Jericho's Fall Read Online Free PDF Page B

earth and light snow, but never quite saw them except for darting flashes of brown or gray farther down the path. The hike down to the gate was ten minutes. The Chevy Suburban from last night had vanished, and nothing had yet replaced it. Maybe Jericho rated security only after dark. Maybe the security was hidden. Maybe her true feelings were hidden, even from herself. Maybe this had been an act of madness, coming up to Stone Heights to be tortured by Jericho’s madness, Pamela’s hostility, and Audrey’s sweetly repressive tolerance. In three days she had to be on that plane from Denver to Chicago. She wondered if the four of them could stand one another until then.
    A mile past the gate, huffing and stretching in the thin air, Rebecca reached the main road. She turned west, away from town. The road climbed higher up the peak. She knew that her mother would have Nina up early, and tried the cell phone, but, as usual on this side of the mountain, there was no signal. A panel truck rumbled past her, two heads turning to ogle as it hurried downhill. A bright-red Explorer with tinted windows overtook her and curved upward out of sight. The angle into the valley was sharper now. Houses scattered thinly below her, and, in the distance, sunlight glistened on the pleasures of Vail. After a mile or so, Rebecca reached the next entrance, the getaway of some software baron many times richer than Jericho. The house was shuttered for the season, but the gate was spanking new and seemed to work just fine. Depressed and not sure why, she turned and started back down the road, and the red Explorer passed her again, heading the other way. She wondered what dawn expedition had led the driver to visit the peak so briefly, or whether he was just lost, and she remembered how Jericho had warned her long ago to keep track of cars that kept turning up.
    Then she heard the gunshot.
    Beck knew guns, of course. Jericho had required her to learn to shoot, and even now, single woman that she was, she kept a loaded revolver in her house, in a locked box under her bed. She lifted her head. There was no second shot. A rifle of some sort. Probably a hunter. At altitude, sounds carried a long way, but she could not escape the impression that the shot had been relatively nearby.
    Short and sweet. A quick bullet to the head…It’s better than the alternatives, believe me .
    No. No. Not possible. Not so soon, and not like this.
    Nevertheless, she headed back toward Stone Heights, fast. Hiking down the peak was easier than hiking up. Rebecca reached the property in mere minutes, hurried along the dirt road to the frozen gates, and then had to climb again. She encountered the dog halfway up the drive.
    She stood very still.
    The dog was black and sleek and must once have been beautiful, but somebody had blown its skull all over the gravel. There was blood, there were bits of white that were brains or bone, there was vomit nearby but that was all hers.
    When she had passed this spot forty minutes ago, the driveway had been clear. She was sure of it.
    The panel truck. The red Explorer. Beck was still babbling about the two vehicles while Audrey made her tea in the kitchen and Pamela went off to phone Jimmy Lobb, the caretaker, to do something about the mess.
    “We should call the police,” Rebecca shouted after her.
    Audrey’s grin as she rubbed Beck’s shoulders was sheepish. “We get vandalism every couple of days. Somebody’s idea of a joke. The sheriff will just tell us to scrape it up, and then they’ll stick the report at the bottom of the pile.”
    “A joke?”
    “Everybody knows Jericho Ainsley hates dogs. Cats. Animals generally.”
    Beck was not so sure about the everybody; and she wondered why, if Jericho hated animals so much, anybody would think that killing one would upset him.
    Pamela was back. “No answer at Lobb’s.” She shrugged. “Well, maybe he’s already on the way. And it’s about time.”
    “About time?” said Beck,