The Laura Cardinal Novels

by J. Carson Black

  “My birthday’s a month away.”

  She was getting old and ornery; he had to make allowances. “It was on sale now,” he said patiently.

  June Burdette got up and followed her son into her living room. The 40-inch, wide-screen TV looked out of place in a room that had not changed since the 1950s: Early American furniture and throw rugs on brown linoleum. The old set had actually had red yarn tied in bows on the rabbit ears. Rabbit ears!

  “What’s that?”

  “It’s a TV. A Samsung—what they call an LCD screen TV. It’s got a wide screen so you can watch your basketball games.”

  “I like my Magnavox. Where is it?”

  “I put it out front.”

  “Well, bring it back in. I don’t want this thing. It’s ugly.”

  Ugly? Her house was ugly. Her housecoats were ugly. Her bald spot was ugly. The way she looked out of her eyes was ugly—she never saw anything good.

  “Did you hear me?” she was saying. “Bring it back! I don’t want your stupid big-screen TV. Take it back where you got it.”

  “If that’s the way you want it.” Clenching his teeth to keep from saying more, Bobby stalked outside and picked up the old Magnavox. He wanted to hurl it out into the yard, take off the heads of some of those fucking garden gnomes. He wanted to throw it on the ground and stomp the living shit out of it.

  Instead, he brought it back inside and placed it on the floor.

  “Don’t hurt it. That TV set has lasted twenty years. Unlike you, I can’t afford to go around spending money like it’s going out of style.”

  “I bought it for you.”

  “Well, I don’t want it”

  He turned it on.

  She stared at the set. “It sure is clear. I thought these big things were hazy.”

  “It’s a Samsung—as good as it gets.”

  “Well, if that isn’t a good picture. Almost as good as the Magnavox. Hmph.” She touched it with the toe of her slip-on moccasin. “Well, it’s here now. You might as well leave it here. No point you taking it back now. Where’s it from, one of those big box stores? That’s the only place you could afford to buy something like this. You know what they’ll do, don’t you? They’ll charge you a re-boxing fee. That’s the problem with those places—they sell you something cheap and hope that when you get it home you won’t be satisfied. Then they get extra money for nothing.” She picked up the remote, still sheathed in plastic, her little bird eyes bright as she traced over the buttons. “If you take it back it’ll just be throwing good money after bad.”

  “Then you want it?”

  “It’s here now. I don’t want you to have to make another trip.”

  Every time, every single time, she did this to him. He’d come over, think that maybe just this once she’d be appreciative, she’d give a little instead of take take take, and every single fucking time, he was disappointed.

  “I’m just saving you another trip. Seems like you’re always making two trips: one to buy and one to repent. Why can’t you just once think before you act?”

  “I can think all right.”

  She snorted. “You never had an original thought in your life. I’ve always had to look out for you. Why you can’t be more like Steven—”

  “Steve’s a damn junkie, Ma.”

  “Don’t use that kind of language with me. He got through high school, didn’t he? What have you ever done?”

  He wanted to tell her what he was about to do, but kept his mouth shut. “You want me to take the TV set back or not?”

  “You can leave it here.”

  “You could thank me.”

  She looked away.

  He wanted to ask her why she had to be so mean to him, why she never once cut him any slack. Why she treated him like he was a dog turd she’d picked up on one of her moccasins. “What’s so hard about saying thank you?”

  “I thanked you.”

  “You did not.”

  “I did.”

  Sometimes he wanted to wring her chicken neck.

  “Your problem is,” she said, “you don’t listen. You don’t listen and you don’t follow anything through. A normal person would ask me what I wanted for my birthday. Like Steven—”

  “I don’t see you getting anything from him.”

  “He’ll come through. He always does.”

  Suddenly he flashed on his Bible class at the First Pentecostal Church his mother used to take him to—how the teacher told them they could pick any Bible story they wanted and draw a picture. He had chosen Cain and Abel. And just like Cain, the gifts he had to offer her were never good enough.

  He didn’t know why he bothered.

