Читать книгу Shallow Grave - Карен Харпер - Страница 12

4

Claire and Nick finally had permission to leave. With Jackson’s help, they had just run the gauntlet of media and curious onlookers outside the gate. With microphones thrust in their faces, Nick had made a brief statement that the accident was under formal investigation and they had no other comment. Claire was upset that cameras rolled and the newspaper photographer took several shots. After all they’d been through, she had no desire to be back in the glare of publicity and the peril it could sometimes lead to.

Things had been going so well, and now this tragedy. She and Nick had both given statements to the Naples detective who had arrived. Ann Hoffman had been interviewed briefly since she had not been in the immediate area nor even seen the tiger that day. Besides, she was in shock. Brittany had told Nick that Jace had suggested he represent her, at least for now, so Nick had sat in with her for a lengthy interview with Detective Jensen.

When they were in their car in the parking lot, Claire exhaled hard and said, “Whew. The last time I was on TV, it brought our enemies to our front door. I just hope there won’t be criminal charges against Brittany or Ann. And they can hardly charge a dead man with criminal negligence.”

“Or his own suicide. But as you said, no one would try to kill themselves that way. And I think—from the fact Jace admired Ben Hoffman so much—with a group of young kids nearby, it couldn’t be suicide.”

“You’re not thinking it could be murder?”

“As I told the media mavens, I’m sure there will be an investigation. I may help out right now, but after all we’ve been through, we’re not getting involved in this. Listen,” he said, reaching over the console to put a hand on her knee, “let’s sit here for a few minutes to see if Jace drives in so we can brief him before he goes inside.”

“Okay, fine. But Brittany was in charge of that tiger. Could the State of Florida at the very least accuse the BAA of inadequate safety procedures or something like that?”

“Her father’s the one who went in the cage. Thank God it wasn’t that the beast got out. She’s still adamant that the tiger was only doing what came naturally. She told the police that the cat should not be punished, not be put down, and she wanted to be there to watch when it regains consciousness. But about your question—yes. The Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission and even the US Department of Agriculture might get involved, but for a private, small zoo—not sure. There’s Jace’s car. I’ll go snag him.”

Nick got out and hurried over to where Jace parked. Claire had to admit, despite trying to keep it together in front of Nick and the police, that she felt emotionally drained and exhausted. Feeling revved up could actually slow her responses, and her narcolepsy was kicking in to make her want to sleep on her feet. In the chaos, she hadn’t taken her herbal stimulant, Country Mallow, on time either. It was at home with her other herbals, which is where they should have been by now. Timing was the problem with herbs, at least hers, so maybe she needed to start carrying a thermos of two kinds of herbal tea around with her.

At least talking on her cell earlier to Lexi and Darcy had calmed her some. Her sister still had Duncan because his mother had not yet been back from her job. Darcy said they had decided not to tell the children what had happened, only that there had been an accident, but Claire figured Darcy was waiting for big sis psych major to explain. And in case they heard about it elsewhere, it was going to be best to tell them the truth.

Claire watched Nick flag down Jace as he parked. She got out and walked over one lane and several spaces toward them as the men walked toward the gate. They evidently didn’t see her.

The only two men she had ever loved seemed so different from each other. Nick was dark-haired with silvering at his temples and gray eyes—her brilliant silver fox. He was several inches taller than Jace, who was more muscular. At age forty, Nick had a sexy, deep voice and tightly coiled but smoothly controlled body and demeanor. He was a deep thinker, with deeper emotions, who had helped many people—mostly without fanfare. Jace was thirty-four, blond with a broad face and blue eyes, still navy-short hair, sharp movements, a modern day Viking with a swashbuckling aura. His feelings were usually all on the surface and sometimes likely to explode.

“What’s with the crowd?” Claire heard Jace ask Nick. “Can’t they leave a tragedy alone? It’s worse than rubbernecking at a car wreck. I—I really liked Ben. Hell of a thing.”

Claire could tell even from this distance that Jace’s face looked ravaged, as if he’d been crying or trying not to. His body language showed he was not only tense but angry.

As she joined the men, she saw Jace study her also, narrow-eyed as he always did, a quick check of her belly. Awkwardly, at first, instead of looking at each other, the three of them turned to look at the people milling around by that entry gate. Their chants swelled, and some held signs picturing lions, tigers and the Florida panther. The original ragtag bunch must be getting more organized.

“Save big cats! Don’t be rats!” they recited over and over. And, once in a while from another group, “Keep the wild in wildlife!” Claire wondered if those people could be from the Save Our Wildlife group Darcy had recently joined, but no time to think about that now.

“Lexi’s all right?” Jace asked her, raising his voice over the noise.

