Chapter 11: Love Is Where the Heart Is
The Veterinarian came over a few minutes later. He saw a crowd around Pepper. He walked over to the crowd.
"Hello Pierre, what happened." The vet asked.
"Pepper was shot, please see what you can do?" He asked his usual Vet.
"Easy girl it will be all right." The vet walked around her and put a hand on her rump. He looked over the gunshot wound. "I need to take some x-rays. It is a good thing I came with my portal able x ray machine."
He turned it on, with the hand-held camera he took some pictures of Pepper's rear end. He turned on the viewing screen, "It looks like it did not hit any organs, only muscle so that is good, so now we have a choice we can leave it in there or we can put her down and try to remove it."
"Doc she was bred three weeks ago, what if she is pregnant?" Pierre looked at the vet.
"So, I think the best thing to do right now is to leave it in until we get word on if she's pregnant or not." The Vet told him. He held up a needle to give her a mild sedative to make her drowsy but not to drowsy to the point that she would not fall. He then stitched her up.
Ranger was looking at the crowd and the horse.
"Damn my stallion just bred her three weeks ago" Ranger was shaking his head as he walked up to Tank.
He put a hand on Tank's shoulder.
"Hey boss, looks like Pepper got lucky just hit some muscle." Tank told him. As they both looked at the mare while she was getting fixed up by the vet.
"Good, I don't want to have to bred her again, that was a pain in the ass" Ranger told him.
"Yeah, she did not like your stallion" Tank was shaking his head remembering that day.
He brought Pepper over to Ranger's place, let her loose in the same paddock as the stallion and the both watched as the sniffed each other. The stallion chased her and try to mount her, but she continued to run. So, Tank got her back into the trailer and called his vet, and they got the stallion's sperm and injected it up Pepper's rear and hoped for the best.
Now three weeks later both Ranger and Tank were hoping for a colt or a filly inside of Pepper.
"If you want I can see if we can get an ultrasound on Pepper and see if what we did worked?" The vet asked them
"Do that" Ranger told him. Suddenly Eddy came up. "Wow this is your place Pierre, it is awesome."
"Yeah Ranger, stay with Pepper and Stephanie, I have to go back to work to question someone" Pierre told him.
He walked up to Stephanie and give her a kiss on the lips, then walked away with Eddy to go question Joyce Barnhart.
They went to the station to get a car. They then left to pick up Joyce Barnhart who was at Vinny's Bonds.
"Hey Tank" Connie told him.
"HI Connie, we need Joyce to come with us for a while, we have some questions to ask her." Tank told her.
Joyce saw him and Eddy and tried to book it out the back door. Tank took what seemed like two huge steps and grabbed Joyce by the arm.
"Where are you going Joyce, and what is your hurry." Tank told her.
"Okay, I was with Morelli the night he got stabbed, but I did not stab him. I left him there in bed sleeping I swear" Joyce cried.
She sat down on the sofa where there was a TV. "How is Morelli anyway?" she asked.
"He did not make it, and right now you are the only one who saw him" Tank snarled at her.
"I swear that was the last time I saw him" Joyce begged, "Please you got to believe me."
"I don't believe anybody when a detective was stabbed and killed" Tank told her.
"Now we can take you to the station or you can tell us what you know here." Pierre told her.
"I saw a brown SUV there when I left his place, it was parked outside across the street. I thought about waking Joe up and telling him but I did not. I got into my car and left." Joyce told him.
"We found a cigarette butt in Joe's room was it yours?" Eddy asked her.
"Yes I had a smoke while he was in the shower, I put it under the bed so he would not see it." Joyce told Eddy.
"Okay you don't leave town, here is my extension at the police station." Tank wrote the number down and walked out.
Once they were both outside, "Do you believe her?" Eddy asked him.
"Yes there was a tone of truth in her voice, she is very upset that Morelli is gone" Tank told him as they were getting into his truck.
