“Hello dear! So nice to see you.”
“Hi Mrs. Fey.”
“Call me Kathleen, remember?” The old woman rose gracefully.
“I brought a party invitation for Peter. I tried to give it to the teacher, but she said Peter wasn’t in her class…?” She held out the envelope, and Mrs. Fey took it.
There was the sound of a quiet engine and the crank of an emergency brake behind her. They both turned as a dark haired middle-aged woman in a burgundy polyester skirt suit got out of the blue Honda.
Deirdre said, “Oh, I didn’t know you had someone else coming, I’ll leave—”
Mrs. Fey grabbed her arm. “No, don’t go. She’s not my guest,” she said under her breath.
The woman walked up to the fence, looked over, and called out. “Hell of a time finding this place. There’s no address. Luckily I followed you!” she addressed Deirdre. She walked along the fenceline, came to the gate and looked at it skeptically. She stayed outside and knocked on the arbor instead, setting off the chimes.
“What do you want?” Mrs. Fey said. Deirdre was glad she hadn’t been greeted like that. The old woman had transformed into a tough hillbilly granny. One that might be hiding a shotgun in her skirts.
“Kathleen Fey?” the woman said, still not taking a step inside.
“Yes?” Kathleen stood her ground too.
The woman sighed and said, “Here. I need to give you these.” She held out a folder.
“What if I don’t want them?”
The woman looked like she’d been presented with a puzzle. After a moment, she said, “Hold on. It’s my first day.”
She went back to her car, pulled out a three-ring binder, and started rifling through it.
“What’s all that about?” Deirdre asked. Mrs. Fey was still gripping her arm and didn’t answer.
The woman popped back out of the car with a happier expression on her face. “Since I’ve made visual and vocal contact with you, Kathleen Fey, you’ve been served.”
She dropped the papers over the fence, got back into her car, and drove away.
Meanwhile Kathleen let loose in a flurry of profanities. The papers got stuck in the rose bush against the fence and hung there precariously.
Deirdre picked them up, pricking her finger in the process. A single drop of blood slid down the front page.
Inside, after a cup of tea and a lot of decoding of legal mumbo jumbo, Deirdre helped Mrs. Fey understand why she’d been served.
Her land was slated for completion of the road to Paraiso. It was being taken by eminent domain.
There was no record of her ownership at the county (“My family’s lived here since before there even was a county. You could say I’m Grandmothered in,” she said) so they weren’t required to pay her fair market value for the land—or anything at all. But since she was considered to have squatter’s rights, she had been officially notified to remove all of her belongings by November 30.
Mrs. Fey’s mood had changed from grim to chipper, and she whistled as she got up to pour two more cups of tea.
“This is really serious Kathleen. You can’t let them take your land.”
“Oh, that won’t happen.”
“How can you be so sure?”
“I was approached by the same party last spring, with an insulting offer to purchase. I declined.”
“You declined? But now they’re saying you don’t even own it.”
“The same protections that helped me last time still apply. I’m not worried in the slightest.” The gazed out the back window with a slight smile.
Deirdre felt a small sense of relief, followed quickly by doubt as to Mrs. Fey’s grip on reality. But the whole month had been so strange, and here she was just sipping tea. What was reality anyway? She inhaled the steam from her teacup, and thought of the process server. “She didn’t want to set foot on your property. It was like there was an invisible line. Did you notice that? Probably thought you had a shotgun!”
“Yes. I did notice that.” Mrs. Fey turned from the window, but her cloudy eye held the diamond reflection of the panes. “But that’s not why she wouldn’t cross the line.”
“Honestly,” Deirdre said, “I had a hell of a time finding this place too. I was about to turn back. And maybe if I hadn’t persisted, she wouldn’t have followed me here to serve that notice.”
“Oh, always persist dear. Always persist.” Kathleen sat down again, crinkled her eyes and took a sip of tea. “By the way, have they found out why your friend’s horse died?”
Deirdre set her cup down with a crack. “Good question.”
