Odd Partners

by Mystery Writers of America

  Now she would know who. Now she would get her revenge.

  The ground, rough with pinecones and rocks, bruised her bare feet. She strode forward nonetheless, head high, surveying the gloaming, listening. Waiting for the woods to tell her their secrets. The woods always knew when someone passed—ferns waved at passersby, birds startled into flight, frogs fell reverentially silent. Small creatures scurried into the undergrowth, fled up the pale trunks of aspens, set evergreen branches swaying.

  Nothing.

  Estelle scanned again, noted still no sign of human passage. A squirrel ran along a high branch; she drew a bead on it, briefly and pointlessly, thinking there was no use in going further—too many trees, too many directions the intruder could have gone. Too many boulders to hide behind, too many rises and falls.

  Or the intruder might still be in her apiary. Perhaps the swinging gate had been a misdirection.

  Carefully, aware of her body gleaming pale and noticeable in the deepening twilight, Estelle backtracked and approached the gate. It fastened with a simple drop bar, and she held the gun steady with her left hand, letting go with her right just long enough to open the latch.

  Using her hip, she nudged the gate open. It gave a faint creak, a quiet noise but one that would have warned her as she lay in her bath, had the sound not been masked by “Flight of the Bumblebee.”

  Who knew she played that music every evening, who knew she bathed with the iPhone on the sill of the open window so the bees could hear the music, too? Anyone regularly passing by, that was who. Anyone on foot, anyone driving—as people ought—with their windows down to catch the mountain breeze, to listen for other traffic. To stay alert for pedestrians.

  Through the vine-draped fence she could hear the angry buzz of Hector’s bees. They were Italian bees originally, unaggressive and tractable, but with each generation their genetics shifted as queens mated with local rabble. “Africanized” was not a yes/no proposition, but a spectrum, and Hector’s bees had grown, over the years, a little hot. This wasn’t all bad; it increased their resistance to the mites decimating other bee populations. But hot bees liked their privacy and their routines. They didn’t like strangers, especially at night.

  Estelle was no stranger, but it wasn’t wise to assume such bees would always observe social courtesies. If the intruder still lurked in the apiary and Estelle caught and confronted him, the bees might well attack. And she was naked.

  She backed up, glanced around.

  There. The clothesline.

  She set the shotgun on the ground within quick reach. The clothesline was easy to undo because Hector had tied it in a slipknot, or maybe it was a running knot, she didn’t know. As she pulled it free another piece of her heart crumbled, at this undoing of the work of Hector’s hands. But there was no help for it; she had to catch his killer.

  Winding the rope through the bars of the gate, she wished she had let him teach her better knots. Hers wouldn’t trap the intruder, if he still lurked inside, but at least it would slow his escape if he went by the gate rather than over the high fence.

  Snatching up the shotgun, she hurried back up the steps and into the cabin, going straight to the landline phone, dialing a number. While it rang, she stretched the cord as far as it would go, toward the living room window. She couldn’t quite see the apiary gate, but she could almost see it. If anyone passed through, she’d at least catch a glimpse.

  In her ear, a voice grunted an unintelligible greeting.

  “Abe,” she said.

  “Yeah.” He didn’t ask who it was; they’d known each other twenty years, ever since a newly wedded Hector and Estelle had moved to Blue Canyon Road.

  “Look out your kitchen window,” she said. “The gate across the road. Is it closed?”

  There was a pause. “Yeah.”

  “Can you tell if it’s locked?” If the intruder had come from outside that gate, Estelle doubted he would bother shutting it, much less take time to thread the padlock back through the chain and lock it. Why slow his escape? If the gate were shut and locked, Estelle bet it was because the intruder hadn’t come through it. Hadn’t needed to, because he lived in Blue Canyon. They were ten miles from the main road, twenty-four miles from town. No one entered or left Blue Canyon on foot, except perhaps to hike across to the Tecolote, and that canyon was also gated.

  “Yeah,” Abe said.

