Racing From Death: A Nikki Latrelle Mystery

by Sasscer Hill

  "Gonna have live music and a barbeque at the track tonight to celebrate the big race tomorrow.” Sable pretended not to notice Lorna's red eyes and wet face. "I got free tickets. Will's gonna go. You two wanna come?"

  "I guess," Lorna said.

  "You should go," I said to her. "I'm going to take it easy tonight. Got that race tomorrow."

  "What she means," Lorna said, wiping her face with a tissue Sable had pulled from her pocket, "is she wants to stay here at the barn, obsess about the stakes race, and mother Daffodil to death."

  Will grinned. "She's got your number, Latrelle."

  "That's pretty much the evening I had planned."

  Sable sat next to Lorna, put an arm around her shoulder. "Come on, little sister. Do you good."

  "All right," Lorna said, and late that afternoon she wedged herself into the back of Will's Mini Cooper.

  Sable sat up front next to Will, where she leaned close, then laughed and touched his arm. I wondered if there was something between her and Will. I turned on the stable radio for company, and tried to shake off the blues as they drove away.

  Did I have feelings for Will? Or was it just the week-long string of disturbing events had me searching for new answers?

  Chapter 35

  I grabbed a hot dinner at the kitchen, some sort of chicken smothered in mushrooms, onions, and peppers. After a chocolate bar for dessert, I walked back to the barn.

  The moon, now rounded to a full globe, rose in the eastern sky. Dew glistened in the grass, melting into dark streaks on my leather boots. The warm temperature of the last few days still held, leaving the air mild, almost sensual.

  Reaching the shedrow, an old Grateful Dead song drifted from the radio. My Mom had played the album when I was little. I knew the lyrics.

  "Driving that train / High on cocaine / Casey Jones you better / Watch your speed / Trouble ahead –” I clicked off the radio as a familiar rumble sounded in the distance.

  Bobby's Mustang. A moment later his headlights swung around the corner. When he shut down the engine outside our shedrow, I hurried over, curious. Anxious, too. As Bobby opened the door to get out, the Cobra's dome light revealed a livid bruise on one cheek. Paler streaks of green and purple colored the skin beneath his eye.

  "It's not that bad," he said, catching my expression.

  "Where have you been?"

  He shrugged. "Around."

  Hard to ignore the flat, muscular abdomen beneath the black T-shirt. Even hurt, he moved with the grace of a dancer.

  "Lorna's not here," I said.

  "I know." He smiled. "She's at the barbeque."

  A glitter in his eyes instilled a discomfort that put me on the offensive. I stared at his damaged face.

  "Your dad do this sort of thing often?"

  He raised his hands defensively. "Easy, lady. I'm already bruised." He walked around the hood of his car, stopping a few feet from me.

  Of their own volition, my eyes dropped to the bulge in his jeans. Damn it. The man was dangerous. Even with his bruises and one lip slightly swollen, he was drop-dead gorgeous in the moonlight.

  I tried to distract him. "Why would your father do that to you?"

  "I guess I just drive him crazy sometimes." He moved closer. "Anybody ever drive you crazy?"

  I took a step back.

  "Knew you were afraid of it," he said, a smile playing on his lips.

  "Just . . . go find Lorna." Jesus, I could drown in those brown eyes. My mouth felt dry, but other parts didn't.

  He moved nearer. "Never been close enough to really see you before. You know you're beautiful, don't you?"

  I shut my eyes. He made my legs weak, opened channels for Mother Nature's insistent whisper, "You know you want to."

  I shook myself mentally. "This how you came on to Lorna?"

  "No," he said, pushing a lock of his hair back. "Lorna came after me. You're different, like a wild horse running the prairie, won't ever let herself get caught."

  Bobby grew still, studied me a moment. "Think you need a firm hand."

  Desire hit me like a freight train. Bobby nodded, as if he could see the heat, smell the smoke, touch the fire.

  "Come here." He grasped my wrists, pulled me into him, put his warm mouth over mine, slid his tongue between my lips.

  Something ignited inside, made me whimper, lock myself against him. His hands moved to the small of my back, drew me closer. His erection pressed against me, hard electricity burning through the denim of my jeans.

