

  Amarilla pulled up behind the van, her big sunglasses aimed at Lorna and Ramon as they led the two new horses down a ramp. A scrawny bay gelding resembling an over trained whippet, and a tall, long-bodied filly with so much blond in her chestnut coat, she almost looked palomino. Amarilla shoved the Jockey Club papers at me, and I put them in the tack room, planning to file them with the track ID man later. I noticed the gelding's registered name was Stinger, the filly's Daffodil.

  Amarilla waited outside the gelding's stall. "Stinger, he run on opening day. You are prepared?"

  I blinked. Opening day was Sunday, entry day for Sunday races had been two days earlier. Who had entered the horse? Not Jim, I would have known. "Are you sure?"

  "Am I sure?" Her scornful eyes slid over me. "Of course. I entered the horse."

  Without asking the trainer? Oh boy, a runaway owner. "Did you draw in?"

  "What you mean?"

  An ignorant runaway owner. "Look, just because you entered doesn't mean the horse got in. There's only 14 slots in a race. Suppose 19 or 20 horses entered? He might not draw in at all, or wind up ‘also eligible.’ "

  I hated being also eligible. You had to wait another two or three days for "scratch time," then if someone else withdrew their horse you might draw in late.

  Armarilla made an irritated gesture with her hand, sending a waft of delicate perfume over. "So, Miss-know-everything, he get in?"

  How the hell would I know? I held up my finger in a "just-a-minute" sign and marched down the shedrow, through the middle and over to the far side of our barn looking for trainer Lilly Best who I'd met that morning.

  An attractive, substantial blond, she hefted a last bale of hay onto a stack against the wall. She still had a copy of the old "overnight." Racing offices print these sheets soon after they finish drawing entries for a given race day. I ran my finger down the page, ignoring the turf and filly races and found the dirt-race with Stinger's name listed, the fifth race.

  He'd drawn the four hole in a field of nine. Amarilla hadn't named a jockey. I'd look the horse over. If he appeared sound and ready to run, I'd name myself on as jockey, otherwise I'd scratch him. I almost shuddered at the thought. She'd be so mad she'd probably sting me to death.

  I went back, told her the horse was in, asked for her phone number, then got busy with the rake. Fortunately, she didn't like the dust it stirred up and got in her Caddy and left.

  What with Bunny and her dolls the night before, not to mention the dead body on the road, I had a hankering for my favorite toddy – bourbon, with hot tea and honey. After meeting our waspish new owner, a bottle of medicinal booze in the cottage pantry seemed a necessity, only I hadn't seen a liquor store since arriving. Being a Maryland girl, this seemed odd. In Laurel, just about every other street corner flaunted a liquor store. Usually had those machines for purchasing tickets from the state-run lottery too.

  Seemed odd the activists and state legislators so against slot machines at the Maryland racetracks didn't complain bitterly about the practice of selling lottery tickets in the booze shops. Friday afternoons, the places were crowded with men sitting in cars drinking out of brown paper bags, lines
from the lottery machines almost out the door, paychecks vanishing . . .

  A bright blue Mini Cooper bumped along our side road, interrupting my thoughts. A nifty painting of the British Flag decorated the top of this tiny car. Will Marshall eased the Cooper to a stop near where I stood outside Stinger's stall. Short, wiry and fit, he sprang from the car like a jack-in-the-box.

  We exchanged hellos and I took him on a brief tour of our shedrow, telling him about Amarilla and asking where I could find some whiskey.

  "Don't you know Virginia doesn't have liquor stores?" His green eyes glowed with amusement.

  "That's ridiculous, of course they have liquor stores."

  "They have state run ABC stores – alcoholic beverage control. But you can get beer and wine at the grocery store."

  "Bourbon," I said.

  "Go for it. But good luck, ‘cause I've never seen a package store around here, and it'll cost you a lot more in Virginia, too.”

  I decided New Kent County was not my favorite place. And why was Will staring at me?

  "You doing anything later?" His words were quick, like someone diving into cold water.

