“Absolutely,” I said. “You have the freedom to talk your way right into a contempt of court.”
“Hey, dude, chill,” said his friend, which gave me a little hope for learning experiences.
“Sorry, Your Honor,” said Dodson and hustled his clients out of the courtroom.
The last three cases of the day asked for continuances, which I granted. I signed a couple of show-cause orders, but there was nothing else on my docket so I adjourned court shortly before three-thirty.
Rather than go back to the condo and veg out, I dug into my purse for the card that Billy Ed Johnson had given me Monday night with his cell phone number. He was so proud of the work he’d done in the area that he’d offered to tour me around. “Anytime,” he’d said. “Just give me a ring.”
When he answered on the third ring, he sounded pleased that I’d called. “I thought you were just being polite.”
I laughed and reminded him that I still had his ball cap from our drive up to the Ashe house.
“Aw, you don’t need to give it back.”
Remembering the raunchy logo on it, I assured him I did.
He told me that he was out near the Tennessee border at the moment, and we agreed to meet at a watering hole two ridges over from Cedar Gap, at a place called Eagle Rest. I gave him my cell phone number in case he got delayed and he gave me clear directions, which he made me write down and read back to him. He assured me that this was a can’t-miss shortcut that would take me straight to the pub by four o’clock if I left right then, so I slid my phone back into my purse, put on my jacket, hung my robe on a hook behind the door, slung my laptop over my shoulder, and was out of there, calling good-bye to Mary Kay, who was still looking at pictures of the bailiff’s new granddaughter.
A UPS truck was parked off to the side of the parking lot downstairs, and if I hadn’t already told Billy Ed I’d meet him by four, I would have hung around to hear what Underwood had learned. Now I’d have to wait till tomorrow.
There was a moment of unpleasantness as I put my laptop in the trunk and unlocked my car door. Several cars over from mine were the two young men I’d just sentenced. The one with the obscene sweatshirt quickly looked away when my eyes met his, but the tattooed one—Barringer—glared back and gave me the finger.
More freedom of speech.
I shrugged and got in my car.
Ten minutes later, I was two turns off the main road, bedazzled by the fall colors blazing all around me as I topped the first ridge. I kept the speedometer well under the limit because there were no guardrails along this secondary road. It’s crazy. I don’t pay a lot of attention to Republicans, but I sort of remembered how one of the state senators from out this way—Virginia Foxx?—keeps trying to get Raleigh to put guardrails on all paved mountain roads. I guess there must not be enough voters up here to keep DOT on its toes and that most of them probably skid off the road every time the roads ice over.
At least the traffic was light here, and the few cars that were on this narrow road seemed to be locals, not leaf-crazy tourists, so when a black Ford Ranger riding high on oversize tires zoomed right up behind me, I assumed it was someone in a hurry to get home and moved over to give him room to pass.
That’s when he bumped me.
Startled, I glanced in the rearview mirror and recognized the angry kid from court. What the hell—?
He bumped me again, harder.
I stepped on the accelerator and my wheels squealed as I took a curve a lot faster than I wanted. He started to pass me, but then a car from the opposite direction appeared in the left lane and he swerved back in, grazing my rear bumper.
I realized that I couldn’t let him get between me and the side of the mountain. The crazy way he was driving, he might push me off the road. The bottom fell out of my stomach as I stole a glance toward the side. No shoulder worth speaking of between the right lane and a sheer drop beyond. I hugged the center line as long as I could, till yet another car appeared and I had to move over, fighting the wheel as the curve tightened. Before I could get back to the center, he elbowed in beside me.
A Firebird’s something of a muscle car, but with those monster tires he could climb all over me. Metal crunched on metal as he nudged me closer to the edge. I battled to hold my own car on the road, then, more in desperate instinct than rational thought, I sat on my brakes and he shot past me.
Frantically, I made a three-point turn and headed back up the rise, but the clashes had done something to my alignment and I had to struggle with the wheel. At least I now had the mountain on my side of the road.
My moment of relief was short-lived, because here was that shiny black Ranger in my rearview mirror again and coming up fast. The road took a sharp right curve, but I kept my right foot on the gas pedal and mashed it to the floorboard as I cornered.
At that instant, I felt a sickening jolt from behind.
A split second later, I was sailing straight out through bright blue sunlight. I stomped on the brakes, but there was only air beneath my wheels.
Sky and trees tumbled wildly in front of my windshield, then my world went black.
CHAPTER 26
THURSDAY, 3:50 P.M.
“Hey, Mary Kay,” George Underwood said as they met at the outer door on the lower level. “Playing hooky?” “Just a little bit. We finished up early and Mrs. Vincent said I could cut out early, too,” she said, referring to Lafayette County’s clerk of court.
“Judge Knott’s already gone?”
She nodded. “You missed her by about fifteen minutes.”
Underwood experienced a twinge of disappointment. He was looking forward to telling her of their interview with the UPS driver, who was just now pulling his boxy brown truck out of the parking lot as they watched.
“You sure you remember that Monday?” they had asked him. “Could you maybe be thinking of an earlier day when Mrs. Ledwig actually did take delivery?”
“It was that Monday. That’s when my radio station does the roundup of all the weekend baseball scores, and I wanted to see who the Braves might be going to have to face in the playoffs.”
“And you’re positive it was Mrs. Ledwig? You knew her by sight?”
“I didn’t ask to see her birth certificate, but I’m pretty sure I’ve seen her before. Middle-aged? Blond? ’Bout as tall as me? She was coming around from the back to get in her car. Had the keys in her hand and looked a little like she really wanted me to move it ’cause the truck was blocking the drive. I just handed her the stuff and she went back with ’em the way she’d come.”
Underwood looked at his notes. Tina Ledwig drove a silver Lexus. “What kind of car was it?”
The driver shrugged. “I don’t keep up with the makes. It was a luxury sedan, though. White.”
“I don’t suppose you noticed the license plate?”
“Sorry. I don’t remember the numbers, but the first three letters were S-U-N.”
Underwood, who had been leaning back in his chair, came upright. “You sure about that?”
“About the letters? Sure, I’m sure.”
Underwood swung around to his computer. “I’m going to type up your statement, and while I’m doing that, Detective Fletcher here will need to get your fingerprints so we can eliminate them from the packages.”
Now, the deliveryman was on his way back to Asheville and Underwood took his signed statement into Sheriff Horton’s office.
“You saying Sunny Osborne was at the Ledwig house that afternoon?” asked the sheriff.
“She’s tall, blond, middle-aged, and the license plate on her white Lincoln has the word ‘SUN’ followed by the date she and Osborne were married. They say she swings a mean tennis racket, too,” Underwood told him.
“Jesus!” said Horton. “You serious? You really think she killed Ledwig?”
“I don’t know. All I know is that she was there that afternoon and she didn’t see fit to tell us.”