Deception (46 page)

Connor ignored her and kept walking, down the steps, toward the garage. The only person who ever called her was Clay, and she didn’t want to talk with him over the telephone.

“Connor! It’s Old Henry at the barn. It’s an emergency.”

Connor turned back “What kind of emergency?” She had the keys to the truck in her pocket and fished them out.

“You’d better get to the barn quick. Old Henry says that mare of yours is cut pretty bad.”

“Which mare?” Connor felt her stomach drop.

“The pregnant one. I’ve never heard Old Henry carry on so. He’s ranting and raving. He says she may be crippled.”

Old Henry insisted on holding Cleo’s lead line as Dr. Sam McSween stitched the mare’s back leg. Watching the rise and fall of the veterinarian’s hand, Connor counted each stitch—all thirty-five—as they went in. She intently noted the vet’s movements and slight noises as he worked. They told her what she needed to know about the mare’s condition—serious.

The cut had been packed with filth. Someone had deliberately shoved dirt and muck into it. Connor knew it, and so did Dr. McSween, even though he couldn’t swear to it.

“It’s a nasty wound,” Dr. McSween said, as he finally stood. “Keep it clean and keep her confined. Wash the leg below the cut with cold water three times a day for at least twenty minutes each time. Maybe that’ll help keep the swelling out. You know, if infection gets in that joint, she may be crippled.”

“What about the foal?”

“The mare’s been put under terrible stress. Let’s hope she doesn’t colic from it.” Dr. McSween rubbed the sweat from his forehead with a kerchief he extracted from a back pocket. The stitching had been a tricky business, and he was tired. “The sedative I gave her was the lightest possible dose, but still not the best for a mare as pregnant as she is.” He shrugged. “Keep her calm. Cut her feed for a few days. Just watch her. Try not to let her get excited.”

“I’ll put her back in the stall,” Old Henry volunteered. He patted the mare’s neck and spoke softly into her ear as he led her away.

Connor followed the veterinariaan into the fading afternoon light, watching silently as McSween repacked his equipment into his truck.

“How do you think Cleo cut her leg?” Connor finally asked.

Dr. McSween clanged two stainless steel buckets back into the truck. “Have you checked your fences? Maybe there’s a nail exposed.”

“There’s not a nail or splinter loose on these grounds.” Old Henry spoke from the shadow of the barn. “I check the fences daily, and the stalls. Someone hurt that animal. They did it on purpose, and there’s no sense pussy-footin’ around about it.”

In her heart, Connor had known that it was a deliberate act, but she hadn’t wanted to acknowledge it. Now it was out in the open. Old Henry was a tall stalk of righteous rage.

“Someone went in that stall and cut Cleo badly enough that they almost crippled her,” Old Henry continued. “Not to mention the way that filth had been jammed into the cut.”

McSween turned around. “You’ve got yourself a serious problem here, Connor. Who would want to hurt your horse?”

“That’s a good question.” She blinked back tears. “I’ll have an answer, too. Before the end of the day.”

“You can bet on that.” Old Henry spun around and walked back into the barn.

McSween wiped his forehead again. “You be careful. I can’t prove that cut was made by a person. I believe it was, but I’ve seen horses do strange things to themselves. Without concrete proof, I’m not willing to state that only a human could have done that.”

“But you know that’s what happened. I do, too.”

“Connor, maybe you should question everyone who has access to the barn.” He closed up the drawers and equipment in his truck before he finished. “Think about this: whoever would do that to an animal is capable of a lot more. If someone viciously cut Cleo to get back at you, what might they do to
you
if they got the chance?”

“How soon before I can trailer her?”

McSween shook his head. “I wouldn’t be thinking about that. Not with her pregnant. Too much stress.”

“Maybe just over the bay. Elvie Adams lives over there, and she’d take care of her for me.”

“I can’t advise that. You’d be risking the mare and the foal, Connor.”

“I can’t leave them here for some maniac to cut to pieces.”

McSween put his hand on Connor’s shoulder. “Watch her. Maybe it was an accident.”

“Accident, my butt.” Connor wiped an angry tear from her eye.

“I’ll be back tomorrow to check on her and give her another shot of antibiotics.”

“Thanks.” Connor managed a fleeting smile. Dr. McSween was a rare find, a man who loved his work and his patients.

