The Bookwoman's Last Fling by John Dunning

other.
    â€œMr. Geiger had his own way of doing things. Me, I might have done it differently.”
    â€œOkay then, back to the brothers,” I said. “Cameron’s a jerk. What about the other two?”
    â€œDamon races at Santa Anita and Hollywood Park.”
    â€œUntil he showed up here, you mean.”
    â€œYeah, that’s what I meant.”
    â€œHollywood Park, Santa Anita…those are pretty classy racetracks.”
    â€œHe trains for other people. Some of his clients have money, but that doesn’t mean he knows anything.”
    â€œSounds like you two don’t get along.”
    â€œIt’s a dicey arrangement. That’s what we have.”
    â€œI couldn’t help overhearing you talking out on the porch and in the other room. Sounded really dicey, what I heard of it.”
    â€œThe man drives me crazy. But for now we’ve got to work together.”
    â€œOn what?”
    â€œWe both want to take some of these horses racing. Jesus, what’s this got to do with anything?”
    â€œThat’s what I’m trying to find out.”
    â€œLook, a racehorse only has a certain amount of time to do whatever he’s gonna do. They’ll never be three years old again, and one or two of ours would have excellent chances in the three-year-old races at Santa Anita this winter, if we can ever get these people to agree on anything.”
    â€œSo you’re trying to work with Damon.” I looked at my notes. “And the other one?”
    â€œBaxter. Crazy as hell, hears voices, talks to the gatepost. I think Bax could have been a decent horseman if he wasn’t nutty as a fruitcake. But I hear he gets along. He’s been racing at good second-rate tracks…Hot Springs…Omaha when it was still going…Denver in the old days. Now he’s trying to make inroads at the big California tracks as well.”
    â€œSo,” I said at last: “Who do you think did this and why?”
    â€œCameron, of course,” he said at once. “He’s always been a two-bit buck chaser.”
    â€œBut you have nothing solid to base that on, right? So far it’s just your suspicion.”
    â€œIf you get to know him you’ll understand.”
    â€œHow did they get along with their mother?”
    â€œIf you mean Candice, she was their stepmother. Mr. Geiger was married before, long ago. He had the three boys with her.”
    â€œWhat happened to the first wife?”
    â€œShe died years ago.”
    â€œOf what?”
    â€œShe had an accident. Christ, how can that possibly be important?”
    â€œWhat kind of accident?”
    â€œHer car rolled over…went into a lagoon and she drowned.”
    I made a lot of notes. He was starting to squirm when I said, “Tell me more about her life and death.”
    â€œTell you what for God’s sake? Look, this was years before Mr. Geiger met Candice.”
    â€œThen tell me about Sharon,” I said.
    â€œWhat do you want to know?”
    â€œWhat’s she like? Where does she live?”
    â€œWhat’s she like? Sharon is…”
    I waited, determined to wait him out if it took all day.
    â€œShe looks a lot like her mother,” he said at last, as if that told me everything, and I had a short, sharp vision of another young woman who looked a lot like her mother, a fleeting thought of the Rigbys of North Bend. Everything goes around; everything comes around. When I looked up at him, he said, “Put Sharon in that white dress and shoot her picture and you’d swear it was Candice, thirty years ago.”
    I cleared my head. “What does Sharon do?”
    â€œShe has a horse rescue farm.”
    â€œWhat does that mean?”
    â€œShe takes in horses that have been treated badly.”
    â€œAnd does what with them?”
    â€œShe heals them. She’s got the most amazing hands. Healing hands…I don’t know how else to describe it. I