Chapter 7

Jarrod went to the livery where he had left his horse. The man who usually attended the place was not there, so Jarrod went in and began to saddle his horse himself, not giving any more thought to the missing attendant. It was not unusual for the man to be gone for a few minutes at a time. Jarrod didn't think there was anything to worry about.

Until he heard a noise up in the loft above him. He moved quietly out of the stall he was in, drawing his gun slowly and carefully, looking up, listening. He stopped a step or two out from under the loft, still looking up and around. Still listening.

Suddenly someone was running across the loft above him. Jarrod spun around, following the sound with his eyes, looking. "Stop!" he yelled.

He heard a stumbling noise, and then a funny sound like someone had burst through the doors up there that led out onto the street. Jarrod ran out to the street, looking – but everything looked normal. People were moving around as if nothing had happened. If someone had just jumped down out of the upper doors of the livery stable, things would not look like this.

Jarrod hurried back into the livery stable, looking and listening. Whoever was up there had decoyed him by making the noise near the doors. Where was he now? Jarrod stood still, holding his gun pointed and ready, listening.

But there was no more sound. Whoever it was, he was either keeping perfectly still, or he had gotten out and away through the back while Jarrod was out on the street. Jarrod puzzled what to do for a moment. If he went for help, whoever was up there – if anyone was - would be long gone by the time he got back.

Jarrod decided to risk it.

Even as he climbed the ladder up to the loft, he knew he was being foolhardy. If someone was up there – if it was the killer stalking him – he'd be watching, and he'd have Jarrod nailed the moment he left the ladder and came into the loft. Jarrod took it very slowly, especially as he began to get above loft level. He stopped with just his eyes above the loft. He looked around.

Hay and several bags of grain were stored in the loft. Someone could be hiding up there. Jarrod looked, waited.

Suddenly, someone came in down below, whistling. It was Toby, the attendant. Jarrod saw him. "Toby, get the sheriff!" Jarrod yelled.

Toby stopped dead, looking up.

"Go get the sheriff!" Jarrod yelled again.

Toby ran out, and Jarrod looked quickly everywhere. If someone was up here, he would run for it now that he heard the sheriff would be coming. But nothing moved. No one ran. Jarrod stayed on the ladder, his eyes just above the level of the loft. He kept watching. Nothing was moving.

Jarrod stayed where he was, but now he was fairly certain that whoever had been up there had gotten out the back in that brief moment when Jarrod went out to the street. It was only a couple minutes before Toby came running back in with Sheriff Madden.

"What's going on?" the sheriff yelled up to Jarrod.

"Someone was hiding up here, but I think he got away," Jarrod said. "Cover me while I look around up here."

"Jarrod, get the hell down from there!" the sheriff yelled, but Jarrod had already gotten up into the loft. "I said, get down here!"

Jarrod moved around just a bit, assuring himself that there was no one up there. Then he holstered his gun and came back down the ladder.

"You could have gotten killed!" Sheriff Madden yelled at him. "If someone was up there, he could have killed you! Why are you doing something as idiotic as that?!"

Jarrod said, "I was pretty sure he was gone before I went up there, Fred," Jarrod said.

"When I tell you to do something, you do it, you got that?" Sheriff Madden yelled into Jarrod's face. "I tell you to come down, you do nothing but come down!"

Jarrod knew he should have done that, and he nodded. "You're right, of course. I was wrong. I'm sorry. I just thought maybe we had him cornered up there."

"It's my job to do the cornering, not yours!"

Jarrod held his hands up in surrender. "You're right. It won't happen again."

Sheriff Madden calmed down a little. "Did you get a look at who was up there?"

Jarrod shook his head. "I heard someone moving around, but I think he got out the back before I got up there. I never saw a thing."

"I'm going to have a look around up there, see if whoever you heard might have left something. Toby, go find one of my deputies, get him over here pronto."

Toby hurried out.

As Sheriff Madden headed for the ladder, Jarrod stayed where he was, saying, "I'll stay until your deputy gets here."

Up one rung on the ladder, Sheriff Madden looked at him, hard. "You do not move. You stay right there."

Jarrod nodded. "Right here."

