by Tonya Kappes
Hitches, Hideouts, & Homicides
A CAMPER AND CRIMINALS COZY MYSTERY
Book Seven
BY
TONYA KAPPES
Hitches, Hideouts, & Homicides
“Mae! Someone opened the stall and opened the back barn door,” Coke hollered over the sound of the rain beating down on the roof. “Help me get Rosa!”
My first instinct was to protest. I’d never been around horses before, and the bars between me and the one I was petting was as close as I wanted to get to the intimidating creatures.
“Come on!” she yelled. “I’ll call Jay.”
I nodded. Maybe she didn’t hear me over the rain earlier.
“He’s not answering.” She put her phone away before she gestured for me to help shut the back door where Rosa had apparently escaped from. “Why don’t you go back to the hoedown, find him, and tell him. Rosa will come to him.”
I nodded instead of trying to yell in the rain.
“Go out this door and just go around.” She gestured me out the barn door.
What on earth had I gotten myself into was all I could think of when I headed back out into the stormy weather. No one in her right mind would be doing this, I thought to myself and noticed my foot had stepped on something round. I bent down and brought it up to my face.
“What on earth?” My heart sank when I realized it was a compass, like the one from the backpack of the guy hiding out in the stables. The same compass I’d seen bouncing on the man's backpack from last night at the campground.
I stuck it in my back pocket and turned to head back toward the barn when I tripped and fell. Only it wasn’t in another mud puddle. I fell right on top of Jay Russel’s lifeless body.
Copyright
This book is a work of fiction. The characters, incidents, and dialogue are drawn from the author’s imagination and are not to be construed as real. Any resemblance to actual events or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Cover by Covervault, Mariah Sinclair. Edits by Red Adept Editing Services.
Copyright © 2019 by Tonya Kappes. All rights reserved. Printed in the United States of America. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews. For information email [email protected] .
About the Author
Tonya has written over 55 novels and 4 novellas, all of which have graced numerous bestseller lists including USA Today. Best known for stories charged with emotion and humor, and filled with flawed characters, her novels have garnered reader praise and glowing critical reviews. She lives with her husband, two very spoiled schnauzers and grew up in the small southern Kentucky town of Nicholasville. Now that her four boys are grown men, Tonya writes fulltime.
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Also by Tonya Kappes
Magical Cures Mystery Series
A CHARMING CRIME
A CHARMING CURE
A CHARMING POTION (novella)
A CHARMING WISH
A CHARMING SPELL
A CHARMING MAGIC
A CHARMING SECRET
A CHARMING CHRISTMAS (novella)
A CHARMING FATALITY
A CHARMING DEATH (novella)
A CHARMING GHOST
A CHARMING HEX
A CHARMING VODOO
A CHARMING CORPSE
A Camper and Criminals Cozy Mystery
BEACHES, BUNGALOWS AND BURGLARIES
DESERT, DRIVERS AND DERELICTS
FORESTS, FISHING, & FORGERY
CHRISTMAS, CRIMINALS, & CAMPERS
MOTORHOMES, MAPS, & MURDER
CANYONS, CARAVANS, & CADAVERS
HITCHES, HIDEOUTS, & HOMICIDE
A Southern Cake Baker Series
( under the pen name of Maymee Bell)
CAKE AND PUNISHMENT
BATTER OFF DEAD
A Ghostly Southern Mystery Series
A GHOSTLY UNDERTAKING
A GHOSTLY GRAVE
A GHOSTLY DEMISE
A GHOSTLY MURDER
A GHOSTLY REUNION
A GHOSTLY MORTALITY
A GHOSTLY SECRET
Killer Coffee Mystery Series
SCENE OF THE GRIND
MOCHA AND MURDER
FRESHLY GROUND MURDER
COLD BLOODED BREW
DECAFFEINATED SCANDAL
A KILLER LATTE
Kenni Lowry Mystery Series
FIXIN’ TO DIE
SOUTHERN FRIED
AX TO GRIND
SIX FEET UNDER
DEAD AS A DOORNAIL
TANGLED UP IN TINSEL
DIGGIN’ UP DIRT
Spies and Spells Mystery Series
SPIES AND SPELLS
BETTING OFF DEAD
GET WITCH or DIE TRYING
A Laurel London Mystery Series
CHECKERED CRIME
CHECKERED PAST
CHECKERED THIEF
A Divorced Diva Beading Mystery Series
A BEAD OF DOUBT SHORT STORY
STRUNG OUT TO DIE
CRIMPED TO DEATH
Olivia Davis Paranormal Mystery Series
SPLITSVILLE.COM
COLOR ME LOVE (novella)
COLOR ME A CRIME
Grandberry Falls Series
THE LADYBUG JINX
HAPPY NEW LIFE
A SUPERSTITIOUS CHRISTMAS (novella)
NEVER TELL YOUR DREAMS
Bluegrass Romance Series
GROOMING MR. RIGHT
TAMING MR. RIGHT
Women’s Fiction
CARPE BREAD ’EM
Young Adult
TAG YOU’RE IT
CONTENTS
ONE
TWO
THREE
FOUR
FIVE
SIX
SEVEN
EIGHT
NINE
TEN
ELEVEN
TWELVE
THIRTEEN
FOURTEEN
FIFTEEN
SIXTEEN
SEVENTEEN
EIGHTEEN
NINETEEN
TWENTY
RECIPES AND CLEANING HACKS
SCENE OF THE GRIND
ONE
Why is it that my big mouth always gets me in a little bit of a pickle? Sitting in the passenger seat of Betts Hager’s cleaning van at five a.m. was definitely not how I intended to spend my morning. Leave it to my big mouth.