Down the road from Emerson Equine Hospital, a small boxy building sat well back in a large dirt lot. Deirdre parked in the shade of a clump of towering eucalyptus and walked into the air-conditioned office of Dr. Douglas MacAllister, large animal veterinarian.
Glenda was at the counter, her short curly hair an unnatural yet flattering shade of magenta. She greeted Deirdre warmly, then asked, “What can we do for you?”
“I was in the neighborhood, and I was curious. How is the autopsy for Swift Justice coming along?” Deirdre asked.
“It’s not,” Glenda said. “Mr. Bartley came in here, all debonaire and charming, making a sad face for his wife’s loss—”
“—he didn’t even visit her in the hospital!”
Glenda nodded, unsurprised, and continued. “And then he asked Mac to sign off on the insurance paperwork.”
“What do you mean, sign off?” Deirdre said.
Douglas MacAllister walked in from the back room. His hands were shoved in his pockets, his bowlegs shuffling in his worn jeans and work boots. He was gray, not just his hair, but his scruffy beard, his eyebrows, and even his eyes.
“And did you?” Deirdre asked him, getting the gist. “Sign off on Swift Justice’s cause of death?”
Dr. Mac looked back and forth between them like he was caught between a rattlesnake and a ledge. “Yep,” he answered, with false bravado.
“So the autopsy showed colic?” she asked.
“No, they’re not requiring an autopsy. The colic was a result of the surgery while she was under a vet’s care. She’ll be buried later today,” he said with finality.
“But Mac, are you really satisfied that this whole thing is kosher? How do you know it was colic?”
“Of course. Horses die after surgery all the time. Colic is the number one cause of death in horses, period.”
“Yeah, horses die all the time,” she said curtly, remembering Bowie, “but usually we know why. Without knowing what happened, and I don’t mean an educated guess, do you think Stephanie will be able to grieve for her horse?”
He breathed out through his nose, shuffling his boots.
“And are you forgetting, the surgery wouldn’t have been necessary without the fall?” she added.
“So?”
“So I found evidence that it wasn’t an accident. Something tripped her.”
“Look, it’s not my call. If the insurance will pay I’m satisfied. Everyone’s too damn sue happy these days.”
“They’ll only pay because you signed off on it! Why would her husband file the claim Doc? He doesn’t care about the horses. He doesn’t even live at the house anymore!”
“He was trying to take care of things for her. From what I hear, she’s pretty broken up. Look. I’ve known Stephanie since she was a teenager, been her vet ever since. She’s a first rate horsewoman, got Biscuit off the track, trained her all by herself. She was a remarkable horse, a lot of ability. Young enough she might have had a chance, that’s why they even attempted surgery. That, and Stephanie insisted. But it was always a risk. There are no guarantees.”
Deirdre blew out a frustrated breath.
“I’ve really gotta go,” he said, putting on his Stetson. “Lotta horses colicking in this heat.”
That felt like a gut punch, and she was left with the image of Bowie, the last time she saw him, burned into her retinas.
&nbs
p; Once the office door slammed, Glenda said, “Sorry he’s so insensitive. He just doesn’t think what he’s saying.” Her eyes were full of sympathy beneath perfectly penciled eyebrows. She stood up, and rustled some paperwork. “I have to fax this to the insurance company.”
“Can I peek at that paperwork Glenda? It’s important,” she pleaded.
“Sure. What’s going on in that head of yours?”
Deirdre leaned on the counter and squinted as she scanned the paperwork, her eyes raised at the payout amount.
“You’re thinking this is some kind of fraud, aren’t you?” Glenda’s eyes sparkled. “You know there was a rash of them in the 90s back east. Used electrocution. Left no trace. But why would Bartley need 70 grand? He’s loaded.”
From Deirdre’s calculations, 70 grand could come real close to making a few payrolls for a crew of angry construction workers. “He’s not doing too good financially, is what I hear. Did Mac even draw any blood?”
“Yes, as a matter of fact.”
“Glenda, I’m going to ask a big favor—”
“What do you want it for?”
