Jose murmured an apology for being late. Jake saw Adela give him a sharp look. The veterinarian was assuring Adela that Diamante was not ill but was only out of sorts from the recent upheaval. With a little tincture of time, he said, the horse would be back to normal. In spite of the veterinarian’s benign report Jose proceeded to pepper the man with trivial questions. Jake kept his eye trained on Adela. Her furrowed brow suggested to him that she was not buying Jose’s performance.
After the veterinarian had departed, Jake judged that it was as good a time as any to ask Adela what she planned to do with the horses. Before Adela could answer, Jose snapped that Jake was out of line for putting Adela on the spot like that. Adela looked weary but did not respond directly to either man. She ordered Jake to take Diamante out for some exercise. Then she invited Jose to walk back to her office with her.
Smarting from what he perceived as a rebuke from Adela, Jake saddled Diamante and led him outside the barn. As he mounted up he looked towards the house. He saw Adela and Jose standing very close to one another, on the patio outside her office. They were engaged in an animated conversation.
Nate flashed Georgina an expectant smile. His expression changed to a frown when she motioned for him to follow her to the side of Adela’s house. “There’s something that you need to know before you go in there,” Georgina said hurriedly as they walked. “Mark has lined up a drug company to buy your patent, and he’s hired an outfit to liquidate everything else.”
“Liquidate?” Nate said angrily. “Nobody said anything about liquidation. I can’t have my staff thrown out of work. How did this happen?”
“Rios was planning it all along. I didn’t know anything about it until this morning,” Georgina said. “And there’s more. Your patent is worth many times what Rios Capital is offering you for the whole company.”
“Why are you telling me this?” Nate asked. “Mark will fire you if he finds out.”
They were about to turn the back corner of Adela’s house. “To tell you the truth, I’m not sure why,” she replied. “Something about these last few days…..”
Suddenly, loud voices rang out from behind the house. Georgina put one finger to her lips to signal Nate to be silent. She reached her head around the corner. She saw Jose Ramirez, holding a switchblade knife to Adela’s throat. Jose's left arm gripped Adela tightly from behind, while his right arm held the knife dangerously close to her neck. He was shouting at a police officer who was standing only a few feet away from him. The officer was aiming his service revolver directly at Jose. Georgina’s heart rate skyrocketed. Quickly withdrawing her head she steadied herself against the wall. Nate leaned across her and peered around the corner.
“Drop the gun or I’ll use the knife on her,” Jose shouted at the officer. “Don’t come any closer.”
Nate pulled his head back. Georgina motioned for him to crouch; then, she looked around the corner again. This time she saw that Jose was slowly backing away from the officer and moving towards the corner of the house where they were hidden. Then Georgina saw Sam.
“Don’t make this any worse than it has to be,” Sam called out softly to Jose. “Come on, easy now, Jose, let Adela go.” Sam motioned for Officer Lopez to lower his weapon. “Easy, easy, Jose. You don’t want to hurt Adela. I know you don’t want to hurt her.” The officer dropped his weapon to his side. Sam slowly advanced towards Jose. “You’re a smart man, Jose,” she told him. “You know what you have to do. Put the knife down and we can work this out.”
“I had nothing to do with Rios’ death, nothing at all,” Jose shouted at Sam. “You can’t frame me for that. No way.”
Jose was now very close to Georgina and Nate. Georgina whispered in Nate’s ear.
Chapter Twenty-One