“Whoa,” I crooned. “Easy now . . .”
“Watch it!” I heard Belinda yell. “Don’t lose the—”
Just as she said it, he reared up on his back legs, and the reins flew out of my hands. Instinctively I grabbed his mane. I held on as he started darting back and forth across the arena, reins dragging on the ground, the squirrel forgotten, but his adrenaline pumping enough now that he couldn’t stop. He rammed me against the fence. I felt the soft saddle start to slip, and I gripped hard with my thighs, trying to keep a seat.
“Grab him!” another, deeper voice yelled out over Belinda’s. Out of the corner of my eye I saw in a blur Dewey’s angry face, the cowboy hats of Chet and his friends, and the shocked face of my husband.
Then I hit the ground. Pain shot through my already battered body like a jolt of lightning. I bit down hard, my teeth slamming against each other. Like I’d been taught in childhood, I ignored the pain and rolled away, forcing myself to scramble under the fence to safety. Gabe was there before I could stand up, pulling me up and cursing vehemently in Spanish.
“I’m okay,” I said, leaning my head against his chest, breathing deep and hard. “Just a little weak. I’m all right.” I swallowed, and the salty taste of blood flowed down the back of my throat.
Across the arena, a commotion caused us both to turn and stare.
“Are you out of your mind?” Dewey screamed at Belinda. “She could have been killed. You know he’s too dangerous to ride. How could you do something so absolutely stupid?” Her broad shoulders slumped, and she seemed to shrink inches under his harsh words. “You’re so all-fire bent on screwing things up for me, aren’t you? Aren’t you?” He gripped both her shoulders.
“Gabe, do something,” I whispered, digging my nails into his forearm.
“Wait,” he answered in a low voice. “This is between them. I’ll step in if it looks like he’s losing control.”
“What were you thinking?” Dewey demanded, shaking Belinda slightly. That did it for Gabe, but before he could step in, Chet ran over and grabbed his dad’s forearm. Dewey shook it off and snapped at his son, “This is between your mother and me. Go get Apache and put him up.” Chet’s face flushed angrily, but he did what Dewey said without a word.
“Hey, y’all,” Cordie June called out, walking around the barn. “What’s going on out here? I turned around, and everyone was gone.” She looked at Belinda and Dewey, at the horse that Chet and his friends were still trying to round up, and at Gabe and me. “Is everything okay?” She cocked her hip and gave a flirty smile.
“Fine, Cordie June,” Dewey said. Belinda jerked away from his grasp. “You get on back to the house and check the barbecue. We’ll all be there in a minute.” He turned back to Belinda. “We’ll talk about this later.”
She sputtered, her face white with anger. “Who do you think you are, Dewey Champagne? I own half this stable. I have just as much right—” His savage look stopped her words. She swung around and headed for the horse barns, cursing loudly. Chet handed Apache’s reins to one of his friends, and after shooting his dad a black look, ran after his mother.
Dewey walked over to Gabe and me. “You okay?” he asked, his face amiable again.
“Yes,” I said, brushing the dirt off my pant leg. “Look, it was just as much my fault as Belinda’s.”
“No, it wasn’t. She knows how Apache is and she let you ride him anyway.”
“I chose to ride him,” I insisted. “I think you’re being too hard on her. I think—” Gabe squeezed my shoulder firmly.
“This is not up for discussion,” Dewey said bluntly. “Why don’t you go in and get washed up. The food’s probably ready.” He turned and walked toward the house, his boots kicking up a small dirt cloud behind him.
I shrugged Gabe’s hand off. “What was that all about? I think he’s being a real jerk. Did you see how he was yelling at Belinda?”
“He’s right,” Gabe said. “She knew exactly what to expect from that horse, so she shouldn’t have allowed you to ride him. And you should have known better yourself. You could have broken your neck.”
“I knew what I was doing,” I said. “He’s not the first horse who’s bucked me off and he more than likely won’t be the last. Belinda had nothing to do with that.”
“Maybe, maybe not. What were you thinking, trying to ride a green horse like that? Dewey told you he didn’t want you riding him.”
“I had to.”
“What?”
“You wouldn’t understand.”
“Try me.”
I exhaled sharply. “She made me feel like I couldn’t do it. Like I wasn’t capable of handling a horse like Apache.”
He gave me an astonished look. “Let me get this straight. You did it because she dared you? Am I talking to a mature woman here, or a teenager?”
“She didn’t . . .” But he was right. She did dare me, and I took the dare. I looked away, chewing on the corner of my lip, feeling heat rise up the back of my neck. “How do you always manage to make me feel like I’m the kid and you’re the parent?”
“Niña, it isn’t as difficult as it sounds.”
“Very funny.” I smacked him in the stomach, which only made him laugh. Then his face turned sober again, and he rested his hands on my shoulders, massaging them gently.
“Benni, let’s get serious here. I don’t like the way this came down. I told you that you need to be careful with everyone involved. That means sometimes backing down when you don’t want to. There’s more honor in that than forging ahead and getting yourself hurt or killed.”
