Death Rides Again (A Jocelyn Shore Mystery) (5 page)

“She probably went to see one of her friends,” I suggested to Uncle Kel, who gave me a baleful glance, then rose and began pacing, his heavy work boots stumping hollowly on the wood floor.

“What if she didn’t? What if that inbred little weasel took her somewhere? I should have killed him when I had the chance.” Kel bit the words off as though they tasted bitter.

“We saw Eddy at the feed store. He was heading somewhere with Carl. I don’t think he’d have had time to go back and kidnap Ruby June.”

Kel just gave me a jaded look and kept pacing. It was odd seeing him doing anything other than working. He’d been running the ranch ever since Uncle Herman, at the age of eighty-five, had fallen off the back of the pickup truck and broken his leg. Uncle Herman, having no children of his own and finally forced to slow down, had turned over the ranch to his nephew Kel. This could have caused hard feelings between Kel and his brothers, but neither my father nor Kyla’s had any interest in the ranching life and approved the transition wholeheartily. At the time, family rumor had it that the ranch was inches away from foreclosure, and no one wanted Herman to lose his land. Kel and Elaine had turned things around by sheer force of personality and the willingness to work sixteen-hour days. One of the first things they’d done was build a few small cabins complete with electricity and plumbing. In the spring and summer, they ran the place as a dude ranch. In the fall, they repurposed it into a hunting lease where they charged fairly steep weekly rates for access to the ranch’s dove, deer, and quail populations. They were probably losing a considerable sum by opening the place up to relatives for Thanksgiving weekend, but I suppose it wasn’t every day that the patriarch of the family turned ninety-five.

“We ran into a neighbor of yours out at the racetrack,” I said, trying to take Kel’s mind away from his daughter. “Seems like a nice guy.”

The tactic worked, but not in the way I’d expected. Kel stopped in midstride, his head snapping up like wolf scenting blood on the wind.

“Which neighbor?” he asked. “Not that son of a bitch Knoller?”

I glanced at Kyla, who’d been fishing in the refrigerator for a beer. She straightened, looking puzzled.

“Yeah, why? He invited us to his place for a post-race party,” she answered.

A muscle worked in Kel’s jaw. Elaine put her mixing bowl down.

“Kel,” she said as a warning. “Just take a breath. The girls don’t know anything about all that, and there’s no reason they should.”

“There’s every reason they should! That bastard is trying to steal my land. I won’t have him trying to get at my family.”

“What do you mean?” I asked.

Elaine sighed. “Fence wars. Our land touches the Bar Double K along Sand Creek. When T.J. took over and started putting up new fences, he crossed the creek and scooped up a long narrow strip of about two hundred acres. Kel tried to get him to reset his posts but he refused.”

“He can’t do that, can he?” I asked. “Aren’t there records or deeds or something?”

“The ranches are both so old, the descriptions are a bit vague. T.J. claims Sand Creek shifted in its banks since the original deeds were laid out and the land is his. We claim otherwise. We might have been able to settle it, but somehow some fences got cut.” Here she threw Kel a glance. “And now he’s suing.”

“Suing? You’re kidding me.”

“Wish I was. The damages to the fence are the least of it. If we try to avoid the court costs by settling, it means admitting that the land was his to put the fence on in the first place.”

“We’re not settling!” Kel said. “Never. That son of a bitch can go—”

“Right,” I cut him off. “We get it. But why does he want that land all of a sudden anyway? Haven’t you been neighbors for years?”

Elaine pulled a tin of muffins out of the oven and set it on the stove top to cool. “Yes and no. Our families have been neighbors since the thirties, but old Tom Knoller passed away a couple of years ago, and T.J. inherited and started making changes.”

“He’s a thief and a liar, and his old man would be spinning in his grave if he knew,” said Kel. “You girls stay away from him.”

I saw Kyla’s expression and decided it was time for another change of topic. The best way to guarantee that Kyla would do something was to forbid it. As I was casting around for a new subject though, the thump of rubber on wood heralded the arrival of Uncle Herman’s cane, followed by the man himself.

