Death by Equine by Annette Dashofy (booksvooks txt) 📕

Milt rubbed his chin with the back of his gloved hand. “That was a mistake. You see, I honestly liked you.” The sad smile was back. “I thought you’d be a nice addition to this second-rate operation.” The smile turned to a snarl. “And I wouldn’t have to worry about you screwing my wife.”

“You knew.”

Clown tossed his head and almost broke free. Milt tightened his grip on the lead shank. “Whoa, son.” He looked at Jessie, but she could tell he was seeing something else. “I suspected. Then that weekend...the weekend Doc and Amelia were supposed to be leaving for Hawaii...I was away at a symposium out in Harrisburg. I decided to come home early and surprise my beloved wife. Only I was the one who got the surprise. They were so wrapped up with each other, they didn’t even realize I was there. Do you know what it’s like to walk into your own home and find your beautiful wife in bed with your best friend?”

“Actually, I sort of do know.”

Milt’s eyes snapped back to focus on her. “I guess you do, don’t you?”

“Only with me, it was my husband holding hands with a total stranger in a diner.” The irony of exchanging tales of heartbreak with a man who literally held her life in his hands wasn’t lost on her. But she needed to give Greg time to get the message and come to her rescue.

Milt had said he honestly liked her. If she could appeal to that side of him. Keep him from injecting the drug into Clown. She might be able to talk her way out of this.

“And now,” Jessie continued. “Now, he’s sleeping with a little blonde twerp who worked for me.”

“It sucks, don’t it?”

“It does. At least I had the satisfaction of firing her.” Jessie forced a grin. It hurt like hell in more ways than one, but she hoped the pain didn’t show.

“And I had the satisfaction of watching Doc die.” Milt’s voice could have frozen water buckets in July. He looked at the syringe.

Her breath caught. Keep him talking. “Something else I don’t understand. Why did Doc fake the x-rays on Blue?”

Milt lifted his head. Once more Jessie had the feeling he was looking back in time. “He knew I was strapped. Catherine and her ponies. It’s not a cheap hobby, you know.”

Jessie nodded.

“I was in debt up to my ears. Buying horses. Feed. Training bills. Money pouring out and none coming in. But it was the price of keeping Catherine happy.”

Jessie thought maybe it was the price of keeping Catherine. Period.

“My dear friend Doc finds this big ol’ boy. Mexicali Blue. Bloodlines out his ass. Now my wife thinks Doc is the best thing since sliced bread for finding her this horse. Except then the horse goes lame. But it ain’t Doc’s fault. Oh, no. He’s still her hero. And I’m left paying for it.” Milt looked down and kicked at a mound of manure. “I think that was Doc’s plan all along. Ruin me. Then he could ride in on his white steed and take my Catherine away from such squalor.”

The stall fell silent. Milt, the picture of a broken man, gazed into space.

Clown broke the silence. He snorted and pawed the straw bedding dangerously close to Jessie’s legs. She drew her knees in. Startled, the stallion flung his head up, taking Milt with him.

“Stop that.” Milt jerked the halter.

“It seems like an odd way to kill someone.” Jessie kept her voice soft, not wanting to spook either the horse or Milt. “I mean, how could you count on Clown killing Doc?”

Milt considered the question before answering. “To tell you the truth, I’d have been happy if all Doc got was busted up real good. But he was so damned distracted with his vacation plans that he let ol’ Clown kill him.”

Doc’s vacation. “It could have been me.” Jessie shivered. “What if I’d have shown up instead of Doc? You had to know I was supposed to be filling in for him.”

“That old cuss wouldn’t miss a call until Amelia had his ass in the seat of the airplane.” Milt’s face softened. “But if you had shown up, I was right there. I’d have been Sir Lancelot coming to your rescue. I never wanted to hurt you, darlin’.”

“You watched him die.”

“I did.”

“Milt, you keep saying you don’t want to hurt me. Don’t do this.”

The agony etching his face gave her hope. “You wouldn’t listen to me. I kept trying to get you to leave it alone. Just let it be an accident. Even your idiot husband kept telling you that.” Milt shook his head. “I wish to hell you’d have listened to us. Now I have no choice.”

She opened her mouth to argue, but he held up a finger to shush her.

“There’s no other way. You’d have to tell what you know. It’s just who you are.” He flipped the cap off the syringe with his thumb.

Jessie swallowed down the panic. “You removed Clown’s records from the file cabinet in the office.”

“Yep. You were digging into this boy’s history.” He nodded at the horse. “I figured as long as you didn’t find out about his reaction to the drug, you’d drop it. How the hell did you get your hands on them after I got rid of them?”

“You didn’t know? Doc kept backup records at his house.”

Milt pressed his lips into a thin, flat line. “Dang.”

“Why did you break into my house?”

“You know why.” He rubbed Clown’s neck—the spot he intended to inject.

“I get why you burned the records.” She had to keep him distracted. “But why bust up my stuff?”

He chuckled. “If all I did was get rid of evidence, it would’ve been too obvious, don’t you think?”

Jessie longed to check over her shoulder in hope of seeing Greg, or even Popovich, standing outside the stall but doubted anyone had received her distress call. And she didn’t know how much longer she