  What was I doing? A dizzying sensation shot through me, leaving me slick, aching, and pliable.

  Bobby pushed me down onto the hood of his Cobra. Stars pulsed in the sky above, roared white-hot through my veins. Somewhere in the stables, a horse nickered. Bobby unfastened my shirt, ripping a few buttons in his haste. He pushed my bra up. Warm lips and wet tongue found one nipple, fingertips on the other.

  I lay moaning, with my back pressed into the smooth metal, still warm from the hot engine. I felt drugged, the moon smiling down, Bobby hard and urgent. He unsnapped my jeans and went for the zipper.

  Was I finally going to do the deed? Not like this. Not on the hood of this man's car. Not with Lorna so crazy about him.

  "No!" I struggled beneath his weight.

  "Don't stop now," he gasped. "Please."

  "No! I don't want this."

  He tried to slide his tongue over my nipple again.

  I squirmed, got a hand free, and smacked him, realizing only as palm slapped flesh I'd hit the nasty bruise on his face.

  Bobby put a hand to his cheek and rolled off me. "You bitch!"

  "I didn't mean to hit you there. But you wouldn't stop."

  Tears glistened in his eyes, dispelling the drugged-with-desire glaze. He stood over me, one hand clenching into a fist.

  I flinched, tried to scrabble backwards.

  He hesitated, exhaled a breath, then extended an open hand toward me.

  I shrank away from him.

  "It's okay," he said, "just trying to help you up." His cocky arrogance and swagger seemed to evaporate.

  I waited a beat and took the offered hand. He pulled me to my feet. Hurriedly, I attempted to straighten my clothes, my fingers searching hopelessly for two buttons missing from the front of my shirt. The smell of engine oil and wax saturated my clothing.

  Bobby took a step away, and in the moonlight some emotion flooded his face. "Shouldn't have done that," he said. "But there was something about the way you looked at me . . . at the plant the other night. Made me want to come after you."

  Looked at him? How? Like I wanted to rescue him? Like I understood his pain? "Has he always beaten you?"

  His head came up, and he moved a step back. "No. You've got the wrong idea. He's okay. It's me. I disappoint him and stuff."

  "I'd hate to see what he'd do if you really pissed him off. He's got no right." I could feel myself taking up for a stray again, feel the anger that abuse always stirred in me.

  Bobby's gaze drifted to the ground. "You don't understand. It was hard for him when my mom ran off."

  "Not as hard as it is for you when he beats you. That's what happened to you when you said you fell off and hit the rail. Isn't it?"

  "Yeah." His voice was so low I could barely hear him.

  Overhead, a night bird flew across the moon, a dark silhouette, the flapping wings loud in the still air.

  "Did he hit your mother? Is that why she ran off?"

  He stared at me, his mouth open. "I . . . don't know. I don't remember."

  I watched him, questions crowding my mind.

  "Don't look at me like that," he said. "All full of pity. That's bullshit. I gotta feeling you've been down the same road. The way you're afraid of sex, afraid of me.”

  We glared at each other in the silver light.

  "So my dad knocks me around sometimes. What's your deal?"

  I wanted to tell him. My own self involvement? Or did I imagine owning up might help him in some way?


  "I lost my mom, like you."

  His eyes widened fractionally. "She ran out on you?"

  "No." My voice harsh, condemning. "She died, left me with her new husband."

  "Oh." His teeth pressed his lower lip a moment. "He hit you?"

  "He had other interests."

  "Whoa. He didn't like –"

  "I ran off before he did." Fear still rattled my voice. Memories of running in the dark along Park Heights Avenue near Pimlico racetrack, of what really happened before I escaped. I pushed them away, focused on Bobby’s words.

  "I figured. It's why you seem like that filly, loose on the prairie, still running. So, you've never been . . . caught, have you?"

  I'd never thought of my virginity in such lyrical terms. Maybe the man ran deeper than I'd thought.

  "Hey, I could still take care of that for you." But he said it with a grin, his voice lacking sexual undertone.

  Without warning, I liked him. Absent the swagger and excess testosterone, I felt myself warming to the person, felt myself grinning.

  "That's not gonna happen," I said.

  "I know. Friends?"

