Farmcall Fatality (Mandy Bell DVM Series Book 1)

by Abby Deuel

  “Hmmm. A lady was in the day before the funeral to get her hair done. I hadn’t seen her before as a client. We got to talking and she seemed a little jilted by Buck. She was getting herself done up so she could show off at his funeral what he missed out on. I don’t know if she would hurt anyone but someone sure broke her heart.”

  “Do you remember her name?” asked Mandy.

  “I don’t. She got color done so I will have a note card with her information on it. Let me grab it for you,” said Fred. He must have put the phone down because Mandy could hear his steps walking away from her.

  “Here it is. Lucy Vanderbeek.”

  “Thanks. I think she is the lawyer in town,” said Mandy.

  “She didn’t mention that so I don’t know.”

  “I will look into it. Thanks again and don’t forget to tell Dennis I called,” said Mandy.

  Chapter Thirty-Six

  She checked the patients. All was well there. She just couldn’t seem to sit still in her office. She wanted to follow up on the hunch she had. She and Lyle got into the Jeep. As she started the ignition, she visualized the route to the McMurphy Farm. She had been so shaken up the last time she was there that she had to concentrate to remember the way. She recalled it with some effort and they headed down the road.

  The rain from yesterday made it feel like winter was coming. There was still frost on the areas of grass that hadn’t come into the sunlight yet. She turned into a gravel road about a half a mile before the entrance to the yards at the farm. She parked the Jeep behind some shrubs to hide her presence here. She left Lyle in the Jeep and cracked a few windows for her to be comfortable.

  “Now sit and stay. I will be right back,” Mandy said.

  Mandy walked through the drainage ditch to stay below the horizon in case anyone was watching. There was a remnant of a turtle shell that a coyote must have eaten recently as the shell had not yet faded. This was a reminder to Mandy that there were predators out here so she needed to work quickly.

  Her walk took her to the entrance to the yards. She retraced her steps from that fateful day to the sight were she had planned to innocently use nature’s little girl’s room. It had been a week since the murder. The yellow tape was no longer surrounding the crime scene. The police had combed over the whole area for clues and hadn’t come up with much. But, they missed one spot. She reached down into the bushes around the gate leading to where the shooting had taken place. She got down on her hands and knees and kept feeling around.

  She had pieced together that they had to have missed the one clue that would lead them to murderer. She found what she had come for and slid it into her pocket. Before she could stand up, she heard a voice coming and quickly hid under the thickest shrubs she could find. The voice was definitely heading her direction. She felt like she was in the poem by Edgar Allen Poe about the beating heart. She hadn’t even done anything wrong and her heart was beating so loudly she was sure that her hiding spot wouldn’t last.

  “It has to be here somewhere,” a voice said. “This whole silly town wouldn’t know something if it hit them in the face,” the voice said, finishing his sentence with an eerie cackle.

  She recognized that it was Fred. Before she could make a plan as to how she could get out of this situation, Fred leaned down and tapped her shoulder. Try as she might, her hiding place didn’t hide her fuzzy hair. He must have seen her in the bushes.

  “Fancy meeting you here,” Fred said.

  “Um, I …” Mandy stuttered.

  “Well, I suppose if you are here, that means you have figured it out,” Fred said.

  “Not everything. I just had a hunch I wanted to check up on,” Mandy said.

  “So, do you have what you came for?” asked Fred.

  “What?” asked Mandy.

  “The watch,” said Fred.

  “Oh, that,” said Mandy. “Yes, I found it. I’ll just give it to you and then you can make your escape. I don’t really have everything figured out so there is no need to do anything to me.”

  “I don’t think so. I don’t like loose ends so I have no choice but to remove you from the situation,” Fred said, pulling a gun from behind his back to point it at her. She couldn’t tell what kind of gun it was but she did recognize that it had a silencer equipped to the end of it. She knew that meant he was planning to remove her from the situation silently.

  “But, I really don’t know anything,” Mandy pleaded.

  “What don’t you know?”

  “Why did you do it?”

  “I have always loved Dennis deeply. I wanted him to live happily ever after with me.”

