Little does she know, p.16
Little Does She Know, page 16
part #1 of If Only She Knew Series
I wasn’t exactly up for a meet-‘n-greet with Benson’s ex, but we were already here.
“And you had to bring me in on this, huh?”
“Well, Benny and Sloane didn’t part on the best of terms, and I kind of got dragged into the middle of their separation. So I was hoping you’d be my buffer. If anyone knows who wanted to hurt Benny, it’d be Sloane.”
Find another suspect, Detective Hughes had told me. I didn’t need more than a tap on the gas to consider it. If it could hand me another suspect, I’d do anything.
As I wove the car around the curves, my foot hopped between the gas and brake until we arrived at a clearing that revealed quite a scene. The house was modern meets cottage. Lots of sharp angles, more window than siding, and it looked to be at least two stories, though the design was so deceiving I could only wager a guess. The driveway wound through the tree-filled lot bursting with colorful flowers, giving it a natural botanical charm.
The porch was tiered, with a first and second landing surrounded by a metal and wire railing, then led up to a set of massive wooden front doors encased in more glass. Ginger groaned and clutched her hip with every step we climbed. She was nearly out of breath by the time she rang the doorbell, which I noticed didn’t ring aloud inside the house. At least not that I could hear.
When the door swung open, the only thought I had was: How?
How did pudgy-nosed, greedy-troll Benson land this supermodel?
Sloane wasn’t just beautiful. She was exotic. With caramel brown skin, long black curls falling down her back, almond eyes that observed us warily…and full lips that frowned in displeasure. One manicured hand found her cocked hip, the slender elbow forming a razor-sharp angle. This was clearly not a happy reunion.
Ginger humbly stood there under her white-hot glare, pulling a tissue from her sleeve (how many did she stuff up there, anyway?) and dabbing at her watery eyes. This was going to get ugly.
Suddenly Ginger’s hands began moving all over the place, and it took a moment for me to realize she was signing. That’s right, I had forgotten. Sloane was Deaf. Peace had mentioned that. And I didn’t know sign language. This was going to be…awkward. I wasn’t sure how I was supposed to be a buffer in an argument that I couldn’t understand.
After a few back-and-forth hand gestures, Ginger stepped toward Sloane, who stumbled back a step in turn. By now Ginger was standing inside the doorway, face-to-face with Sloane. I wasn’t sure if someone was going to bitch-slap or shove or go Jerry Springer, but I readied myself to come to Ginger’s rescue if things got physical. I had gone to public school, after all, so I’d seen plenty of brawls and bullying.
Sloane’s hands rose, and as I moved to intercept her, she reached around me and grabbed Ginger in a hug, pulling her in warmly. They both started crying, holding each other in the only apology that now mattered.
As Sloane guided us inside, they both began signing frantically while I helplessly watched with a keen understanding that this must be what it feels like to be a Deaf person in a hearing world, or a foreigner in a new country, isolated by a language barrier. Only now did Sloane seem to notice me, as she gestured the universal sign for hello, the only word I understood so far.
I followed her down a hallway, her unadorned cream-colored dress skimming the tops of her bare feet. She was effortlessly chic, the type of woman who could make a basic white dress look exquisite.
Sloane continued on, as Ginger interpreted. “She said, ‘My name is Sloane. Welcome to my home.’”
“Tell her my name is Tara and I think her home is incredible,” I replied.
While Sloane and Ginger made some animated chitchat, I took in the space that seamlessly transitioned from living room to botanical garden. On the other side of the floor-to-ceiling windows, tree trunks jutted up like candles in an earthy cake, their plumes of green high above us, like we were in a treehouse. We were a good two stories up, with walls of glass overlooking the forest and succulent green plant life climbing all around us. Sliding glass doors led onto a patio filled with pristine white furniture and dozens of flower species in a kaleidoscope of colors.
