Death on Heels by Ellen Byerrum Read Free Book Online Page B

dogwoods and holly trees.
    Of course, plants and trees grew more easily in Virginia. Here in Colorado, the Smithsonians’ grass was flat and yellow, like every other Denver lawn in wintertime. The evergreen bushes needed to be trimmed, but the pines and junipers stood tall against the winter storms. Heaven forbid that a leafy tree should intrude on the alpine splendor of it all.
    “It’s so good to have you home, Lacey. Now, take your time, relax, freshen up, but do hurry and get ready, dear. Your father is taking us all out to dinner,” Rose announced. “And we’ll hammer out this whole Cole Tucker business.”
    That’s what I was afraid of.
Lacey set her bag down in her old, yet not at all familiar, bedroom and fled to the living room. “Where’s the newspaper?” She wanted to see how the local media were handling the story. Her mother pointed to
The Denver Post
on the blond coffee table.
    “I bought an extra copy for you.” Tucker’s arrest was featured on the bottom of the front page, with a jump to the inside. W ESTERN S LOPE R ANCHER A RRESTED IN T HREE M URDERS . “For your scrapbook.”
    Lacey perched delicately on one of the uncomfortable accent chairs. The story was long on background and short on relevant facts.
The
Post
had clearly been caught by surprise and was padding the story with local color. A sidebar on the murders even pointed out that Sagebrush wasn’t that far from Brown’s Park, once a notorious outlaw haven in the Old West, and that some claimed the area was still a hangout for “criminal elements.”
A century ago,
Lacey thought,
when Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were hanging out there.
    “I’ve been thinking, Lacey,” Rose said. “Cole must have a hidden life.”
    “It’s impossible to have a hidden life in Sagebrush, Mom. Everybody is in your business all the time. Kind of like our family.”
    “Did you know he was a homicidal psychopath?” Cherise asked.
    “Cole Tucker better be innocent. That’s all I can say,” Rose said. “My God, he was here with us for that one Thanksgiving dinner. I served him turkey at our table. He seemed so nice. Why, I never would have—”
    “You never would have served a murderer your Thanksgiving turkey,” Lacey said. “We know that, Mom.”
    “How’s my girl?” Steven Smithsonian emerged from his workshop in the garage and gave Lacey a hug.
    Steven was an even-tempered man who let his wife handle the family and the social calendar, which left him free to play golf. His golfing buddies had nicknamed him Even Steven. He and Rose were also fond of tennis. They played doubles with friends and were taking up birding. They had season tickets to the Colorado Rockies and Opera Colorado. He might have felt like the odd man out, outnumbered by the females in the house, but his daughters thought of Even Steven as the counterbalance to Rose’s flamboyance.
    Steven Smithsonian had always looked like the quintessential dad to Lacey, with his black Clark Kent glasses and combed-back brown hair. His daughters used to pretend he was more interesting than he appeared. They finally decided that he must be a CIA agent, rather than the manufacturer’s senior sales rep he said he was. He sold plastic parts for some sort of machinery, but eyes glazed over whenever Steven went into detail.
    “What’s all this nonsense about that old boyfriend of yours?” he asked.
    “That’s what I’m trying to find out, Dad,” Lacey said. “But what’s going on with you?”
    “Flying to Thailand on Monday.” That was a relief to Lacey. He would be in transit for at least twenty-four hours, unable to aid and abet Rose in any of her schemes.“Your mother tells me you have another young man on the hook.”
    “On the hook? Thanks, Mom.”
    “Isn’t this new one from Sagebrush too? Something about that place, you know. There really should be a way to figure out whether these fellows of yours are going to turn out to be bad apples. Before you date them, I