  Mandy had a hunch that this was the truth behind it all. It was not satisfying to hear it straight from Fred in these circumstances, however.

  “I decided that if I couldn’t have him, he needed to be happy and I knew Anna was perfect for him. Plus, it would bring him back here closer to me. I even grew all kinds of species of cacti to make him feel as if he was out in the West when he came to visit.” As Fred spoke, he led Mandy at gunpoint further and further into the woods beside the yards. Mandy knew it would be hard for anyone to find her. She was trying to come up with an escape plan, but Fred was keeping a very fast pace.

  “I couldn’t believe that Buck made it so difficult for Dennis to be happy with Anna. Buck spent years tormenting Dennis over Anna. I couldn’t watch it anymore,” said Fred. “I tried to keep you from getting stuck into the middle of this. I sent you two written warnings to which you took no heed. I even tried pointing you on wild goose chases. You are just too stubborn for your own good,” Fred said.

  “I couldn’t let Anna’s town be blemished by an unsolved murder. Anna meant too much to me,” Mandy said.

  “She meant something to all of us. She was supposed to make Dennis happy since I couldn’t. But then she ruined the plan by dying.”

  “Why now? Why kill Buck now?” asked Mandy. Mandy could tell that Fred’s grasp on reality was a distant thread. Still, she was curious as to his mindset.

  They continued their pilgrimage to parts unknown of the woods. Mandy’s heart was beating so hard it was pounding in her ear drums. Her palms were sweaty. Fight or flight adrenaline was in full throttle mode. She tried to remain calm and think on her feet. It was a little hard with the cold tip of a gun jammed in her back. Fred was making her keep her hands in the air which was hard to do for this long. Her arms were starting to ache.

  “I knew that Dennis was coming to town and I didn’t want him to have to face the man who stole happiness out from under him. So, I had to kill him before the Halloween Hoedown where Dennis would surely see him.”

  “Why the McMurphy farm?”

  “It was a place I figured no one would be able to find him until his body was unrecognizable from the coyotes. If it wasn’t for the nosy vet who had to pee, it would have been months before anyone found him. They just would have thought he left town again on some crazy scheme. No one would have missed him. And Dennis could have moved into Anna’s house and been close by me.”

  Mandy thought about the coyotes. If only that had been her only worry now. A coyote might be easier to defend herself from than a crazed hairstylist with a gun.

  “So you thought he was still on the deed? You didn’t know that Anna had bought his share out from under him?” said Mandy.

  “I wasn’t sure and neither was Dennis. That’s what he needed to find from Anna’s house. He had asked the lawyer to get it from you, but you hadn’t been able to find it. He thought he would know where it was. Now I have a question for you. How did you know about the watch?” asked Fred.

  “I had seen the tan line on Dennis’s hand and knew he was missing something like a watch. Being from out West, his tan line was so obvious and I just kept thinking about it and how he reacted when I pointed it out. Then I saw the way you looked at him. I thought maybe you had taken it as a memento of him. And then, I knew it would be too loose on your wrist since you are more petite than him. I figured
that when you opened this gate it would have fallen off or you took it off so it wouldn’t have gunshot residue on it. I thought it was strange that it hadn’t shown up again on Dennis’s hand so I knew you had or he gave it to you and then you misplaced it. It was a long shot. I had been trying to piece together the triangle between Dennis, Anna, and Buck. I was missing a piece. Then I realized that piece was you.”

  “I’m impressed Dr. Bell. It’s too bad you won’t live to tell anyone of your cleverness. You should learn to mind your own business.”

  They had made it so far from where they had started that even if Mandy was going to try to run, she didn’t know which direction to go. The clouds were covering the sun so she couldn’t even tell which way was north.

  “It’s not in my nature to stay out of things. I just can’t believe I shared gummy bears with you.”

  “I put on a good act. They said I could have gone to Broadway.”

  “Why let all of this ruin the rest of your life? If you confess to the murder, you can plea bargain and get off light. You can follow your dreams. You are still young.”

  “You’re not talking me out of this. You have to go, now,” Fred said with an evil voice that Mandy couldn’t believe was coming from such a fashionable, seemingly well-adjusted man. “Now turn around and face forward.”