“I can’t let it rest until I know for sure that she wasn’t poisoned or something. I have a friend that might be able to test it.” She wasn’t sure, but Lina worked in a lab, hopefully she could do something with it.
Glenda thought for a minute, pursing her lips and moving them in circles.
“If the insurance doesn’t need it, what does it matter?” Deirdre asked.
“Okay, why not,” Glenda relented. She opened the mini-fridge door and handed a labeled blood vial to Deirdre. “Still, I’ll be in deep shit if he finds out.”
“Will he ever find out?”
“Of course not. He can barely find his truck keys.” Glenda smiled, sliding a ring of keys out from under her schedule binder. The bell above the door jingled as Doctor Mac came grumbling back in for his keys, right on cue.
“Put it in your purse, quick,” Glenda whispered.
Deirdre slid the blood vial into her purse and turned to walk out. “See you later Mac,” she said, and escaped to the parking lot. But he’d gotten his keys and was following her out.
As she hiked toward the Bronco, trying to pull her own keys out of her purse without dropping the vial, he said, “Oh, Mrs. Boyd?”
Oh god, he knows. I’ll have to find a new vet. “Yes?” she said, sounding as innocent as she could.
“Let me know how that mare of yours is doing. She was acting broody last time I was there. We could put her on something, like ReguMate, if she gets too out of hand. It would make her feel better, be easier on you too.”
“Ok Mac. Thanks.” She smiled weakly and got in the Bronco where she unclenched her jaw and broke out in a sweat.
Just like Mac to think every hormonal female needs to be medicated. She waited for his truck to leave the lot, then turned the key and the engine roared to life. As she pulled out, she called Lina and asked if she could meet her at work.
The 5 South was slow.
It seemed like afternoon rush hour had extended and merged with lunch hour traffic. There was really no good time to get on the freeway anymore, except the middle of the night, and then you’d be subject to the wrong-way drunk drivers. The stop-start was grinding her nerves, and the Bronco’s A/C didn’t work that great, plus it had started to overheat, so she’d turned it off. She was cooking from sitting on the asphalt with the windows open, so at the next exit, she got off and took the coast highway.
It wasn’t any faster, but the illusion of motion helped. It wasn’t much cooler either. Even here at the coast, the air felt dry and the wind was blowing out to sea instead of the other way around. As she drove through the little surfer towns, she wondered what on earth she was thinking. Was this a crime, what she was doing? What if they found something, but she had spoiled the evidence so they couldn’t bring anyone to justice? And if they did find something, how could they prove who had done it?
The sandstone cliffs came into view, and she swooped up the curving road away from the beach and onto the plateau forested with gnarly windswept pine trees and biotech companies. She parked on the street near the research institute, got out and leaned against the car while she waited.
The architecture of the building was stark and modern, with the limitless ocean extending into the distance like something from a future where the human problems of war, famine, and pestilence have been solved and all that’s left is this peaceful existence bathed in golden light. It must make you feel important to work at a place like this.
She saw Lina hurrying across the parking lot. When she got to Deirdre, she pulled a pack of cigarettes out of the pocket of her lab coat.
“I didn’t know you smoked Lina.”
“I don’t. Usually.” Her thick accent, glasses, sleek dark hair and white coat actually made her very imposing, nothing like the nervous nelly on horseback that Deirdre knew. “I’m on break, I only have a few minutes,” Lina said.
Deirdre started to pull the vial of Swift Justice’s blood out of her bag.
“Wait,” said Lina. “Don’t be so obvious.” She flicked her eyes behind her, towards the guard shack at the entrance of the parking lot.
Deirdre palmed the tube and shook Lina’s hand, which felt ridiculous but got the job done.
Lina slid the blood into her lab coat pocket. “What do you want me to test for?”
“I don’t know, that’s the thing. Mrs. Fey said oleander is poisonous to horses. Lots of other plants too, I can’t remember all their names.” For such big animals, horses were so damn fragile.
“What’s oleander?”
“It’s a bush, it’s all up and down the freeways.”