The cleaning supplies and tools rattled in the back of Betts’s van, not giving me a moment of silence to close my eyes for a little more sleep. The van hugged the side of the asphalt along the curvy road on our way through the Daniel Boone National Park in Normal, Kentucky, to the north side of town off Fawn Road where the Old Train Station Motel was located.
“You know we wouldn’t be in this situation if you hadn’t opened your big mouth down at Cute-icles.” Betts reminded me of the conversation I’d had with Coke Ogden while I was getting my manicure at Cute-icles, the only salon in Normal.
“She said
she needed a cleaning service.” I groaned. “At the time, you were looking for more work, and I referred my friend. How was I to know she meant the old train station?”
Recently, Coke had bought the rundown place and had renovated it into a motel.
“I appreciate you telling her about me, but you don’t know Coke Ogden yet. She can be a pill.” Betts was right. “Besides, I only clean houses. Not motels.”
I was still new to the area, like almost two years now, and I did know most of the citizens. Just not Coke. It wasn’t like Normal was a big city, like New York City, where I’d moved from.
“Just drop me off, and I’ll do the cleaning.” I wasn’t in the mood to hear Betts fussing at me all day. “Or you can just think of it as a mansion.” It sounded like a good reasoning tactic.
“Ten rooms? Ten bathrooms? Ten toilets?” Betts questioned. “There’s no way you can get that many rooms ready in time for tomorrow night’s big hoedown. And the rest of the motel. I’m not mad. I’m just saying you could’ve been sleeping in if it weren’t for Coke.”
There was a tone in Betts’s voice that made me push myself up in the seat and glance over at her. “What’s the deal with you and Coke?” I reached over and grabbed my coffee thermos full of liquid life and took a sip. Followed up by a gulp.
“She’s just so gossipy, and I’m still a little raw from you know what.” Betts shrugged, hands gripping the steering wheel as she stared straight ahead.
Betts had just gone through a terrible divorce that we didn’t talk about much. At the time, she was left with one income and devastated. That was why I suggested Coke use Betts’s cleaning service. Only I thought it was going to be that week not a few months later.
“Don’t give her anything to gossip about.” It seemed like a good suggestion on my part. “We will keep our heads down, clean, and get out.”
“That all sounds good, but you don’t know Coke.” Betts turned off Fawn Road. To the right was the entrance of the only motel in Normal. “If you don’t watch it, she’ll be gunning for your customers.” Betts looked over and raised a brow.
My heart jumped. I never thought a motel in Normal would take away the tourists that rent my renovated mini campers and bungalows at the Happy Trails Campground.
My campground.
“We just have to make sure Abby Fawn does more of her social media marketing for me.” I winked over the steam coming out of the mouth of the thermos. “Fawn Road.” I laughed. “Abby Fawn.”
Abby Fawn was a good friend and the librarian of Normal County Library. She was a whiz at social media and had been instrumental in helping put Normal back on the map for one of the best tourist towns in Kentucky.
“Her family actually owned a lot of this land before their big bankruptcy,” Betts told me.
I knew nothing about that. “What?” I asked and took another drink of hot coffee from the thermos.
“I guess you don’t know all the history of Normal since you didn’t grow up here.” Betts pulled the van up to the front of the old train station and parked.
The massive concrete station was beautiful, framed by the dramatic backdrop of the mountains of the national park. I would say Coke Ogden had a hit on her hands. From what I remember reading about when I first moved here, there was a set of beginning trails on the back of her property that were some of the hardest trails and climbs of the area. Those were the most appealing to tourists who came to Normal for the hiking.
Right in the middle of the structure was a domed, circular open courtyard area with six massive concrete pillars holding up a dramatic patina metal roof with a rooster weather vane. The one-level covered structure jutted equally out on both sides of the dome with five doors on each side with those same big concrete pillars standing tall and ornate.
“Those must be the rooms.” Betts pointed toward some doors with brass numbers on them. “I’m glad I brought the brass cleaner because those really need to be shined up.” She let out a long sigh. “It’s going to be a long day.”
Betts and I jumped out. I followed her lead and met her at the back of the van, where she already had the double doors open. I dragged two buckets of cleaning supplies to the edge.