“You take care.” The vet walked around to his truck, got in, slammed the door, and drove away.

For as long as she could, Connor watched him drive away. When his truck had vanished among the oak trees and woods, she turned around and walked back into the barn. She intended to question everyone, with the exception of Old Henry. If he hadn’t been watching out for Cleo, she might have been in much worse shape.

Before she started looking for Jeff, she dialed Clarissa Barnes’s stables and got Elvie on the phone. She briefly told her what had happened to Cleo.

“Since you can’t bring her over here, do you want me to come over and stay with you?” Elvie asked.

Connor hesitated. “I don’t know what I’m going to do.” For the first time her voice broke. “It’s not just Cleo, there are some other things happening at Oaklawn.”

“What is it?” Elvie’s voice was filled with concern. “I know I haven’t said anything, but Richard has been worried about you. He won’t ever tell me any specifics, but he’s always asking about you, making sure that you’re happy. Hell, I told him you were Queen of the South.”

“I’m okay,” Connor said, fighting to regain control. “If I need you, I’ll call, okay?”

“Are you sure? I can brave the old dragon and ask Clarissa to let me have tomorrow off.”

“No point in getting your skin scorched unless you have to. If I need you, I’ll call. I promise.” She put down the phone and went into the barn. Old Henry was leaning over Cleo’s stall, watching her.

“Jeff!” she called. “Jeff! I want to see you in my office!” Now the questioning would begin. She took a seat at her desk, gripping the edge of the top to hide her trembling hands. It was only a matter of a few seconds before Jeff appeared.

“If you’re going to ask me who cut that mare, I can tell you I don’t know.” Jeff stood in the doorway.

“Since you’re innocent, you won’t mind answering a few questions, then. Where were you all day?”

“Well,” Jeff leaned against the door frame, “I don’t know that I want to tell you this.”

Connor felt her anger churn. All afternoon, dread and guilt had managed to keep the anger pushed to the back. Now it was dangerously close to the surface. “I know Clay feels that you’re a good manager, Jeff, and I agree with him. But let me warn you, if he even suspects you’ve damaged an animal, you’re gone. It would be better if you told me. I’m not asking you alone, I’m going to ask everyone on this place. Someone cut Cleo, and I’m going to find out who and why.”

“When I heard old Henry squawking, I looked at her leg. I knew she’d been cut deliberately, but it wasn’t me. If you’re really wondering what I was doing all morning, maybe you’d better ask Sally. She might be embarrassed, but she can give you the specific details.”

“Sally?” Connor repeated the name as if she were stupid.

“She called in sick this morning, and I took a little time myself. I’d just gotten here when that deliveryman pulled up. Maybe you’d better ask Old Henry if he did it. He’s been lurking around that mare like a lovesick old fool.” He walked out the door without another word.

Connor let him go. The children had been in school. Besides, Danny loved the horses and Renata wouldn’t go in the barn. That left only Willene, who’d had never been down to the barn a day in her life and wouldn’t go close enough to a horse to spit on it, much less touch it. That covered everyone who belonged on Oaklawn. Cleo had been cut by someone who wasn’t supposed to be at the estate. But who? Who hated her enough to do such a thing? Whoever was in the house. Whoever it was who’d been hiding and lurking, sneaking and attacking her. Now she’d moved on to the horses. And she had to be stopped.

Connor picked up the telephone and dialed Clay’s office. To her surprise, Margaret, the receptionist, had no idea where Clay had gone.

“I don’t know where he is. His brother’s been calling here, and Mr. Ashton. They’re both very upset. Mr. Sumner has simply disappeared.”

“When you find him, please tell him to call his wife immediately. This is an emergency.”

“Certainly, Mrs. Sumner.”

Connor replaced the phone, and her fingers traced over the bill from Bayshore Boutique. In the madness over Cleo, she’d pushed the matter of the dress to the back of her mind. She had to talk to Clay. Before she really lost her mind.

“Connor! Connor!”

The note of excitement in Danny’s voice got her out of her chair. Looking out the office window, she saw Danny and Renata trotting very fast into the barn area. She hurried outside to meet them.

“Look what we found!” Danny rode up to Connor and held out his hand. The pocketknife was covered in blood and dirt. Some of it had rubbed on Danny’s hand and arm.

Her first impulse was to recoil, but she held out her hand. “Where was it?” Connor took the grime-coated weapon. She couldn’t prove it, but there was a good chance this was the knife that had been used to cut Cleo.

