Foal Play: A Mystery Read Online Free PDF

they’ll whack me.”
    Myrtle had obviously seen one too many episodes of The Sopranos . The likelihood of anyone being whacked in the Outer Banks was slim to none. In the last two years there had only been one murder in all of Currituck County, not counting the body found on the beach this morning. Still, there was something disturbing about a man with a gun lurking in the woods.
    “Fine,” Colleen said. “I’ll tell Sheriff Dorman what you saw and you can go home and be safe.”
    “I can’t go home. Nellie’s expecting me at the booth.”
    Maybe it was her fight with Bill this morning. Maybe it was being stuck in the mosquito-infested trees with her former teacher and a gunman. Maybe it was the heat. But Colleen had had enough. “Damn it, Myrtle, either you think someone’s trying to kill you or you don’t. My advice? Go home. But you do what you want!” she said with irritation.
    “Well … I never … and after all I taught you,” Myrtle said after a moment of shock and marched away in a snit.
    Colleen groaned in frustration as Myrtle stomped through the foliage and disappeared. Sparky squirmed on his leash wanting to follow. In case Myrtle really was being watched, Colleen held back a few moments before picking her way out of the trees. Until she knew for certain what was going on, there was no point in taking any chances. The presence of the man with the gun brought back her earlier concern about trouble arriving in Corolla. Was it coincidence or were the body on the beach and the man with the gun somehow connected? And if so, how? Colleen didn’t have answers to her questions but she had every intention of getting some.

Chapter 4
    “Never eat more than your mask can hold.” It was one of the first lessons Colleen learned as a junior firefighter and it came to mind now as she passed fairgoers stuffing their mouths with greasy treats from vendors.
    Colleen pushed her way through the crowd searching for Bill. Her heart beat in her throat and perspiration ran down her temples. She fought through the lines of people and squinted from the intensity of the lights hung around the grounds. A teen boy jostled Colleen and stepped on Sparky’s paw. Sparky barked at the boy as he disappeared behind the “Dunk the Clown” cage. Colleen spotted Bill three booths away. She waved and called out to him but her voice was drowned out by the sound of the announcer on the loudspeaker broadcasting the beginning of the fireworks.
    The lights around the booths dimmed. All eyes focused upward. Neon necklaces, bracelets, and anklets floated about the grounds on the bodies of children. A woman with a stroller bumped into Colleen and apologized profusely. She forced a smile, then surveyed the area for Bill. She scanned the booths, grounds, and road but he was nowhere to be seen.
    The first fireworks exploded overhead. Colleen did a final search for Bill and turned back toward the engines. Her job demanded her complete attention now. She’d tell Bill about the man with the gun as soon as the fireworks were over. She concentrated on the falling debris from the explosives and began her patrol of the area with Sparky. The dog had an uncanny ability to detect fire the moment a spark ignited. It was how he had earned his nickname.
    It took Colleen more than half an hour to circle the fairgrounds, during which she stopped occasionally to appreciate the fireworks. As a child her favorites had been the green and red ones that burst into enormous parachutes and the small white ones that broke apart, fragments whistling as they flew in different directions. However, after fifteen years of firefighting, she now preferred the ones that burst into stars and then quickly fizzled out.
    Colleen reached the emergency vehicle parking area. The grand finale would be starting soon. She wanted to get Sparky into her SUV before the final series of fireworks were rapidly launched into the air. The loud noises had always bothered the canine. If it