Death Comes to a Retreat (Book 4 Molly Masters Mysteries) Read online

  “This is your last chance to go peacefully,” Nancy said.

  As she tried to kneel to inject me, I grabbed a handful of sand and pine needles and threw it in her face. She let out a grunt and turned her face.

  With physical strength born from my own intense pain, I bit her arm just above the wrist. She lost her grip on the syringe and I grabbed it just as Faldo barreled into both of us—pinning Nancy against me. He tried to claw Nancy out of the way to get to me.

  All I had to protect myself was the syringe.

  Nancy spotted the needle in my hand. She tried to grab it from me and yelled, “Faldo, no! Release! Release!”

  In her attempts to grab the needle, Nancy managed to move so that my torso was exposed to Faldo.

  His huge paws on my shoulders, he snapped his teeth at my face, barely missing. With Nancy still screaming, I jabbed the beast with the syringe and pushed down the plunger in blind desperation.

  Faldo lifted his head. He got off me, took a couple of stumbling steps, and sat down, blinking at the two of us.

  “What have you done to my dog?” Nancy cried. She wrapped her arms around his neck and wept.

  I felt nearly crazed with the still unbearable pain in my leg. “If you want your dog to live,” I said in groaning pants, all the voice that I could muster, “get him to a vet.”

  Blood was streaming down my ankle and soaking into the ground. Nancy looked at me, her eyes wild with fury. She took a step toward me, and I cried, “Leave me alone! It’s too late for you to get out of this! Get your dog to a vet!”

  Still sobbing, Nancy rose and tried to coax Faldo to his feet. Nancy started to come at me, hands set to strangle me. “I’ll kill you for this!”

  Automatically I held up an arm to fend her off. I was no physical match for her in this state. She stopped, then looked back at Faldo. “Damn you!” she yelled at me. “Look what you did to my dog!”

  She returned to Faldo, now lying down, his breathing labored. She grabbed his collar and tried to pull him to his feet. “Come on, Faldo,” she coaxed through her tears. “We’ve got to go.”

  While she struggled with her enormous dog, I got up on my one good leg and started limping toward my car.

  “Stop!”

  I kept going, bracing myself for an attack.

  “You’re right,” she cried. “This is hopeless. The police already know I did it, and I can’t lift Faldo into the car by myself. Just…please send help for my dog.”

  I looked back at her, stunned. She dropped down and sat beside Faldo, then lifted his head onto her lap.

  “I will.” I dragged myself into the car to drive to the fire station nearby.

  “I do,” Tommy said.

  “I hereby pronounce you husband and wife.”

  At the Boulder judge’s words, a cheer went up from what was quite a large audience for such a small room. Their applause made me cry all the harder.

  “You’re going to have a hard time seeing what you’re signing,” Jim murmured in my ear, handing me another tissue. This time, I managed to use it without losing a grip on one of my crutches. We were the official witnesses and needed to sign the certificate.

  Flanking us were all five children, though with Jasper and Joey’s adult proportions they’d have balked at that description. Half a dozen uniformed officers were there as well, from both the Boulder police and the sheriff’s department. Partially, I suspect, through their influence, we’d been able to delay the ceremony by twenty-four hours so that I could attend.

  It was over. I was finally off the hook, and Allison’s killer was behind bars.

  Yesterday, after the police had responded immediately to my call from the Evansville Fire Station, Nancy Thornton had given them a full confession. Apparently her Achilles’ heel had been her dog, something I was beginning to appreciate myself now that Betty Cocker was our newest family member.

  Faldo, the police officers had assured me this morning, was recuperating; furthermore, a dog psychologist in Boulder had been consulted to train Faldo out of his attack-mode behavior.

  Lauren and Tommy were getting hugs or vigorous congratulatory handshakes. I watched but was determined to get my emotions in control before joining them. At length, Tommy broke off from the group and came over to me, shaking his head at the sight of my tears. “Now, I know I’m not good enough for her, but you don’t have to cry quite this hard, do you?”

  “It’s not that. I’m delirious from all the painkillers.” I laughed in frustration as a new host of tears burst forth, and I lost hold of one of my crutches. Standing on my uninjured leg, I deliberately dropped the other crutch and held out my arms. “Congratulations, Tommy.”

  He held me in a tight hug for a long time, and as he pulled away, I saw tears in his own eyes. In an attempt to cover for his emotions, he asked gruffly, “You gonna have time to make your flight?”

  Lauren was making her way toward us and I grinned at her. If possible, she looked even prettier today than she had when I’d first seen her in that dress.

  I nodded. “We’re leaving tomorrow morning,” I told Tommy. We would be boarding a flight to Albany, New York, where we’d drive to a small suburb named Carlton. Otherwise known as home.

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  Leslie O’Kane also writes under the pseudonym of Leslie Caine. She considers the incident in which she was taken hostage to be the start of her “life in crime.” When the robber clobbered her with a shotgun to make her stop laughing, she learned that a sense of humor can be dangerous. Leslie lives in Boulder, Colorado.

  Dear Readers,

  I hope you have enjoyed my book. If so, I hope you will want to read my other books in the Molly Masters series. Especially for dog lovers, you might also enjoy my Allie Babcock series. I am currently in the process of writing a radically different style of book—a trilogy of thrillers for young adults, which I anticipate having available as eBooks in July of 2013.

  If, however, my writing style doesn’t appeal to you, I hope you are at least having a nice day. Thank you for reaching the end of my book even so.

  As I am writing this, my website is being redone by my wonderful Web Designer, Maddee James. Please visit my site at LeslieOKane.com.

  Thank you so very much for reading my book and supporting my career. You have my deepest appreciation, and my warmest wishes always.

  Yours sincerely,

  Leslie O’Kane

  eBooks By Leslie O’Kane

  DEATH COMES eCALLING

  DEATH COMES TO SUBURBIA

  DEATH OF A GARDENER

  DEATH COMES TO A RETREAT

  DEATH ON A SCHOOL BOARD

  DEATH AT A TALENT SHOW

  DEATH COMES TO THE PTA

  PLAY DEAD

  RUFF WAY TO GO

  GIVE THE DOG A BONE

  WOOF AT THE DOOR

  THE SOUL SHIFTERS BEGINS: Jake Greyland, A Short Story

  THE SOUL SHIFTERS: A Novel

  Coming Soon:

  ECHOES OF SOULS

  SHADOWS OF SOULS

  Writing as Leslie Caine:

  DEATH BY INFERIOR DESIGN

  FALSE PREMISES

  MANOR OF DEATH

  KILLED BY CLUTTER

  FATAL FENG SHUI

  POISONED BY GILT

  HOLLY AND HOMICIDE

  Table of Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Chapter 18

  Unnamed

 

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