A Fatal Slip (15 page)

EMMA
left Angel Cuts feeling like a new woman. She swiped a hand across the back of her neck and was relieved that all the straggly ends were gone. She also ran a hand through her hair to loosen the viselike grip of the hair spray Angel had used. Emma liked her hair to be soft and touchable. That thought made her think of Brian, and she could feel the color rising to her face.

Arabella had asked her to stop in at the Meat Mart and pick up some pork chops. Emma pushed open the door to the butcher shop. Willie was standing behind the counter, his white apron as pristine as ever. Meat was arrayed neatly on trays inside a glass counter, the aged and well-marbled steaks each splayed out exactly one-quarter inch apart, the crown roast of pork sporting frilly paper crowns on the ends of the Frenched bones, the lamb chops pink and delectable.

“Miss Emma.” Willie greeted Emma with a big smile. His round face was almost the color of the huge roll of butcher paper by the counter. “How have you been? I heard from Miss Arabella that you’ve been doing some work for the Grangers. They’re something like celebrities in town. Everyone knows who they are, but they’re rarely spotted out and about, traveling as much as they do, but when they are, it’s an occasion to be sure.” He crossed his arms and stuck his hands in his armpits. “Of course that young ’un, Jackson, we always know when he’s around, roaring up and down our quiet country roads in that fancy sports car of his.”

Emma smiled and listened patiently. It seemed everyone had an opinion on the Grangers—good or bad.

“Jackson Granger was set to be a real star on the UT lacrosse team, and he was, too, until his grades brought him down. Some people got real mad at his professors for failing him. Thought they lacked school spirit and all that. Apparently Jackson had quite the flair for art, but other subjects like math and history . . .” Willie rolled his round, blue eyes. “Well, they were his downfall.” He gave a chagrined smile. “But I don’t suppose you came in here to hear me talk. What can I get for you?” Willie’s hand hovered over the counter.

“Arabella would like about five nice loin pork chops.”

“You’ve come to the right place.” Willie stuck his chest out with pride as he plucked several beautiful specimens from the counter and put them on the scale. “Think that will do her?”

Emma nodded. “Looks good to me.”

Willie pulled off a long sheet of waxed butcher paper and stacked the chops on it carefully. He folded the paper just so, fastened it with twine and tucked the package into a brown paper bag. He pushed it across the counter at Emma. “Just be careful, okay? The Grangers always get what they want . . . no matter what they have to do to accomplish it.”

Emma left the Meat Mart with Arabella’s pork chops as well as very strange feelings. Had Willie been trying to warn her about the Grangers? Certainly it was normal for people of great wealth to think they were entitled to get what they wanted. She didn’t anticipate getting in their way, so why should she worry?

• • •

MARIEL’S
car was in the driveway when Emma arrived later that afternoon at the Grangers’. Another car, a dark, late-model BMW was pulled up behind it. Emma let herself in, as was her custom, and was crossing the foyer when she heard raised voices coming from the living room. She stopped abruptly. One of the voices sounded like Mariel’s. The other was a man’s. She didn’t think she’d ever heard it before. They both sounded angry.

The word
police
caught Emma’s ear, and she edged her way closer to the living room.

“That Detective Walker has been around twice now, insisting I tell him where I went the night of Hugh’s murder.” Mariel’s voice softened slightly. “You’ve got to tell him I was with you. You’re my alibi.”

Emma heard a rustling sound. “I can’t. Not after what happened before.”

Mariel gave a high, tinkling laugh that sounded on the verge of hysteria. “We don’t have to tell them the truth. We’ll tell them we were having an affair and we agreed to meet somewhere.”

Emma stared at the sunbeam that was coming through the window and lighting up the jewel tones in the Oriental rug on the foyer floor.

The man snorted. “And what will my wife say to that?”

“She doesn’t have to know. Or, better yet, you can tell
her
the truth. I’m sure she wouldn’t want the police to know that you are back in the business of prescribing narcotics.” Mariel’s voice had taken on a threatening tone.

The man must be Dr. Sampson, Emma realized. She heard his sharp intake of breath.

“I just can’t do it. You’ll have to come up with something else.”

Emma heard footsteps heading toward the door and quickly ducked into the kitchen.

She didn’t think Dr. Sampson had seen her; she hoped not.

She heard the front door slam and scurried down the hall toward the storage room, where she quickly set to work.

After two hours Emma was ready for a break. There was one more painting left in the row she’d started earlier that afternoon. She’d plug in that information, and then go out to the kitchen to make another cup of tea.