Herman Shore was ninety-five years old. In his youth, he’d been a big man, taller even than Kel, but age had finally stooped his shoulders and the fall that had broken his leg had given him a permanent limp. The paper-thin skin on his hands reminded me of the transparent sheets of onionskin that people slip into wedding invitations, but the expression in his eyes was as alert as that of his nephew. He might have turned over the daily management of the ranch to Kel and Elaine, but he was still a force to be reckoned with and went to some pains to assert his authority at regular intervals. It was hardly his fault that between his thick glasses and his balding head, he looked like a stuffed frog.

“Uncle Herman!” I said with a smile, rising to give him a hug.

He grinned and patted my shoulder. “Well look at you. Little Annie Oakley and her faithful sidekick Grumpy, all grown up.”

I could almost feel Kyla’s quiver of indignation behind me and carefully did not turn around. “Jocelyn and Kyla,” I reminded him gently. “I’m Keith’s daughter, remember? And Kyla is Kyle’s daughter.”

He gave a snort. “Darlin’, I know who you are. I’m not senile yet.” He stumped forward a few steps and took a pumpkin muffin from the tin, then gave his nephew a sharp glance. “What’s all the commotion about, son? I could hear you jabbering all the way across the yard.”

“The girls ran into T. J. Knoller today, Uncle Herman,” said Elaine quickly. “We were just explaining about the lawsuit to them.”

Herman gave an odd cackle, reminiscent either of a psycho in a slasher flick or an extra large chicken. I said a quick prayer that certain genetic characteristics would not flow down to my twig on the branch of the family tree.

“You don’t need to worry about that,” he said. “I’ve taken care of it.”

Kel’s eyes widened in alarm. “What do you mean? What have you done?”

“Never you mind. After Friday, you won’t have anything to worry about from that smart puppy. I’ve docked his tail for him—he just doesn’t know it yet.”

The mixture of anxiety and wary hope that rippled through both Kel and Elaine was painful to watch. For one thing, it made me realize just how bad this lawsuit must be, and I wondered if T. J. Knoller had any idea of the stress he was creating for his neighbors. He’d seemed so friendly, had never even flinched when he realized who we were, and had invited us to his party as persuasively as possible. Perhaps he considered the lawsuit just business, something unpleasant but necessary that need not interfere with relationships between friends and neighbors. If so, he was being woefully naïve, although it was not the first time I’d run across that attitude.

Kyla must have been thinking along the same lines. “Maybe he’s trying to make a peace offering by inviting us over.”

“Or maybe he’s just trying to use you to get some inside information, feel you out, see if we’re about to settle,” snapped Kel.

“I don’t think that’s why he invited me,” said Kyla with what I considered to be an offensive amount of smugness. “But if it is, he’ll be disappointed. We can’t tell him anything because we don’t know anything.”

“And because you won’t be going,” Kel reminded her.

“Yeah, about that,” she began.

I quickly changed the subject. “Anyway, who else is coming this afternoon? I know Will and Sam are due in around four.”

Will and Sam were my younger brothers who both lived in California. I hadn’t seen either one of them in months and was looking forward to their arrival.

“Wonderful,” answered Elaine. “It’s just too bad your parents couldn’t make it.”

My parents both served in the diplomatic service, and as a result, I had spent my childhood growing up in a variety of cities in France, Italy, and Spain, before they’d moved to Austin to let the three of us have an American high school experience and spend a few years near our father’s family. After I’d graduated, they’d returned to Europe and for the last two years they had been stationed in Paris, much to the delight of my very French mother, who did not quite understand why my brothers and I wanted to live anywhere else.

I shrugged. “They couldn’t get away. The French have holidays every five minutes, but they don’t celebrate Thanksgiving. Anyway, I think my folks are planning a trip to Austin over the Christmas break, and I’m sure they’ll come out here to see you then.”

“And my folks have gone over to the dark side,” said Kyla.

Which meant they were visiting her mother’s relatives in Phoenix. For reasons unknown to me, Kyla disliked her mother’s side of the family with an intensity and passion she usually reserved for pedophiles and boy bands.

Elaine nodded, her mind obviously elsewhere. Kel seemed equally distracted and tense. For whatever reason, they seemed excessively concerned about the whereabouts of Ruby June, who could hardly have been gone more than a couple of hours. Remembering how small she’d looked when we left her at her house, I felt a twinge of unease myself.

