Dead Case in Deadwood (13 page)

"Fine. Then set me up with him, help me out here. I’m
flopping and flailing in front of him."

"You’re supposed to be on sabbatical," I reminded
her.

Last month, after Natalie’s last boyfriend cheated on her
and left her pissed and heartbroken—again—she’d sworn off men for a year. That
so-called year hadn’t even lasted a day before she saw Doc pass by Calamity
Jane’s front window. Her infatuation for him had grown like a wildfire—fast and
uncontrollable. For that matter, so had mine.

"How am I supposed to stay away from men with someone
like Doc in town?"

"He’s not all that." I lied and turned away from
her to stare out my window so she wouldn’t see my nose twitching. Stupid tell.

Mudder Brothers Funeral Parlor glowed in the distance, the
back doors lit by a nightlight installed over them. "I’m sure he has
plenty of faults just like everyone else," I added for good measure.

"Name one."

He’s having sex with me.
I hesitated, the truth on
the tip of my tongue, but dread holding me prisoner. "Sometimes he doesn’t
shave."

"Which makes him look killer sexy."

Hear, hear!

"Name another," she said.

"He acts really odd at times." Like each time he sniffed
a ghost and keeled over in a faint.

"He’s mysterious. Next."

"Ummmm."
Tell her. Tell her. Tell her.
"He’s
not always good about returning phone calls," I added, thinking of how I’d
wanted to break every cell phone I could get my hands on when he kept dodging
my calls after the first time we’d had sex.

"He’s his own man. That’s a turn-on. Anything else?"

Yes.
"Well, there is something I kind of need to
tell you."

The sight of Ray’s SUV pulling behind Mudder Brothers and
backing up to the double doors under the night light stopped me in my tracks.

"Nat, look," I whispered and slunk down in my seat,
even though I doubted Ray could see me in the dark, not even with the orange parking
lot light overhead. "It’s Ray."

She leaned over my lap and stared out my window. "George
is opening the back doors for him."

From our viewpoint, we could see the profile of Ray’s
vehicle. As we watched the snake glanced around, and then opened the tail end
doors of his SUV.

"Ten bucks says there is a crate in the back,"
Natalie said.

"That’s my bet. You can’t take my bet."

"You snooze you lose, babe."

Ray climbed into the back of his SUV, the suspension
bouncing under his weight. George waited at the tailgate. Together, they hauled
out a crate. The missing twin.

"Holy freakin’ moly," I said under my breath.

"I win."

"What’s in that thing?"

We watched as they hefted it out and lowered it to the
ground. George pulled a bar from behind him and leveraged the lid open. I held
my breath.

"Can you see what’s in it?" Natalie whispered.

"No, it’s too dark. We need night vision goggles."

George lifted the lid, stared for a count of five, and then
dropped the lid with a thud that echoed across the grass and parking lot. He staggered
over to the back quarter panel of Ray’s SUV and buried his face in his hands,
shaking his head.

Ray stepped close to George, leaning into his face. He
reached behind him and pulled something from his waistband. Something small and
pointed.

"Oh, my God! Is that a gun?" Natalie asked.

"It kind of looks like it." I squinted and leaned out
the open window, white-knuckling the sill. "But it could also be a big
stick of celery."

"Or a knife," Natalie grabbed my forearm. "If
he’s threatening to hurt George, we need to call Cooper."

"We are not calling Cooper. Not unless we are one
hundred percent positive that is a gun or a knife. Not after the warning he
just slapped me with."

"Does Ray always lean in like that when he talks?"

"In my experience, only when he’s leering or
threatening." I watched as Ray and George separated and each grabbed an
end of the crate, carrying it through the back doors of the funeral parlor.
Where was Eddie?

Natalie sat back as soon as the doors closed behind them. "What
now?"

I kept my eyes glued to those back doors. "Let’s wait a
bit and see if they bring the other crate out."

Ten minutes later, several cars had rumbled past us through
the parking lot, but Ray’s SUV still sat there, the double doors still closed.

"Maybe we should drive over there," Natalie said. "We
might be able to find some evidence in the back of his SUV."

"No way. That’s too risky."

"
Bak bak bak
," she clucked.

"Hey, if Ray catches me and calls Cooper, I’m dead
meat. I’ll have to be more careful when I snoop now."

"Does that mean your investigation of the Case of the
Missing Crate is back on?"

While I pondered that question, Ray came around from the front
of the funeral parlor and climbed into his SUV. Nat and I slunk down in our
seats again as his headlights flashed across Nat’s pickup.

When we sat back up, she said, "Damn it."

"What?"

"We missed Doc leaving."

Sure enough, Doc’s Camaro was gone. Good! "Oh, darn."

She started the engine. "So, what were you going to
tell me about Doc before Ray came knockin’ round George’s back door?"

As much as I wanted to spill my guts about Doc and me, I
couldn’t say the words. My moment of courage had slipped away.

"Nothing important," I said.

She accepted my answer with a nod, which made my chest
constrict with guilt.

"What are you going to do about that crate business?"
she asked, shifting into gear.

I stared out the open window at Mudder Brothers Funeral
Parlor. "I’m going back in that room."

Saturday, August 18th

The Picklemobile sat ticking in the drive the next morning
when I stumbled out into the eye-watering sunshine. The keys dangled in the
ignition.

The smell of bacon floated my way from Miss Geary’s house,
making me drool. The uber-healthy granola bars Natalie had brought for
breakfast tasted like wood chips, undoubtedly similar to the ones we poured
into the bottom of Addy’s new gerbil cage last night.