It was all I could do to turn my attention away from their breathtaking beauty to the sprawling living room that matched the natural outdoor setting. The scent of dewy leaves was invigorating, and the flora was incredible. Blooming orchids, vibrant cacti, lush fig leaf plants all competed for space…it was a tropical paradise. We sat on the lushest sofa I’d ever sunk into, and I realized Sloane was classy. Successful. Confident. Everything about her clothing, her makeup, her home, her décor was carefully chosen and put together. Thus bringing me back around to my original curiosity: How?
How did the Benson I knew—gaslighting, manipulative, greedy, controlling—win over this incredible woman? Something didn’t add up.
Ginger turned to me, signing while she spoke. “I asked Sloane if the cops had spoken to her yet, and she said they came by already. She was out of town on a party-planning job for some Blake Lively gal the night it happened, so she has an alibi. And I asked her if she had any idea who would want him dead.”
“Rewind a minute,” I said, my brain stuck on one majorly important detail. “Did you say Blake Lively? As in Gossip Girl Blake Lively?”
“Is that someone important?” Ginger asked while interpreting for Sloane.
“She’s a celebrity, Ging.” Ginger looked at me quizzically. “Think Daisy Duke from Dukes of Hazzard, but with classier shorts and a lot more money.”
Ginger shrugged and continued interpreting.
“Anyway, what did Sloane say about who might want to hurt Benson?” I asked, glancing from Ginger to Sloane.
Ginger shook her head. “No idea. He didn’t have a lot of friends, but he didn’t exactly have enemies either.”
While Sloane continued signing, Ginger translated for me:
“You know I adore you as a mother-in-law, Ginger, but your son became a cruel man. He wasn’t always like that. I remember back when we first met after he hired me to plan a retirement party for his boss. He was such a gentleman in those early years. So sweet. Thoughtful. And I knew he wasn’t after me for money, because my event planning company hadn’t taken off yet.”
Sloane paused to finger her delicate gold necklace that had the initials B♥S across it. They had loved each other once. It was devastating that such love could be so easily corrupted.
“Somewhere along the way Benny got self-obsessed and changed into someone I didn’t know. Suddenly he didn’t want children anymore, which I did. And he was holding me financially hostage when he took out a loan against my company that I built all on my own, nearly bankrupting me. He ruined my credit, emptied our accounts, and all for what? He ended up dead.”
Ginger touched her arm gently and signed, “He lost the best thing that happened to him. I’m so sorry, dear.”
“I used to constantly dwell on it, living in those gentle memories of Benny, trying to rationalize the monster he became. When did he change? Was it all worth it?”
I watched as Ginger apologized for her son, and I wondered if I would ever be put in the position to have to apologize for Nora. I had lucked out with a wonderful kid, but it was scary how parents felt responsible for everything their children did, as if they were extensions of ourselves.
Sloane seemed to be empathetic to Ginger’s pain, but her next statement made it clear whatever affection she’d had for Benson had been buried with him.
“He was a wonderful man once upon a time. But he lost focus on what was important. I hate to speak ill of the dead, but if he treated everyone like he treated you and me, Ginger, then it’s no surprise what happened to him. We all get what we deserve in the end.”
As I watched the empathy in Sloane’s face sour into disdain, I couldn’t help but wonder if she had been the one to give Benson Mallowan what he deserved.
Chapter 26
Tara
The kill pen was on a scab of barren land just outside of Bloodson Bay. The monstrous metal building came into view as my truck, hauling a bullet-shaped silver horse trailer, bumped along the rural highway pitted with potholes and surrounded by untamed land. Waist-deep weeds and scrub trees lined the berm of the road all the way up to my turn-off, a gravel path that led to a dusty parking lot beside a huge metal arena. The arena where truckloads of horses were dumped off in an auction where they’d be sold either as pets or food.
As I backed my truck between two empty trailers, I thought of today’s conversation with Sloane. Clearly she had long ago fallen out of love with Benson, but did she hate him enough to kill him? Obviously the police didn’t think so, because she was free and my husband wasn’t. Hopefully not for long.
