Hayburner (A Gail McCarthy Mystery) Read online

  " 'Take this bucket of water to that pen over there,' he'd say. Pretty soon he let me help him feed. And then one day-I'll never forget it-he put me up on one of his broke horses and let me ride. After that I was over there every day."

  "I can imagine." I flipped the steaks and took a long swallow of margarita.

  "It was sort of a long, slow progression," Blue said. "First he taught me to ride, and then he offered me an after-school job as his ranch hand. I knew my way around the place by then, so I could be some help to him. Finally when I was about fifteen, he let me start getting on the colts."

  "You were keen to do it?"

  "I was keen to do anything with horses. I'd been watching Tom start colts for years, so I already had a clue." Blue smiled. "Tom taught me everything I know about horses. He taught me to rope, too."

  "He was a big part of your life."

  "Yeah," Blue nodded slowly. "A big part. In some ways I was closer to him than to my own family."

  We both stared at the sputtering steaks. Inwardly, I willed Blue to keep talking. This reticent man had never mentioned his family to me before.

  The silence seemed to go on and on. Finally I said, "I never felt terribly close to my parents."

  Blue seemed to take the cue as meant. "No. Me either. Nor my brother."

  "Was that your whole family?"

  "Yeah. How about you?"

  "I was an only child," I said. "My parents got killed in a car wreck when I was almost eighteen; I was pretty alone, except for an aunt and a cousin in Michigan."

  Blue nodded quietly. "I had one brother," he said. "He was killed in Vietnam."

  "Oh." I wasn't sure what to say.

  "It was really hard on my parents," he said. "Rich was killed when I was just a kid; he was seven years older than me. I don't think my mom ever got over it."

  "Are your parents still alive?"

  "Yeah. They are. They sold the old farm; they live in a condo on a golf course now. My father still owns a couple of orchards."

  "And what about Tom Billings?"

  "He died when I was twenty. He didn't have any kids. Some cousin of his inherited the place and just sold it off."

  "That must have been sad."

  Blue looked down at his feet. "Well, it set me to traveling," he said at last.

  I lifted the steaks off the grill and carried them into the house. Blue followed me. "Could you open this zin?" I asked him, handing him the bottle and corkscrew.

  "You bet."

  In a minute I had the food on the table and Blue was pouring the wine. I felt a brief inner glow of satisfaction that the meal had come together so handily-nothing raw, nothing burned.

  Blue lifted his wineglass. "Here's to your garden."

  "Cheers," I said.

  For a while we ate and drank and Blue made appropriate comments about how good the food was; eventually I took advantage of a pause to lead the conversation back to his life.

  "You've traveled a lot, haven't you?" I asked.

  "Quite a bit. For ten years, anyway. Mostly in Europe and Asia. I ended up in Australia, and almost settled there for good."

  "That's where you got 'Blue,' right?"

  "That's right. All redheads get called Blue or Bluey there."

  I smiled. "And women named Gail get called Stormy."

  "You got it." Blue smiled back. "All I seem to be doing is talking about myself. How about you? What's going on in your life?"

  "Well, let's see. Other than buying Danny," I hesitated, then told Blue about Friday night's barn fire, it being the most exciting event in my recent veterinary career.

  "That's too bad," he said when I was done. "I know that old place. And you say two horses were killed?"

  "That's right," I said sadly. "It could have been a lot worse. I know when I got out of my truck I was really dreading it. But only two horses had burns, and they weren't too bad. The rest were mostly smoke inhalation problems."

  Blue nodded. "I know that feeling of dread," he said. "When I was sixteen, a bunch of Tom's horse herd got out on the railroad tracks and the train plowed through them. He called me to come help and I didn't want to go."

  "Did you?"

  "Yeah, I did. It was bad."

  I nodded sympathetically. "That's the worst part of my job. Dealing with horses that are really badly hurt. Especially when I can't help them."

  "It just wrings your heart, doesn't it? They seem so innocent in their suffering. It's one of the things that got me interested in Buddhism." Blue turned his wineglass slowly; I stared at his long, graceful hand curved about the dark red wine.