“The kids are all safe,” she told him.

“Thank God. Gotta get to Brit. But why would her dad go into a tiger cage?”

“Good question,” Nick said. “I hope she or the BAA won’t need representation, but she’s asked for it, just in case. I didn’t want to get involved but I told her sure. If it gets sticky or drawn out, I can always assign a partner.”

“Good. I told her you could help.”

Jace extended his hand, and the two men shook. Despite some rough spots in the past, they’d worked together to live through worse than this. They had been on edge with each other at first, but they had saved each other’s lives since. What was that Chinese proverb, Claire thought, that if you saved someone’s life, you were somehow responsible for them?

“Be safe,” Jace said with a lift of a hand as if he were blessing them. But he turned back. “Does Lexi—the other kids—know what really happened?”

Claire shook her head. “I asked Darcy and Bronco to tell them there was an accident, but they don’t know details—not that anyone really does. I’m going to explain as best I can.”

“Tell Lexi that I—we—love her. Gotta help Brit,” he threw over his shoulder and jogged toward the crowd at the gate.

Nick took Claire’s arm, and they were starting toward their car when a sleek, black pickup truck pulled up to them. The door was emblazoned in gold with the words TROPHY RANCH, NAPLES, FLORIDA, HUNTER’S HEAVEN. A rugged-looking, handsome man with a mustache, wearing a Western hat, leaned out and called to them, “I’m the neighbor. Just heard what happened. Hope I can help. You’re Nick Markwood, right? We’ve met before.”

“Right. I recognize you, Stan Helter,” Nick said and reached toward the driver’s window to shake hands. “Nothing to do now, I think, unless you can get rid of this crowd—or want to be interviewed by the media.”

“Even for free publicity, hell no. Don’t need our future guests getting gun-shy over an animal killing a man. Big ex-marine shoulda had a gun on him. As for the crowd, coupla blasts with a hunting rifle in the air might clear them out.”

Claire figured that was his idea of humor, but she wasn’t so sure when she saw he had a gun rack mounted in the back cab window, one obviously not for show since it bristled with rifles, some with big scopes attached.

“They gonna keep the killer cat alive?” Helter asked Nick.

“It wasn’t really theirs. A refugee, kind of a ward of the state they took from some old woman who couldn’t keep it and shouldn’t have had it. Its BAA keeper insists the killing was instinct, not intent.”

“Brittany Hoffman, you mean, the beast-loving blonde. But they’re sly and crafty—big cats. Hope I can help the Hoffmans later somehow. Listen, Markwood, come visit us someday, almost always something doing. Bring our mutual friend Manfort with you. See you, Counselor. Ma’am,” he said, giving Claire a good once-over before he drove off.

“Someone who works at the Trophy Ranch?” Claire asked as they headed toward their car again.

“Its mastermind and owner. That place is big business. I met him once at a Save the Glades charity event. A friend of mine from way back, Grant Manfort, introduced us. I think Grant’s a shareholder in the Trophy Ranch.”

“But they shoot big game there, don’t they? Those ‘save big cats’ protestors should go picket his spread. And he asked what they were going to do with the tiger as if he’d like to get his hands on it.”

“I think they hunt everything there from gators and wild boars to who knows what else.”

“I noticed—maybe he did too—that you didn’t introduce me.”

“Not the type of guy you’d like to know. Grant says he’s savvy, but a rough character and a real womanizer.” He opened the car door for her, and she got in. “Sweetheart, let’s just go get Lexi before either of us starts cooking up suspicions or strategies about Ben’s death. Besides, you look like you need your meds before a bad dream hits.”

“This is already a bad dream. Yes, let’s go try to tell the kids a version of what happened before we go home.”

* * *

Inside the tight quarters of the BAA administration trailer, Jace held Brit close. He’d had to talk his way in through the cop at the gate. Brit had said her mother was heavily sedated and lying down in the back room, just staring at the ceiling. Brit hugged him back hard, but he was amazed she didn’t cry. Tough cookie. Or else she was in shock, like her mother. He knew damn well from combat experiences that horror sometimes took a while to be real, let alone to heal.

“The tiger had already mauled him and bitten through his carotid artery,” she said against his shoulder. “There was blood, blood, blood all over. Jace, just when the tiger was bringing more people in, and our family was getting on better. Wait until Lane hears. He’ll go ballistic. He hated the idea of the BAA.”

“Yeah, you got a brother who’s a far cry from the rest of you. But back to what happened here,” he said with a sniff as he pictured an apparently healthy, happy Ben having a beer with him just last week. Had he known the guy at all? Had he liked him too much too fast? Damn, but he regretted their recent argument. Trying to keep his voice steady, he asked, “Did Ben go in to feed Tiberia?”

