Unbridled Murder

by Leigh Hearon

  Dan gave a large, ungainly harrumph, apparently his vocal indication that the tales were about to begin. It took another five minutes for people to seat themselves with a suitable beverage, but at last Dan had his audience together, and he stood up, ready to begin.

  “The secrets to the cases I am about to unfold . . .”

  Boos and napkins were thrown in his general direction. Dan glared at his critics and began again.

  “All right, all right! I’ll cut to the chase. This is one of the most interesting cases I’ve ever seen. I just wished it had happened in my jurisdiction. I would have cleared it up a lot sooner.”

  Sporadic laughter broke out, but it was not unkind.

  “Here’s the mystery. Why would a run-of-the-mill mechanic kill a deputy of the peace, an airline pilot, and a feedlot owner? What possible motive could he have for all these killings? They had to be related, but how?”

  “Personally, I’m just glad the killer didn’t turn out to be a horse rescuer,” Maria said, glancing over at Annie. “That would have been bad for the cause.”

  “And I’m just happy there was only one killer, period, and he didn’t succeed in killing me, Marcus, and the horses.” Annie cast a meaningful glance over at Jessica, who smirked.

  “Well, for heaven’s sake, don’t keep us in suspense, Dan. Tell us. Hopefully, in two thousand words or less.” Kim Williams had recently been promoted to undersheriff. Annie could tell that she felt a lot more comfortable telling her boss how she felt. Good for her, she thought.

  “Yes, start with the first murder. Why did Andy kill George?” This was Marcus’s contribution.

  “Well . . .” Dan said, then stopped. “Oh, hell, Colin, you know this better than I do. Why don’t you tell us about the friction between the mechanic and the feedlot owner?”

  Sheriff Mullin had tried to talk to Colin the day after Andy’s death. The weapon Colin had used against Andy was widely recognized as his. And everyone knew Colin’s black stallion; the two were inseparable. But he found he was unable to talk to the boy, for the simple fact that by then Alvin Gilman was Colin’s attorney of record. Marcus had seen to that the next morning, while he and Annie were still luxuriating in bed in Patricia’s pasture-side cabin.

  Colin had been forthcoming with his new attorney, who, in turn, had related the facts of the case to the sheriff and local prosecutor. Coupled with Annie and Marcus’s statements and phone interviews, the prosecutor felt he had no option but to decline to bring charges. Annie personally thought Colin deserved a medal. That, sadly, had not yet been bestowed.

  Colin stood up now. Annie was sure he’d grown two inches since she’d seen him four weeks ago.

  “I knew about Danny Trevor a long time ago. I would hide in the rocks and watch him fly over our land. One day, I found a place he sometimes landed. Another man was with him, Andy, the mechanic. They argued about what Danny was doing.”

  “You mean Andy actually thought what Danny was doing was wrong?” Annie couldn’t believe this.

  “No. They were arguing about money. Andy thought he should get money from the tribe, too, because he took care of Danny’s airplane. Danny said he got paid enough and wouldn’t get any more. This made Andy mad. So when the plane crashed, I knew that Andy had to be involved.”

  “Which, of course, was absolutely right,” Dan interrupted, looking at the boy with real respect. “And it was perfect timing for Andy. The bomb went off while Trevor was still in the clouds, and as we all know, he was flying VFR.”

  “We do? I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Samantha Higgins shot out, while several people around her nodded in agreement.

  “Visual flight rules.” Dan said this as if it he’d known it all his life. “The pilot doesn’t rely on instrumentation, just what he sees around him. Well, that day, there was a big cloud bank over the pass, and the bomb went off just when Trevor’s Cessna was about to go into the murk. Which meant Trevor couldn’t see squat outside the plane and, because of the smoke inside the cockpit, couldn’t even see his instrument needles plunging. There was no way he could have gotten down quickly. He picked the wrong day to punch into the clouds.”

  Annie almost wanted to laugh about Dan’s self-importance over his newfound aeronautical knowledge, not to mention his new vocabulary. But whenever she heard the story, she thought of Tony and his unexpected and sudden death. Many glasses had been raised today in honor and remembrance of the fallen deputy. Annie had no doubt that they would continue to be raised for years to come.

