Death on the Range: Target Practice Mysteries 1 (7 page)

“Very good, thank you for asking.”

Jess gestured at me. “This is Di. Di, this is the owner of Westmound Industries, Mrs.—”

But the lady stepped around her and extended her hand while saying, “Call me Elizabeth, please. We are all part of the Westmound family.”

I stood up, wishing I had bothered to look in the mirror before they arrived, and shook Elizabeth’s hand. She had a strong grip.

“I wish I could have met you under better circumstances. I came over as soon as I was notified. Liam says that you found Honey. How are you doing?”

I had heard that Westmound headquarters was in Utah; she must have driven over first thing this morning.

“I was pretty upset, but Liam was very kind.”

“I’ll be making arrangements for a grief counselor to come to the center and talk to everyone as soon as possible.”

I waved a hand in the air. “Oh no, I’m fine.” I smiled brightly while Elizabeth studied my face.

“Do you mind if I sit for a second?” As I nodded, she sat in a chair and gestured to the couch for me to sit before continuing. “Do you know that I personally made the final decision on every person hired for the center? This center is really my pride and joy. I love the entire outdoor industry, but I have a special place in my heart for archery. You were the final hire we made, and I did some internet research on you. We’re very lucky to have you here.”

I fidgeted in my seat. I knew there was quite a bit about me available online, from articles about high-dollar contracts our company earned to a few about women in technology and at least one article about me leaving the company when divorce proceedings started. I silently begged that she not ask about the divorce. “Thank you, I’m happy to be here.”

“About ten years ago, my husband and father passed away in the same year. I was left to run both growing companies. I insisted that I was fine and had everything under control. Eventually my son quit college to come home and help me. He made me go and talk to someone, and I think that was the only thing that saved me. There is no shame in letting someone in.” She smiled at me with genuine warmth.

I smiled back. “Thank you.”

“If you ever need anything, please don’t hesitate to tell Jess or Liam. Or you can call me directly.”

As she headed to the door she asked Jess to show her where Liam’s room was. They said goodbye to us and left.

Mary gushed from her spot on the floor.

“She’s so awesome. I did a couple articles on her and Westmound companies in general last year. She’s one of the few female owners in the industry. She knows everyone by first name, even if you met her once five years ago, and she pays attention to every company she owns and employee she has. She must not sleep. Plus, she has been so kind to me. That’s part of the reason I applied to work here. I want to be her when I grow up,” Mary said in an awestruck tone.

“I think I do, too. I can’t believe she took the time to come by the room. She probably has a lot of other stuff on her mind right now.” I gazed at the door. “How long was I asleep?” I was still exhausted, but I no longer felt like death warmed over.

“A couple of hours, but I have good news. I finished reading the memoir. Even being super careful to read every word, it was still really short. I highlighted some stuff to read to you. Honey didn’t exactly tell the truth in a lot of the stories.”

“Like what?” I dragged the notebook over the table and starting looking at her notes.

“It’s hard to explain. She didn’t flat-out lie about any facts, like winning a medal she didn’t or making a team she didn’t, but every story is just a bit off. Let me back up. You didn’t know much about Honey, right? Can I tell you from the beginning?”

I smiled and grabbed a pen to doodle with while Mary talked. Mary loved to tell a story. I had avoided personal stories from either of us, and she respected that, but she gave me long-winded explanations about every show we watched.

“Honey was spoiled. I don’t know how rich her parents were, but they had some connections and enough money that she could devote herself to full-time training. In her book, she talks about being a triumphant winner and a gracious loser, but that wasn’t the case. She had a reputation for being a poor sport: not shaking hands after a match, being rude if she lost, just unpleasant, but nothing really against the rules.”

Mary got up off the floor and sat in a chair to continue.

“Nationwide, we only have about a hundred women that are seriously training in competitive recurve archery. The talent pool is good but not very deep. Honey had been sitting in about eighth position of the national rankings for years: very consistent but not good enough.”

