Read Champagne for Buzzards for Free Online

choked up, our normal life shattered by death.
    Uncle Ziggy reached out and patted my arm. “No matter, honey, I watered them for you. Those pretty little pink things will be fine.”
    The sheriff barked, “Who else had keys to the truck?”
    â€œNo one. But I leave spare keys behind the visor so anyone can use it if they need to. It wasn’t locked.”
    â€œSo anyone could have driven the truck away or met Percell here.”
    â€œWas he killed here?” I asked.
    Sheriff Hozen’s lips tightened. He didn’t like being questioned. “Too early to say. He could have been murdered elsewhere and placed in the truck. There was no one on the property to see what happened, to see if someone took the truck off the property?”
    I shook my head. “Mr. Sweet worked until I arrived and then left for the day.” Howie Sweet was Clay’s foreman, the man who looked after the ranch day to day and kept it going while Clay was away making money. Howie Sweet was also the man who had owned the ranch before Clay bought it. The Sweet family had been on this land for three or four generations as the family went on a long, slow slide into oblivion. Pearl and Howard Sweet only had one daughter, Lovey, and a granddaughter named Kelly. Lovey owned a small diner called the San Casa on the main street of Independence. “Did you know Lucan Percell, Miss Travis?” I shook my head. “Never met the man. Is that who the dead man is?”
    â€œSeems like it. That’s what the driver’s license says.”
    â€œWas there money in the wallet?” He thought it over before answering, “Some.”
    â€œSo it wasn’t robbery.” The sheriff scowled at me.
    I felt it necessary to add, “If he was killed for his money, killed in a robbery, the killer would have taken the wallet. Of course, maybe the body isn’t that of Lucan Percell. Maybe someone stole the wallet and then the robber was killed and his body was put in my truck. Maybe that’s why the head was battered, so no one could identify him.” Sheriff Hozen was not real pleased to hear any of my ideas. “If it is Lucan, what was he doing in Jimmy’s truck?” Tully asked, getting into the game. “What was he doing in the truck unless he was killed here?”
    â€œNothing to say he was killed here,” Ziggy answered. “Could have been killed somewhere else and dumped at Riverwood, someone wanting to make it look like Clay was involved.”
    â€œLook,” the sheriff said, his voice loud. “This isn’t helping. I just need to know facts and not conjectures. What do you actually know to be a fact, Miss Travis? What do you know happened?”
    â€œNothing, I know nothing about this. It may seem that it’s just careless to let your pickup be used as dumping ground for murder, but I know nothing about it. I don’t know how a body ended up in my truck.” I couldn’t turn myself off; words just tumbled out of my mouth. “It’s just stupid. Why would someone kill Lucan and put him in my truck, especially if it was done out here. Why load him into Big Red when there’s all that land to hide him in?” I gave a broad wave of my hand in case he wasn’t sure what land I was talking about. “Doesn’t make any sense.”
    The sheriff had had enough. “Mr. Adams, where can we get in touch with him?”
    I turned over this information. I’d talked to Clay after I’d called the sheriff. Laura Kemp had already phoned him earlier and from his frosty tone I was lucky there was only one dead body on Riverwood. I also assured Clay there was no need to come home, not that he’d offered.
    â€œYou’ll have to come into the station and make a statement about all this.”
    â€œOf course, although you now know all I know.” The sheriff frowned at me and then turned to Tully and Ziggy and asked, “Have you seen