“I know,” I said, tilting my head back and relaxing under his gentle hands. “I’ll think twice before I do anything from now on. I promise.”
He bent and kissed me. “Good. Now, let’s get you cleaned up and get something to eat.”
Belinda had taken one of the stable’s trucks and left before Gabe and I returned. No one mentioned the incident with Apache during lunch, but an uneasiness swirled through the festivities. Chet kept shooting his father angry side looks, which Dewey ignored. Later that afternoon, when everyone had gone inside to watch Chet’s rodeo videos again, I excused myself and retreated to a wooden lawn chair under a thick shady ash next to the house. I watched a red-tailed hawk ride the air currents over the grassy meadow next to Dewey’s property. The air felt warm and heavy on my arms. In the distance, through the glistening heat, I could see grain silos, tall and silvery-white, and it occurred to me for the first time that they were probably the inspiration for Frank L. Baum’s Emerald City. The screen door opened, and Dewey stepped out on the porch. He strode across the lawn to join me.
“You feeling okay, short stuff?” he asked, his brown eyes concerned.
I smiled and lifted the damp hair off the back of my neck. “Dewey, I grew up on a ranch. I’ve had wrecks before and I’ve made it thirty-five years without experiencing any major plaster yet. I’m fine.”
“Then you know it was real stupid of you to ride that stud,” he said, perching on the handle of my chair and resting his arm behind me. “I told you—”
“I apologize,” I said sharply, cutting into his lecture. “It won’t happen again.”
“Good.” He picked up a long strand of wild wheat and stuck it in his mouth. “Belinda says she’s sorry. She’ll tell you herself next time she sees you. Sometimes she doesn’t always think things out before she does them.”
“You don’t have to apologize for her,” I said, irritated at his condescending attitude. “What happened was between me and her. It’s not your responsibility.”
He gave me his lazy grin and rolled the wheat strand to the other side of his mouth. “Belinda and me, we were together a long time. Since high school. Kind of like the way it was between you and your first husband—what was his name, Jake?”
“Jack.”
“Right, Jack. That’s a lot of time, a lot of history. So I do feel responsible. Family loyalty means something to me. Even though we’re di
vorced, she’s still family in a way, because we have Chet. And because of DeeDee. So I always take responsibility for my family and my friends when they need help . . . or do stupid things.” He squinted at me, his brown eyes slits under his thick dark eyebrows. “I have a sneaking suspicion you feel the same way. Am I right?”
“Yes,” I said slowly. “But even family loyalty and friendship has its limits.”
“Does it?” He was silent for a moment, his eyes challenging me to go further.
I turned away from his gaze and looked to the house, where shouts of laughter filtered through the screen door. “But none of this has anything to do with the fact that no one forced me to ride Apache. I made that decision on my own. That’s what we’re talking about, isn’t it?”
He spit the weed out, gave a sharp laugh and stood up, adjusting his pale hat. “Well, of course it is. What else would we be talking about?”
“He knows who did it,” I insisted after repeating his cryptic comments to Gabe on the drive home. “Or at least he suspects.”
“He’s not stupid,” Gabe said. “He certainly has the same suspicions we do.” He frowned, his jaw setting in a familiar granite position. “What he said bothers me.”
“I think he was fishing, but I didn’t give anything away.”
“I don’t like his threatening tone.”
“You didn’t even hear his tone! How do you know it was threatening?” I sat back in my seat. “You know what I think? I think he suspects Belinda did it, though I can’t imagine why. I could imagine her killing Cordie June—but Tyler?” Then something dawned on me. “What if Dewey was having an affair with Tyler?”
Gabe pulled the car over to the side of the road and stopped, letting the engine idle. He leaned his head against the steering wheel, one fist clutched against his leg. “I don’t want to do this,” he said. “Think of them this way. I wished we’d never come. If we’d never come—”
I touched his forearm gently. “It would have happened anyway. Our coming didn’t cause this. You know that.” Suddenly, all I wanted to do was go back to California. At that moment, I didn’t care who killed Tyler, who had an affair with her, why any of this happened. I only cared about Gabe and how this was tearing him up and how he’d never be able to look into the faces of his friends again without wondering. I knew how that felt. For one incident to totally change your whole life, shake up the very foundations you thought would never be moved. But I also knew he’d never be completely satisfied unless he found out the truth. Truth, even when it was painful, was eventually always better than lies.
The next day, Sunday, we didn’t see anyone except his mother. I knew I couldn’t expect an answer from Emory until Monday morning when his sources were back at work, but I was antsy all day. Kathryn kept giving me odd looks, as if she were on the verge of saying something, then held back. We went to bed early that night simply because there was nothing else to do.
On Monday I woke early and tried not to hover around the phone. “Why don’t you go over to Otis’s and ride Sinful?” Gabe suggested when he grew weary of my pacing around the house. He’d started work on some electrical outlets that needed replacing.
“I want to be here when Emory calls.”
“I’ll be here.”
“I don’t feel like riding.”