  "You told me once that you trained to be a Buddhist monk."

  "I did. In Dharmasala. I was with a group of Australians; we were lucky enough to be taught by the senior tutor of the Dalai Lama."

  "Wow. I don't know much about Tibetan Buddhism, but surely that's a big deal."

  "It was a big deal," Blue said evenly. "Like I said, it was an honor. We were the first Westerners to receive that particular teaching. "

  "So what turned you against becoming a monk?"

  "Women, I guess." Blue smiled at me. "I like women too much."

  "En masse?" I smiled back at him.

  "No. One at a time." Blue got up from the table and took my hand; I stood up with him. "Can we go sit on the couch?" he asked.

  "Sure."

  Still holding my hand, he led me over to the couch in the corner. As we settled into it, I could just see the full moon rising behind the big blue gum tree on the ridge. The next second it was blocked by Blue's face as he leaned toward me.

  Our lips touched; I was conscious of a million tiny details-the silvery moonlight flowing in my big window, the warm scent of Blue's skin, the touch of his hand on my back. Then everything was swallowed up in our mouths meeting and exploring each other.

  Many long minutes later Blue sat up and met my eyes. Pulling me into him, he smiled. "I've been wanting to do that all night."

  "Me, too," I said truthfully, and then we were back together again, learning each other's ways.

  Blue slipped his hands under my dress and caressed my back; I rubbed his shoulders gently. I could feel the warmth building between us, could feel myself softening. Everything was touching, feeling, scent and skin. Until my mind said, wait.

  Why, my heart answered.

  You might get hurt, the mind replied.

  For another long moment I wallowed in the physical closeness, my mouth connected to Blue's mouth, my body pressed against his. I could feel the longing deep inside, the intense desire to open up to him. But my mind was unrelenting. Do you really want to go to bed with this guy? What about tomorrow?

  Shit. The questions took root; I was losing my ability to concentrate on physical sensation. Gently, I disentangled myself.

  Blue looked into my eyes. I could read the longing in his, feel the intensity. He reached out for me again; I held his hand in mine.

  "Wait," I said quietly.

  "All right."

  "I'm sorry to be such a spoilsport, but I'm not sure I'm ready for this."

  Blue looked puzzled, as well he might.

  "I do want you." I shrugged helplessly. "I guess the simplest way to put it is that I'm not completely comfortable going to bed with someone I'm not in a relationship with."

  Blue thought about that a minute. "So how do we get in a relationship?" he asked. "Do I need to promise lifelong fidelity before we sleep together?"

  I laughed. "When you put it like that it sounds ridiculous. Still, it's true in a way. I've never been promiscuous. The only men I ever slept with were all my boyfriend at the time, and, yeah, we were in a committed relationship."

  Blue sighed, and I could feel the moment slipping away. Damn you, Gail, I cursed myself, why couldn't you just relax and let go for once in your life.

  Then he smiled at me. "So how about I court you for a while. So you know I'm really interested in you. I can't promise lifelong fidelity at this point, but I can sure wait to go
to bed until you're comfortable with it." He reached out his hand and took mine. "I won't quit trying, though. That's part of the courting. I want you to know just how interested I am."

  Our mouths met again; it was many long minutes later before we disentangled. I felt chaotic, half caught up in the rush of desire and half afraid to take that final clinching step into intimacy.

  "I'm just not ready," I said, somewhat incoherently.

  ''That's okay." Blue sat up again. Still holding my hand, he added, "I'll go now. Do you want me to come by tomorrow and help you work with your colt?"

  "That would be great." I felt a huge surge of gratitude and affection for this man; not only had he accepted my anxieties and restrictions without resentment, he was proffering just the sort of reassurance I needed in his offer to come over tomorrow.

  "In the morning then," he said.

  "About ten o'clock," I agreed, smiling at him again. "That would be perfect."

  But it wasn't to be.

  FIVE

  At eight o'clock the next morning I got a call from the answering service. One of my patients out at the Bishop Ranch was having severe respiratory symptoms. The owner was afraid he was getting pneumonia.