  “Another thing—you said you were going to take care of that tree out there for me. One of these days, it’s going to fall on the house.”

  “I said I will and I will. As soon as I get some time.”

  She folded her arms. “See? That’s exactly what I mean. You’re always saying you’re going to do something, then find some excuse not to.”

  “I’ve got to go.” He started for the door.

  “What about the Magnavox?”

  “What about it?”

  “You going to throw it out? You know how my back is, I can’t do it.”

  He wanted to tell her she could shove the fucking Magnavox, but he didn’t.

  He took it with him and threw it in a dumpster on his way back home.

  11

  It was going on three o’clock in the afternoon when Laura got back to Williams. She bypassed the motel and turned onto the street where Shana Yates lived.

  When she arrived at the Yates’s house this time, no children were in evidence. Out front, the two-horse trailer was hitched to the beat-up old truck and Shana Yates was in the process of loading Mighty Mouse. Shana draped the lead rope over the little horse’s back, and he dutifully walked right in. Shana ducked into the horse trailer, ostensibly to tie him up, then opened the side window. Immediately, Mighty Mouse’s nose poked out, nostrils fluttering as he pulled in the scents, a green straw of alfalfa already sticking out of his mouth.

  Shana looked good in jeans and a green long-sleeved blouse. When she saw Laura, uncertainty flitted across her face, as if she had encountered someone who was out of place. “Hi,” she said, the smile not reaching her eyes.

  “Hi, Shana. Can we talk?”

  Shana gestured to the trailer. “I’m kind of busy.”

  “Going to a rodeo?”

  “Rodeo?”

  Laura glanced at the cleared land across the street. “You’re a barrel racer, aren’t you?”

  “Well, actually, I don’t ride anymore.”

  “Oh?”

  There was an awkward silence. Then Shana said, “Well, I’ve got to go.”

  “Can I come along?”

  “Uh. I might be gone for a while.”

  “I’ve got time. There are a few more things I need to get cleared up.” She added. “Finding out who did this to Dan.”

  Shana looked torn. She obviously didn’t want to talk to Laura, but she loved her brother. The love of her brother won. “Okay.”

  Laura got into the passenger side of the truck, which looked as if it had been hit by a bomb. Papers, fast-food wrappers, magazines, a halter that had seen better days, an old cowboy hat, water bottles, candy bars—all sharing space with her feet.

  “Where are we going?” Laura asked as they pulled slowly out onto the street.

  Shana paused, her face drawn. Then she said, “I’m selling Mighty Mouse.”

  That stunned her. “Is there some special reason you’re selling him now?”

  Shana’s shoulders rose and fell. “It’s just time. I’m a mom now.”

  “How’re Adam and Justin?”

  “Good. They’re with Ronnie.”

  “Who’s Ronnie?”

  “Their dad.” She glanced at Laura. “I know what you’re gonna ask next. We’re divorced.”

  “But you still see each other?”
>
  “Why would you think that? I hate his ass.”

  “I thought your ex might be the guy you were with in Vegas.”

  Shana colored. “I wouldn’t go anywhere with him.” She glanced in her rearview mirror as she shifted down for the turn onto Cataract Road. At last she said, “So I knew about Dan and Kellee. What’s the big deal?”

  “Nothing, except maybe your parents would have liked to know.”

  “That was up to Dan, wasn’t it? You can leave me out of it.”

  “But you’re in it. You knowingly lied to me. Do you think I’m just playing around here? This is a murder investigation, and we’re talking about your brother’s death.”

  Shana slapped the steering wheel. “Okay. Fine.”

  “How long did you know about Dan and Kellee’s wedding plans?”

  “A couple of weeks.”

  “You have any idea why they kept it secret?”

  “I might as well come clean, huh? Isn’t that what they say on TV? Dan and Kellee got married because she was getting sick again.”

  At that moment the truck jounced into a pothole. Laura felt her heart sink, too. “You mean the brain tumor?”

  Shana wiped at her eyes, sniffed, trying to keep the tears at bay. “You know about that, too? You are a good detective.”