I was boggled by her exact statement. “How do you know that?”

“Because of the articles I wrote. Normally I’m a freelancer, but this last summer I worked part time with NOUSAA, the National Organization of USA Archery, writing little articles about the teams for the Summer Games. Everyone else on the team was easy. Owley lives and dies archery. I don’t think I have even heard of her dating until today, but I will get to that later.”

I drew a heart next to Owley’s name in the notebook.

“Owley trains nonstop, and this was already her second Summer Games. She’s our top-ranked female and places well internationally, though she tends to be a bit unpredictable. One world event she will medal, then the next she won’t even make top thirty. She may be pretty weird in person, but she sounds great on paper.”

“What about Minx?” I had taken an instant dislike to her abrasive personality.

“Minx is awesome, a real great story. She comes from this huge family, has like a million sisters. They don’t have a lot of money. She lives at home and helps with the family business during the day then trains in the evening. They have bake sales on the weekend to raise enough money to send her to tournaments. She’s a rising star in the organization. She has been on a steady climb for the past few years, and she will probably eventually be better than Owley. She’s tough and a hard worker. If she gets into the OSA program here to train full time, she might be unstoppable. If I had been in charge of publicity, I would have had Minx everywhere, but I found something that explained why she wasn’t. I’ll pull it up for you.”

“Argh, she gets under my skin. And Honey?” I attempted to draw a skull and crossbones next to Minx’s name.

“Honey’s story was really hard to write. She only barely made the team at all. The team was picked over three events, and her ranking coming in was sixth. There were only three spots on the team, but it wasn’t the best year for our athletes. There isn’t much money in recurve archery, especially for females, so a couple of long-time athletes retired when they got great job offers or got married. Two others got pregnant, and another had to leave the first event when her mom was rushed to the hospital.”

“How sad. Did her mom die?”

“No, she lived, but if you miss one event you can’t advance.” She thumbed through the tablet.

“That sucks, but at least she didn’t lose her mom as well.” It would be too awful.

“I totally agree; there’ll be other Summer Games. I got hired right before the final trial so I went to watch. Minx and Owley had the top two places pretty well locked up, but Honey barely snuck in third by a fraction of a point. She hasn’t won a single national medal in her ten years of shooting, never competed internationally or anything. No hobbies. Nothing. It was a super boring article. That’s why I did so much research on her; I was hoping that something would come up.”

“You make it sound like she didn’t deserve to make the team. Do you think she cheated or something?”

I felt as though I was missing something to the story.

“No, she didn’t cheat, at least as far as I know. She just made it sound like she earned all these things when really it was more about other people’s misfortunes or her using money or influence to pull strings.”

“Didn’t she place the highest at the Summer Games?”

“That was super surprising. I read something in her memoir that was weird about that—” Mary was cut off abruptly by a knock at the door.

CHAPTER FIVE

Mary got up to answer the door. As she opened it, a black nose pushed inside, and Moo ran into the room. He hopped up on the couch next to me as Minx entered the room, holding two arrows and a baggie.

“Liam has a meeting at the center and asked if I could drop the dog off here. I need to fletch two arrows, and the equipment room at the center is still off limits. Do y’all have some acetone and alcohol?”

Mary came back and swiped across her tablet while answering Minx, “Sure, give me just a second and I can grab it for you. Here, Di, this is that article I was telling you about.” She handed me the tablet before she left the room.

She had pulled up a section from Honey’s memoir. I scanned the page, focusing on a few highlighted sentences. The page started with her returning home after the trials. She mentioned getting headshots, hiring a publicist, getting her hair cut, speaking to sponsors about renegotiating her contracts, and talking to new sponsors but very little about practicing. Mary had highlighted a line. “I wanted to make the most of my one opportunity.”

Minx and Mary returned to the room, and I shut the tablet cover and notebook. Minx settled on the floor with a small trash can next to her.