She lifted the painting from the rack. It was a small Cézanne still life—nothing elaborate, but utterly stunning nonetheless. Emma could almost feel the fuzziness of the blush-colored skin on the peaches and the rough texture of the sharp yellow and green lemons and limes. She stood and admired the painting for a moment. It really was a thrill to be working so closely with so many beautiful things.

She turned the painting over reverently and entered the data into her computer—Cézanne, Paul, 1890,
Still Life.
She added the measurements, took one last lingering look at the work then replaced it in the rack.

She was picking up her mug when she noticed a smudge of green on her finger. She looked at it more closely. It wasn’t ink. She hadn’t been using any pens, and even if she had, they would most likely be blue or black. She dabbed at the spot. It was damp and looked like . . . paint.

Emma turned around and retrieved the Cézanne from the rack. She held her finger up to the still life—the color of the paint on her finger matched the color of the limes in the painting. She touched the canvas gently and was shocked to find the paint was slightly tacky.

It couldn’t be. The piece had been painted in 1890. Emma was truly puzzled.

She wondered if Jackson was around. She headed toward the office, but the room was empty, as was the kitchen. She finally found him in the library, engrossed in a copy of
Art International.
He tossed it onto the tufted leather sofa when he noticed Emma standing in the doorway.

“Good article on the discovery of some paintings that had been snatched from their rightful owners by the Nazis.”

“I was reading an article about that online.”

Jackson gestured toward the magazine. “Please feel free to borrow any of our books or reading material if you like.”

“Thanks.”

“Was there something you wanted?” Jackson prompted when Emma didn’t say anything.

Emma wasn’t sure where to start. “I was cataloging a lovely Cézanne . . .” she finally began.

“They are beautiful, aren’t they?” Jackson jumped to his feet. He was wearing a dark blue shirt tucked into what Emma assumed were probably two-hundred-dollar jeans. “He’s a favorite of mine.” He frowned suddenly. “I hope there isn’t a problem?”

“Not a problem, exactly, no.” Emma cleared her throat. “But on one of the still lifes, the paint seems to be slightly . . . damp.” Emma held out her hand and pointed to the spot of green on her thumb. “See? Some of the paint rubbed off on my hand. I don’t know how that could be since the piece was supposedly done in 1890.”

For a moment a startled look crossed Jackson’s face to be replaced almost immediately by a bland expression. He smiled reassuringly and gave a half laugh.

“It must be one of the pieces that just came back from the restorer. It shouldn’t have been in that rack.” He frowned. “Sometimes those older works need a good cleaning, and sometimes even a bit of a touch-up. We send them to someone in New York. He’s supposed to be the best, but it seems he’s gotten careless sending back a painting that was still a bit tacky.” Jackson drummed his fingers on the desk. “Did you touch it?” he barked suddenly.

Emma jumped. “Touch it?”

“Yes.”

“Just barely. Just to see if that’s where this paint came from.” She brandished her thumb. “I don’t think I’ve done it any harm.”

She had a horrible thought. What if she’d somehow ruined the painting? Would they make her pay for it? It must be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. Sweat broke out along the back of her neck.

But Jackson just gave another half laugh and waved a hand. “I’m sure you haven’t. If you don’t mind, could you put it to one side? I’ll take a look at it later and see if it needs to be sent back to New York.”

• • •

BY
five o’clock, Emma was more than ready to go home. She turned off the computer, turned out the lights and let the door to the storage room slam shut behind her. She paused in the foyer to slip into her coat and wind her scarf around her neck. She could see forbidding gray skies through the window, and a few light flakes of snow were falling.

The front door opened as she was pulling on her gloves. Sabina bustled into the house, looking warm and comfortable in her fur coat and suede boots. She smiled when she saw Emma.

“How is your project going?” she asked as she pulled off her leather gloves and tucked them into her purse—a large, expensive leather bag that Emma thought might actually be Hermès.

“Very well, thanks.”

“I’ve come to collect my husband.” She glanced at her gold-and-diamond wristwatch. “We’ve got dinner guests tonight, and he’s going to need to change.” She smiled at Emma again. “When he’s among his precious works of art, he loses all sense of time.” She sighed. “I’m afraid Tom’s missing Hugh terribly. They’d been friends for decades. I’m hoping having some people over will cheer him up and take his mind off it.”

She glanced over her shoulder out the window. “Good thing you’ve got your scarf. The wind has picked up, and the snow’s started again.”

