Night of Shadows (12 page)

"What's wrong?" he
demanded.

Her first impulse was to fling
herself into his comforting arms and tell him the whole story. But, somehow, in
the cheery lights of the cabin, she began doubting herself. And she didn't want
to sound like a babbling idiot especially after Mac had accused her of being
hysterical when Sammy was gored by the bull.

Melinda brought herself under
control with slow, deliberate breaths.

"I was — jogging," she said
brightly.

"Jogging?" Mac asked. "I've
never seen you jog before."

"That's — why — I'm out of
breath."

Melinda knew by Mac's expression
she was in for a good grilling if she didn't make her escape now.

"Excuse me, gentlemen,"
she said in her best Southern belle voice. "I feel a little tired. So I
think I'll turn in early tonight. I want to be ready for the big day tomorrow. We
get started early, don't we?"

"We need to get going by
eight," Preston volunteered.

"Sure enough? Well, I'd better
get to bed." She stretched and yawned. "See you in the morning."

She was aware of Mac's eyes boring
holes through her back as she hurried up the stairs and to her room.

***

The next morning, Melinda sat at
the reserved McClure table in a covered portion of the stands as a parade of
horses being led around the track signaled that the first race was about to
begin. She kept her eye on a spirited chestnut that danced behind its lead
horse at a diagonal. The animal's enthusiasm was contagious.

"That's the one I want to bet
on," she said, pointing.

Preston, who was seated on her
right, looked up from a deep perusal of his racing program. No McClure animals
were entered in this event.

"Number nine? That's Gadfly. You
don't want him. He's a 20-to-1 long shot!" Preston said.

"But he looks like a
winner."

Melinda heard a groan from Mac on
her left. "The track counts on people like you. That's how they stay in
business."

Melinda made a face at him, then
signalled for an attendant to come over. She handed him four one-dollar bills.

"Two dollars on number nine to
win, and two dollars on numbers nine and two to place," Melinda said.

"Ooooh," Preston said, as
the attendant printed out the tickets on a portable machine. "Big
spender."

Mac and Preston already had engaged
in a discussion involving an intricate betting strategy that used geometric
terms like trifectas and boxes. Melinda didn't bother to learn what they were
talking about. She wanted to keep her enjoyment of the sport simple, at least
for starters. She knew only about win, place, or show.

The horses were at the gate. And
they were off. Forgetting her decorum, Melinda was on her feet when she saw
Gadfly take an early lead — only to immediately begin fading behind. The race
was over in seconds, leaving Preston to reach across the table to give his
brother a high-five with a slap of palm to palm.

"Do we know our horse flesh,
or what?" Preston asked.

Melinda squinted at the official
results now flashing on the board. "What are you talking about? The horses
that placed have the best odds."

"Yeah. That, too,"
Preston said.

"Then where's the
mystery?" Melinda asked. "If you want to win, you just bet on the
horses with the best odds."

"Not necessarily,"
Preston said, dropping his voice to a conspiratorial tone. "Now this race
coming up. That's a different matter entirely. I'm going to take pity on you,
Melinda. I'm going to give you a tip. Bet on number five."

"But five is a 32-to-1 long
shot."

"That's right. But do it
anyway. What's two bucks, eh? Put two bucks on number five — to win."

Melinda saw the worry lines crease
Mac's forehead as he watched his brother.

"Oh, Mac," Melinda said,
misunderstanding. "It's okay. I can afford to throw away two
dollars."

Preston joined her with a hundred
dollar bet on the five horse. And Mac sat this one out. Minutes later, Preston
and Melinda both were screaming at the top of their lungs as they watched their
underdog streak into the front and beat the field by a good five lengths.

Melinda turned to Mac, delighted. "Can
you believe it? Your brother must be psychic!"

"He's got a knack, all right."
Mac's tone was neutral. "He does this sort of thing all the time. Lately,
that is."

Melinda was too excited to dwell on
Mac's change of mood from upbeat to somber. She studied her program for the
next race.

"Hey, Preston!" she said.
"Here's one called Intuition. What do you think?"

When Melinda didn't get an answer,
she looked up in time to see Preston's stricken expression. He stared at an
area next to the track where a number of people were gathered by the fence.

"Preston?" she asked
anxiously. "What's wrong?"

She felt Mac stiffen beside her as
he followed Preston's gaze. Preston shoved his tip sheet into Melinda's hand.

"Here," he said grimly. "You
go ahead without me."

Without explanation, Preston got up
and left. She and Mac watched in silence as Preston made his way up to the
restaurant area above them and moved out of sight. She and Mac exchanged a
silent look. The older McClure brother merely shrugged and shook his head in
dismay.