  “Yeah, you can tell, or yeah, the gate’s locked?”

  “Both.”

  Okay. That was good. “Abe?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Call the sheriff. Tell him someone just tried to kill me. And keep an eye on that gate.”

  Stentorian breathing, the rasp of it sudden and frightened. She could picture the old man clutching his chest, faded eyes fixed on some unseen horizon.

  “Take your pill,” she said hurriedly. “I have to go. Will you call?”

  He sucked in a gust of air. “Course,” he said. “Be careful, girlie.”

  Even if the sheriff jumped straight into his cruiser, he wouldn’t reach her for another thirty minutes, minimum. And he might not jump straight into his cruiser. He might chalk the whole thing up as a foiled burglary, reported by a woman he already had pegged as borderline paranoid. He had Friday-night emergencies, a limited staff. Estelle would be lucky to see the sheriff before midnight.

  For a heartbeat she stood still, indecisive. She wanted to get dressed and check the apiary—but no. Phone calls first. Because if the intruder had escaped before she’d tied the apiary gate closed, she had only a tiny window of time to narrow down who he might be.

  The mountains had no cell reception, none for five miles of winding gravel road, none for another fifteen miles of paved—across the wide meadows, through the cut in the rocks, past the HITCHHIKERS MAY BE ESCAPING CONVICTS road sign, all the way to the New Mexico Correctional Facility. Only there did reception kick in.

  So if someone answered his landline, then he was home, not creeping through the woods having recently attempted cold-blooded murder.

  His second cold-blooded murder.

  The two closest cabins, Estelle figured, were a wash. Her attacker would have had time to get home already, if he lived in one of them.

  She dialed the next farthest cabin.

  “Hello?”

  Linda. Before Estelle could ask for her husband, to rule Tim out as well, she heard his familiar voice reprimanding their unruly Labrador in the background.

  Without a word, she hung up.

  Already it had grown too dark to see the numbers on the phone. She took a few precious seconds to light the emergency candles that always stood on the end table, her hands trembling, the flame wavering and smoking before the wicks caught. How many calls could she make before the relevant window of time closed? The farthest house from her own was Harry Garcia’s, way back almost to the Santa Fe National Forest. Estelle could walk it in twenty minutes, run it in less. Between Harry’s house and her own lay, what, ten or twelve other houses?

  She needed a pencil. She should document as much as she could, for the next—she chose a random number—six minutes. Then she would check the apiary.

  A noise made her pause.

  A squeak, a creak. Had she imagined it?

  No. It came again.

  It could be a raccoon, a possum, any number of woodland creatures. Or simply the wind. Or it could be a killer letting himself out the apiary gate, climbing the three creaky wooden steps to her porch.

  She picked up the shotgun.

  Around her, candlelight flickered warm and mellow, hateful. It called up memories of Hector’s face in the dancing light, Hector’s hands as they trimmed the kerosene lamp, Hector building a fire in the wood-burning stove. It reminded her she was alone.

  It lit her clearly, as on a stage, for the dark form that might be standing outside her window.
/>
  And she was naked.

  She hadn’t cared before, in that initial burst of adrenaline. Racing outside with her gun in pursuit of Hector’s killer. Now it felt different. Now she was a woman boxed in, alone and lit by flickering candlelight, the windows blinking light back at her so she couldn’t see who stood upon her porch, watching her like a movie, like a fish in a bowl.

  Dashing into her bedroom, she jerked on jeans, boots, a flannel shirt, the closest things to hand. As she fumbled a button closed, a loud knock made her heart lurch. A knock at the front door—rat-a-tat-tat—insistent, aggressive.

  For an instant she considering hunkering down, hiding. Hoping he would go away. But there was no point; her cabin wasn’t a fortress. Better to deal with this head on, with dignity, on her own terms.

  Though not the terms she originally had set.

  Cautiously Estelle edged toward the living room, raising the gun. The cuff of her flannel shirt hung loose, impeding her trigger finger. She shook it back, eased forward another few feet.