  "Yes," I said. "Looking for booze." Was he asking me out? I'd never thought of Will that way. He felt more like a distant relative. Besides, I was taller than he was. But he did have that nice face, honed, handsome, almost ascetic.

  "Okay, see ya." He climbed into the Cooper and left before I got another word out.

  An odd feeling washed over me, like I'd lost something. Hellish pushed her head over her stall door and I automatically moved close, stroking her face, breathing in her rich horse smell. Will Marshall? Nah.

  I found Lorna to see if she wanted to join me in my booze quest, but she said she'd hang at the track. I drove to the Kitchen, found an area directory and located a package store at a place called West Point. I climbed back into the Celica, stopping at a gas and food mart, where I bought a map and a chocolate bar.

  I sat in the car eating chocolate and figuring a route to the package store, almost 20 miles away. As the chocolate's caffeine and sugar rush hit me, I gave myself a mental admonishment. Entirely too enjoyable, and here I was on the way to buy liquor.

  I finished the candy, licking the last traces from my fingers, and suddenly wondered about people who get hooked into darker cravings.

  What would it be like to have a need so strong it possessed you? Maybe even consumed your life?

  Chapter 11

  Forty minutes and a couple of wrong turns later, I left New Kent County and crossed over the Pamunkey River on Route 30. The town of West Point sat on a peninsula between the Pamunkey and Mattaponi rivers. My map showed the two small rivers flowed together beyond West Point and formed the York River. A cell phone call had confirmed the town's ABC store lay in a strip mall near the bridge.

  The area should have been beautiful, but an immense container-board mill squatted on either side of route 30 as I came down off the bridge. To my left, tall buildings sprouted half-a-dozen stacks pumping gray smoke into the air, the unpleasant odor working its way through my closed car windows. On the right, a gigantic dumping ground of logs, boards and pulp.

  With all my sightseeing I almost missed the strip mall entrance. My sharp pull on the steering wheel caused my shoulder bag to slide across the passenger seat and tip its contents onto the floor. My wallet disappeared below the seat.

  I refrained from cursing at the inherent perversity of inanimate objects and parked the Celica at the lot's far end, closed in by thick evergreen bushes. Beyond the foliage, a broken-down fence failed to guard the large overgrown backyard of a dilapidated Victorian. Apparently the new strip mall had been plopped down on the edge of an historic neighborhood.

  I climbed from the Toyota, wondering how the townspeople could stand the malodorous paper mill. Major job source, no doubt. Moving around to the passenger side, I leaned in and poked around for my wallet, hairbrush and other stuff strewn across the carpeted floor.

  Rustling sounds and a disturbance in the brush rushed toward me. I straightened, clutching my wallet. Something jerked me away from the car door and slammed me onto the hood.

  "Give me the fucking wallet." Eyes rimmed in red, sweaty face marked with sores and blackened scabs.

  I was so scared, lying on the hood under his nightmarish stare, I couldn't move.

  "Give it, bitch." He smiled, exposing browning, misaligned teeth that were dying in a bed of corroded and disfigured gums. I gagged at his breath, a chemical, rotten-egg stench. Tried to roll away.

  He made a fist, clubbed the side of my face. I rolled with the blow, let go of my wallet and ended up on my palms and knees in front of my car. He stepped around the Toyota and kicked my side. Heavy boot. I went over. Hurt like hell.

  A car pulled into the lot. I could hear the wheels. I struggled back onto my knees. The creep had my wallet, ripping the cash out as he scrambled away and disappeared through the green bushes. I knelt there a moment, taking inventory. Didn't think anything was broken. My neck hurt. The side of my face where he'd smacked me felt hot and sore. His boot had smashed my right hip and the pain was heating up.

  "Jesus, lady, are you all right?" A man, eyes wide, with one of those little manicured beards on the end of his chin, stared at me.

  "I think so. Guy mugged me." I rubbed at my neck, the oily scent of tar rising where the afternoon sun had warmed the asphalt. "You see him?"

  "Saw something running through that fence, into that yard there. He have a blue jacket?"

