Page 34 of Final Ride

Before first light, he packed up his room, made sure he remembered the money in the safe and he left with Cleo on her leash.

After his belongings were loaded into the Wrangler, he walked Cleo around the hotel property and then put her in the passenger seat of the Jeep to wait until it was time to leave.

He picked a heavily treed spot near the fence that marked the hotel property line and hid himself in the foliage. Bobby waited in that spot for at least half an hour, batting away mosquitos, hoping Tammy would come out alone to walk the hounds.

She’d walked them herself the previous morning and Bobby hoped she’d be by herself again. That would make things a lot simpler for him.

After all that waiting and watching, Bobby was in luck. Tammy came out the side door of the hotel with the two hound dogs on leashes.

When Tammy passed Bobby’s hiding spot, he jumped out, snatched her off her feet, slapped a strip of duct tape over her mouth and tossed her over his shoulder.

The hound dogs ran off barking and baying as Bobby ran to the Wrangler, opened the hatch and tossed Tammy in. He had everything ready to tie her up.

He smacked her in the face with his fist, knocked her out and the rest was easy. Using plastic ties, he trussed Tammy up like a pig for the barbeque.

“There you go, you murdering bitch. You haven’t got long now.”

Eyes wide with surprise, she yelled at him from under the duct tape and Bobby laughed. He threw the dog’s blanket over her to cover her up and keep her out of his sight.

“I can’t stand to look at you. This is for Ray and for all the times you tried to finish me. Mostly for Ray.”

Cleo jumped from the front seat to the back and hung her huge head into the hatch while Bobby did his thing. She growled and snarled at Tammy like she wanted to tear her limb from limb.

“You’ll get your chance at her, girl. You hate Tammy almost as much as I do. She won’t be here in the land of the living too long, Cleo. We’ll get rid of her soon.”

Willy waited in the room for Tammy to come back with the dogs and after an hour, he began to worry.

“Did she take George and Gracie and leave me behind?” Willy checked the bathroom and Tammy’s toiletries were still on the vanity. “Her suitcase is here, and it’s not zipped up. She must be outside.”

Willy took the elevator down to the main floor, crossed the lobby in a hurry and ran to the spot where they’d parked the truck the night before.

The truck was sitting in the same spot, and both dogs were sitting next to it waiting to get in. Leashes dragging on the pavement.

“Where’s Tammy, doggies?”

The dogs were happy to see Willy and it was mutual. He gave them each a hug, took the leashes off and put them in the truck. “Wait here for me. I’ll be right back.”

Willy ran back to the room, packed up everything belonging to himself and Tammy and the dogs, and hauled it all out to the truck.

“The cops must have picked her up while she was out walking the dogs. It’s the only explanation I can think of. Maybe Tammy wasn’t being paranoid after all. She was on edge all day yesterday. I shouldn’t have made fun of her and pissed her off like I did.”

He slid behind the wheel and started the engine of the old truck. “Nothing we can do if the police have Tammy, doggies. We’ll go to Canada anyway now that we’re this close.”

George and Gracie wagged their tails. They were happier than Willy was.

Budget Inn. La Grange. Texas.

Virge and I were up early getting ready to fly home to Montana. It was an hours’ drive into Austin to the airport and we had to allow time for breakfast before we left.

Kevin Bennet knocked on the door before I had my stuff packed. He had things for Dad to sign before we left. With him coming at the last minute, it was going to be a rush.

Dad let him in, and they sat at the table and went over the changes the people who owned the ranch in Lincoln had made.

“This is the amended offer, Travis. You can see here where they raised the price a little and they approved the spot where you aligned the two closing dates more closely so you could close the Montana ranch first and then have the Texas ranch close the next day—just to make it a little less hectic.”

Dad nodded and Kevin handed him a pen. “Everything looks exactly like we agreed.”

Dad signed everywhere he was supposed to, and Kevin shook his hand. “Congratulations, Travis. You just bought yourself a ranch in Texas.”

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