Suddenly the front door burst open so hard it slammed against the wall and nearly ricocheted back again. Both Emma and Sabina jumped. Sabina’s hand flew to her throat.

A young boy stood there—Emma thought he was the same one who had so conveniently appeared to take care of Mariel’s horse the other day. He looked to be around seventeen and had slightly shaggy, dark hair and large, brown eyes. His face was red from the cold, and flakes of snow were melting on the shoulders of his jacket. His boots were muddy and his jacket had a V-shaped tear near one of the elbows. He stared at Emma and Sabina, his eyes round. He opened his mouth, but nothing came out.

Mariel came out of the kitchen just then. She stopped short when she saw the boy. “Peter, what’s wrong? Has something happened? Do you need something?”

He looked down at his dirty feet. “I’m sorry about the mud, ma’am, but it’s . . . it’s . . . Miss Joy, ma’am,” Peter managed to stutter finally. “She’s hurt, ma’am.”

Mariel frowned, deepening the wrinkles in her forehead. “Hurt, how?”

“Thrown from her horse. She was riding Big Boy and something spooked him, ma’am.” He stared down at his worn boots.

“Spooked him? What do you mean? Big Boy is very even-tempered. That’s not like him.”

Sabina began to dig in her purse and pulled out her cell. “I’ll call nine-one-one.” She put the phone to her ear.

“I know what you mean, ma’am,” Peter continued. “But there was a noise, and next thing I know he’s throwing Miss Joy off like she was nothing more than a rag doll. She landed on the ground. It’s plenty hard right now on account of being frozen.”

“What kind of noise was it?”

“I don’t really know, ma’am. But it sure sounded like a gunshot.”

“A
gunshot!” Mariel echoed as she yanked open the hall closet and pulled out her barn jacket. “Take me to her right away. Is she conscious?”

The boy looked confused.

“Is she talking?”

“No, ma’am, she’s lying there looking all twisted like a bunch of rags with her face all white.”

Mariel frowned. “This doesn’t sound good,” she said to no one in particular.

“Paramedics are on their way,” Sabina said. She still held the cell phone pressed to her ear.

Mariel opened the front door and a gust of cold air swept through the foyer. Emma shivered.

“Do you want me to come with you?”

Mariel looked grateful. “If you wouldn’t mind. We might have to move her, and another set of hands would be useful.”

Emma pulled her collar up around her ears and followed Mariel out the door. The wind momentarily took her breath away, and Emma gasped. Peter led them around to the back of the house, through a gate in the white picket fence, and across a frozen field that was beginning to turn white from the snow that had started to fall.

Emma kept up with Mariel as best she could. She wished she had worn boots instead of shoes. Her foot caught in one of the ruts in the field and she nearly fell. She could feel the snowflakes melting in her hair, and ice cold water dripped down the back of her neck. Mariel seemed oblivious as she marched across the stiff, icy grass, her hair blowing furiously, her coat clutched closed with one hand.

Big Boy stood off in the distance, amid a group of three or four other horses, stamping his feet and snorting clouds of warm air through his nose. Emma saw what looked like a bundle of clothes tossed onto the ground, but, as they got closer, she realized it was Joy. Mariel quickened her pace, and Emma followed suit, nearly trotting to keep up.

Mariel dropped to her knees beside Joy’s still body. “She’s breathing,” she called over her shoulder to Emma. “Joy, can you hear me? Joy?”

Joy moaned and moved her head back and forth. Her face was pale, and the smattering of freckles across her nose stood out strongly. Her eyelids fluttered, and they all held their breath.

“Run and get a blanket.” Mariel pointed to Peter.

“You mean the ones we use on the horses?” Peter stood there, his big hands hanging at his side, his eyes still wide with alarm.

“Yes.” Mariel’s tone was clipped with impatience. “It doesn’t matter. We need to keep her warm.” She snapped her fingers. “Hurry.”

They stood over Joy, waiting. Emma stamped her feet to try to warm them, and stuck her hands deep into her pockets. Mariel seemed impervious to the cold—still clutching her coat instead of buttoning it, her bare hands turning red from the chill.

Mariel glanced at her watch. “What is keeping the ambulance?”

Peter came running back from the stables with a red and green plaid blanket in his arms. Mariel tucked it gently around Joy’s still form. Emma bent and plucked several large pieces of hay from the wool.

Just then they heard the wailing of a siren in the distance, growing louder as it got closer. Emma was past feeling the cold; her hands and feet were numb and prickly.