“Good morning!” Coke Ogden stood underneath the spotlight that hung from one of the pillars. “Glad to see you’re here to get an early start.”
I peeked around the back van door and waved to her. Coke was an odd bird. She looked as though she’d stepped right off the Mary Tyler Moore set with her colored blond hair parted down the middle and flipped up around the edges. It was hard not to stare. I just wanted to know how it stayed perfectly in place. She wore a black headband that kept the shoulder length hairdo off her face. She had petite bird-like features and a tiny frame to match. Bermuda shorts swallowed her legs. Her long-sleeved, mint-green cardigan was buttoned to the top and a matching silk scarf was knotted around her neck.
“The outside looks great,” I noted of what I could see in the van headlights when we drove up. I grabbed the bucket with one hand and the vacuum with the other.
“Thanks.” Coke walked to the back of the van. “Do you need help?”
“I think we have it,” Betts said as she pulled her shoulder-length, wavy hair in a low ponytail using the black band she took from around her wrist.
We turned around when an old pickup truck pulled in next to us. The inside light popped on when a man in a cowboy hat opened the door. He held it open with one booted foot and grabbed a rope hanging on his gun rack on the back window.
“Howdy.” He looked at us from underneath his hat.
“Jay Russel, this is Mae West and Betts Hager. They’re here to make sure everything is all tidy before the big day.” The tone in her voice caught my attention. It seemed like she was giving him more of a warning than a casual introduction.
“Is that right?” He slid his eyes between me and Betts. “Hmm, I know Betts.” He gave her the sympathetic smile I noticed a lot of people gave her. “Down at the church functions and all.”
“Yes,” Betts said in a low voice. “Nice to see you.”
We stood there waiting for Jay to say something more, but he simply walked away and around the motel.
“Don’t mind him. He’s not really happy with me.” Coke laughed. “This was his family’s property and had been for sale for years.”
“Yeah.” Betts shook her head. “I remember seeing the broken-down realtor sign in the front acre.”
“I’m talking twenty years or more.” Coke led the way through the courtyard of the motel with us following her. “Jay has his business in the stables. He teaches competition riding. You know, rodeo, barrel roping, and things of that nature. After I bought the place, I told him he was going to have find another stable and riding ring because I’m turning the stables into a wedding venue.”
“Wedding venue. That’d be nice.” Betts stopped in the middle of the courtyard and looked up, causing me to look up.
The courtyard was open to the sky, exposing the variations of blue in anticipation of the sunrise that would wake up the tourist town around seven a.m.
The crescent moon and stars were visible, and the view was breathtaking.
“Wow. This is amazing.” I twirled around while I looked up. “It’s like we are in one of those planetariums.”
Memories of Paul, my con-ex-now-dead husband, had taken me to Hayden Planetarium in New York City for a romantic dinner under the stars. He’d actually rented out the entire building just for us. Even though he was in the middle of conning people out of their retirement, which I didn’t know about, it was actually very romantic. Even for a crook.
The city lights were too bright to ever see stars or even the moon. I’d told him so many stories about me growing up in Kentucky and how the stars were the only light I had needed at night. It was one thing I had missed about Kentucky. He had been eager to give it back to me.
“I’m very excited about the guests using this area. I’ve got some very expensive telescopes
being installed today just for the guests to enjoy such magnificent views.” Coke broke the memories in my head and brought me back to the conversation. “Anyways, I’ve done a pretty good cleaning over the past few months while the contractors worked on all the structures. I’m not afraid of getting my hands dirty or anything.”
“Where do you want us to start today?” Betts was done with the chitchat and ready to get started.
“Move it!” Out of the darkness of the opposite side of the courtyard, a guy appeared, barreling through us, knocking me off balance. He ran so fast, the only thing I could see was a round compass bouncing up and down on the backpack strapped on the person’s back.
Luckily it didn’t hurt when I fell down because I had enough padding on my backside. There was a second-long glimpse of the guy when he turned to look at me as if he wanted to see if I was okay. There was a little trickle of blood from the corner of his left eye.
Betts and Coke stood with their mouths open, watching the man run past them.
“I told you that if I caught you here again, you’d regret it!” Jay quickly followed with his shotgun in hand. “You’re mine now!”
He stopped, shouldered the shotgun, aimed, and pulled the trigger. The shot rang out so loud that on instinct I threw my arms over my head in fear a stray bullet would hit me even though he wasn’t aiming at me.
“What on earth is going on?” Coke screamed. Her voice carried in the courtyard. “Jay! Stop that right now,” she cried out after Jay had fired off a few more shots.
“Don’t you get in the middle of this, Coke,” he warned with a fiery look in his eyes. “If I don’t stop them right now, you’ll be the one doing it.”
He dropped the gun and looked over at me.
“You alright?” he asked. A pool of blood, not yet congealed, trickled from his head. He walked over and stuck his hand out to help me up.
