One Hoof In The Grave [Carriage Driving 02] by Carolyn McSparren Page A

hand “Clean it properly this time, please, Manuel,” she said. “Then hang it with its harness. Gracias.” She turned on her heel and walked toward what looked like an office door.
    He followed her into a handsome paneled room that was part library, part office, and part lounge, with a stone fireplace in one corner, and a galley kitchen across the back. “Is that what you’re doing?” he asked. “Mourning?”
    Those blue eyes blazed at him, then she smiled. She might not be Helen of Troy, but her smile transformed her handsome face into something approaching real beauty. “Actually, I’m celebrating. Ding Dong, the wicked warlock is dead.” She sat on a battered maroon leather couch and motioned him to an equally battered club chair across from her.
    Ah, here was where at least one member of the family lived. Sarah Beth had her peach morning room. Dawn had this room.
    “If you don’t mind, I have a few questions for you.”
    She waved a hand. “Ask away. I didn’t kill him. I have nothing to hide.”
    “Not even your attitude?”
    “Not even.”
    “Or your fiancé?”
    The smile vanished. “You leave Armando out of this, cop. He’s on his way back from Wellington as we speak. You know where Wellington is?”
    “South Florida, by Palm Beach.”
    “Right. He’s been refereeing a tournament in Wellington all week. Plenty of people can vouch for him.”
    “Good. I’m always happy to mark somebody off my list. I will, however, need to speak to him personally. Does he speak English?”
    “Probably better than you do. And Spanish, and Portuguese.”
    “Are you going to marry him?”
    “As soon as this mess is over with, you bet your ass. He’s going to train polo ponies, and I’m going to take over the breeding end of the business.”
    “So you inherit the farm?”
    “Of course I do. Unless Daddy changed his will recently, Sarah Beth gets a bunch of cash, and probably the condo in Atlanta. Maybe even the house on Jekyll Island. But the farm was always going to come to me.”
    So she thought she knew the provisions of her father’s will when Sarah Beth swore she didn’t. Geoff made a mental note to check with that lawyer quickly.
    Stan said he’d heard that at the show Raleigh threatened to disinherit Dawn. Maybe he was always threatening, but never made good on his threat. If she thought that this time he was serious, however, she might have wanted him dead before he could do it. She was her father’s daughter. She’d fight for what she wanted.
    Without evidence of anyone besides Raleigh in the dressage arena before Merry, he and Stan Nordstrom had been working under the assumption that Raleigh had been driving his horses alone.
    Merry had told him that putting to a four-in-hand of high-strung warmbloods wasn’t easy.
    Raleigh could have done it, but so could Dawn and a number of other people. What if Raleigh hadn’t been the one to harness the horses and put them to the carriage? What if someone else had been driving them? If Raleigh had seen his carriage and team loom up out of the fog, with Dawn or someone else on the reins, he’d have hot-footed it across the arena to find out what the hell was going on.
    Maybe two people were involved in the murder—one to decoy Raleigh with his own carriage, one to waylay him at the edge of the woods and kill him. Armando’s alibi had better be solid.
    Merry said the fog dampened sound. Even if Raleigh had shouted, the sound might have been swallowed up, or simply ignored.
    Could Dawn have done the job alone? If she’d taken his team without permission, Raleigh might have dragged her off the box in a rage. He was big and tough, but even big men overbalance. She might have tripped him so that he fell face forward. If she had the stake ready and waiting, she could have driven it into his brain before he’d had time to react.
    He wished Arnie at the Atlanta medical examiners’ office would finish the autopsy. Even with a high profile case, the results