  Laura could understand the sarcasm. It was a coping mechanism—she’d used it herself. Had to, the only female detective in four squads at DPS. Shana reminded her of a kitten, hair standing up on end to make her seem bigger.

  “Kellee’s brain tumor was coming back, so she and Dan decided to get married?”

  “Well, what would you do?”

  Laura tried to picture the situation, put Tom into the middle of it. A few days ago she would have been more level-headed. Now she thought that getting married was exactly what she’d do in a case like that. “I’m sorry,” Laura said. “It’s such—”

  “A waste? Oh, yeah. It’s that, for sure!”

  Bitter.

  Laura realized what a rollercoaster Shana had been on in the space of forty-eight hours. First a wedding, now a funeral. Laura realized it wasn’t so strange that Shana was selling her horse. When faced with a death in the family, people often did something drastic, hoping that by taking action—any action—they could somehow change the dynamics of their broken lives. Laura, herself, had done something similar. She had married Billy Linton a few weeks after her mother and father were killed.

  She thought of the parallels between her own life and that of the Yates family. When faced with Kellee’s bad news, Kellee and Dan had decided to get married. Laura wondered if, had Dan and Kellee lived, it would have worked out better than her own hasty marriage had.

  Laura recognized the route they were taking. The road they were on passed the north entrance to Cataract Lake before coming to a T-stop at Country Club Road. They turned right, which would lead them past the section of campground where Dan and Kellee were found. Laura noticed that Shana kept her eyes forward, concentrating on the road. Not even a flick of the eyes as the Kaibab National Forest sign marking Cataract Lake flashed by.

  Her knuckles white, though, holding the steering wheel in a death grip.

  “Shana, do you have to sell your horse now?” Laura asked.

  “I want to.”

  “How long have you had him?”

  “Seven years.”

  “How many ribbons have you won on him?”

  “I dunno, close to thirty? I almost won a horse trailer once, missed by a fifth of a second.”

  “Sounds like he’s been a friend to you.”

  Shana looked at her. “How do you know?”

  “I had a horse once. She was a friend to me.”

  “What happened?”

  “The woman who owned her wanted her back.”

  “I thought you said you owned her. How could—”

  “To tell you the truth, it’s still a sore spot with me. I do know I missed her. She was in many ways my best friend.”

  Shana kept staring straight ahead, but her shoulders started heaving. She kept swiping at her nose, but this time the tears came and she couldn’t stop them. “Oh, God, I can’t see!”

  She pulled over to the side of the road in a cloud of dust. Laura glanced back and was reassured by the shape in the horse trailer’s front window.

  Shana laid her head down on the steering wheel. “He’s gone. I can’t believe he’s gone!”

  She held onto the wheel, crying. Hitching breaths, ragged sniffles. Laura had a pack of tissues in her purse and handed them over. Shana blew her nose, gulped. “He … he was my best friend. He was more than a brother.” She swiped at her nose again. “We were twins. I was the older one by two minutes, but he was always my older brother—and now he’s gone. All I have left is Mighty Mouse …” Which started her crying again. At last, tears and snot wiped away, she put the truck in gear and headed out again.

  “You could call whoever it is—”

  “No. I said I’d come by. Her granddaughter’s there and she wants to ride …”

  Laura realized it wasn’t her place to say any more.

  The blacktop curved to the left and became Double X Ranch Road, although Laura saw more golf carts than cows. Abruptly, the artificial green of the golf course gave way to fenced meadow. Off to the left was a sprinkling of ranch houses, backdropped by the Bill Williams Mountains.

  Shana slowed the truck and turned onto a cinder lane that was little more than two tire ruts. One car-length in from the road was a five-bar gate bracketed by fence posts made from naked tree limbs. Hammered to one of the posts was a metal sign that said UNICORN FARM.

  “Can you open the gate?” Shana said. Laura did so, waited for Shana to drive through, then closed it behind her. “Why’s it called Unicorn Farm?” she asked as she got back into the truck.

