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“I know you do, Travis. You’ve been a good friend to both of us.”
“I just bought a trailer for my horse and your boys are digging it out of the snow. Will you give me a call when I can pick it up?”
“Sure. They’ll have it ready by the end of the day.”
Cut Bank Hospital.
On the drive to the hospital to pick Tammy up, I called Doctor Olson. “Anything on the COD for Chris Concordian, Doc?”
“Been meaning to call you, Travis. With the body being frozen for that long and mutilated by the animals and then thawed out before I could examine it, I had a bit of a tough time.”
“I understand how difficult it might have been. I’m bringing in all of the suspects today, Doc, and it would help if I knew how Chris died.”
“Close as I can tell, he was poisoned by reconstituted army rations, if that makes any sense.”
“Huh. Yep. Sure does. Could you tell if he was already dead before he was frozen by the weather?”
“The poison would be fast acting and from all indications I’m saying he died and then his body was placed outdoors. My best guess.”
“Amazingly helpful, Doc. Thanks so much.”
“What’s amazingly helpful?” asked Billy.
“Poisoned army rations in his stomach. Chris was dead before they took him to Thorn’s ranch and dumped him to freeze to death.”
“That’s why they wanted to move the truck to park it on one of the county roads—so it would look like he was hunting or doing his survival thing.”
“But they couldn’t find the keys,” I said.
“There won’t be anything in the truck,” said Billy. “Might as well cancel those forensic techs. Chris was never in his own truck after he died.”
“No, but he was in either Raza’s truck or Suzie’s car.”
“Yep. One or the other. In the load bed of Raza’s pickup or the trunk of Suzie’s car.”
“Yep, had to be.”
Billy parked the squad and I checked my watch. We were at the front entrance of the hospital just before ten.
“I’ll stay here,” said Billy. “Run in and get her.”
Tammy was dressed and ready to go when I got to the room she was in. She smiled and said, “I’m ready to go, Travis.”
She was a little wobbly as I helped her to the squad. She sat in the back with the dogs and both of them licked her face and made her squeal.
Tammy hugged both of them and snuggled in close to their furry bodies. I watched her in the rear view and could see how happy she was.
Before going to Conrad to pick up Suzie Concordian, we dropped Tammy off at the station to stay with Molly.
Concordian Residence. Conrad.
Suzie Concordian was just getting into her Lexus when we got to her house. Billy pulled in behind her car and blocked her exit.
We both jumped out and Billy was quicker than I was. He caught her as she attempted to run back to the house for whatever reason.
“Suzie Concordian, you are under arrest on suspicion of murder and for conspiracy to commit murder.” I nodded to Billy and made him recite the Miranda warning to her just for practice.
He had it down and never missed a word.