A few minutes later, they caught
sight of Preston again as he pushed his way through the crowd along the track
sidelines below them.

First, Melinda spotted Debbie and
Connie — in the company of Roy Finch and two other well-dressed men. As Preston
reached the group, Finch took him to the side and immediately engaged him in
deep conversation. Apparently Finch had wanted to be spotted by Preston, which
was why he took up a position directly below the McClure box.

When the next race started, Melinda
and Mac paid no attention. They tuned out the noise of the crowd, and kept
watching the scene below. While everyone around them was absorbed with the
race, Preston and Finch stood out by being oblivious to everything around them.
Their private exchange was punctuated with animated gestures.

Then, in the midst of all the
commotion, Roy Finch turned and stared straight up at Melinda momentarily with
a look filled with an ominous promise. An icy chill pierced her. Preston
followed the direction of Roy's gaze, then grabbed his arm as though to
distract him.

Finally, Preston made his way
through the crowd and out of sight. In a few minutes, he was back at the table.
His face was flaming red, and his expression ghastly as he sat back down.

"I'm staying in Ruidoso a few
more days," he announced. "You two go on home without me."

Mac shook his head in denial. "I'm
not going anywhere until you tell me what's going on with that creep."

Preston looked squarely at Mac. "Trust
me on this one, Mac. I know what I'm doing. I promise I'm going to take care of
everything. Now listen to me carefully. It's very important that you take Melinda
— and the two of you get on out of here."

Preston's emphasis on Melinda's
name seemed somehow to reach Mac. Both brothers turned and regarded her in
unison.

"Now just a minute,"
Melinda said. "I have every right to be told what's happening here."

"Not yet, Melinda,"
Preston said. "In time. Trust me. I'll be back in a couple of days. Until
then, I want you to stop asking questions. Got that? Don't ask anyone any more
questions."

"This is about my meeting with
Connie and Debbie yesterday, isn't it? They're involved with Finch somehow. You're
clearly involved with Finch. And for all I know, Joan is, too."

Preston began looking around
desperately, as though expecting to be overheard. Taking the cue, Mac reached
over and gently covered Melinda's arm with his hand.

"Don't say anything else,
Melinda," Mac said quietly. "Let's just do what Preston asked and get
out of here."

"Good." Preston nodded
his approval. "And hurry. I'll stop and check with Bates, make sure he
takes care of everything before we finish up at the track. I'll get him to loan
me his car. He can ride back to the ranch in the truck pulling the horse
trailer."

Soon she and Mac were in the SUV, heading
back to the cabin to pick up their clothes. That's when Melinda quietly told
Mac about the vehicle that tried to run her down the previous night.

"Why did you wait until now to
tell me something like this?" Mac's voice was almost a whisper.

"After the way you treated me
when Sammy was killed? I was afraid you would think it was all my imagination.
The truth is I thought it was all my imagination."

Mac's hands tightened on the
steering wheel. "Sammy. My God. I was so positive it was an accident…"

"You're not so positive now, are
you?"

Mac stared straight ahead at the
road for several minutes before he finally answered.

"All I know for sure is that
this thing, whatever it is, has gone far enough."

Three uneventful days later,
Preston finally reappeared at the ranch.

He was accompanied by a man he
introduced to Melinda only as Scott Bradford, a supposed horse buyer who would
be spending some time there as a guest. Short, sandy-haired, and humorless,
Bradford treated Melinda as though she had all the importance of a bug.

She soon observed that he and the
two McClure brothers spent considerable time sequestered together in the
library, engaged in low conversations she was unable to overhear even when she
tried covertly eavesdropping on several occasions. And from her bird's eye view
from the balcony of her room, Melinda saw that the three men often drove off
together to explore dim ranch roads seemingly leading nowhere.

The most notable change was the
amiable relationship now shared between Mac and Preston. They pleasantly
answered any question she might have, using equal skill to sidestep issues of
any real substance.

At the very first meal they all had
shared together after Preston's return, she had tried — and failed — to find
out what had so bothered him that day at the track.

"Just a misunderstanding,"
Preston said as he crunched a pickle. "I got it straightened out. Isn't
that right, Mac?"

"That's right," Mac
agreed stiffly.

Scott Bradford merely scowled and
opened up the two slices of his sandwich bread to carefully inspect the sliced
beef and lettuce inside. He acted as though he expected something unsavory to
lurk there.

"So did you find out anything more
about Joan?" Melinda asked impatiently.

Both brothers fixed their attention
on Scott, as he carefully reassembled the sandwich, making sure that each curve
of the two bread slices precisely matched. He gave each of the McClures a cool
look that clearly said Melinda was to be excluded from their exclusive little
club.

"We're working on it,"
Mac said finally.