  The girl shrugged. “Mrs. Wingate likes unicorns.”

  “Wingate? Any relation to Josh Wingate?”

  “His mom.”

  So this was where Josh Wingate had been going when he saw Dan’s truck.

  Up ahead, in a scattering of ponderosa pines, a Wedgwood-blue house topped by a brown shingle roof dreamed in the sun and shadows. The roof stretched down past the house, doing double duty as a porch covering, running all the way across the front. To the right of the house up a slight rise was a long, low building, small square windows running along the side high up—a barn. A few chickens out front, near a triangular chicken coop. The lane branched right and left through a last-gasp riot of sunflowers. They took the right fork toward the house.

  A woman stood on a wet flagstone walk out front, watering the flowers bordering the bright green grass fronting the house. Up close the place showed signs of disrepair; a few shingles were missing, the roof was matted with pine needles, and the house paint had faded. The words “genteel poverty” came to mind.

  The woman watering the pansies out front was heavyset, her ponytailed blonde hair showing two inches of roots. In shape, she was an apple, not a pear. She wore white Capri pants and a pink T-shirt that swelled around the bulge in her waist.

  Shana pulled up and asked Laura to roll down her window. She called out, “Hi, Suzy. Where’s Barb?”

  The woman paused to bat an ash from her cigarette. “Down at the barn with those horses again, last I saw.”

  Shana put the truck in gear and they drove to the barn. Laura watched Shana, the set of her mouth, her eyes squinched up against something hurtful. Almost said something, but didn’t. Shana was over twenty-one; she had a right to do anything she wanted, even if it appeared she was acting impulsively. For all Laura knew, this wasn’t an impulsive act at all.

  Shana got out and walked into the barn, calling out Barbara Wingate’s name.

  Laura watched her stalk around the side of the barn. There was a manic quality to her voice. Grief or anger.

  Or fear?

  It came to Laura all at once, the overwhelming sense that Shana was scared.

  Scar
ed of what? It could be as simple as the fact that she was facing her own mortality. Her twin brother, big, handsome, strong—had just been wiped out in an instant. That would scare anybody.

  Shana tromped back over to Laura. “She’s not around. I don’t know what she’s doing. She told me she’d be here!”

  Moving rapidly into tantrum mode.

  Laura caught a movement in the corner of her eye—a figure in the pasture to her left. “Could that be her?” she asked.

  Shana followed her gaze. Her face fell into lines of relief. She called and waved. The woman, wearing jeans and a long-sleeved shirt, waded toward them through the shin-high grass, followed by three horses.

  Judging by Josh Wingate’s age, Barbara Wingate must be at least in her mid-forties, but looked much younger. She wore a gray felt cowboy hat with a flat crown, clapped down over reddish-gold hair pulled back into a ponytail. A few loose strands, torched by the afternoon sun, framed her heart-shaped face. She had a figure that was both slim and generous. She looked like the kind of woman you’d like to share morning coffee with on a sunny deck. Hell, she looked like an ad for a woman you’d like to share morning coffee with on a sunny deck.

  She stripped the heavy leather gloves from her hands and tucked them into the belt that cinched her small waist. “Shana! How are you doing?” Her voice as melodious and attractive as her person.

  “I brought Mighty Mouse.”

  As Laura reached over the wire fence to shake Mrs. Wingate’s hand, something crunched underfoot—the wing of a dead raven. Laura stepped back quickly, noting the ants riddling the shiny black carcass, the empty eye socket.

  “You’re with the Department of Public Safety?” Mrs. Wingate asked. “Josh told me all about you. He was very impressed with the way you work.”

  That caught her off-balance. “Thank you.”

  Shana repeated, “I brought Mighty Mouse.”

  Barbara Wingate frowned. “You know, Shana, if you don’t want to sell him, we could lease him for a few months. That way, if you change your mind—”

  “I won’t change my mind.”

  “Well, then, I’ll go get Erin.” She climbed through the fence with desultory grace and walked toward the house.