“Hey, Princess, what article you reading?” Minx leaned back on her hands and smirked at me. She had emphasized the word princess and appeared to be waiting for my reply.

“Princess?” My suspicions were increased when her smirk burst into a full-blown smile. I had taken the bait.

“Yeah, Princess Di. I figured that you needed a pro name, and I’m pretty good at them, right Mary?” She nodded her head in Mary’s direction but watched me for my reaction.

Mary squealed with glee and clapped her hands once. “Princess Di. It’s perfect.”

I didn’t like being called Princess. It might be okay for a father to call his daughter that, but in an adult it carried the implications of spoiled and high maintenance. “Why in the world would I need a pro name? I’m not a professional archer.”

My tone held a bit more force and snip than I intended, which made Minx smile wider.

“I saw you shooting yesterday. Honey said that you used to compete in college and then you took a job here. It’s only a matter of time. I’ve an eye for these things.” Minx sat forward and wiped her hands on her pants then started cleaning her arrows. She peeled the tiny plastic veins off along with the black tape that held them on.

“Did you see that in Honey?” I needed to take control of this conversation.

“Geez, Honey.” She stopped to look at me. “I heard you guys are throwing a celebration of life or something for her. How did you get sucked into that?”

I shrugged noncommittally, hoping that she wouldn’t ask for more details, then countered, “Not a fan?”

“Were you?” Minx didn’t even look up, but I could see a half smile on her face. Was it possible that she was being difficult on purpose? I looked at Mary then tipped my head in Minx’s direction.

As Mary and I silently communicated, Minx used a combination of acetone on a cotton ball and her thumbnail to work that double-sided tape off of the arrow shaft.

“Minx, I was just telling Di about the Summer Games and writing those articles about you guys. Yours was the most fun.”

Mary smiled at Minx with genuine warmth, and Minx returned it.

“Thanks, you did a great job on it. Though really it wasn’t much competition, was it? Honey had that whole team of people helping her, but even they couldn’t make her likable. Owley has no personality. That’s part of the reason I’m here. She has been in the range, watching videos of her competing against Honey in the Summer Games Elimination match for the past hour or two. Owley sitting there with those big, empty eyes watching, watching, watching. I was about to go mad.”

“I heard Honey had a lot of people supporting her.” I put finger quotes around supporting.

Minx snorted with a flash of amusement in her eyes.

“Right, supporting her.” She echoed my finger quotes. “People have gone into space with a smaller support crew. After the Summer Games team was selected in the fall we had a lot of team events to meet the coaches, familiarize ourselves with shooting together for the team event, publicity, etc. NOUSAA kept pushing team America, but Honey was all about Honey. She wanted to have her own personal photographer for every photo op, and we were always standing around waiting on someone.” Minx was focused on scrubbing the arrow.

I gave Mary a nod to encourage her. Minx was responding better to Mary than me. “I always wondered why she got so many stories done on her when you and Owley were better archers.”

“Simple—money. Mary, you and NOUSAA did a great job trying to support us, but you had six athletes, including the men. Honey just had more resources. Her publicist could get out more specialized information faster, and they had connections. And she didn’t believe in sharing the spotlight at all. She didn’t even pretend.”

“That sounds frustrating,” I said.

“Frustrating? It was infuriating.” Minx put down her arrows to look at me fully. “I had spent years shooting and training for this opportunity, and Honey turned it into a living nightmare. I was a background player in her play. Do you know that she brought an analyst in to assess her competition, including us? Originally, she told all of us that the analyst was looking at other countries. But we’re archers, not basketball or football players. Everyone has the same game plan: aim at the middle, and try to hit the middle. Sure, some people are weaker in the rain or wind, but unless we invented weather control, what good would it do to know that? Then it came out that the analyst was also looking at Owley and me. Looking for weaknesses. The team manager about flipped out. They kicked everyone out of the camp and all future training camps except the athletes and one personal coach each. It was glorious.”