St Kilda Consulting 01 - Always Time to Die
me know if it makes you sick.”
“You’re such a Pollyanna.”
“It’s a gift.” Dan sat and watched his passenger from the corner of his eye. The rest of his attention was on the road.
After a bit of a struggle, Carly managed to open the water. She took a mouthful, let it dissolve the foul flavor in her mouth, and spat it out the open window. The third time she did it, her mouth tasted more like her own. She sipped and swallowed tentatively. Another sip. Another.
“You doing okay?” he asked.
“So far. It’s not like having too much booze in my blood. Drinking water doesn’t make me feel worse.”
He waited.
After a final sip she capped the water. “Let’s see how that settles.”
“Good idea.” With that, Dan gave his full attention to the road. After five minutes, he glanced over at Carly again. “Doing okay?”
“I’m still fuzzy. But not like before. I can stay awake.”
He took her pulse. Slow, but nothing to worry about. She was just really, really relaxed. He turned the ignition key so that he could run up the passenger window.
“Here,” he said. “Sleep if you want to. It’s safe now.”
“You mean you aren’t going to jump me?”
“This minute? No.”
“Well, damn. Then why are we freezing our butts off out here?”
“Humor me.”
“But—”
“Do you really want to know?” he asked.
“Yes.”
“I’m waiting to see who comes along.”
“I figured that out. But why?”
“Somebody might be curious about how well the dope worked. Or to finish the job if you’re still…” He shrugged.
Alive.
Neither said it.
Both thought it.
QUINTRELL RANCH
LATE THURSDAY NIGHT
36
WINIFRED IGNORED THE SLUGGISHNESS OF HER BODY AND MIND , STRENGTH LOST to a drug, strength she couldn’t afford to lose.
Who was it?
Who drugged us?
Why?
The questions battered her mind as much as illness battered her body.
Everybody could have. Once the doctor brought me into the room, my back was to the bottle holding the farewell toast. Or it could have been put in the empty cups.
Anyone. Anyone at all.
With a sharp movement of her head, she tossed back the stimulant she’d mixed for herself as soon as she’d understood what had happened. While the false strength hummed through her blood, she put away the old questions and asked another one.
Who couldn’t have drugged us?
That was the person she would trust to mail the envelopes.
With steady rhythm and unsteady hands, she wheeled herself through the house’s wide hallways to the Senator’s office. She didn’t see the paintings and sculpture, the expensive knickknacks from another time; she thought only about the members of the household, the people who had access to her herbs and those who didn’t.
Nothing changed. It still could have been anyone. She would have to see to the copying and mailing herself.
She opened the door to the office and nudged her wheelchair through. Across the room, the old-fashioned clock ticked between photos of the Senator smiling into the camera, his eyes on the main chance and his hands ever ready to grab a female butt.
I should have killed him years ago.
But she hadn’t. She’d been afraid of his son, a fear that proved wise.
She wheeled over to the desk. Everything she needed was there, from copier to computer to supplies. Melissa kept the office as if the Senator was still alive, still able to dictate letters and watch them typed. Outgoing material—bills and checks and orders for supplies—lay bundled on the polished wood tray at the edge of the old desk, just as mail always had at the ranch.
Winifred turned on the copier and went to work, reproducing the old document she’d taken from a locked box hidden in her room. When she was finished copying, she shut off the machine and turned to the desk. The wheelchair made reaching everything awkward, but she had no choice.
The side drawer stuck, then finally gave with a creak when she kept tugging. Deliberately she counted out three envelopes crisp with the Quintrell ranch logo and began addressing them. Into each envelope she put a copy of the old document. She hesitated, then put the receipt for the DNA samples that she’d sent into the envelope destined for Carolina May. She also put the original document in that envelope, folding the brittle paper ruthlessly.
With deliberate motions that belied the frantic beating of Winifred’s heart, she sealed the envelopes and put stamps on each. Then she carefully mixed the three
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