Free Murder and Moonshine: A Mystery by Carol Miller Page B

hand with that new butchering knife?”
    Sue grimaced.
    “It isn’t an emergency,” Daisy explained. “And we haven’t seen Rick. He’s not with you?” She glanced over at the shrub from which Bobby had emerged to see if his brother had secreted himself there too.
    “Naw. I went out alone.”
    “Well, he’s the reason we drove all the way up here, so do you know if he’s around somewhere?”
    “Ain’t you tried the door?” Bobby motioned toward Sue standing in front of Rick’s trailer.
    “I was just about to knock.” Sue raised a timorous fist and rapped the warped aluminum frame gently.
    Bobby let out a snort. “How the jiminy is he gonna hear that? I’ll get him for ya.” He pulled the large-bore rifle from his back and let a shot rip into the woods with a sharp, startling crack.
    “Bobby—” Daisy began critically.
    “Relax. We got no neighbors. Ain’t nobody gonna get nicked.”
    Sue gazed curiously at the rifle, which matched Bobby’s clothing in its perfect camouflage of olive green, gray, and neutral beige undertones. “Did you paint it to look like that?”
    “Don’t know much about huntin’, eh?” he chortled. “You buy ’em this way. They make ’em for all different terrains. Snow, woods, water. This one’s supposed to look like real trees. It’s for goin’ after turkey.”
    “It’s the middle of summer,” Daisy said. “Turkey season doesn’t open until October.”
    “I’m just practicin’,” Bobby replied with a suspiciously innocent grin.
    “With a rifle? Last time I checked, turkey hunting’s usually done with a shotgun.”
    The grin turned sheepish.
    Daisy rolled her eyes at him. He was obviously up to something bad, but in her experience the only one who ever got hurt in all of Bobby’s ill-advised and ill-fated schemes was himself, so she let it drop.
    “There’s noise inside.” Sue backed swiftly down the steps and away from the trailer. “I think he heard us.”
    “Took him long enough,” Bobby muttered, massaging the stock of his rifle.
    Sue went over and stood next to Daisy. She knew why. It wasn’t the gun itself. Sue was used to guns. Her husband was the Pittsylvania County sheriff after all. He carried a pistol most of the time. But George Lowell had been properly trained in the use of firearms, and he was emotionally stable. Whether the same could be said for the Balsam brothers was debatable.
    A lock clicked, and the screen door flew open.
    “Jesus, Mary, and Joseph! How many times have I told you not to do that, Bobby? You don’t shoot at a rustle in the bushes. And if you fire a warning shot, it’s always, always into the ground. Never the trees! You don’t know who could be out there. One of those high-powered cartridges you’re using can go over a mile.”
    “I tried to tell him,” Daisy said.
    Rick gaped at her. She couldn’t remember when she had last seen him so stunned. Fred Dickerson’s collapse on the floor of the diner had certainly surprised him, but he hadn’t looked half as shocked then as he did now. It was like she had metamorphosed into a mermaid right before his eyes and was lying on the clay in her clam shells, flapping her tail.
    “What—” he garbled, his jaw sagging so low that it wasn’t fully operational. “What are you—”
    “What am I doing here?” she finished for him. “I came with Sue. She needs to talk to you.”
    Turning to her in anticipation, Daisy assumed that Sue would take full advantage of the introduction and jump straight into the meat of the matter. But she was just as speechless as Rick, although rather obviously for a different reason. If Rick hadn’t expected to see Daisy standing in front of his trailer, then Sue hadn’t expected Rick to come out of that trailer half-naked.
    “Gah,” was all she managed to say.
    It took some effort on Daisy’s part not to laugh. Sue was quite evidently admiring a view that her darling portly George didn’t provide. It was a good view. That was