  “But while killing Danny might have made Andy feel better, it wasn’t bringing in any money,” prompted Maria.

  “Yes,” continued Colin. “So I started to watch Andy, to see what he’d do next.”

  The crowd unconsciously settled into the chairs. This was where the story was becoming interesting.

  “One day, not long after the plane crash, Andy called George on the phone from his shop. He wanted to meet with him. George must have said okay because Andy was real happy after that.”

  “Hold on! Wait a minute! How did you manage to pick up on that phone conversation?” Jessica was slightly indignant. “I mean, did you put a bug on his phone, or what?”

  Maria smiled benevolently at the vet. “No one pays attention to a fifteen-year-old boy, Jessica. If he’s not making trouble, he’s invisible. Colin was a good tracker from the time he was just a toddler. You’d be having this private conversation, or so you thought, and realize that Colin was quietly watching you from a corner of the room.”

  Jessica still looked skeptical.

  “That first night you were in town, Annie, and saw the horses on the ridge,” Maria began.

  “I never told you I went there!”

  “No, but Colin did. He was watching you from behind a rock, along with his sister. You never even knew, did you?”

  Annie shook her head. It seemed incredible to her that she could have been so unaware. But then, she’d been totally engrossed in the flight of the wild horses.

  “So where were you hiding, Colin? When you heard Andy talking to George on the phone?” Jessica now seemed to accept the boy’s tracking prowess.

  “In the rafters. Where the pulleys are for cars. If Andy was working on a car on the ground, he never looked up.”

  Ten pairs of eyes looked at Colin, all admiringly. The kid clearly knew what he was doing, even if it was at a high risk to himself had he been caught.

  “The next morning, I was supposed to watch the herd. So I asked Maria if she would do it for me so I could wait at the feedlot. She said yes. I got there about six o’clock. Andy showed up around seven-thirty. He banged on the door, and George finally opened it. They argued, too. It was the same thing. Money. Andy wanted to take over Danny’s job and wanted George to convince the tribe. It was hard because while Andy worked on airplanes, he didn’t fly them. But he told George he knew everything about flying planes even if he didn’t have a license.”

  Annie remembered Andy’s telling her he knew more about airplane instrumentation than anyone else. She’d thought it was an outlandishly boastful statement at the time. She hadn’t known then that he knew enough to turn a plane into one massive incendiary device.

  “So George told Andy to leave. And then he got on his Kubota and went to feed the horses. Andy returned to his truck and shot him in the back. Then he ran around the corral and out the back.”

  “Where was Myrna all that time? Didn’t she hear the argument? Or the gunshot?” Kim was asking all the questions a good undersheriff should ask.

  Dan cleared his throat. “According to Sheriff Mullin, Myrna was having an affair with the fertilizer salesman in Loman. She was barely at the feedlot anymore, let alone home.”

  “Apparently old George was so blitzed most of the time, he never knew if Myrna was coming or going,” Maria added. “But then, I didn’t have a clue, either, and I was at the feedlot every week.”

  Annie found it difficult to believe that Myrna could hold any attr
action for another human being, but then, she reminded herself, she hadn’t met the fertilizer salesman.

  She also knew an inside detail about the case that she and Marcus had decided to keep to themselves. As her last act as Alvin Gilman’s client, she’d turned over the photos she’d taken on her smartphone to her attorney, who’d duly passed them on to the police—after carefully looking at them first himself. After enlarging the photos showing the red dots, Alvin had discovered that the first two photos were of Colin, wearing his red bandana, from behind the horses’ rear paddock. This was where he’d been hiding, as he later told Alvin. But the third photo—the one of a person fleeing the property wearing red, was of Andy. The enlarged photo even gave pretty good detail of the gun he was carrying—a Marlin lever-action rifle, the same caliber as Annie’s Winchester, only Andy’s had a mounted scope.

  “Why didn’t you tell anyone, Colin?” Kim was sympathetic but obviously curious as to why the young man would not report a crime.

  “I thought about it. But I didn’t like George, and two of the men Andy had killed were killing the horses. So even though Andy was doing it for money, I wasn’t sure the killings were a bad thing.”