  Mandy did as she was told. She was startled by the change in Fred’s face. He was clearly not well.

  Chapter Thirty-Seven

  Mandy didn’t imagine her life would take this turn of events. Though she never planned to settle down, she didn’t plan on an early departure either. She focused on her breathing to remain calm. She had already tried talking Fred out of it with no success. She thought of one more idea.

  “Don’t you want to say goodbye to Dennis and explain that you have done this all for him? If you kill me, you will be caught and he will never know the truth about how you felt.”

  “I am going to kill you and then kill myself. This world is not ready for what I have to offer,” Fred said.

  Having tried that approach, the only thing left to do was try to knock the gun out of Fred’s hand. He had obviously grown up in Crestview and had an aiming stance that showed that this was not his first exposure to a gun and he would likely shoot with accurate determination. There was not even a waiver in his grip. He was ready to do the deed he believed to be the correct next move.

  The world was suddenly very still to Mandy. She could hear every bird chirping in the woods and even thought she could hear pine nettles brushing against each other in the wind. She always figured that the last moments of a person’s life would be marked by a fast forward movie of their life’s memories. She was not experiencing that. The tunnel of light people describe was not present in her consciousness either. All she could focus on was her breathing while her eyes were fixated on Fred’s maniacal countenance.

  As she was deep in thought about how to get out of this mess, she heard a loud bang. She thought for sure she had been shot. The adrenaline must have shielded her from the pain because she felt nothing but numbness. She fell to the ground and the world became a black hole in her mind. She felt a warm sensation over her face. It was like she was being baptized. The warmth turned to wetness. She thought this was a rather strange way to start an afterlife, if there would be one. She then felt pressure on her shoulders as if someone was digging at them.

  “Ruff, ruff, whimper,” cried Lyle.

  Suddenly Mandy’s eyes popped open to find Lyle licking her and pawing at her. She could see a blurry version of Gerry in the background as well.

  “Are you ok?” Gerry asked. He had one hand on her head and the other was checking her pulse. Lyle was torn between licking Mandy and growling at Gerry for being so close to Mandy.

  Mandy realized that, in fact, she was not dead. She felt dizzy and confused. Her version of Heaven might include Lyle, but it surely wouldn’t feature Gerry.

  “I think so,” Mandy said with a tremor in her voice. “What happened?”

  “I got your message that you were coming out here and I didn’t want you to be by yourself. I must have arrived just after you did. I found your Jeep hiding in the bushes down the road with Lyle in it. I let her out and since there was no sign of you, I knew you were in trouble. Luckily, Lyle here led the way. She’s not just an eye dog. Her nose works pretty well, too,” Gerry explained.

  Lyle sat obediently by Mandy’s side. She was still licking her. Now she had moved from her face to her hands, softly nudging her as she licked. Her bushy black and white tail was swaying back and forth to show her appreciation of one more day with her beloved human.

  “She led me all the way over here. I could see I only had a split second before I was too late, so I took that shot that I could get. The ambulance is on its way. I called them in when Lyle and I were in pursuit,” Gerry continued. “I am just so glad we got here in the nick of time. Are you sure you’re ok?”

  “I appear to be unscathed. All of a sudden, I am very cold,” Mandy answered.

  “I haven’t seen any wounds. I’d say that you are suffering from a bad case of shock,” said Gerry.

  “Fred?” asked Mandy.

  “The shot I took looks to have been fatal. I could only get a clear chest shot.”

  The ambulance EMTs showed up, having following the trail of yellow tape that Gerry had tied to branches here and there as Lyle led him through the woods so the EMTs could find their way. They checked Fred over first. He was indeed deceased. Mandy, on the other hand, was fine. They gave her a blanket and some hot tea.

  Larry arrived shortly after and took Mandy’s statement. He would get the rest of the story from Gerry back at the station. They loaded Fred into the ambulance and decided the rest of the formalities could wait. The murder had finally been solved. Night was coming in and it was time to get Mandy back to town.

  “Would you like to accompany me to the Inn?” Gerry asked Mandy.