  Once I was out there, I knew, I would need to take at least a brief look at the rest of the barn fire victims. Danny-and Blue-would have to wait.

  I called Blue and made my excuses; he seemed to understand. As a farmer, he was familiar with the fact that living creatures don't operate by the clock. Animals, like plants, have their needs and emergencies at often inconvenient times.

  Half an hour later I'd done the chores, eaten a hasty bowl of cereal, and was on my way to the Bishop Ranch. Frowning, I saw that the temperature, duly noted by the gauge on my pickup truck, was already in the seventies. It was going to be another hot, dry day. Just what we didn't need.

  The meadows and forests of Harkins Valley rushed by me, bright and dewy in the morning sun. Billowing in and out along its length, the valley narrowed in spots to a steep, shadowy canyon filled with redwood trees, and then spread out in broad, grassy flats, dotted with oaks.

  The Bishop Ranch Boarding Stable was located in such a flat; across Harkins Valley Road from the stable sat the wide plots of Lushmeadows subdivision, a pricey bunch of spec homes for horse people. Lushmeadows had been part of the original Bishop Ranch; Bart and Clay's mother had sold the land to a developer to make ends meet. As I turned in the Bishop Ranch drive I wondered, not for the first time, if Mrs. Bishop had ever regretted her decision.

  The smell of charred wood met me as I got out of the pickup; I could see Bart and several other people standing about near the rubble of the big barn. I walked in their direction. A blond woman with her back to me turned her head and looked over her shoulder; I recognized Detective Jeri Ward of the Santa Cruz County Sheriff's Department. We both smiled.

  Jeri and I were friends, of a sort. Or, if not quite friends, we were more than acquaintances. Since she'd acquired a horse this last summer, our relationship had become closer.

  "How's ET?" I asked her. "He wasn't in the big barn, was he?" I tried to remember if her old gelding, ET, who was boarded out here, had ever been kept in the barn that had burned.

  "No, no," Jeri said. "He's fine. He was in one of these shed rows. No problem there."

  "Oh," I said. Putting two and two together, I asked her, "Are you out here because of the fire, then?"

  "That's right." Sending what I thought was a significant glance at Bart Bishop, who stood about fifty feet away, talking to an older woman, Jeri knit her brows slightly and then indicated the man on her right. "This is Walt Harvey. He's the fire investigator. Walt, this is Gail McCarthy. She's my horse vet."

  "Nice to meet you." Walt Harvey stuck out his hand; I shook it. His hand was small and cool and clammy; I resisted the urge to wipe my own hand off on my jeans afterward.

  "So, is this arson, then?" I asked the two of them.

  Walt looked at Jeri. Jeri looked at me and nodded. "We think so."

  Taking this as permission, or so I assumed, Walt addressed me directly. "Oh yeah. Definitely arson." He grinned as if he were happy about it.

  "How do you know?" I asked.

  "Char patterns," he responded laconically. "This fire had more than one source of origin."

  I nodded as if I understood, though I didn't really, and thought that Walt Harvey was quite a study in contrasts. Short and stout, he looked like nothing so much as Bozo the clown, with a ruff of curly, reddish brown hair surrounding a bald dome, round, slightly watery blue eyes, pale skin, and a weak chin. In counterpoint to his physical appearance, however, he held himself in an exaggeratedly macho stance-shoulders back, chin up, gut sucked in as much as possible, one hip slightly cocked. To top this off, his clothes were very "western"; he wore Wrangler jeans, boots, and a belt with a fake trophy buckle. I thought he looked downright silly.

  Having run with the genuine article, I tend to find wannabe cowboys more than a little ridiculous. No horseman worth his salt would be interested in wearing a trophy buckle he or she hadn't won.

  Regarding Walt Harvey with a slightly jaundiced eye, I turned back to Jeri. "Does this mean you'll be investigating?"

  "That's right," she said. Once again she looked briefly at Bart Bishop and then our eyes met again.

  "Oh," I said, under my breath.

  I knew, like everyone else in the world, that the owner of a burned-down building is the first suspect in an arson case. Turning slightly, so my back was to Bart, I said softly to Jeri, "He said he was underinsured."

