2 Landscape in Scarlet by Melanie Jackson Page B

canyon was disturbed by her passing, shaking the few remaining leaves from the colonnade of oaks that gave the town its name. There was no speed limit posted, but Juliet was sure that she was exceeding safe speeds. That meant her follower would have to exceed them too or give up.
    As expected , the gray man decided to play though a quick check in the mirror showed Juliet that his smile was gone. In fact, he looked a bit dismayed. He’d probably been told to look for a ret i red nerd and was expecting gray hair, a nervous disposition that was easily overawed , and perhaps a bag of knitting she hung off her cane . He had expected to be able to lean on her and have her cave immediately.
    Juliet took the next turn hot, skidding in the dirt and throwing mud and rock into the air. The Subaru protested but held to the track . Behind her she heard a scraping noise, but no fatal crunching. Her follower had hit shrubs, not trees.
    Too bad.
    It occurred to her that maybe she was overreacting, but this obnoxious stranger had her back up. And anyway, she was enjoying the small bit of vehicular recklessness. Their little chase was down payment on a lesson in manners which was likely never to be delivered in full since she had no intention of ever going back to Washington.
    But this man could be the surrogate , the whipping boy . She needed to get rid of him and to start spackling the cracks before her wall of privacy started eroding. Maybe a report about erratic behavior would keep them away. No one wanted to work with an insane operative.
    She flashed by the first geodesic dome covered in weathered shingles. There were two, the second painted up like a cupcake that had begun to look a little moldy with the encroaching moss marching up the walls . The road looked like it was veering left, but just over the crest it jogged right. Juliet wait ed to set up for it until the last minute, hoping dust might obscure her follower’s view.
    The other car had fallen back. That was fine . Juliet just needed enough of a lead to reach the auto dealership without being seen and she could park behind the shelter of the old frontier wall that enclosed the parking lot. If she moved fast enough, she could be out of the car and into the sheriff’s office before he turned onto the main — and only — street running through town.
    Fortunately the town was all but deserted , practically a ghost town, and Juliet was able to nip into the lot and find a space next to the wall and half-shrouded by oleander and yew. She was out of her car and up by the gate only seconds later. She peered around cautiously and finding her path clear, she dashed up to Garret’s office.
    There she met with a setback. Garret wasn’t in. She debated for about one second the merits of questioning Deputy Henderson and then decided that it wasn’t worth it.
    “Do you know where the sheriff is?”
    “I think he’s out by the stables. Or else down at the gallery.”
    The stables. Had he thought of something else he needed to investigate at the scene of the crime ? Some fact the y had overlooked the first time?
    “I’ll try and catch up with him there.”
    The stables were closed and looking forlorn and as cold and damp as any building had ever been. Juliet turned the south corner and stopped short. The re was no sign of Garret, but the gray man was there. The persistent bastard had headed right for the crime scene as if he knew that was where she would come.
    He had his back to her, facing a large stone. B ut it wasn’t likely he would contemplate the boulder for long. It was impressively large but a rock of limited fascination in other respects . And if he looked to the left he would see the repair shop and, from that angle, a glimpse of the back end of the muddy Subaru.
    He might have already done so and that was why he was waiting where he was.
    Juliet called Fate a lot of names in her head but then turned to duck behind the thick yew where the ravens still sat , living markers