*   *   *

As the afternoon wore on, the Shores began streaming onto the ranch. The first to arrive were a set of second cousins from San Antonio who rolled up in an RV the size of a convenience store and strategically parked directly in front of the gate. Aunt Elaine took one look and gave a groan.

“They can’t park there. They’ll be blocking everyone.”

“I’ll go,” I volunteered.

I hurried out to meet them as the side door opened and at least six kids under the age of ten poured out of the RV. They hit the dirt running and scattered like cockroaches as a heavyset woman swung herself down from the cab with surprising agility and thumped to the ground like a jumbo-size gymnast sticking a landing.

“Aunt Gladys!” I said.

“Baby doll!” she boomed, enfolding me in a bear hug and squashing me into her massive bosom. I managed to turn my head to the side just in time to avoid being smothered. Death by boobage was always a risk when my relatives were around.

I returned the hug, then wriggled free with some difficulty. “Aunt Elaine wants you to park over on that side of the house,” I said, pointing.

“Scotty! D’you hear that?” she shouted. Her voice had a resonance that James Earl Jones might have envied.

Her husband, just as hefty and good humored as herself, obediently returned to the RV and started the engine. The vehicle lurched forward as a slender girl appeared in the side door. She clutched at the doorjamb, flailed a little, and then more or less fell out onto the dirt. Gladys gave a little cry and rushed forward.

“Okra, honey, are you all right?”

I knew I had not heard that right. I watched as Gladys picked up the girl, set her on her feet, and brushed her off as though she’d been a toddler instead of a full-size teenager. If she didn’t have any neck injuries from the fall, she probably had them by the time her mom was done with her. Gladys kept an arm around her shoulders and dragged her over to where I stood.

“Okra, you remember your cousin Jocelyn, right?”

There was that name again. What was she really saying? Although the girl was less than half Gladys’s width, she was fully as tall, which meant she topped me by an inch or so. I guessed she was in her late teens, probably almost Ruby June’s age. The resemblance ended there, though. This girl had obscured what I guessed was a very pretty face with purple eye shadow, heavy kohl eyeliner, and both an eyebrow and a nose piercing. She’d also cropped her hair short, dyed it raven black, and gelled it into spikes. Overall, she reminded me of a terminally depressed porcupine.

I smiled at her. “I know we’ve seen each other before, but I’m sorry—I’m just not catching your name.”

Aunt Gladys laughed, another big booming sound. “Her name’s Opal, but she said she didn’t want to be called that anymore. So the kids started calling her Okra, and it sort of stuck.”

A dull flush crept under the girl’s pale skin. “Where’s Ruby June?” she asked me, breaking free of her mother’s grasp.

I hesitated, not quite sure how to respond. In that instant, we heard a shout, followed by a high-pitched squeal. Gladys snapped to attention like a bird dog scenting a quail.

She shouted, “Eric! Austin! You drop that right now!” and thundered away like a vengeful freight train, leaving me alone with my young relative.

We looked at each other.

“Where’s Ruby June?” she repeated.

“We’re not sure,” I answered. “She and Eddy had a fight, and she left.”

“But she promised … she said I could stay with her.” The protest burst out, the underlying wail forced back at the last minute. Despite her appearance, this was a girl who had to work hard to maintain a façade of apathy. I looked at her with a little more interest.

“So what do you like to be called?” I asked her.

She shrugged, eyes down. “It doesn’t matter,” she muttered.

“It would matter to me. Unless you like being called Okra?”

The flash of her dark eyes was answer enough.

“So what do your friends call you?”

“I don’t have any friends.” This was said in a tone of bitter defiance.

I laughed at that, and she glanced up at me, startled. She’d probably expected the usual adult patronizing protests and fake encouragement.

“Not true. You’ve already told me you have at least one friend—Ruby June. I bet you have a couple of others. But I’ll call you Okra if that’s what you want.”

The desire to be dark and brooding warred with the deeper need not to appear ridiculous.

“Kris,” she finally said.

“Is that your middle name?”

“Kristine is.” Then she added with a sigh, “With a K.”

Opal Kristine. O.K. One short step to Okra, especially for a girl with brothers. Parents could be so cruel.

“So who are all those kids?” I asked, staring across the yard to where Aunt Gladys was wagging a finger in the faces of four little boys.