  She shrugged. "So he says," she said equally softly.

  Walt Harvey watched this exchange and then chimed in with, "Guy who did this was probably an amateur. That, or he was real keen to make the fire look like an accident."

  "How can you tell?" I asked, genuinely curious.

  "Used available materials," he said, reverting to the laconic style. "No propellant."

  Once again I nodded as if I understood.

  Jeri came to my rescue. "What Walt means is that the fire was started with stuff that was already in the barn-easy enough with a building full of hay. The arsonist didn't use gasoline or any kind of fuel as an accelerant. Most professional arsonists use something of the kind-gets the fire going faster, makes it harder to put out."

  Walt grinned at Jeri. "You bet," he said. "Amateurs, like our boy here," he indicated the barn with one hand, "just build a little fire with whatever comes to hand. This one started back in the hay barn."

  "Could it have been caused by a hot bale of hay?" I asked.

  "Nope." Walt shook his head, round eyes twinkling. "That's what we were supposed to think. But no, the guy lit several candles back in the hay and put little piles of paper around them. I found the hydrocarbon residue."

  Jeri nodded slowly and held up a transparent bag. Sure enough, there were two charred candle stubs inside, and some burned shreds of newspaper, marked with wax.

  "He probably lit at least a dozen of 'em," Walt Harvey said. "This is what survived. These guys that use candles never expect that, but there's always some residue, and I always find it." He grinned.

  "Oh," I said again. Looking at Jeri, I asked, "So what happens now?"

  "I investigate," she said briefly. "Which means I need to talk to the owners."

  I nodded. "I'd better have a look at my patients. See you."

  I turned away, but not without a quick glance in Bart's direction. He met my eyes; both he and the woman he was with were staring right at me. I waved a hand awkwardly at them. "I'm here to see a horse with respiratory problems," I said. "Just thought I'd say hi to Jeri."

  "Oh yeah. Our very own Detective Ward is looking into this." Bart bared his teeth briefly at Jeri, who walked forward and addressed the woman standing next to Bart.

  ''I'm Detective Jeri Ward," she said. "Are you Mrs. Bishop?"

  "Yes, I am Doris Bishop." The woman held her chin up, but she looked anxious. I stared at her curiously; I'd never se
en Bart and Clay's mother before.

  Doris Bishop was short, plump, and gray-haired; she stooped a little and leaned on a cane. According to Clay, she'd been fighting cancer for several years and wasn't strong.

  She faced Jeri steadily enough, however, her eyes as watchful as her son's, who stood next to her like a short, stocky pit bull on a leash. Bart and his mother appeared to be quite aware that they were the prime suspects.

  Waving again, I turned away. Whatever drama this group was planning to play at, it was none of my business. My business was sick horses.

  After a little poking around, I found the man who had called me out. His older gelding was definitely suffering from bronchitis; the horse's respiration was elevated and the animal was coughing frequently. I prescribed a new round of antibiotics and told him to call me if the horse wasn't better in forty-eight hours. Then I rechecked the two horses with significant burns, relieved to find they were doing fine. Three more victims of smoke inhalation were showing signs of bronchitis though, including Angie Madison's mare, Sugar.

  "Damn." Angie's young and pretty face contorted with what looked more like annoyance than grief. ''I'm going to have to draw out of the Cow Palace. And we had a real chance, too."

  "That's too bad," I said.

  "You're damn right it is." Staring at Sugar morosely, Angie said, "You know we placed at Salinas this year."

  "Wow," I said. The best barrel racing horses in the country competed in the Salinas Rodeo.

  "If we'd done well at the Cow Palace, I could have got fifty thousand for this mare."

  "Wow," I said again, politely, I hoped. I knew good barrel horses were worth a lot. Nonetheless, I wasn't much impressed with the notion that Angie was more chagrined at her horse's decline as an investment than concerned with the animal's wellbeing.

  "Call me if she's not better in two days," I added, and turned away, almost running into Clay Bishop, who had come up behind me.

  Clay put out a hand to steady me; our eyes met. I blushed; I could feel it. "Hi, Clay," I said.