It was another five minutes before the deputy showed up. Sheriff Madden had gotten into the loft, opened the doors up there to get more light and taken a quick look around. As soon as the deputy was down there, the sheriff called down. "Jarrod, get up here. Show me where you think this fella was."

Jarrod climbed back up into the loft and moved to the area directly over the stall where his horse was waiting patiently for him. "I first heard him about here, then it sounded like he was trying to open those doors you just opened. I thought he was getting out, so I went out to the street. I didn't see anything, so I came back in and he must have ducked out the back way while I was out front."

Sheriff Madden started nosing around the hay and the grain, but he hadn't done much before he said, "You get out of here. Go home before it gets dark. Jack and I will go over this loft and see if we can find anything. Jack, once Jarrod is down, you come on up."

Jarrod did as he was told without another word. As soon as he was down, the deputy started up the ladder. Jarrod backed his horse out of its stall and began to saddle it. "Did you find anything?" Jarrod called when he finished saddling his horse.

"Not yet," the sheriff said. "Go on home."

"I'll talk to you in the morning," Jarrod said and led his horse out into the street.

He mounted up, and as he rode out of town he looked long and hard at everyone and everything he passed. He was sure someone had been up in that loft, and whoever it was ran. That meant it had to be someone up to no good – and Jarrod felt it sink in for the first time. Someone was about to ambush him in the livery. It was only luck that saved his life. The man killing lawyers was no longer focusing only on shooting single lawyers who lived alone, and shooting them in the dark. He was changing his pattern, and now Jarrod knew he no longer had that cozy safe place to believe he was in. Now he was at risk, too.

XXXXXXXX

"All right, that's it," Nick said as soon as Jarrod had finished explaining what happened at the livery stable. "You don't go into town alone again, not until this is over."

Everyone expected Jarrod to object, but instead, he said very calmly, "You can't stay with me all day, and you don't need to. Send somebody to go in with me and to come home with me and that will be enough."

"Jarrod, everyone who's been attacked has been attacked in town," Heath pointed out.

"I'll avoid being alone when I'm in town," Jarrod said. And when he family all looked unhappy, he said, "Look, I'm working for the State right now. No one can just sit in on things that I'm doing that are not public, like a trial is."

"Don't you have a trial tomorrow?" Victoria asked.

"Only if I can't get a guilty plea."

"Well, then let me or Nick go with you and stay long enough to see if you're gonna get a guilty plea," Heath said. "If you don't and you have a trial, we'll stay. If you get a guilty plea and go back to your office, we'll head home and either come back later or send somebody else back to head home with you."

Jarrod sighed. It was a better arrangement than he thought he was going to get, but then again, he had to admit to himself, if not to them, that he had been frightened by what happened in the livery stable. He was steadying his nerves again now, but at the stable, he was scared.

"All right," Jarrod said. "Decide which one of you is going with me. I'm going up to talk to Archer for a few minutes."

The family stayed quiet until Jarrod was out of sight upstairs. Audra spoke first. "I think what happened today shook him up."

"I think it would shake anybody up," Nick said. He didn't want to think about how close Jarrod came to be another victim of whoever had it in for lawyers.

As if she were reading his mind, Victoria said, "I wonder what this shooter has against lawyers?"

"That's the big question, isn't it?" Nick asked.

"Lawyers aren't all that popular with everybody," Heath said. "Look how many men Jarrod put away have come after him when they got out. And I'm sure he's not the only lawyer in town who's been threatened before."

"And nobody likes Phil Archer," Nick said.

"He's not a pleasant person," Victoria agreed, "but that's no reason to shoot a man."

"It could be for some people," Heath said, "but that wouldn't explain why Kemper and Tiebolt were killed. They weren't particularly difficult men."

"No," Victoria said. "No, and it seems what's happening is oddly personal – not personal to the victims. Personal to the shooter."

"What do you mean?" Nick asked.

Victoria thought out loud. "Like there's something about the shooter that makes him hate lawyers. Not because of who the lawyers are, but because of who the shooter is." Victoria mused silently for a moment and then said, "Well, I'm sure the sheriff is looking at that angle, too. He'll find out who's behind this."

Nick and Heath looked at each other, understanding each other. They both hoped the sheriff would find the man before anyone else was hurt, especially Jarrod.