  “Is this a date?” asked Mandy.

  “Nope, just a gentleman looking after a lady in distress,” Gerry retorted. “The town will want to thank you as well.”

  “Thank you for saving my life, by the way,” Mandy smiled back.

  Despite Gerry’s help in saving Mandy, Lyle wedged herself in between them when he gave Mandy a hug.

  “Jealous, eh?” Mandy said, looking down at Lyle. “I can take a hint,” she said as she backed away from Gerry.

  Chapter Thirty-Eight

  “What a couple of weeks,” Mandy said with a sigh. “I never thought Anna’s little quiet town of Crestview would have a murder and a Hoedown in the same week.”

  “I hope this doesn’t cloud your view of our quaintness. Now that you are the town hero and all, I’d suggest you stick around a while and at least enjoy the fruits of your labor,” Gerry said to Mandy with a nudge. Lyle darted over to them and squeezed herself between them to cut off the nudge.

  Myrna and Merv delivered a feast of roast turkey with all of the fixings to the table. There was sweet potato casserole with marshmallows, green bean casserole, mashed potatoes, dressing, gravy, fresh rolls, cranberry sauce, and a steaming hot mound of freshly cut turkey off the bone. The Inn was toasty warm and packed full of people. The Halloween decorations had been removed and in their place was a plethora of Fall decorations. There were all the colors of Fall represented in various shapes of leaves suspended from the ceiling and bar area. It created the illusion of feeling of being outdoors in the forest while staying warm inside.

  “This meal is on the house, ladies and gentlemen. Thanks to Mandy, Crestview is back to normal. With any luck we can convince her to stay on as our vet slash sleuth,” Merv said.

  Around the table were Rhonda, Doc Tom, Gillian, Hamish, Mandy, Gerry, Larry, Dennis, Pat, Aaron, and Howie. The rest of the Inn was filled with more locals, all enjoying the early Thanksgiving meal.

  “We will see about that. I have enjoyed myself here, but I never planned to settle in anywhere,” Mandy said as she started to l
oad her plate with the dishes that were being passed around on the lazy Susan in the center of the table. “I think I will stick around for the Christmas Mingler and then see what happens after that. That should give me sufficient time to sort through Anna’s affairs.”

  Since Lyle had played a huge part in solving the murder and saving Mandy’s life, she had an extra special spot on the floor at the foot of the table. Merv had placed a nice plush pillow for her comfort.

  “Poor Lyle is feeling left out so I made her a special treat. I understand she is fond of dairy so I made her a cheesecake to show our appreciation,” Merv said. He lifted the lid on the serving tray he had carried from the back and placed it in front of a very excited Border collie. She wagged her tail with a newfound happiness and started to gently lick her reward.

  “Wow, that is very sweet of you, Merv. Thanks so much,” Mandy said.

  “You know, Mandy, if you stick around, Hamish and I can teach you how to ride a quarter horse so you and Lyle can really start to work some sheep,” Gillian said.

  “We’ll see, you guys. For now, let’s enjoy this meal. A toast to a wonderful meal with lovely company,” Mandy said, as she raised her glass to the others.

  “And to the future, and whatever possibilities it may hold,” Gerry added to her toast, giving Mandy a cheeky wink. Lyle promptly stopped eating her cheesecake to give Gerry a disappointed stare.

  Before everyone could dig into their meals, the phone rang.

  “Who would interrupt this?” asked Merv as he walked to the bar to answer it. “Hello. Yes, she is here. I see. Let me get her for you.” He set the phone on the bar counter and asked Mandy if she could be so kind as to take the call.

  “Hi. This is Dr. Bell, how can I help you? I see. Hmmm. Are you sure. Ok. I can meet you at the clinic in a few hours.” She hung up the phone and turned to the table of people waiting in anticipation.

  “What is it?” asked Gillian.

  “It seems that a baby orphaned bobcat has been found in the outskirts of town. A citizen brought it inside and warmed it up. It seems to be hurt and someone had said that I had experience with wildlife,” she said as she winked at Gillian. “So they are going to bring it to the clinic for assessment.”