  Even the best laid plans go astray, and Estelle hadn’t so much planned as hoped, announcing her daily spell of vulnerability with bumblebee music, buying copious amounts of tequila from the gossipiest storekeeper, in hope—not expectation, merely hope—that Hector’s killer would show himself. He would come to drown her, to make it look as if she’d fallen and hit her head, perhaps slipped beneath the surface in a drunken haze. Another accident. Another needless death. Hector and Estelle, so careless. But when he burst into the bathroom believing he was the predator, she the weakened prey, Estelle would rise up out of the water and raise the .357 from beneath the crumpled bath towel and blow him to kingdom come, where he would never meet Hector—residing with the angels—but would burn in hell for all eternity, contemplating his depravity.

  That had been her plan. Such as it was.

  Attempted electrocution by iPhone, attack by way of a window guarded by Hector’s bees while the front door waited invitingly unlocked—the possibility had never crossed her mind.

  She felt very stupid about that.

  The pounding on the door came again. Rat-a-tat-tat.

  At least he had come, whoever he was. That was the important thing. She was so tired of wondering and waiting.

  “Estelle!”

  A man’s voice; she thought she recognized it.

  “Estelle, I know you’re in there. Open up.”

  Tears filled her eyes.

  No. Not Harry.

  A loner with some sort of military background—or maybe just a liking for army surplus stores—Harry Garcia earned a meager living doing unskilled work such as winterizing cabins and opening them up in the spring, meanwhile learning carpentry from Hector. Basically, he was Hector’s apprentice, and—she had thought—his friend.

  But essentially he was Hector’s business rival, it occurred to her now. He did menial work, grunt-work, while aspiring to Hector’s better jobs. Money was at the root of most murders, wasn’t that what statistics said?

  “Estelle,” Harry called again. “Open up. I need to know you’re okay.”

  Sure he did.

  Harry had motive to kill Hector, but what did he have against her? Estelle was no carpenter. She wielded a hammer only to hang pictures.

  It didn’t matter; she didn’t have to understand his motives. He had killed Hector, and in return she’d kill him. Even if she couldn’t prove what he had done, no one would blame her—a woman alone, in the dark, moments after placing a frantic call for the sheriff.

  Blinking away angry tears, she strode across her living room and flung open her front door.

  On the porch, Harry Garcia took one look at her gun and raised his hands shoulder high.

  He wasn’t alone. The woman beside him gave a small shriek, her eyes going wide.

  Ashley Swanson looked, as usual, like an Eddie Bauer model. She was dressed in brand-new hiking pants with zippers in implausible places, and a navy jacket done up to her chin. A lavender Fitbit peeked out from one cuff. A few strands of salon-streaked hair had escaped her artfully messy bun and curled coyly, damp with perspiration, around her pretty face. She smelled of something fruity and expensive.

  Beside her Harry looked particularly uncouth. The dark stubble on his cheeks went far beyond the point of fashion; his army surplus fatigues featured a rip mended with duct tape; his gray T-shirt and unbuttoned flannel shirt had worn thin to the point of disintegration; and his work boots looked like something pulled off a casualty of the Bataan death march. As always, he smelled like sweaty male. Estelle had heard women speculate that Harry might clean up well, but this was pure supposition. No such Harry had ever been spotted.

  Ashley and Harry were about the same age—mid-thirties—but beyond that, a more unlikely pair Estelle could not imagine. And it wasn’t just their clashing fashion choices. Harry, a year-round resident, lived mostly off the grid and mostly off the land. Ashley and her husband were summer people, do-gooders who wanted to improve local schools, pave roads, change zoning ordinances, regulate this, deregulate that, and talk the local grocer into carrying certified-organic free-range non-GMO everything.

  Maybe Ashley was slumming?

  Maybe Harry was slumming.

  The breeze from the apiary carried the scent of raspberries; the blossoms on the fence nodded their heads. The gate stood ajar, clothesline dangling loose.

