Chapter 14
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
“Thanks for your help, Randy,” Sully said inside the stables on his ranch.
“Of course,” Randy replied. “None of us saw the damn thing when we came back from the skeet shoot. I hate snakes, especially prairie rattlers.”
“In October, they’re looking for a place to hibernate for the winter,” Doc Henderson, the veterinarian, said standing next to the mare that had been bitten, named Rain.
“I’ve got the Springs Snake Control and Removal experts on the way.
If there are any more rattlesnakes trying to hibernate, we’ll find ’em,” Sully replied with a pat to the mare’s mane.
Rain was a little sister to Storm. He’d had both horses for a couple of years, and Doc Henderson had always taken good care of them and his other four horses.
“The snake was a small one.” The veterinarian nodded to the dead rattler a few feet away that was missing its head thanks to Randy’s sure aim with a gun. “So, Rain’s bite isn’t nearly as bad as it could have been.”
“Right. Still, I appreciate you getting here first thing this morning, Jill,” Sully said to the vet. “And for coming back to check on Rain this afternoon.”
“Any time, Sully. And even though the snake was small, I administered steroids and an anti-inflammatory to minimize tissue damage and to help with potential shock. Along with the tetanus shot I gave Rain, the antibiotic will take care of any bacteria the snake may have transferred into the wound when it bit her.” The vet closed her bag and stepped out of the horse stall.
“Swelling and infection are the main concerns. So, watch for both and call me if need be.”
“We will,” Sully said. He walked the vet out of the stables and back to her car as the exterminator truck came to a stop near the barn.
“Thanks again, Doc,” he said as she got into her car.
He gave her a wave, thinking this was not the way he’d planned to spend the day.
But he greeted the two men from the snake control company and escorted them to the stables.
“After you’ve inspected the stables, please take a look around the exterior of the house, garage, and barn.
” He left the snake experts to take over the rattler hunt from there.
Sully checked his phone to see if he had a missed call or a text from Charley.
Then it dawned on him, he hadn’t given her his number. “Damn.”
Sully called Cash Cooper and asked for Charley’s number.
He punched her number into his cell. It rang.
No answer. He hung up. His number would have come up as unknown, so she might not have answered for that reason.
Or maybe she hated guns so much she no longer wanted to see or speak to him.
Whatever the case, she was a beautiful, independent woman, and he wasn’t the only man who wanted her.
Maybe she’d made other plans for the evening.
He called again. No answer. This time he left a message.
An hour later, Sully was checking on Rain when the men from the snake company tracked him down.
In a far pasture, they’d found the den from where the prairie rattler had slithered.
Maybe it was looking for one last mouse meal before the long winter.
In any event, they had captured half a dozen venomous snakes.
Then they had spread a commercial-grade snake repellent to create a barrier around the house, garage, barn, and stables, deterring other rattlers from looking for a home in which to hibernate during the cold months approaching.
Since the snakes’ food source needed to be eliminated, rat poison had been strategically spread as well.
Sully thanked the exterminators, paid them, and returned to his house.
It was around four when Sully checked his cell to make sure he hadn’t missed a call or text.
None. Why hadn’t Charley invited him to come back?
Why hadn’t he offered to treat her to dinner?
Dammit. He turned on the flatscreen in his bedroom.
Blue lights from police cars and red lights from a fire truck were on the scene in Old Colorado City.
“Hell,” Sully muttered. He punched in Charley’s number. No answer.
He sprinted outside to his truck, cursing himself for leaving her. On the main road, he stepped on the gas. Please don’t let her be hurt. Or worse.
The trip into town seemed to take twice as long as usual.
Leaving the highway and heading toward Colorado Avenue, Sully finally neared Charley’s shop and duplex.
He saw lights on in the windows of her apartment.
He also saw the lights of police cars just up the street from her place.
Making a quick decision, he veered up the short hill beside the shop and turned into the driveway of her duplex.