The ambulance pulled into the driveway. Mariel walked briskly toward the house, waving to them as she went. Two paramedics in black pants and black jackets got out of the front. They opened the back door of the ambulance, pulled out a gurney and lowered it to the ground.

The frozen field made the gurney ungainly, sticking in the ruts and nearly flipping over at one point. One of the men swore, and the word carried on the wind to where Emma was standing. Mariel had come back to join her, and they stood waiting and watching the slow progress of the paramedics.

Joy groaned, and Emma and Mariel leaned over her. Her eyelids fluttered again, but when they called her name, she didn’t answer. Mariel stood up with a hand to her back.

The paramedics had finally managed to maneuver the gurney over to them. They were panting, their breath making huge puffs of vapor in the cold air. One of them grabbed a backboard from the gurney and began setting it up.

The other man squatted down next to Joy. “Has she shown any signs of consciousness?”

Emma and Mariel shook their heads.

“We’re going to use the backboard as a precaution. Just in case she’s injured her neck or back.”

“Okay,” Mariel said.

The paramedics removed the plaid horse blanket and replaced it with the clean white one they had brought with them.

“Peter.” Mariel looked toward the boy, who stood there with his coat open, seemingly oblivious to the cold that was making Emma shiver. “Can you take the blanket back to the stable? And then come back here, please.”

“Yes, ma’am.” He tucked the blanket under his arm and took off at a trot.

By the time he returned, the paramedics had strapped Joy to the backboard and placed her on the gurney. They then began their slow journey across the field to the waiting ambulance.

“Peter.” Mariel turned to the boy who had finally started to shiver. “You said you heard a gunshot?”

“Yes, ma’am. Least, that’s what it sounded like to me.”

“Who would be shooting off a gun?” Mariel looked at Emma with her eyebrows raised. “Our neighbors are hardly the sort to go after rabbits or squirrels, and there’s nothing much else to hunt at this time of year.” She turned to Peter again. “Did the shot sound close?”

“Yes, ma’am. Real close. Otherwise I doubt it would have spooked Big Boy the way it did.”

Mariel turned to Emma. “We might as well go back in. I’ll follow the ambulance in my car.”

She and Emma headed back across the field toward the house. The ambulance had already started down the drive, the siren going and the lights whirling and throwing a kaleidoscope of colors against the white house.

As Emma got into her car, she couldn’t help but wonder who had fired off a gun, and whether or not it had been done on purpose to cause Joy’s accident.

• • •

“I
don’t like it,” Francis said later that evening, when they were all having dinner at Arabella’s house. He drew his black brows together. “It sounds to me as if someone spooked that horse on purpose.”

“Maybe it was meant as a warning,” Priscilla said, taking a delicate sip of her coffee. “Maybe this Joy was getting too close to discovering the murderer.”

“That’s exactly what I’m afraid of,” Francis said helping himself to another slice of pie. “I’m worried about you, Emma. If the murderer gets wind of the fact that you’ve been snooping around, asking questions, overhearing conversations . . .”

“The murderer might not even be in the house,” Priscilla said, arching a brow.

“True.” Francis smoothed his mustache with his index finger. “But they might still find out about it. People like that have their ways.”

“I really thought Joy had killed her father herself,” Emma said, swiping her fork across her plate to get at the last bit of Arabella’s delicious peach pie.

“It sounds as if she hated her father enough,” Arabella said.

“We know someone involved has a gun,” Francis said, pushing away his empty plate. “Hugh was shot before he was shoved off that balcony. The local boys are still waiting on the ballistic reports.” He sighed. “At the rate the lab is going, we’ll have the case solved long before we get their results.” He turned to Emma and shook a finger at her. “That’s why you need to be extra careful.”

“How is Brian doing?” Arabella cut in smoothly. She poured herself a cup of coffee and stirred in a spoon of sugar.

They had already cleared the dishes from Arabella’s delicious dinner of fried pork chops with gravy, mashed potatoes and collard greens sautéed with bacon. Emma had stacked the plates in the kitchen, and Francis had offered to put them in the dishwasher after dessert and coffee.

“Brian is doing very well. He’s being discharged. I’m picking him up in an hour.” Emma glanced at her watch.

“That’s wonderful,” Arabella said, her face glowing. “Such good news. You’d better be off then. He may need help getting his things together.”

Emma put down her napkin. “As soon as I freshen up a bit.”