All I wanted to do after dropping Ginger off at home was fall into my bed and sleep for days. The sleep deprivation was getting to me, and my nerves were frantic and spazzing. I could barely eat due to the nausea that roiled in my stomach nonstop since Chris’s incarceration. But duty called…literally. The phone call from Al Dutey, the man who organized the horse auctions at the kill pen, had flashed across my screen just as my head hit the pillow.
A nearly starved eleven-year-old mare I had won at auction was ready to be picked up from the lot, and after a quick change into jeans, a T-shirt, and boots, here I was to save her from this hell.
I loved my job as much as I loathed it. Seeing the horses’ bones jutting out, the emaciated ribs, the cracked hooves, and the way they flinched at the slightest movement of a tender hand revealed the extent of their abuse. Watching them herded into these lots day in and day out took its emotional toll on my fragile heart, but knowing I could give some of them another chance at life evened out the sacrifice. It was the ones I couldn’t save that broke me.
Dirt kicked up in a cloud around my cowboy boots as I plodded toward the wide gated arena entrance to wait for Al. The metal walls of the building were gnawed by rust along the bottom, and inside the whinny of horses bounced off the high ceiling. The afternoon sun blinded my eyes into a squint as I watched a small scrum of sweaty horses, squeezed in side to side, wrestling for space. The fug of dust and manure billowed around their stomping feet.
No water buckets to quench their thirst were in sight. No fans to blow off the flies. My fingers itched to open the latch to the gate that would set them free.
“Well, well, if it ain’t Tara Christie, come down from her pretty little pedestal to save the world.”
The sneering voice kindled a flame of fury deep inside me. Turning on my bootheel, I fought the urge to tear the man I hated most in this world a new one.
“Victor Valance, always a pleasure,” I said between gritted teeth.
Wrapped in a black leather jacket (who wore leather in the sizzling June heat?) with a Stetson shading his hooked nose and tobacco-stained teeth, he could have played the villain in any number of old Western movies. Victor and I had a long history of outbidding each other on horses, his goal to buy them low and sell them high to Mexican dog food manufacturers. My goal was to do anything I could to stop him. Which made me numero uno on his shit list.
Vic sauntered toward me on his bandy legs, tossing an empty beer can on the ground as he propped his Ariat-booted foot up on the bottom rung of the gate and scraped off the caked-on manure. His left cheek, filled with a wad of chaw, pooched out like a giant tick.
“I heard you’re here to pick up that old mare you outbid me on. I should warn you, I don’t take kindly to you tryin’ to run my small business into the ground,” he spat, ambling so close I could smell the beer on his breath.
Maybe if I ignored him he’d go away, which was a better alternative than a joust of words with the only human I knew who took pleasure in killing. Men like Victor Valance were the worst type of weeds. Suffocating, lethal, insufferable, indestructible.
“Don’t kid yourself, Vic. You’re not a small business. You’re an animal killer. There are a dozen other ways to make dog food without slaughtering domesticated horses, but you care more about your bottom line than you do about people’s pets.”
“What you call pets, I call food,” he scoffed, resting a calloused hand on my shoulder. A thick gold ring with a ruby gem hugged his ring finger. His rodeo ring. Everyone on this side of the Mississippi had heard in great detail about how he had won it at the state bull riding competition. I swatted his hand off; his touch disgusted me.
“If people cared so damn much about ’em, the horses wouldn’t be here at the kill pen. Consider me a philanthropist, doin’ my part to help stop global warming. A few hundred less horses means less methane bein’ released into the atmosphere.”
I rolled my eyes, biting back a retort. My mother always said that unexpressed feelings didn’t die. You just buried them alive so they could claw their way back out, uglier than ever.
“You’re suddenly an environmentalist, driving your diesel truck while tossing garbage on the ground, huh?” But there was no point to debating values with Satan’s second cousin. “Would it be too much to ask if you just stay out of my life, and I stay out of yours?”
“It’s too late for that. The only life that matters is mine, girl. And I aim to stomp my boots on top of anyone who gets in the way of that. Even a pretty little thang like you.”
I almost gagged. “Good luck stopping me.”