  "Sure. " I slid my arm around his waist, giving him a brief squeeze.

  "Thanks." He smiled, closed his fingers lightly over my hand.

  "Bobby?" Lorna rushed at us. Her eyes held a wild light and her hands were balled into fists at her sides. "What the hell's going on?" Arriving on foot, wearing her Nikes, we'd never heard her coming.

  Bobby and I jumped apart. Could we look any more guilty? Well, yeah, if Lorna had arrived a few minutes earlier.

  "It's not what it looks like," Bobby said, moving toward her.

  That was lame. But what can you say that doesn't make it worse?

  The betrayal in Lorna's eyes crushed my heart. This wasn't fixable.

  "Lorna –”

  "Don't." Lorna held up her hand, staring at my disheveled clothing.

  I'd forgotten the torn buttons. My shirt gaped open, revealing my bra.

  "Damn you. Damn both of you." With a little cry, she whirled and ran. Bobby started after her, but she screamed over her shoulder. "Leave me alone!"

  "She's too freaked," I called to Bobby. "Give her some time." I wasn't sure there could be enough time.

  A shadow moved on the shedrow, shifting into human form as it stepped into the moonlight. Will. Great, how much had he seen? As he walked closer his expression was unreadable.

  The pounding of Lorna’s Nikes made me turn. She ran down the gravel road, as if heading for the other barns. Then she veered into the woods.

  "Lorna, don't go in there!" I took off after her, Bobby on my heels.

  "I'll get a flashlight," Will called from behind.

  I entered the woods on a diagonal, hoping to head Lorna off, and promptly fell over a fallen tree limb. I went down hard on my palms and one knee. The limb got Bobby, too. He crashed beside me.

  In the distance I could hear Lorna's progress – the snapping of twigs, the rustle of branches, the tread of feet – some of it muffled by pine needles, all of it speeding away. In the murky light it would be almost impossible to chase her. As Bobby and I stood up, the beam of Will's light found us.

  "Wait up. I brought an extra flashlight." Will reached us and held it out.

  "You're a regular boy scout, aren't you?" Bobby said, brushing leaves and dirt from his clothes.

  "Thank you, Will." I took the extra light. "Lorna was pretty upset –”

  "She had reason to be." Will turned away from me. "We should spread out," he said over his shoulder. "You might as well stay with Bobby. Keep calling her name, so we can hear each other." Then he moved away through the underbrush.

  "Lorna," I called, my voice weak.

  "We are, like, so busted," said Bobby. "How long do you think she was standing there?"

  "Let's go," I stumbled ahead through the underbrush. "Lorna," I shouted. Damn everything. I groaned out loud. What had I been thinking?

  I'd known Lorna and Bobby were a train wreck waiting to happen. Christ, they'd been heading for it since the day they met. I'd just never envisioned myself as the oncoming train.

  Chapter 36

  The smell of damp earth and rotting leaves hung heavy in the air as Bobby and I blundered through the woods. A massive cloud bank worked its way across the night sky, obscuring the moon and making it harder to see. Will's occasional cry of, "Lorna," echoed through the trees somewhere to our right.

  Between the police, bloodhounds, the escaping Atkins, and Talbot's shovel, there were too many broken branches and too much disturbed ground for any hope of following my friend's trail.

  "Lorn-aah." Bobby's voice rang out before evaporating into the dense woods.

  I shook my head. Here was Bobby searching so hard for Lorna, when she'd spent the previous two days desperate to find him.

  "So Bobby, where were you all that time Lorna was looking for you?" In the dim light I had trouble reading his expression as he hesitated next to me.

  "I had to drive a shipment to Jersey with this other guy. Then we hauled some stuff to the Canadian border. We never stopped, just kept driving."

  "For your dad?"

  "No,” he said quickly. “For the baron. My dad manages the distributorship, but it's the baron's company.”

  "So you were shipping what? Liquor?"

  "Well, yeah. I guess."

  "You guess?"

  He threw me a sharp look. "It's company business."

  Striding ahead, he left me behind. I ran, caught up, and grabbed his shoulder just as the moon broke briefly through the clouds.

  “Then tell me about the Cheswick boys.”