  Western justice, Annie thought. There was a certain honesty about it even if it was no longer the prevailing law of the land.

  “But I probably would have,” Colin continued, “except that I met Annie. And I thought, what if I tell the sheriff what I saw, and he gets mad at me, not Andy? Then Andy could come after me. Or Annie.”

  “Why would Andy want to hurt Annie?” Patricia was genuinely flummoxed. “She’s such a good person.”

  “Good to dogs and horses,” Dan said ominously. “The rest of us take what she dishes out.”

  Much-needed laughter filled the air. There was something about Colin’s solemn delivery about the practical points of witnessing murder that was a little bit off-putting.

  Colin did not laugh, Annie noticed. He was always so serious. She hoped someday she’d see the boy laugh— sheer, spontaneous laughter that came from his gut over something that was spectacularly silly.

  “Yes, Annie is a good person,” Colin agreed. “But I know the men who damaged the trailer. Andy knows many of them, too, and is friendly with them. When I saw him working on the trailer in his garage, I knew that Annie was in danger.”

  “But why? Even if Andy knew the men who vandalized it, he was still making a pile of dough off their bad act. How could that put her in danger?” Kim was digging into detail that most other listeners would just let slide.

  “Because of what Annie told him.”

  Annie wracked her brain, trying to think of what incriminating thing she had said that might have set Andy off. She came up with nothing.

  “She told Andy that there were eyewitnesses, people who saw who was destroying the trailer. This worried Andy because he was one of them.”

  A gasp went around the circle, the biggest from Annie. The mechanic had seemed so completely taken in by her story. And he’d done such a good job fixing the trailer. It seemed off-kilter that he would take so much trouble to repair something that he had tried to destroy. But then, he probably thought he was really scoring one over Annie—first, trash the trailer, then profit from repairing it. It still didn’t explain why he might want to harm her.

  “Then Annie told him that Dave at the airport had talked about the crash. That made Andy really worried.”

  “Why?” Annie was dying to know.

  “Because Dave thought Andy was behind the crash, and Andy knew it. And so Andy called Dave to ask why he had told this total stranger about it, and Dave said he hadn’t. That got Andy really suspicious. So he called the motel where Annie had been staying and found out she had checked out earlier than she was supposed to. So Andy told Leroy—”

  “He’s the top goon in Browning,” Annie explained to her friends.

  Colin nodded. “He’s a bad man. And when Andy told Leroy that Annie wasn’t telling him the truth, Leroy told him to watch her because she might be investigating the plane crash and other stuff.”

  So that was it. Andy had been convinced she was working undercover for the FAA or, more likely, Jessica’s insurance company.

  “But even if I had, killing me wasn’t going to make any difference.”

  Colin nodded once more. “Yes, but Andy is the kind of person who thinks he has to get rid of anyone who might hurt him. After I heard him talk to Leroy, I knew that he was going to try to kill you, too.”

  The words sounded so stark coming out of the boy’s mouth. But it was true. Andy had tried to kill her, and had failed, only because Colin, her guardian angel on earth, had protected her. What could she possibly do to thank him?

  Wolf came trotting around the corner, wearing a bright red bandana. Annie had decided her blue heeler needed sprucing up today in front of so much company and could think of no greater compliment to Colin than for the dog to wear his trademark neck attire. Colin smiled. The smile got even broader when he saw that Wolf was carrying a half-rack of pork spareribs in his mouth. He set it down in front of Annie, pawed the ground three times, and looked up at her.

  “What? Do you need another napkin?” she asked. Her tone of voice gave the dog the encouragement he needed, and he promptly buried his teeth into the meat.

  Everyone around her began to laugh, even Colin. It wasn’t quite the belly laugh she’d hoped to hear, but it was a laugh.

  “Roger that,” Colin said, grinning, as Wolf enthusiastically began to gnaw away.