  Harry or Ashley. Harry and Ashley.

  Estelle’s blood pulsed painfully in her ears.

  “Do you have a license for that thing?” Ashley said, pointing at the shotgun.

  “Permit,” Harry said. “And she doesn’t need one.” His hands were still raised, but he didn’t look unduly alarmed to be held at gunpoint by a damp and wild-eyed woman. He seemed to be contemplating nothing more concerning than Ashley’s ignorance of New Mexico gun laws.

  “Are you two together?” Estelle said.

  “What? No!” Ashley recoiled. “I’m a happily married woman.”

  Estelle looked at Harry. His expression said High-maintenance city girl? Not likely.

  One or the other. A killer and—unfortunately—a bystander.

  Estelle shifted, covering them both with the shotgun. “Which of you just tried to electrocute me in the bath?”

  Ashley gasped; Harry’s eyes went suddenly alert.

  “You—” Estelle jabbed the gun at Ashley. “Why are you here?”

  Ashley blinked. “Um, neighborly kindness? I was out for a walk and heard the power go. I thought you might want company, given your situation.”

  “My situation.” Estelle kept her tone even.

  Ashley’s blue eyes clouded with sympathy. “Recently bereaved,” she said in a stage whisper, as if the words were too awful to say aloud. Then, in a normal tone: “The power went out. I thought it might make you nervous.”

  Estelle contemplated the younger woman. “No,” she said. “Nervous is not what it makes me.”

  She switched her gaze to Harry in time to see his lips twitch with a suppressed smile.

  “Talk,” she said, eyeing him coldly.

  His gaze flicked away. “I was up behind your cabin, on the ridge”—he gestured with his chin—“tracking a nuisance bear. The one that’s been tearing up trash bins at the youth camp.”

  He wasn’t making eye contact, but his story was credible. There had in fact been a bear poking around, and though camp sessions had ended for the year, they brought in weekend groups through October. It was a dangerous combination, hordes of city people and a bear that no longer feared humans.

  “Where’s your rifle?”

  “At home.” Hands still raised, he slowly turned around, showing her his back. Through his shirt she could see the bulge of a handgun.

  “Lift the shirt.”

  He did. “Smith & Wesson 500,” he said.
<
br />   That would take down a bear, all right.

  “You people.” Ashley snugged her zipper more tightly beneath her chin. “Guns don’t solve anything.”

  Except rogue bears. And attempted murders. And rattlesnakes, rabid raccoons, large rats with boundary issues…

  Harry turned back around, slowly, hands still up. His nose was twitching. “Estelle,” he said. “I might sneeze. Don’t get startled and shoot me.”

  He sounded just like he always did. He looked just like he always did. Unkempt, but not entirely unattractive. And Hector had liked him; she knew he had.

  “Grief makes people crazy,” Ashley said, her tone so earnest it set Estelle’s teeth on edge. “But you can’t go around making wild accusations. Someone might sue. And you know it was a squirrel on the line—that’s what it always is. Nobody tried to electrocute you.”

  The pity in her face made Estelle want to pull the trigger.

  Instead she swung the gun toward Harry. He leaned back, as if that would make a difference. Not completely nonchalant, not anymore. Probably wondering what sort of load the shotgun carried, slug or shot, though either would do the job at this range.

  “If you were tracking bear on the ridge,” she said, “what brought you here?”

  He answered in a carefully steady voice, as if she were a wild animal. “It was getting dark, and I’d lost his trail,” he said. “So I was heading for the road. Easier walking back that way than going cross-country.”

  “Harry came around the far side of your house just as I got here,” Ashley said helpfully. “I came up the steps on this side, and he came up the steps on that side.”

  Harry cleared his throat.

  Ashley frowned at him. “Maybe you got to the porch a step or two ahead of me, but that’s all.”

  “Actually”—Harry drew out the word—“I was here before. Well before.”

  There was a glint in his eye.

  “Oh, for Pete’s sake.” Estelle went prickly with annoyance.