"So would you care to let me
in on your plans?"

"Uh — no," Mac answered
apologetically.

"Fine." Melinda laid her
sandwich down. "Then I'll tell you what my plans are. I'm driving into the
nearest large city, and I'm going to hire my own private detective to help me
look for Joan. So would you be so kind as to loan me a vehicle?"

"No," Mac said. "Not
for a few days. They're all — being used right now."

"So I'm a prisoner?"

"That's being a little melodramatic,
don't you think?" Mac smiled, this time with real amusement.

Scott took a tiny, meticulous bite
from the corner of his sandwich, then wiped his mouth delicately with a napkin.
Melinda stood, threw her napkin to the side, and pointed at him accusingly.

"And you," she said. "You're
no horse buyer."

The man looked right through her as
though she didn't exist.

After a few exasperating days of
being ignored by Scott and being treated with cloying kindness by the McClures,
Melinda began to suspect that she also was being very closely watched. When she
stood on the veranda, one of the three of the men always was there somewhere
within sight below.

When she tried to strike up a
conversation with one of the ranchhands, Preston or Mac inevitably happened
along. She didn't feel particularly threatened by their actions.

Just smothered.

Melinda tried amusing herself with
her drawings. But she knew she couldn't take much more of being left in the
dark. So on the fourth day following Preston's return, she decided she had to do
something. As if reading her mind, Mac stopped her on the front porch that
morning.

"I thought you might like to
go riding today," he said with a tone of forced cheerfulness. "I've
already told Carl to get you a horse ready. It'll help pass the time."

Melinda stood, arms folded,
resisting the temptation to inform Mac that his sudden concern for providing
her with a recreational pursuit was an obvious ploy to get her out of the way.
She was certain the three of them had something planned that day, and they
didn't want her to see what they were up to.

"A horse," she said
skeptically.

"Sure. Go. Have some fun."

"And what if I don't want to
go?"

Mac looked uneasy. "You should
go."

"You mean I have to go."

"I didn't say that.
Exactly."

Melinda thought about putting up
more of a fight if for no other reason than to watch Mac squirm. But she really
wanted that horse. At least this way, she could ride to a neighboring ranch and
ask for a lift to town.

She wasn't sure what she planned to
do at that point. She might follow through with her threat to hire a private
detective. Or she might go straight to the police and convince someone to accompany
her back to the ranch and help her find out exactly what was going on around
here.

"Thank you," she said
finally. "I would like to go riding."

"Good." Mac's dark eyes looked
beseeching. "Look. When this is over, I hope we can…you know, be friends."

"When what's over?"

"Nothing. Just take the horse
and enjoy yourself. Harriet's making the lunches."

"Lunches?"

"Carl's going with you."

"Is he?"

Melinda didn't argue. She had her
horse, after all, and she would figure out a way to ditch Carl later.

When she entered the kitchen a few
minutes later, she saw a cheerful Harriet packing the lunches. Since the
reconciliation between Mac and Preston had become so obvious, Harriet's usually
fierce expression had relaxed visibly. She even poured Melinda a cup of coffee
without seeming to begrudge the act.

"Have you noticed? It's like
old times again between those two," Harriet said.

"I've noticed," Melinda agreed.
"What do you think caused it?"

"Trouble." Harriet dropped
her voice conspiratorially. "Trouble always brought them together when
they was little boys."

Melinda tasted the bitter coffee,
and tried to sound casual. "And do you suppose that trouble involves Roy
Finch?"

Based on her previous interaction
with Connie and Debbie, Melinda half expected Harriet to clam up at the name.
Instead, the housekeeper unexpectedly laughed out loud with glee.

"Gal, I don't suppose it. I
know it. That Roy Finch character has caused us nothin' but grief since he
moved out here. And he's about to get his come uppance."

"What has Finch done exactly?"

"I have a pretty good idea, but
can't tell you right now."

"Okay then. What are Mac and
Preston planning to do about Finch?"

Harriet just smiled secretively in
answer.

For just a moment, Melinda was
tempted to do as she had been asked and simply stay out of the way. Maybe she
should just trust the McClures to do the right thing.

But what if the brothers were brazen
enough to attempt some type of vigilante action? What if Preston was mixed up
in something illegal, and Mac wanted to keep it hidden? And what if their plan
involved Joan, and she somehow got caught in the crossfire?

No. Melinda was determined to bring
in someone from the outside. She was tired of being shut out. And she needed to
do something on her own to help Joannie.

She took another sip of coffee. "So
that ranch Finch owns. It's just east of here, isn't it?"

 "I wouldn’t call it a real
ranch, but…yeah."

