Maximum Security (A Dog Park Mystery) by C. A. Newsome Page A

your job,
and I’m not going to insult my best client by refusing to go to her
home. I can’t believe that Kate Onstad has the strength to load a
crossbow and the skill to kill a man with one.”
    “Yeah, her lawyer did point that
detail out to us.” He rubbed his neck. “I’m trying to see this from
your side. All my life, I’ve been told it was my responsibility to
do the right thing and take care of those who were weaker than me,
and I grew up around women who want that protection. It’s that
whole Adam’s rib thing. It’s hard to set it aside.”
    “You’re going to have to bend
those principles if you want us to make it, Kentucky Boy.” She gave
him a squeeze. “Let me finish making dinner. Let’s give this a rest
for right now, and you can tell me all about your squirrelly case
while we eat.
    Peter forked up the last of his
greens and rice, chewed, swallowed. “The crossbow is a Barnett
Zombie. It’s a serious crossbow with a 175 pound draw. It does take
a lot of practice to handle, especially without a laser sight. We
have the same concern about Kate Onstad, that she’s unlikely to
have the ability to pull off a kill shot, especially if she used
that hunter’s blind. Hard enough to imagine her climbing that tree,
even with the rungs nailed into the trunk. Still, even if she
didn’t do it, she’s attracted the attention of the person who did.
Please be extra careful around her.”
    Lia suppressed a smile. “Yes,
Daddy, I promise. What will you do now? Can you trace the bow to
its owner?”
    “Crossbows aren’t registered like
guns. We used the serial number and went to the manufacturer. The
owner never registered the warranty but the manufacturer traced the
shipment to a local store, over a year ago. They’re unhappy someone
used one of their bows to kill a person, so they’re reviewing their
records. If it was bought with a credit card, we’ll have
him.
    “Since the package cost around six
hundred dollars, it’s unlikely he paid cash. Too bad the sale took
place so long ago. If it was recent, we’d be able to use the time
stamp on the receipt to pick our guy out on the store’s
surveillance videos.
    “They had several of this model.
They’ll track down all of them for us, if they can. Then we get to
sweat the guys who bought them, match them against hunters licensed
for the deer cull.”
    “You think it was a hunter who did
this?” Lia asked.
    “They didn’t buy the bow to kill
George, then wait a year to do it. That doesn’t fly. They had the
wrong arrowheads on the bolts for target shooting. So they bought
it to hunt with. There are a couple hundred bow hunters licensed
for this year’s cull, but only thirty had permits to be in Mount
Airy Forest when George was killed.”
    “Thirty is a lot of suspects,
isn’t it?”
    “George typically didn’t head for
the park until after nine. Most of these guys were at work and will
have alibis. It’s still plenty to go through, and there’s no
guarantee that our man had a legitimate license for that period.
He’ll show up somewhere on the registry, though. You don’t spend
that much money on a bow unless you intend to use it.”
    “What else is happening with the
case?”
    “I reviewed Munce’s phone calls.
He was talking to a divorce lawyer, so we’ll need to interview him.
It looks like Munce was planning to be a different kind of
statistic. Enough about work. How did you do today with the
flyers?”
    “Bailey and I hung up at least
fifty flyers around the park. I imagine, if Daisy is still there,
she’d be near the picnic areas because that’s where she’d find
people and food. I’m thinking about taking Honey up there and
walking around. Daisy knows her. I’m hoping if she’s still in the
woods, she might smell Honey and come out.”
    Peter winced inwardly at the
thought of Lia up near the killing ground. He reminded himself that
the woods were still closed to all hunters as well as hikers,
stifled the impulse to