He shrugged and went back to work. Halfway through, he discovered he needed two more outlets.
“I’m going down to the hardware store,” he said. I walked with him out to the car. “If your cousin calls, do not, I repeat, do not act on any information before I get back.”
“Yes, sir, Chief,” I said, saluting.
He took my chin in his hand and shook it gently. “I mean it, niña. This isn’t a game.”
I swatted at his hand. “Stick a needle in my eye, Friday. Geeze.”
While he was gone, I sat on the front porch, wrote postcards to the people back home, and replayed Saturday’s conversation with Dewey in my head. He and Tyler? Could they have carried on a relationship without anyone knowing about it? I thought of what her landlady told me—the arguments with some man over the phone. Could it have been Dewey she was fighting with over the phone? And if it was, who killed her? Cordie June because of jealousy? For that matter, jealousy could have driven any of them to do it—Belinda, Lawrence, Janet, Rob—even possibly her husband, John, though I still couldn’t imagine that in a million years. Maybe Dewey himself? But why? I doodled on the postcard in front of me, which showed a horrified Dorothy staring at a farmhouse with sparkling red slippers sticking out from under the crooked foundation. “I’m bringing down the house in Kansas,” it said in fancy script.
“Is Gabe back yet?” Kathryn called through the screen door.
“Not yet.”
“Oh, dear.” Her voice dropped in dismay.
“What’s wrong?”
“I’m in the middle of baking lemon meringue pies and I’ve run out of eggs. I was hoping he could run to the store and get me a dozen.”
“Oh.” I cringed inside, knowing what she was expecting. I also knew that crucial phone call would probably come when I was at the store. She waited expectantly, and finally I caved in. “I can do it if you don’t mind lending me your car.”
“Not at all. As long as you’re going, would you mind picking up a few other things? You’ll probably have to go out to the big Dillon’s on Rock Road. We’re going to a potluck at Mrs. Cleveland’s house tonight. She was Gabe’s kindergarten teacher.”
I sighed, knowing I was stuck. “No problem.”
At Dillon’s it appeared everyone was doing the grocery shopping they’d put off all weekend, because it took me almost an hour to maneuver my way through the crowds. I stood in the checkout line trying to keep my impatience from getting the better of me by glancing through the magazines that grocery stores always tempt you with along with Milky Way bars, purse-sized flashlights, and rolls of Scotch tape. I picked up a quilting magazine and flipped through the pages, my attention caught by an article on quilt patterns. Apparently some woman in California had developed a computer database of quilt patterns, their origins, a cross-reference of their many names, and where they could be found in various pattern and quilt history books. I studied the examples and wondered about setting up something similar on a smaller scale at the folk art museum, though we didn’t have a computer yet. Our library had grown fairly extensive, especially in the quilting area. I tossed the magazine in with the rest of the groceries and filed it in my mind as something to look into when I got back home.
I was back at Kathryn’s, lugging in two bulky bags of groceries, when what I’d read in the article hit me. The answer had been there all along, but because I hadn’t looked any farther than my own surface knowledge, I hadn’t seen it. The baby quilt was possibly a commemorative quilt of Tyler’s time in Arkansas, the birth of her baby, but could it also be a memory of the baby’s father? I set the bags of groceries on the sofa and dashed upstairs to look through the quilt encyclopedia I’d bought at the quilt show.
“Benni, is that you?” Kathryn came upstairs and stood in the doorway of the bedroom as I feverishly searched for the page showing the Arkansas Traveler pattern.
“Yes?” I looked up from my place in the quilt book, my heart pounding. “Is Gabe back?” I asked before she could say anything further.
She touched a blue-veined hand to her chest. “That’s what I was coming up to tell you. He came back from the hardware store, but left again. A man called asking for you, and Gabe took the call. Gabe said to tell you he had some personal business to take care of, that he’d tell you about it later.”
“How long ago did he leave?” Not wanting to frighten her, I tried to keep the panic out of my voice.
“About half an hour. Benni, what’s going on?”
“Did he say where he was going?”
“No, he didn’t. But I’m worried. He seemed very upset. Do you know where he went?”
I found the page for Arkansas Traveler. The sm
all notation read “This pattern dates from the late 1800’s. At various times, it has been called Secret Drawer, Travel Star, and Teddy’s Choice. During the early 1930’s it was also called Cowboy Star.”
“I’m pretty sure I do,” I said.
FOURTEEN
“CAN I BORROW your car?” I asked Kathryn.
“What’s wrong?” she immediately demanded.
I held her steady gaze. “Kathryn, there’s no time to explain, but I have to go after Gabe. Can you just trust me on this?”
“Is he in danger?”
“I don’t know.”
“Should we call the police? Should we call Dewey?”
“No.” My voice sharpened.
Her eyes darkened slightly, and in that instant I knew she knew. But this was her son we were talking about, and a woman who had only known him six months was asking her to trust his life to her judgment. She hesitated.
“There’s no time to waste,” I said softly.
Kansas Troubles Page 27