“Not too far down the trail.” Danny’s eyes were wide. “Wonder who dropped it. Do you think it was used to kill somebody?” His voice rose with childish anticipation of imagined horror.

“I don’t think so.” Connor realized then that Danny didn’t know about Cleo. “Someone went in the barn and cut Cleo’s leg pretty badly. The vet just left from stitching it up.”

“They cut Cleo? Let’s hunt them down and kill them.” Danny’s eyes glittered with anger and tears.

Connor shivered. Dusk was settling in around Oaklawn. Always a melancholy time of day in the winter, it now carried an edge of the sinister. “I’m going to report this to the police,” Connor said, patting Danny’s leg. “They’ll find whoever did this, and we’ll prosecute.”

“Is Cleo going to be okay?” Renata looked worried. “Is the baby okay?” Tears formed in her eyes. “I can’t believe anyone would hurt one of the horses. That’s not right. Nobody should do such a thing. Nobody.”

“I think she’s going to be fine,” Connor soothed. Renata was working herself into a real frenzy. “Did you see anyone in the woods?”

“No.” They spoke in unison.

“Not even your friend Hilla?”

Renata slid down off her pony. “I think she’s gone, but she wouldn’t hurt a horse anyway. She loves horses. She had one of her own.”

“Can I see Cleo?” Danny interrupted.

“She’s still sedated, but she’ll be glad to see you.” Connor was worried about the children. Danny loved all the horses, but after Ali Baba, Cleo was his favorite. And Renata—she’d grown fonder of the horses than even Connor had suspected.

As the children went to untack, Connor walked around the corner of the barn and turned the hose on the knife. It had an expensive onyx handle with a stainless-steel blade. As the blood and grime rinsed away, she saw the initials: CAS. With water dripping off her fingers, she went back into the barn.

Danny was standing in the aisle at Cleo’s door, talking to the mare. Renata stood about fifty feet from the doorway, looking in but unwilling to enter.

“You guys run up to the house and get washed up for dinner. It’s going to be dark soon.”

“Can I come back down to see about Cleo?” Danny asked.

“We’ll see. Run on, now.”

When they were gone, Connor went back to her office. She closed the door and leaned against it, her body shaking so severely that she almost cried with weakness. CAS. Clay Alan Sumner. The same as the stock tie. Clay’s signature on the bill for a black wedding dress—purchased the day after she’d made her own selection, the day after she’d described the dress in detail to her loving groom.

Like a sleepwalker, she went to the telephone and called Harlan. Four weeks ago, no one could ever have convinced her that she would voluntarily call the doctor for any reason.

“Harlan, it’s Connor.”

There was a long pause. “Have you heard from Clay?” His voice gave nothing away.

“No.” Connor could hear her own voice falling apart. “Have you seen him?”

“No, but when I do, I’m going to kick his butt. Benedict and I have been trying to find him all day. He’s flown the coop and I’m left here to babysit the telephone and try to track him down. He had a very important meeting with the Chairman of the Democratic Party.”

“I need to talk with him.”

“Sounds more like you need a good stiff drink. What’s this all about? Trouble in paradise? So soon?” There was a bit of gloat in Harlan’s voice.

“I want to know the truth about some things.” Connor found herself choking back tears. Her emotional fragility embarrassed her. “I have to know, Harlan. I think I’m going crazy.”

“What the hell is going on out there?”

“Harlan, did you get someone to dress up in a black wedding dress at my wedding?”

Harlan’s answer was swift and emphatic. “No. What are you saying?”

“I didn’t fall. Someone, a woman, tried to hit me with a hammer. I wasn’t lying about that, and I didn’t make it up.” Connor gripped the telephone tighter. “I thought you were behind the incidents. Sort of an attempt to scare me into leaving.”

“I won’t pretend that I didn’t want you to leave. I did, and I still think, for your safety, that the best thing would be for you to leave Oaklawn immediately. I don’t know what’s happening there. I have no idea. But I do know that Clay has never been … completely balanced. Especially not when it comes to women. He gets obsessed with one to the point that he has to press and press and press until he wins her. Then …”

Connor shut her eyes, but two tears squeezed out. “Don’t say that, Harlan. It isn’t true. Why would Clay want to marry me just to hurt me?”