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  A huge debt of gratitude goes to Chuck Perry, chief pilot for Kenmore Air, who not only made sure all the aeronautical bits and language in this book rang true, but also significantly helped shape the plot and turned out to be a very good line editor. His knowledge of old Chevy trucks also should be noted and applauded. My big brother Steve gets full credit for introducing me to this great line of farm trucks, one of which he restored for my husband and painted atomic orange. Other heartfelt thanks go to my agent, Paige Wheeler of Creative Media Agency Inc., Dr. Cary Hills of Sound Equine and vet tech Vicky Carter, ace attorney Ken Kagan, criminal defense attorney par excellence Jeff Kradel, bomb technician Alex Kaye of the U.S. Navy, Sandy Dangler, the best mentor one could ever have, and the many friends who read the book and thoughtfully provided suggestions on how to make it better. I am eternally grateful to Fern Michaels for her continued support and frequent atta-girl’s, Robert Schwager for his always insightful comments, and to my husband, who thinks being married to a writer is just swell. Finally, thank you to all the people who rescue horses from feedlots. At some time, every one of these horses was loved. Those who choose to give them new and better lives have earned, as my mother would say, their stars in heaven.

  If you enjoyed UNBRIDLED MURDER, be sure not to miss Leigh Hearon’s

  SADDLE UP FOR MURDER

  A Carson Stables Mystery

  At first, horse trainer and Carson Stables owner Annie Carson blames the random losses of local livestock on feral animals stalking the Olympic Peninsula’s farms and ranches. But when one of her own flock is found savagely slaughtered, it gets personal. Then it turns dangerous when Annie discovers the body of a young woman hanging in her new hay barn. Suddenly, she’s up to her neck in complicated mysteries—one involving her private life. But her sleuthing skills aren’t exactly welcome by the sheriff. And as she uncovers a clue to the killer’s identity, Annie fears she’s leading a deadly trail straight to her door.

  Turn the page for a special look!

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  PROLOGUE

  TUESDAY, APRIL 26

  Ashley Lawton dug into her jacket pocket and pulled out a key, a single strand of green yarn fluttering from the top. She turned to the woman beside her and said proudly, “Mrs. Carr lets me have my own. It’s not strictly company policy, but she can’t move around very well and it takes her a long time to get to the door.”

  Her compan
ion nodded appreciatively. She was a willowy brunette dressed in an old-fashioned jumper. Ashley acknowledged her friend’s tacit approval with a quick return nod and inserted the key into the lock in front of her. The knob turned, and she leaned inside, calling out, “Mrs. Carr? It’s Ashley. I’ve brought a friend.”

  They stepped into a small vestibule and a tropical climate. Spring may have arrived on the Olympic Peninsula, but Mrs. Carr’s comfort apparently required a higher temperature. Ashley rushed to the thermostat on the wall and peered at the setting.

  “She must have forgotten to turn it down.” Ashley gave a small, embarrassed laugh. “She gets cold a lot.”

  “How old did you say she was?” Ashley’s friend was still standing by the door, hesitant to venture farther.

  “She’ll be ninety-six on her next birthday. And still has every one of her brain cells. She’s amazing.”

  “Wow. I want to meet her.”

  “Right this way.” Ashley walked through a hopelessly cluttered living room, picking up dog-eared magazines and crocheted blankets along the way and throwing them onto a sagging love seat. She navigated as someone who knew the house and the habits of its occupant.

  “Mrs. Carr? I’m coming into your bedroom. It’s ten o’clock. Time for your pills.”

  The two women walked down a hallway crowded with old family photos long faded from the passage of time.

  Ashley pushed open the bedroom door. “Mrs. Carr?” Her friend stood on tiptoe to look over her.

  Mrs. Carr’s form was barely discernable in the large four-poster bed that took up most of the bedroom. The bed was piled high with comforters in a rainbow of colors. A reasonable person might wonder whether the woman was there at all.

  “That’s odd. Usually she’s sitting up by now.” Ashley walked quickly over to the side of the bed and lifted one comforter, then another. Mrs. Carr was now visible, at least from the neck up. But there was no vitality left in her face. Her wide-open eyes had sunk deep into the sockets, and the pallor of her skin was pasty white. Ashley tugged at the comforter, and a clawlike hand emerged, grasping the edge of the cloth, seeming to resist any attempt to take away her last bit of warmth.