Chapter Forty-Three

The first rackvisible in the tack room held only one saddle. Wendy disappeared for a second, then brought another to the rack and rested it there. Considering its stirrup hung by a ribbon of leather, I guessed she was gathering the saddles that needed fixing.

"Wendy, we need to talk."

"I'm busy." She didn't stop her methodical movements, back and forth, back and forth. A third saddle. A fourth.

"It was the DNA test, wasn't it, Wendy?" I kept my voice calm and reasonable, careful not to lead with an accusation. "Keefe was getting the test results back and you couldn't have that. Did you intercept results once already? But how many times could that work? How many sets could you destroy?"

Wendy went for another saddle — and reappeared immediately with a shotgun pointed at us. It must have been behind the door.

I heard Diana's quick intake of breath beside me.

I'd rushed it. Too far, too fast.

She'd been close to the edge, pushed there by her own knowledge and Randall's fake note.

"Get your hands out of your pockets," Wendy ordered.

I'd unlocked my phone, but didn't persist.

She gestured for us to back up slightly. Afraid we'd rush her? Or not wanting blood and... evidence ... all over herself?

The Kenyons and McCrackens were silent behind us. They had to know the shotgun could reach them, too. Though she couldn't get everybody before somebody could rush her.

Small comfort with Diana and me in the front row.

"Should have used this on him instead of that peashooter. But even Brenda would have woken up. She's always trying to make out I'm the deaf one, but she's worse."

I thought I heard footsteps. Right or wrong, the best thing I could do now was stall.

"Did you see the DNA results?"

"The DNA results, the DNA results. I am so tired about hearing about those damned things. If the results were just about those stupid outlaws he was always going on about, everything would have been fine," she snapped. "My uncle said — but I thought maybe he was wrong or Ulla lied to him. But those results said it was true. Showed him right there with the other Barlows."

"You destroyed the first set of results. Like you burned your uncle's will. Did he leave the ranch to all three of you or just you and Keefe?"

She blinked at that, but didn't say anything.

"What the hell are you doing, Wendy?" Brenda demanded from my right.

"Get back in the barn," Wendy ordered.

Brenda kept coming.

"Go call the sheriff," I shouted at her.

She didn't stop and she didn't pull out a phone.

"I'll shoot you, Brenda."

Wendy swung the gun in that direction.

We couldn't possibly reach cover before she could swing it back. But Diana and I must have had the same idea for taking advantage of the distraction, because each of us had a hand in a pocket, hitting buttons on our unseen phones.

"Yeah?" Brenda mocked. "You could've done that anytime these past decades. What's it going to get you? What's any of this going to get you? Somebody'll get away. And that'll be the end."

"It's my ranch. I can—"

"You can't. It's the end."

The gun wobbled in Wendy's hold. I didn't consider that much of an improvement.

Brenda said, "Drop it."

Wendy didn't.

She gave a strangled shout and ran to one of the ranch trucks.

Before getting in, she turned back to us and swung the shotgun around like a kid with a hose, as if to hold us all at bay. None had gotten any closer.

In fact, Diana and I moved of one accord toward the tack room doors. Randall tugged Robin to behind him. Sam, Serena, and Brenda stood rooted where they were.

The truck rumbled to life and headed out.

"Shouldn't we—?" Sam started.

"Go after her? No," I said. "Call the sheriff's department? Yes."

Diana held up her phone, indicating she was fulfilling that duty.

I went to Brenda. "Are you okay?"

"Why shouldn't I be?"

"You said the sheriff's department got it wrong for arresting Wendy for killing Keefe, but I'm afraid—"

"They did. Not wrong that she could kill him or did kill him, but that she did it over some supposed romance they had."

"You... you thought she could have killed him? You thought that all along?"

"Sure."

The truck rattled over the bridge, then slowed.

It was too far away to see if Wendy Barlow turned back to look at the ranch she loved enough to kill for.

The truck lurched forward under a heavy foot on the accelerator.