“Yes, but what’s in it? Chemical, I need chemical. I’m a chemist, not a botanist.” Lina took a drag, then exhaled the smoke into her face. “Never mind. I do a panel and see what comes back. Go from there.”
“Thank you Lina. I know this is a long shot. I owe you, big time.”
Lina shrugged. “All for the bimbo, huh?”
“No, it’s for the horse. Think of the horse.”
Lina raised an eyebrow, dropped the cigarette, and ground it into the pavement.
Wednesday, October 17
AT 4 P.M., DEIRDRE sat at her desk, trying like hell to concentrate on her work. When the phone rang, her heart raced as she answered, hoping it was Lina.
“Boyd Bookkeeping.”
“Mrs. Boyd, this is Bob again.”
“Hi Bob, what’s up? Don’t tell me the rent check bounced.” She laughed, but then thought about it, and stopped.
“No—at least not that I know of. It’s something else. Remember those surveyors?”
“Yes?”
“They were from the county. They’re surveying for a road or something. Anyway, seems like you put up the barn a little bit over the property line. Maybe a lot over.”
“You told us it went all the way down to the stream!”
“I’m sorry. I never had an official survey of the property, just a rough idea…never thought it would matter that much, you know? But as soon as the county jumped on that, they cited me and I’m getting fined a thousand bucks a day unless I…” She heard a semi-truck rumble past where Bob stood at a payphone on some unnamed Northern California logging road. It almost disguised his deep sigh.
“Unless you what? Don’t tell me we have to tear down the barns and…and move them?” Deirdre couldn’t even imagine the work that would take.
“Yes, we’ll have to do that too, but…”
“But what Bob, what?” She stood up, pacing next to her desk.
“It’s just a formality Deirdre. Look, is Walt there?”
“No, he’s not, and whatever it is you can tell me.” She was getting angry now.
“I have to file eviction paperwork.”
The word hit her like a truck. Eviction.
“Like I said, it’s just a formality,” Bob continued. “If I don’t do it, I’ll go bankrupt. They
won’t fine me as long as I show signs of correcting the problem, which to them means evicting the tenant. I wanted to tell you in person before you got the letter in the mail. But don’t worry, we’ll get it all straightened out before the end of the 60 days…”
His voice got fainter and was replaced by a hum. The world got whiter. She needed to sit down. She hung up, walked like a zombie into the kitchen, and sat at the table. She could hear Bob ringing her back again, but she lacked the strength to answer. She looked out back, at the lawn, the citrus trees. The two tall palms framing the property lines—or what she thought were the property lines. She couldn’t take anything for granted now.
The phone stopped ringing and the answering machine whirred to life. The voice on it was deep, throaty, and not Bob’s. “Deedee, I found something,” Lina whispered like an Eastern Bloc spy, “in the bloodwork. I tell you tonight at yoga.” Click.
As she walked to yoga, Deirdre’s nerves snapped like downed electric lines. At dinner this evening, she hadn’t told Walt about Bob’s phone call. Of course she’d have to tell him sometime, but it would distract him on his work trip, and she was afraid it would just add to his fervor for moving to Texas. Besides, she’d compartmentalized that bad news inside her dread of whatever it was Lina was going to tell her.
She ditched her shoes in Morgan’s hallway with everyone else’s, and scurried into the living room. The lights were still up and everyone was still upright and talking, although they had already laid out their yoga mats to stake a claim to their floor space.
Deirdre touched Bonnie on the shoulder and a brutal static shock arced off the end of her finger.
“Sorry!” she said, as Bonnie yelped.
“Oh, you scared me more than anything,” Bonnie said with a hand over her heart, laughing.
Deirdre’s heart was skipping beats too. She told Bonnie about Lina’s message, and Bonnie’s face darkened. Deirdre felt like she was waiting to find out the results of her own test for cancer or something. But Lina wasn’t here yet. Probably stuck in traffic on the 5.
October's Fire (Fairy Glen Suspense Book 1) Page 24