  In the silver light I could see the color leave his face. He stared at me, silent. I wanted him to speak.

  “You were with them the night they died. You have a part in that?”

  “Jesus Christ, no! They cleared me of any involvement.”

  “Yeah, I heard. But you know why they died.”

  “No.” He kept his eyes wide and honest appearing, but something shifted in them, a blink that wasn’t quite a blink. “I don’t know, and this conversation is over.” He stalked ahead.

  The air around me grew cold and darker, as a pattering sound rattled the dry leaves overhead. I glanced up, and drops of rain stung my face. I should have known Bobby would never answer my questions.

  "We'd better go in," he called over his shoulder. "Too bad Boy-Scout Will didn't think to bring a cell phone. For all we know, Lorna could be trying to reach us."

  I didn't think Lorna was trying to call anybody. I remembered that betrayed look in her eyes.

  Bobby stopped walking and shouted, "Will!" A voice called from the right, and the two men yelled back and forth until Will drew close enough and used our light as a beacon. I didn't want to see the judgment in Will’s face, either, so I turned and started back.

  The rain came down harder as I navigated around a fallen tree trunk that blocked my path. A huge old thing, it must have come down in a storm. I didn't remember it from earlier. Had I headed in the wrong direction? I glanced back to see if the guys were following and stepped into open air. I fell into loose dirt and mud, my flashlight flying from my hand.

  "Nikki!" Will cried. "Are you all right?"

  "Yeah, I fell into a hole or something. Over here." I found my light, then shined it around me. I was in a dug out rectangle about two feet deep and six feet long.

  "Aaah." I scrambled to my feet and climbed out of there.

  "Jesus." Bobby stared down from where he stood on top of the log. "That looks like a grave! Is there anything . . . in it?"

  "Just Nikki, apparently." Will came around the end of the log. His flashlight illuminated the hole.

  A creeping sensation made me shudder. Dirt covered the back of my jeans and cold wet denim pressed into my skin. "Talbot's been digging graves?"

  "Why would he?" Bobby asked.

  "Let's get out of here," Will said.

  We moved away from the grave, tr
udging through the underbrush in silence. Was Lorna out here somewhere? Cold? Wet?

  Ahead of me, the downpour soaked into fallen leaves, the smell of decay growing stronger. Moss at the base of a tree glistened in my flashlight's beam, reminding me that water poured on Colonial's turf course, too. If it rained all night, the racing secretary could take the race off the turf, run it on the dirt. I'd have to scratch Daffodil.

  Maybe it would be just as well.

  Wiping water from my forehead, I took a deep breath. Screw that attitude. I'd worked too hard, and was gonna ride that filly with everything I had. My shoulders straightened as I hurried forward. Will and Bobby scrunched through the undergrowth behind, while distant lights from the Colonial backstretch glimmered through the woods ahead.

  Clearing the trees, I broke into a run for my car and cell phone. I punched the numbers for Cormack, and once again felt relief when I heard his voice.

  "What now?" He sounded weary. No doubt his dictionary featured a picture of me next to the word, "trouble."

  "It's Lorna. She got upset and ran off into those damn woods. I searched with Will Marshall and Bobby. We can't find her."

  He was silent a beat, but I thought I heard teeth grinding. "How long she been missing?"

  "About two hours."

  "Y'all spent all that time in those woods looking for her, without callin' anyone?"

  "Well, yeah."

  "Stay the hell out of there! Where're you now?"

  "At my barn." Jeez, he didn't have to bite my head off.

  Cormack's sigh drifted through the cell phone. "Stay put. I’ll be right there.”

  The rain stopped a few minutes later, and the three of us left the cover of the shedrow where we'd been waiting. Bobby bumped Will with his shoulder, causing the jockey to stumble.

  "Watch it, asshole," Will said.

  "Wanna make me?"

  Oh for God's sake. Didn't we have enough trouble? Thankfully, Cormack's SUV pulled up. The investigator used the running board to work his legs to the ground.

  "He looks pissed," said Bobby.

  "Know just how he feels," Will said, shooting a glare at Bobby.

  I walked closer to Cormack, hoping the men's animosity wouldn't escalate into a fistfight. They hung back, leaving me to talk to the investigator on my own.