Harriet collected a stack of dirty
dishes from the table and placed them in the sink, where she began vigorously washing
them. Melinda picked up a dish towel draped over the stove handle and began
drying.

"So…who else lives nearby?"

Melinda feared she was being far too
obvious. But Harriet seemed uncharacteristically eager for conversation and
didn't seem to notice.

"That'd be the Bartons. Nice
people."

"Hmm. I wonder where they live
exactly."

Melinda placed a cup in the cabinet,
and reached for another to dry. Harriet used a scour pad to attack a skillet,
giving it extra elbow grease. Then she wiped a hand across her brow.

"You have to keep going east,
past Eagle Ranch. The only road to their place branches off from the main route
leading here." She gave Melinda a quick sideways glance. "You should
know where it is. That's where Mac found you when you near-drowned."

Melinda's heart sank. "So to
reach Eagle Ranch and the Barton Place, a person would have to go all the way
back to where that road branches?"

She knew she would never manage to
cover that kind of distance without the McClures catching up to her first.

Harriet, who finally seemed to be
catching on, regarded her with narrowed eyes. "Carl
is
going riding
with you, isn't he?"

"Of course. I thought it would
be a good idea to get my bearings. You know. Just in case…"

"In case the old fool drops dead
with a heart attack?" Harriet chuckled at Melinda's horrified expression. "Well,
there used to be a direct road to the Barton place from here. It goes on up
over that hill to the north of us. But the Eagle Ranch folks locked the gate a
while back. Put up
no trespassing
signs. Downright unneighborly of them,
if you ask me. Besides, some of that route crosses public land. They don't have
the right."

Harriet took the dish towel from
Melinda's hand, and then handed her a saddlebag. "Here's your lunches. Run
along now, and don't worry about anything. Carl knows where to go, and he'll
take good care of you. Oh, and tell him I remembered to put the matches in
there, too."

"Matches?"

"It's a rule Mac has. Anyone
going out on horseback has to take matches with them — in case of emergency,
they might need to make a fire or something."

Melinda opened up the satchel and
spotted a little round, clear pill box with matchsticks inside.

"It keeps them
waterproofed," Harriet explained. "More reliable than lighters,
too."

On her way to the stable, Melinda
made one unorthodox stop at a tool box kept in the storage closet near the back
door. Quickly she snapped open the lid and looked inside. Then she grabbed the
wire cutters and slid them into the saddlebag.

Melinda stepped outside just in
time to see the McClure brothers and Scott pull away in one of the pickups.
Carl walked up to her at the same moment, and led her to the corrals where two
horses were saddled.

One corner of his jaw was pooched
out with chewing tobacco, and he spat before he could speak. "You all set
to go?"

"Sure." Melinda looked
over at the horses. "I — uh — wonder if I could ask you a little favor,
though. If you don't mind, I really prefer to go riding alone."

Carl's face split into a wide,
wrinkled grin as he spat another squirt of chewing tobacco between the hooves
of a nearby horse.

"Don't worry, Ma'am," he
said. "You can trust me to behave myself."

"No, that's not what I meant. I
— " Melinda turned red, and looked around as she tried to think of some
other way to win her argument.

She walked over to the horses and
began stroking the small, brown-and-white spotted pony that she guessed
probably was meant for her to ride by the length of the adjustment on the
saddle stirrups. After she draped the saddlebag over the horse, it shoved its muzzle
against her shoulder and snorted.

"That's Becky," Carl said.
"She's gentle as a lamb."

Melinda patted the horse's
shoulder, and turned back to face Carl. She knew the imploring expression on
her face must have appeared genuine for she did, in reality, feel desperate.

"Carl," she said. "Please
don't take this personally, but I absolutely must have some time to myself. Since
I've been here, I've been so worried about Joan. I'm at my wit's end. There
comes a time — well, when a person has to get away to think in private. Away from
the house, away from people. I promise you I'll be okay."

Carl had no real reason to suspect
that her words were anything but honest. He wrinkled his brow and chewed
fiercely on the tobacco, before letting another stream of juice squirt to his
left.

"I don't know, Miss
Bailey," he said at last. "Mac, he told me not to let you out of my
sight."

Melinda stared out into the
distance, and heaved a sigh. "What if I promised to stay on the roads? I'm
an experienced rider, if that's what has you worried. And I am a grown
woman."

"Which way would you be
going?"

She waved an arm in a northerly
direction.

Carl nodded his approval. "There's
a real pretty spot on down that road a piece. You'll find an old spring where
the deer like to gather. You might want to eat your lunch there. You'll be back
well before sundown, won't you?"

"Of course."

"I can't see no harm so long
as you stick to the roads," Carl agreed reluctantly. "I've got some
chores that sure need tending."