“He was going to feed him since I was with the kids, including Lexi, but he knew better than to go into the cage for that—for anything, especially at feeding time. He knew just to shove the food through the hatch and then push it in closer only with the long gaff pole. The food box was not in the cage—but he was.” Her voice broke again.

“Maybe he just stepped inside because he thought the animal was secure in that holding area—what you called the bedroom, separate behind the cage. Maybe Tiberia was hiding in that little cave you made so he could get out of the sun, and then—”

“Jace, I’ve been over it all with an officer, then a detective with Nick Markwood there!”

“Sure. Sure,” he said, kissing the top of her head through her wild hair, then pressed his lips there. “Just a mystery, then, one we may never have the answer to.”

“He hadn’t been himself lately. Kind of depressed and inwardly angry—more than usual, that is. That scares me.”

“You mean that he might have been secretly sui—”

“I don’t know. I don’t know! Now I have to decide whether to admit Mother to the hospital where they can keep an eye on her or whether I can take her home.”

She suddenly exploded in sobs. He held her as tightly as he could, sat down in the swivel desk chair and pulled her onto his lap. If only Claire had been like this when they were married, telling him everything, trusting him, clinging even.

* * *

Claire, Nick and Darcy sat the four children down in Darcy’s living room. Lexi perched on a leather hassock between Nick’s legs. Duncan was sitting cross-legged on the floor with Darcy’s son, Drew, and Jilly leaned against her mother’s shoulder on the couch. Still fighting exhaustion, Claire sat in a chair, facing everyone.

In her steadiest voice, feeling a bit better since Darcy had brewed tea for her, even if it didn’t have her herbals, she began, “I know you are all wondering about the accident at the BAA today.”

“It was a loud scream and scary,” Jilly said.

“It was real bad,” Duncan added. “Like someone getting beat up and real hurt.”

“Okay, that’s all true,” Claire put in, feeling it wouldn’t take much for this to “go over Niagara” as her father used to say. “Remember that Brittany, the tiger talker, told us that tigers are wild animals. When they live in the wild, they have to kill to get meat to eat.”

Nick nodded in encouragement, and Darcy bit her lower lip. Claire still didn’t know how she would have survived her own childhood without her younger sister, when their father took off for parts unknown and their mother became such a recluse, escaping reality through books. Sad that the two men Claire had cared for had father issues too. And what was the truth about Ben Hoffman’s relationship to his daughter and son—even to Jace?

“Well, Mr. Hoffman, Brittany’s father,” Claire went on, struggling for words, “the man we met in the parking lot, made a mistake when he went to feed the tiger its meat. Somehow he didn’t know Tiberia was in its cage and he walked inside, and the animal thought it was still in the wild, and he hurt Mr. Hoffman. Sadly, he died.”

Drew asked, “You mean the tiger or Mr. Hoffman?”

“It was a terrible accident, but Mr. Hoffman died.”

Lexi said, “Then isn’t the tiger a murderer, not just a hungry big cat?”

Claire tried to keep her voice steady. “But you know that’s how animals are. They aren’t like people, who decide whether they will hurt or kill someone. Animals don’t know right from wrong like people do.”

“Bronco sometimes kills gators and those big snakes that are out in the Glades,” Lexi said. “Is he a murderer? And do you mean that Tiberia ate Mr. Hoffman—like—like—for dinner?”

“My dad hurt and killed someone,” Duncan said, “and that’s why he ran away, but the tiger’s in a cage and can’t go anywhere.”

Questions, protests followed, some rational, some off the wall. Lexi and Jilly cried. Claire and Nick, Darcy too, tried to calmly, carefully explain animal instinct and carnivorous vs. herbivorous to the children. Though she’d thought she could handle this, Claire scolded herself. She could have done better actually testifying before a hostile lawyer in court right now.

Besides, in the middle of this terrible day, Claire remembered that last week she and Nick had invited their friends and South Shore team members Heck and Gina, Bronco and Nita for dinner in—she glanced at her watch—three hours. At least the women were bringing dishes to go with salmon steaks on the grill. She bet, with all this going on, Nick had forgotten too.

But despite it all, she refused to cancel the dinner because it was going to be a big night for Bronco, and he had wanted those closest to him there. He was planning to announce his engagement to Nita after he proposed to her out by their pool, under the gazebo he had built for them. No going back to reschedule, since Bronco had picked this date because it was also Nita’s birthday and, he’d said, there would be a full moon tonight.

Full moon. Perfect! Wasn’t that when people supposedly went crazy?