He snorted, just like the pig that he was. “Oh, you gonna have your hubby kill me like he killed Benson Mallowan?”
My attention shot over to him.
He knew he had provoked me.
“Didn’t you know the whole town heard about it? You’re famous, darlin’! A hero, in fact. I thought he had it comin’ for all the people he owed money to. Took me for five grand in a poker match, cheatin’ bastard. I would’ve taken him out if your husband hadn’t thought of it first. Let me guess—I’m bettin’ it was an affair gone wrong. Am I right?”
“Shut the hell up, Valance. You don’t know what you’re talking about.”
I clenched my fists, wanting to pop him in his rumor-spreading mouth.
“Hey, I’m not the one spreadin’ the story, though I can’t say I don’t enjoy watching it unfold. Don’t be surprised if you see me around more.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Was he the one hanging around my neighborhood, to keep an eye on me?
His thin lips opened, then closed as he reconsidered whatever he was about to say. “Look, I know I’m a monster, but not for the reasons you think. I’m not evil for killin’ horses. I’m evil because of how much pleasure I get killing these beasts when I know it kills you.”
I looked at him with disgust. “You are sick, you know that?”
“And rich, bitch. Just know that I’m not keen on competition, and I aim to bring you down. Whatever it takes.”
With that parting shot he sauntered away, pausing at the overcrowded pen to rub the flank of a pony with fake affection. “I call this ‘un Alpo,” he joked to me over his shoulder, and hocked a ball of tobacco spit at the poor beast for good measure.
I prayed a tractor would run over the son of a bitch.
After dropping the mare off at the Rockin’ C Ranch, I pulled up the driveway beneath a concrete gray sky. I was still livid over Vic while blindly searching my bottomless purse for my house key. Not a blink of light was on, not a rustle of life.
When I finally found my key, I touched the tip of it to the lock, sending the door swinging open to an empty house. It hadn’t been properly locked, let alone closed, with a damn killer on the loose! My first thought was that I was certain I had locked it behind me when I’d left Nora alone in the house, asleep.
My second thought considered the possibility that Nora had woken up and unlocked the front door for some reason, despite my helicopter mom edict that she keep all the doors locked, always, especially when she was upstairs in her private bubble. But as I entered the house, something felt off. It was too late, too dark, too quiet.
Turning on a table lamp in the living room, I skimmed the first floor. Nothing was out of place. Maybe exhaustion was messing with my thoughts. My tender foot screamed for attention. I needed to sit down, so I took off my boots and tossed them under the entryway table. Setting my keys down next to the lamp, I caught the flutter of a handwritten note:
Decided you were right. Don’t want to miss out on the wrestling state championship, so Grandma took me to practice. Sleeping at Grandma’s tonight. Be back in the morning. Love you. Nora <3
Well, at least that explained the open front door. Nora must have forgotten to lock up behind her. After years of raising a devoted mommy-worshipping little girl, then a thoughtfully helpful middle-schooler, I came to realize when Nora arrived at her thirteenth birthday that teenagers were a completely different breed of human. Messy. Notoriously forgetful. Distracted. But what hit me the hardest was that her world no longer revolved around me. My place as sun to her earth had been replaced by social media, boys, shopping…anything and everything, really.
I sank into the sofa, picking up the remote control to distract myself with some Netflix. Definitely not Stranger Things, since Chris would kill me if I watched ahead of him, so instead I scrolled to something warm and fuzzy. A little Bridgerton, maybe. The red N was still dissolving off the screen when I heard a crash somewhere within the house. I turned off the television, sitting up straight to listen. All was quiet, but not quite right.
It was most likely a mouse in the house, and I would have thought nothing more about it…until I heard footsteps. Then a long creak, like a door closing. Listening for its source, I reached into my back pocket for my cell phone…which wasn’t there. I must have left it in the truck. But who would I call, anyway? Chris was in jail, Ginger was nursing her battered hip, and Peace customarily turned her phone off after eight o’clock because she went to bed with the chickens and woke with the roosters.