  "Yeah" The word came out a slow sigh. "That was him. Think he dropped my wallet after he took the cash. Could you – "

  "I'm on it." The guy moved quickly, finding my wallet, then the keys, locking the car. He helped me into the store, where a double-wide, dark-skinned ABC clerk worked her way from behind the counter and fussed over me. She sent a younger woman into a back room for a chair and some ice wrapped in a towel. I sat on the chair pressing the cold towel against my face. Around me, the store was immaculately clean, spacious and well lit.

  The clerk clutched the phone as she explained about the mugging to the 911 dispatchers.

  "I've been telling you people we have some rough types been hanging around here." She was almost yelling into the phone. "This poor girl looks half beat to death."

  I realized she was talking about me.

  She listened a minute, then said, "All right. Just get an officer over here." She slammed the phone down. "Those paper-mill dope heads been hanging around here for months. I've called the police and – "

  My rescuer with the little beard slid some bottles of scotch on the counter, then cut his eyes to me. "You want a mini bottle of something? Gin? Maybe some liqueur?"

  I shook my head and everything hurt. Maybe I should ask about a bathroom, find a mirror, clean up my face. I had some burns on my palms where I'd landed so hard on the pavement. Bits of asphalt peppered the flesh.

  "You got a mini bottle of Wild Turkey 101?" I asked.

  "Sure do," the big woman said. "But I can't let you drink it in the store." She paused a moment, then held up a paper coffee cup. "But if you was to take this cup and this little bottle and go into our lady’s room back there, don't suppose anyone would be the wiser. Cops never get here'n less than 10 minutes."

  She dropped one of those tiny airline-size bottles into the paper cup. "On the house."

  Little Beard walked it over, opened the bottle and poured the amber liquid into the paper cup. He breathed in the rising vapors. "Huh. Gonna have to buy this stuff."

  I stood up carefully, gasping from the pain in my hip. I took the bourbon, and the younger woman showed me to the restroom in the back. Utilitarian and clean, it had a shelf over the sink I could set my cup on.

  I stared in the mirror. The right side of my face had swollen into a purplish red blossom. Some filling had settled under my right eye, the color a shade darker than my bruised cheek. I unfastened my jeans, and pulled them down just enough to see my hip.

  "V
ery nice," I said, inspecting the damage.

  More of the same bruising and swelling. I made no attempt to fasten up the jeans. It would hurt too much. I grabbed the cup, poured in a finger of water and drained it empty. Closed my eyes, and waited a few beats.

  I washed my palms with warm water and soap. Stung like hell. Zipped up and moved slowly from the restroom back to the cashier counter. I could hear a siren in the distance.

  #

  Officer Delmot, of the King William County police department, sat on the bench seat of his police cruiser finishing up the mugging report. He asked me a couple more questions about the guy who'd assaulted me, then set his clipboard down and shifted in his seat so he faced me.

  The bridge of his nose appeared to have been broken at some point and weariness dragged at his face. But his brain worked fine and his voice was crisp.

  “The description you gave me of the assailant is textbook methamphetamine addict. The teeth and gums in particular. We call it meth mouth.”

  My fingers traced the swelling on my face. "He had so many sores." An involuntary shudder rippled through me.

  "Those people, they pick at those scabs. Can't leave themselves alone, think they have bugs under their skin. One guy down here had to have his arm amputated he'd gotten it so infected." He paused, drawing in a breath. "Miss Latrelle, I know you had an unpleasant experience. But consider yourself lucky."

  Delmot seemed to focus on something in the distance I couldn't see. "You saw his teeth. Meth addicts smoke the stuff, corrode their teeth. When they're high, they're wired in a way you and I can't begin to understand. Grinding their teeth to stubs while believing they're king of the world."

  He pulled some mint Lifesavers from his shirt pocket. Offered me one, which I took. He peeled the foil and paper back to expose a second one for himself.

  "When they come down, they're depressed, exhausted. Guy hit you, probably wanted money for another pipeful. Doesn't cost much, but meth addicts aren't exactly adept at holding down a job. You're lucky Mr. Hethmink drove into the lot when he did."