He hopped out of the truck and knocked on her door.
“Charley!”
No answer. Sully called her phone. It rang from inside her apartment.
He pulled the extra key to the new door lock out of his pocket and opened the door.
Her phone lay on the kitchen counter. The place was quiet and just the way they’d left it earlier in the day.
Locking the door, he sprinted back out to his truck and took off along Colorado Avenue.
Nearing the blue lights of the police cars, Sully saw an ambulance parked near the firetruck now as well.
He strained in the late afternoon duskiness to see beyond the police, paramedics, and onlookers.
Glimpsing Rod Vaughn and Leon Lerfeld, it appeared the two of them were getting into it again as they had been earlier that day.
“Charley,” Sully whispered in relief as he finally caught sight of her.
Standing under a lamppost, she was caught between the two men, who were obviously vying for her attention.
Sully parked his truck as close to the scene as he could and jogged across the street.
As a body on a gurney was rolled toward the ambulance, he heard the raised voices of Vaughn and Lerfeld.
Sully stepped onto the sidewalk halfway down the block behind the trio.
Charley whirled away from the two men, and the frown on her beautiful face disappeared the instant she saw him.
“Sully!” Charley called and raced toward him.
Vaughn and Lerfeld turned as well. Shock registered on their faces.
Whether it was from seeing him or watching Charley running away from them to him, Sully didn’t know.
Maybe both. In any case, Sully walked toward Charley, and as she neared him, he opened his arms. She flung herself against him, and he wrapped her in his embrace.
Her arms clasped around his neck and her feet left the ground.
“What the hell’s going on?” Sully asked and set her feet back on the sidewalk.
“Another girl has been murdered!” she said, looking up at him. “Detective Groves just got here, and he told me it happened within the last couple of hours. But this time, the body was dumped into a big trash bin, and there was no toadflax. She was found by a restaurant employee.”
“Where?” Sully asked as Vaughn approached with Lerfeld trailing behind him.
“Behind the café where we had breakfast.”
“Really,” Sully muttered, remembering that’s the place where they’d seen Vaughn and his on-again, off-again girlfriend.
Dumped in a trash bin didn’t fit the pattern of the so-called Cave Killer, but Sully bet it was the same guy.
He took Charley’s hand and said, “Let’s go.
” She held on tightly as they stepped off the curb and walked between two parked cars.
“Charley!” one of the men, maybe Vaughn, shouted.
“Charley,” the other one, Lerfeld, Sully guessed, echoed.
Sully ignored them, and Charley did too.
They crossed the street, went straight to his truck, and he opened the door on her side.
She hopped in and he closed the door. As he made his way around the front of the truck, he saw Vaughn and Lerfeld across the street scowling at him.
With a victorious tip of his cowboy hat, Sully climbed into his truck and started the engine.
“What made you come back to town?” Charley asked as he pulled away from the curb.
“You,” he said, driving along Colorado Avenue. “I got your cell number from Cash and called you earlier to tell you why I got hung up. Then I saw the report on the news and tried to call you again. When I couldn’t reach you, I headed to your apartment.”
“I heard the sirens and went to see what happened,” Charley said. “I grabbed the new key to my apartment but forgot my phone on the counter.”
“Yeah, I found your phone.” Sully made a U-turn and headed back toward her shop and duplex. The ambulance was gone, and the police cars were pulling away from the scene of the murder. There was no sign of Vaughn or Lerfeld. “What were Frick and Frack doing there?”
Charley hesitated for a split second and then laughed. “You mean Rod and Leon?”
“Yes,” Sully grumbled and turned up the hill to her duplex.
“They both claimed they were in the vicinity.” Charley smiled and said, “Thank you for rescuing me from them and for the ride home.”
Sully drove up her hill, stopped on the parking pad in front of her apartment, and gripped the steering wheel.
He looked at her and said, “Charley, come home with me tonight.” She glanced away from him to her apartment.
