Dying For Revenge (The Lady Doc Murders Book 1) Read online

  Praise for Dying for Revenge by Dr. Barbara Golder:

  “Barbara Golder joins the ranks of Chesterton’s bloodthirsty heirs as she spins a tale that will delight mystery fans. With Dying for Revenge in hand, your beach experience is now complete!”

  Mark P. Shea

  Author of Mercy Works

  “Dying for Revenge dives into the deeply personal place in so many hearts with “justifiable” reasons for revenge... but the face of mercy is entwined in the unexpected turn of events. You’ll be captivated...”

  Patricia M. Chivers

  ABLAZE Radio WNRE-LP 98.1 FM Catholic Church of Saint Monica

  “Dying For Revenge is a darn good medical thriller — a page-turning plot and vivid characters —with a stop-you-in your tracks twist: the costs of revenge. It’s a gripping story — I defy anyone to put it down.”

  Deacon Dennis Dorner

  Chancellor, Archdiocese of Atlanta

  “When medical brilliance and a riveting plot collide, you get Dying For Revenge — a story of intrigue, murder, and faith that will leave everyone suspect but only one guilty...”

  Rev David Carter

  JCL Rector, Basilica of Sts. Peter and Paul, Chattanooga TN

  “I know it sounds cliché, but I honestly couldn’t put this down. It isn’t just who-dun-it, but it’s the story of the power of understanding in a world that’s afraid of self-knowledge.”

  Joan Watson

  Director of Adult Formation, Diocese of Nashville

  DYING FOR REVENGE

  Book #1

  The Lady Doc Murders

  by

  Dr. Barbara Golder

  Kindle Edition

  FQ Publishing

  Pakenham, Ontario

  This book is a work of fiction. Characters and incidents are products of the author’s imagination. Real events and characters are used fictitiously.

  Dying for Revenge (The Lady Doc Murders #1)

  copyright 2016 Dr. Barbara Harty Golder

  Published by Full Quiver Publishing

  PO Box 244

  Pakenham, Ontario K0A 2X0

  www.fullquiverpublishing.com

  ISBN Number of Print Edition:

  978-1-987970-00-5

  Kindle Edition

  Cover design: Doreen Thistle

  Cover photo: James Hrkach, Ellen Hrkach

  Author photo: Stephen Golder

  Back cover photo: Stephen Golder

  NATIONAL LIBRARY OF CANADA

  CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION

  ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

  No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means — electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise — without prior written permission from the author.

  Copyright 2016 by Dr. Barbara Harty Golder

  Published by FQ Publishing

  A Division of Innate Productions

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  Chapter Ten

  Chapter Eleven

  Chapter Twelve

  Chapter Thirteen

  Chapter Fourteen

  Chapter Fifteen

  Chapter Sixteen

  Chapter Seventeen

  Chapter Eighteen

  Chapter Nineteen

  Chapter Twenty

  Chapter Twenty-One

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Chapter Twenty-Four

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  Chapter Twenty-Six

  Chapter Twenty-Seven

  Chapter Twenty-Eight

  Chapter Twenty-Nine

  Chapter Thirty

  About the Author

  Acknowledgments

  To my midwife for helping me birth Jane and company

  and to my husband. You are NOT Dead John.

  PROLOGUE

  JUNE 5, MID-AFTERNOON

  “Is Mitch there?” A pause, then another question, “Are you Marla? Marla Kincaid?”

  A female voice, with a smokes-and-whiskey quality that made Marla feel superior. Mitch couldn’t possibly have anything to do with someone this low-class. Without thinking, taken off guard, she answered yes and her world had exploded.

  “It’s Liz. Liz Norton, from the Hollywood Inquisitor. Mitch’s ex-wife just tested positive for AIDS. It’s our front-page lead tomorrow. Did you know? Has he been tested? Did he tell you before he screwed you the first time? How about the baby?” The questions came out in a rush, a miserable torrent of words that made Marla feel dirty just listening to them. The voice was matter of fact, no warning, no cushioning to let her take it in little by little. Marla’s stomach knotted, and she felt her heart racing even as she was powerless to reply.

  And then the woman made it worse. “She’s in detox, heroin and crack. Says they shot up together all the time. Never mind the sex, he’d have it from the needles. He’s got it for sure.” There was a curious delight in that awful voice. A sort of pleasure in the sorry details she just kept piling on. Marla closed her eyes tight, as if shutting out the light of day would shut out what she was hearing. For sure. Nobody smart got infected anymore. That was for losers, for derelicts, not for superstars like Mitch Houston. For a long moment, Marla stared at the phone in her hand, then dropped it as though it burned her. She could still hear muffled sounds: a rough, wicked cackle and then her name repeated again and again: “Marla? Are you there?” After what seemed an eternity, blessed silence.

