Elena Estes - Dark Horse Part 28

"Sorry I missed it. No one makes a better bad cop than me."

"I have no doubt about that," he said with half a smile. "Aren't you going to invite me in? Say the water's fine?"

"That would be a cliche. I abhor predictability."

I swam to the ladder and climbed out, forcing myself not to rush to cover my body with my towel. I didn'

t want him to know how vulnerable I felt. Somehow I thought that even in the dim light around the pool he would see every scar, every imperfection. It made me angry that I cared.

I toweled myself off, rubbed my hair dry, then wrapped the towel around my waist like a sarong to hide

the pitted, scarred flesh of my legs. Landry watched, his expression unreadable.

"Nothing about you is predictable, Estes."

"I'll take that as a compliment, though I don't think you consider unpredictability a virtue. Do you have

any good news?" I asked, leading the way to the guest house.

"The deputies found Erin Seabright's car," he said. "Parked under about six inches of dust in a corner of that first lot at the truck entrance of the equestrian center."

I stood with my hand on the doork.n.o.b, holding my breath, waiting for him to tell me Erin had been found

dead in the trunk.

"The CSU is going over it for prints, et cetera."

I let go a sigh at the initial sense of relief. "Where was it?"

"In the first parking lot as you come in the truck entrance, over by the laundry place."

"Why would it be there?" I asked, not expecting an answer. "She would have parked near Jade's barn,

not half a mile away. Why would it be there?"

Landry shrugged. "Maybe she had dropped stuff off at the laundry."

"Then walked all the way to Jade's barn? And then walked to the back gate to meet whoever she

thought she was meeting? That doesn't make sense." "It doesn't make sense for the kidnappers to move it there either," Landry said. "They kidnapped her.Why would they care where her car was parked?"

I thought about that as we went into the house. "To buy time? Monday would have been Erin's day off.

If not for Molly, no one would have missed her until Tuesday morning."

"And no one would have missed her then, because Jade claimed she'd quit and moved to Ocala,"

Landry finished the theory.

"How did he take the questioning?"

"It was an inconvenience to him. The interview and the murder."

"Any nerves?"

"Not worth mentioning."

"Well . . . the guy makes a living riding horses over fences taller than I am. It's not a game for the faint of

heart."

"Neither is murder."

A game. It would be difficult for the average person to consider murder and kidnapping a game, but in a

macabre way it was a game. A game with very serious stakes.

"Any word from the kidnappers?"

Landry sat against the back of a chair, hands in his pockets. He shook his head. "No. The phones are

rigged at the Seabright house. I've had a couple of guys checking out the neighbors. That's a dead end."

"There's a bar in that armoire under the TV," I said, pointing into the living room. "You look like you need it. Help yourself while I change."

I made him wait while I took a quick shower, then stood in front of the mirror for five minutes, staring at

myself, trying to read my own inscrutable expression.

I didn't like the anxious feeling lingering in my belly. The bubble of fear had been replaced by something I

almost didn't recognize: hope. I didn't want it to mean so much that Landry had come back, that he wasfilling me in, including me. "You told Seabright you're a private investigator," he said. His voice was strong and clear. He must have been standing just on the other side of the bedroom door. "Are you?" "Not exactly." "That's fraud." "No. It's a lie," I corrected. "It would only be fraud if I were misrepresenting myself and accepting money from the Seabrights based on that misrepresentation. I'm not." "You'd make a h.e.l.l of a lawyer." So my father had always said, which was the reason I had become a cop. I hadn't wanted to be like him, bending the law like it was made of wire, bending it to suit the needs of corrupted people, corrupted

wealth. I hadn't realized at the time that as a cop I would end up bending it as many ways myself and

excusing my actions because I believed my cause was just. I still wasn't like him. That was the important

thing.

"I checked the Seabright kid's record," Landry said. "He's never been in any trouble. Good student, lotsof extracurricular activities." "Like s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g his stepsister?" "And the math club." "I don't like that he's lying about where he was Sunday," I said.

"Like father, like son."

I pulled on black underwear, checking over my shoulder, half-expecting to see Landry standing in the doorway. He wasn't.

"Seabright's going to stick by his own flesh and blood," I said. I put on a white tuxedo s.h.i.+rt and a pair ofblack cigarette pants. "He isn't going to allow for the possibility Chad might be involved somehow."

"That's a.s.suming the father is the one providing the alibi. It works the other way too."

I tied the s.h.i.+rt at the waist and escaped the bedroom. Landry stood leaning back against the kitchen counter, a scotch in hand. He took in the outfit with hooded eyes.

"You didn't have to dress up for me," he said. "I didn't. I can't see Bruce Seabright actively partic.i.p.ating in the kidnapping. Even if he wanted Erin gone, he wouldn't get his hands dirty. Too risky. So why would he need an alibi?" I asked. "Chad wasthe one involved with Erin." "And Erin is the one with the juvie record," Landry said. "Shoplifting. Possession." "Of what?" "Ecstasy. Busted at a party. She got a slap on the wrist. I've got someone in the Juvenile Division checking out the pals she was arrested with," Landry said. "And I reached out to a guy I know in Narcotics to get a line on the dealer."

"Who in Narcotics?"

"Brodie. You know him?"

I looked at my feet and nodded. I stood across from Landry, leaning back against the other counter, my arms crossed over my chest. The room was so small, my bare feet were nearly toe-to-toe with his shoes.

Good quality, brown leather oxfords. No ta.s.sels for Landry.

Matt Brodie had been a friend once. Or so I had thought. I wished I hadn't asked the question. NowLandry was waiting for me to elaborate. "He's good enough," I said.

"I'm sure he'd be happy to have your approval," Landry said with a dry edge of sarcasm.

I wondered what Brodie might have said about me, not that it mattered. Landry would think what he wanted.

"Jade is the one who claims the girl just up and left," he said. "He's the last one who saw her. I think it goes this way: Erin knew something about the dead horse. Jade wanted her out of the way. He set up the kidnapping to make some extra money for his trouble. The girl is probably as dead as the one in the s.h.i.+t

pile."

"I'll hope you're wrong about the last part," I said, knowing he could well be right. I'd had the thoughtmyself. "Look, Estes, I owe you an apology," he said. "That's why I'm here. Maybe if I'd listened to you the first time you came in, Jill Morone wouldn't be dead. Maybe we'd have Erin Seabright back by now." I shrugged. "I don't know what to say to that." He was right and we both knew it. I wasn't going to offer plat.i.tudes like some good wife excusing a husband's minor transgressions. Nor was I going to grind the truth in his face. He had made a judgment

call, a bad one. I was the last person with a right to criticize on that count.

"It's not all about you," I said. "I was there ahead of you. I didn't stop that girl getting killed. I didn't find Erin. Sometimes things just play out the way they play out."

"You believe that?"

"I have to. If I didn't, then I'd be to blame for every rotten thing that ever happened, and I know for a