“And stay until women stop dropping dead all around you. I think it’s concerning that the dead include your mother and two women you knew. ”
“I didn’t know the first victim or the last two,” she reminded him. “The café owner, Denny, said the girl murdered today was new in town and he’d just hired her. He feels terrible.” Charley thought for a moment and said, “My mother didn’t fit the profiles of the other victims.”
“Yeah, but we know you do,” Sully said. “Your mother just got in your attacker’s way. Please close your shop indefinitely and come out to the country until they catch the killer.”
“Come inside, Sully,” Charley said and grasped the door handle of the truck.
Sully caught her arm and asked, “So you can pack?”
To his immense relief, she nodded. “Yes. Leaving the Closed sign on the shop door after you left, I figured I wouldn’t open again until the killer is caught.”
“Good.” Sully let go of her arm.
“But I hate being so intimidated that I’m closing my shop.”
“You’ve already been attacked once. You’re being smart, not intimidated, Charley.”
Sully got out of the truck and came around to her side.
As she alighted, he pulled her into his arms and lowered his head.
She tilted up her chin, and his mouth came down on her soft, supple lips.
Her arms wrapped around him, and her hands flattened to his back as she stood on tiptoes to kiss him.
Letting go of her, he gave her fanny a familiar pat and took her keys out of his pocket.
This time, he put them on his keychain after unlocking her apartment door.
Going inside, she went to the counter and checked her cell.
“I see your missed calls.” As Charley said that, her phone rang, and she rolled her eyes. “It’s Frick, I mean Rod. I’m going to block him.” No sooner had she started to do so than her cell rang again. “Frack, now. I’m going to text Leon that I’ll advise him when I decide to reopen the shop.”
Sully nodded. “What do you need me to do to help you?”
“Nothing. Just keep me company.” She brought him a glass of wine, and pouring one for herself, she motioned for him to follow her into her bedroom. He sat down on the bed and watched as she took a carry-on-size suitcase out of a closet and began filling it.
“Do you have a costume for a Halloween party?” he asked. “Your cousin, Chloe, invited me, as usual, to her annual party.”
“I do. I love Halloween. I usually dress up that day and pass out candy in the shop.”
“Great. What will you be?”
“You’ll have to wait and see. What will you be?”
“Your date.”
Charley laughed and asked, “What was going on at your ranch today?” Gathering items from her bathroom, she put them, along with a hairdryer, into her suitcase.
“A mare, named Rain, was bitten by a prairie rattler on the way to a skeet shoot.”
“Oh no.” Charley turned to face him. “Is she okay?”
“Yes, I think so. But I wanted to make sure, so that’s why I didn’t come back to town sooner. The vet treated her and checked on her twice.”
“Thank goodness. I hate snakes.”
“Like you hate guns?”
“I decided it’s not the gun but the person holding the gun that matters.”
Sully dipped his head once and smiled. “I agree.”
“Okay.” With a look around a few minutes later, Charley put a laptop into her bag and then grabbed the charger for her cell phone. “I’m ready to go.”
“Let’s hit the road,” Sully said and picked up her suitcase.
The blissful numbness had hit with the woman’s death.
But he’d almost been caught by that stupid café employee.
Hiding had interfered with his showing up at Charley’s apartment.
He’d planned to be the hero, protecting her from the Cave Killer.
Not only that, but she could have provided him with an alibi as to his whereabouts at the time of the murder.
He’d been barely half a block away when he heard yelling at the restaurant.
He’d kept walking in the opposite direction.
When the voices said enough time had passed, he walked back down Colorado Avenue, planning to see the action and go tell Charley about it.
But Charley had already heard and was there.
Then the other two guys showed up. First the one he’d encountered that morning at her shop, and then the one named Sully.
Picturing how Charley had run to that big, brawny gun-toting rancher, he screamed and battered his head with his fists.