  It had all been so perfect. How had it gone so horribly wrong? Marla Kincaid screamed at last, once, a scream that vanished into a whimper. Then she sat on the floor of the marble shower that she had retreated to after that call, trying to wash off the filth of that awful call, hugging her knees to her chest and sobbing as the water spilled over her and ran down the drain. There she stayed until the hot water turned warm, then cold, a long time because it was a high-end shower, made for indulgent people, and she was indulging herself and her anger. At last she stood up, knees wobbly, skin turning to gooseflesh. She turned the shower off and stepped onto the sea-green rug, wrapping herself in a towel, warm from the rack, and shaking her short, blond curls. She regarded her image in the foggy mirror. Her hand dropped to her belly, small and round and firm. It had been so perfect, just like she planned. What was going to happen to her now?

  She dried off quickly and dropped the towel to the floor. She pulled out her daddy’s old red flannel shirt from the back of her closet. It was so big it fell to her knees, and the sleeves were so long they hid her hands. She clenched the soft fabric in her fists and then hugged herself, pressing her head to her chest and imagining her daddy’s arms around her. Then she sighed, looked around at the mess in the bedroom, and opened the big French doors. She stepped out onto the expansive porch, a hint of breeze ruffling the shirt and making her hug herself again, this time for warmth, if not for control.

  The sun was just beginning to lower in the afternoon sky. She heard a rustle and watched a deer meander from the far edge of the woods, coming almost up to the house. She was surprised to see him out so early, but the deer near Mountain Village were accustomed to people, almost tame. He nuzzled and then nibbled the tender tops of the newly planted bushes. She shifted position, making only the faintest of noises, but it was enough to startle him and he looked up directly at her. His antlers were just visible against the
pale lawn now behind him. She counted the points, six to a side, a trophy buck. She gave a wry smile. Trophy buck. Just like Mitch. A trophy every woman in the country was after, a trophy she had managed to snag with determination and guile and feigned innocence that even Mitch had taken for the genuine article.

  He’d found her on the set of his last movie, in a role supporting the famous actress he’d been dating and grown tired of. A year later, here she was, living the life she’d dreamed about, schemed and clawed for, since leaving Little Rock at eighteen to become an actress. There had been so many terrible jobs, so many terrible people who had taken advantage of her, but she was good, and she was determined and she’d finally gotten herself noticed and cast into a real movie, not some grade-B disaster flick that went straight to DVD. The last year had been better than she could have imagined. All those years of living in roach-infested flats and eating peanut butter and working three jobs while juggling auditions were worth it. All those lecherous agents and casting directors and money-men she had flattered for an opportunity and then endured on her way up faded into the background when she stepped out on the red carpet with Mitch Houston, wearing custom gowns and covered in jewels lent to her just because she was who she was. Because she was with Mitch. She’d been on the cover of People and the subject of too many gossip columns to count. She was important and she was pregnant. Mitch was over the moon about the baby, and she’d never have to worry about anything again. He would never leave the mother of his son. Children maybe? Heir and a spare, like Diana, like Kate? No, one was enough. He was hers forever.

  Or so she had thought until his cell phone rang. That call. The one she answered because he was gone, buying some wine. Mitch had people to do everything imaginable for him, everything normal people took for granted. But here in Colorado, taking a break in this little mountain town, he liked to pretend he lived just like everyone else. He had a maid to do the cleaning, and of course he kept his personal trainer. But everything else, he did. Just another role, just another pretense in his life. He was out pretending to be an ordinary guy while she was left behind, pretending not to care that he’d been gone for hours while she was bored to tears. And he wouldn’t even let her drink the wine, on account of the baby.

  He’d lied to her. He didn’t use drugs; he said so. Then she remembered those times he disappeared for hours at a time and then came home too tired to do anything but sleep with no word of explanation. Unable to think, she needed to do something to get rid of the fear and pain and anger that consumed her, anger at Mitch for his betrayal, at herself for being so stupid to trust him, angry that she was pregnant and he was going to die from AIDS and so was she and maybe even the baby would too. Or maybe just the baby. She saw the phone on the edge of the gray rug and kicked it across the room. She heard it hit one of the legs of the bed and ricochet into the wall behind.

  She screamed again at the top of her lungs and so long her throat hurt and she went dizzy from lack of breath. Then she cried, great, hot tears that soaked her sleeve when she wiped her eyes, tears that rose again as soon as her arm fell back to her side. Finally, she turned her frustration from herself to Mitch. She threw things, anything she could get her hands on. She picked up his Oscar, that precious statue, feeling its surprising heft in her hands and thinking that she was glad the little figure didn’t have eyes and couldn’t see what was happening to her. She heaved it at the big mirror on the wall above the dresser, damn the bad luck. What could be worse than what already was? It broke into a spider web of cracks. The jagged, shiny pieces fell to the floor in a glittering cascade. One long piece, curved like a scythe, stuck upright in the floor.

  She yanked his clothes from the closet, tearing his silk shirts with her bare hands and ripping holes in his designer suits and linen slacks with the jagged piece of glass from the mirror. Still, she took care to sheath her hand in the towel to keep from spilling her own blood. What she couldn’t tear or cut, she threw in the middle of the fireplace. She narrowed her eyes as she carefully pulled the clothes away from the gas jets at the base of the ceramic logs, then pushed the igniter button beside the mantle to start the blue flames. Gray, choking smoke spilled into the room for a moment or two before it began to course upward. The logs might be fake, but the gas jets and the chimney worked just fine.