It didn’t take Emma more than five minutes to wash her hands, comb her hair—Angel had done a really good job on the cut—and dab on some powder and lipstick.

“Give Brian our best,” Arabella called from the kitchen as Emma headed toward the front door.

She beeped open the Bug and got in. She had an ulterior motive in heading to the hospital early. She’d called Mariel to check up on Joy. Apparently Joy had been banged up but aside from some cuts and bruises and a minor concussion, she was going to be okay. The doctor wanted to keep her overnight for observation. But even more important, she was conscious and talking. Emma hoped to sneak in to see her. Maybe she would be scared enough to reveal what she knew. Because Emma was quite certain she knew something—something that had scared the killer enough to spook Big Boy. She didn’t know whether they had hoped the accident would kill Joy or whether they had merely hoped it would serve as a warning to her. Emma had to talk to Joy before she put the pieces together and realized that her only safety lay in silence.

Emma pulled into the Henry County Medical Center parking lot and found a space. The woman behind the information desk didn’t even look up when Emma asked for Joy Granger. She tapped a few keys on her computer and handed Emma a slip of paper with Joy’s room number on it. “You need directions?” she asked, finally looking at Emma. Her slightly protruding blue eyes were crisscrossed with red veins.

“I think I can find it.” Emma tucked the piece of paper into her coat pocket and headed toward the elevators.

She got off the elevator, consulted the signs on the wall, and turned left. The door to Joy’s room was ajar, and she could hear the television blaring—some ubiquitous game show. “And now, for the grand prize, answer this final question,” the host yelled excitedly. Emma peeked around the corner of the door into the room. Joy was snapped into a blue hospital gown, propped up in bed. There was an angry-looking purple bruise on her forehead, and Emma noticed a bandage on her left hand along with an intravenous line leading to a bag suspended from an IV pole next to the bed.

Emma knocked gently and stuck her head into the room.

“Joy?” she called to the figure in the bed.

Joy looked up, her head swiveling toward the door, obviously startled. “Oh, I thought you were the nurse. You’re Emma, right?”

“Yes. Do you mind if I come in?”

Joy shook her head, her hair making a swishing sound as it rubbed back and forth against the pillow. She pointed toward the bedside chair where a plastic, hospital-issue basin sat. It was filled with a plastic cup, a tube of hand lotion, a miniature box of tissues and a clean, folded washcloth. “Sorry, you’ll have to move that stuff. The nurse left it there.”

Emma put the tub on the window ledge and sat down. “I wanted to see how you were doing. We were all so frightened seeing you lying there in the field like that—not moving or talking.”

“Fortunately, I don’t remember much of anything about it. I didn’t come to until I was in the ambulance.” Joy winced as she moved sideways on the bed. “I’m a jumble of bumps and bruises, but that’s the price you pay when you ride. This isn’t the first time I’ve fallen off a horse.”

“You didn’t fall, though.”

Joy whipped her head around toward Emma. “What do you mean?”

“You were thrown. Someone spooked Big Boy.”

Joy’s face relaxed. “Horses are spooked all the time—by the strangest things. I’ve seen a small kitten throw an Arabian a hundred times its size into a tizzy. It doesn’t mean anything.”

“Peter said he heard a gunshot. Someone shot a gun into the air—on purpose—to spook your horse, hoping he would throw you.”

A strange look settled over Joy’s face. Emma could see the rapid rise and fall of her chest, and the panicked way her eyes darted about as if she were looking for escape.

“Do you have any idea who would do something like that? Or why?” Emma persisted.

Joy’s expression turned mulish, her eyes narrowed and her jaw set. “That’s ridiculous.” She gave a harsh laugh. “I don’t know why someone would do that, let alone who. Besides, being thrown by my horse is hardly going to kill me. Like I told you, it’s one of the hazards of the sport. I’ve probably been thrown a couple dozen times since my mother first sat me on Maximilian.”

“Maybe the person didn’t want to kill you? Perhaps his intention was just to warn you.”

Joy stared at Emma for a moment, her face completely white. Before, her look had been unconcerned . . . even cocky. Something had spooked her horse, and she’d been thrown. No big deal. Nothing out of the ordinary.

Now she looked positively
scared
.

• • •

EMMA
left Joy’s room and headed down the hall toward the elevator. The information about the gunshot had certainly had an effect on Joy. Emma had the distinct impression that the word
warning
had struck a target. And that Joy knew exactly
who
and exactly
why
someone was trying to warn her.