  At length, fury temporarily spent, she fell into the shower, hoping that she might be able to wash it all away. It hadn’t worked and here she was, still waiting for him to return, knowing that he could never resist the opportunity to pose with fans, sign autographs, and schmooze because it was all that adulation that made his life worthwhile. His life hadn’t changed at all, not even when he’d told her she was his special, only, once-in-a-lifetime love, and now her life was never going to be the same.

  She watched the deer nibble a few more branches and then bound off again until he disappeared back into the woods. She shivered a bit and went back inside, too chilled to stay outside now that the sun was behind the gathering clouds of an afternoon rain, and the breeze was picking up. With a set of her jaw, she determined not to remain in the house any longer. She went to the dresser, stepping over the mess and started to pack her bags and leave. The little pearl-handled gun her father had sent with her — and taught her to shoot as well as he did — lay half-buried under designer camisoles and tees. She picked it up idly, thinking about the difference between the father who gave it to her, who wanted to protect her from everything, and the father of the child she was carrying, who protected her from nothing.

  A sudden calm came over her as she felt the weight of the gun in her hand. It was almost as though she were back home, standing by her daddy as he taught her to shoot, first at big tubs of lard, then coffee cans, and finally rabbits and squirrels and doves and deer, squeezing off rounds two at a time just for insurance. “No use knowing how to shoot at cans, baby, unless you can shoot at something that matters when the time comes,” he had told her. She had cried the first time she killed a squirrel, but after a bit, she learned to squelch the rising tears and shoot as well as any of her brothers. She wondered whether she still could.

  A squirrel scampered across the edge of the porch toward the low-hanging branches of a fir at the edge of the woods, perhaps twenty yards away. Looking again at the pistol in her hand, Marla eased out onto the deck, tip-toed to the edge of the railing and waited, still and patient, for it to move on again from the limb. She knew from experience that if she waited long enough, it would tire of its post and move along and it did. With practiced ease, she lifted the gun, tracked the animal, and fired. She knew she had missed as soon as she pulled the trigger. She had forgotten to take and hold that breath her daddy taught her to count time by, to account for the lead needed for a moving target and she hadn’t fired the two shots in succession he taught her to, just for insurance. But a falling twig told her she hadn't missed by much. Easy enough to correct and not an issue if the target was standing still. It would do, if it came to that. If it came to that...

  Marla walked back to the dresser and tucked the gun back between her camisoles, pulled out a tee-shirt and jeans, and dressed. Perhaps a walk around town would clear her head. Besides, there was business to attend to. She just hoped the doctor’s office in the Regent Building was still open and that she didn’t run into Mitch along the way.

  CHAPTER ONE

  JUNE 6, EARLY MORNING

  John had just touched my face in his familiar way when the phone startled me out of my sleep. It was one of those vivid dreams, the kind that it takes a minute or two to realize you’ve passed from it into wakefulness. I was especially unhappy because, since his death five years ago, the only way I ever saw my husband or felt his touch was in my restless slumber. The phone rang again, insisting that I answer. In my line of work, a call in the middle of the night is never happy news. It means that death has come calling, unexpected, or violent, or both. It’s the time of night when teenagers run off the road, when drug deals go sour, when sick old men die, the man inside
having given up the struggle to keep the man outside alive, when drunken spouses abuse each other to death. At the end of it all, somebody calls the medical examiner, and I am pulled out of my orderly world into someone else’s dark night. I wondered idly what particular nightmare I was entering this time as I punched the keypad of my cell phone.

  “Yeah?”

  I am not particularly civil at three in the morning. Fortunately for me, the cops who are on duty at that hour — the ones most likely to call — aren’t too sensitive. This time it was the sheriff of San Miguel County himself who answered. His voice called up his lanky frame, thinning red hair, pockmarked face and crooked nose.

  “Aren’t you just Dr. Mary Sunshine! Wake up, Jane Wallace, you’ve got a case.” His gravelly chuckle broke up a bit. Call reception isn’t always good in the mountains.

  “Yeah, yeah, yeah.” I rubbed my eyes and took another stab at civility. “What’s up, Tom?”

  I sat up, stretching my neck and trying to come to consciousness. Tom had used my first name, something he never did, preferring to alternate between Dr. Wallace when he was vexed with me, and Doc when he approved of the way I was executing the demands of my office as Chief Medical Examiner for the Western Slope of Colorado.

  “Oh, big dealings right here in Mountain Village. We got ourselves a celebrity murder, we do.”

  The words were flippant and out of context with the somber nature of such early morning calls. There’s a certain propensity toward inappropriate humor among those of us who work regularly among the dead and the degenerate. I wouldn’t put it past any of my law enforcement brethren, least of all Patterson with his avuncular style, to string me along for the sake of a little joke to liven up an otherwise routine death. I could jest with the best of them.