Damn my sister and her so-called "gifts" for my
kids. One chicken was already one too many pets for my family. Lucky for me, Aunt
Zoe’s tolerance for Addy’s stray pets rivaled an Appalachian moonshiner’s
tolerance for hooch.

Shaking my head, I backed out onto the street and shifted
into Drive. Sunlight hit the windshield, emphasizing all of the smudges and wiper
streaks—and a bare footprint on the glass right under the mirror.
A footprint?
I recoiled.

"Oh, come on!" I yelled in the rearview mirror at
Miss Geary’s house.

I smacked my palm down on the dash, sending dust swirling.
Harvey was getting nooky all over town, including inside his damned old belching
truck, and I had to resort to phone sex each night from the bathroom while letting
the water run. No freaking fair!

Squirming on the seat, I grimaced at the thought of Harvey’s
bare butt rubbing on the cracked vinyl bench seat. I tucked the extra folds of
my green sundress between my legs and scooted up against the door, cursing the
lucky old buzzard under my breath all the way to work.

I didn’t even bother stopping in at Calamity Jane’s first
this morning. Doc’s Camaro sitting in the parking lot was invitation enough for
me to knock twice on his back door and let myself in before anyone saw me.

"Hello?" I said, peeking in the back room and
finding it empty.

"In here," Doc’s voice came from the open bathroom
doorway.

I leaned against the doorjamb, admiring his reflection in
the mirror. His right jaw and neck were covered in shaving cream; the minty
scent of the foam filled the small room. His chest and back were bare, his khaki
cotton slacks slung low on his hips. A dark green dress shirt hung from a
hanger on the wall behind him.

I lowered my tote to the floor, and then clasped my hands
together to keep from touching anything. Or rubbing. Or stroking.

When I finally raised my eyes to his, he shot me a lazy grin
through the foam. "How’s the phone?"

"Not so good. We’re going to give it another day to dry
out before declaring it officially dead."

"Were you actually in the tub last night?" He
scraped the razor down his cheek, leaving a strip of bare skin.

"Yep. Covered in bubbles."

He paused, razor in midair, his dark eyes drifting down the
front of my dress. "Completely covered?"

"All except the tips."

He groaned and banged the razor on the lip of the sink. "You
know, I have a tub at my place." He made another swipe with the razor. "It’s
big and white and just waiting to be tried out."

"I require bubbles. Lots of ‘em."

His eyes darkened. "So do my fantasies."

The stark hunger in his gaze lit me on fire everywhere south
of my forehead. It took me a moment to douse the flames and unpeel my tongue
from the roof of my mouth. "Hurry up and finish shaving."

He rinsed the razor and made another couple of swipes. "I
have an appointment. He’ll be here in fifteen minutes."

"I can be done in five."

His laughter rumbled from deep in his chest, sounding all
sexy and inviting. "Once isn’t going to cut it after what you teased me
with last night." He drew a swath down his neck, leaving just a single
thin trail of foam left over his Adam’s apple.

I batted my eyelashes. "You liked that little teaser?"

"Liked it? I spent half of the night imagining it, the
other half dreaming about it." He scraped away the last stripe and rinsed
the blades under the faucet, then splashed his face, reaching for the hand
towel to dry the drips from his jaw. "The next time you drop the phone in
the water, make sure you finish what you started first."

I was happy to finish right here and now, to hell with best
friends, gerbils, haunted hotels, and dirty old men. "You want me to
whisper the ending in your ear?"

"Violet." He threw down the towel.

"What?"

"I can’t do this."

"What?" I could have won an Oscar for how well I
feigned innocence.

He pulled his shirt from the hanger. "I can’t touch you
for just a few minutes, and then try to converse rationally about retirement
plans across my desk."

"Why not?"

"You mess up my ability to add numbers."

That made two of us. "So, wing it. It’s only money."

He put on his shirt. "I want more than just your mouth."

"Yeah, but that’s such a great place to start."

He stared at my mouth as he buttoned his shirt, then shook
his head. "I meant what I said last night."

"About the spurs?"

His lips quirked, but when his eyes locked with mine, the
flirting glint faded. "About you hiding things from me. We had a deal."

I leaned my head back against the door and sighed. "Didn’t
we talk about this enough last night?"

"No. We just got started. Then Natalie needed to use
the bathroom, so you pretended I was your dad, and told me how much Layne is
obsessed with the Maya since your brother sent him that book on ruins in the
Yucatan."

"Oh, right." Lucky Quint and his photojournalism job.
I often daydreamed of Quint’s life, exploring all around the world with no
offspring to tie him to one place, require a diaper change, or need new school
clothes. But would that get lonely?

"I swear we talked about Harvey after Natalie left,"
I said.

I distinctly remembered cursing the dirty bird and his five-gallon
bucket mouth—for telling Doc that Cornelius claimed he could talk to ghosts—before
I had a chance to decide how much I wanted to share on that particular subject.

"We did."

"See. I knew it."

"But only because I brought up again what he’d told me
about your new client."

Man, Doc’s teeth were locked onto this Cornelius business
with a bear trap grip. "Like I said last night, I was gonna tell you. I
just hadn’t gotten a chance to yet." I’d been too busy sneaking around
Mudder Brothers, and then spying on Doc with Natalie. "It’s really not a
big deal."

"Your client claims to talk to ghosts in a supposedly
haunted hotel. When word about this gets out, which we both know it will in
Deadwood, your reputation will take another hit."

"Cornelius likes to grandstand." His Abe Lincoln
outfit alone was evidence of that. "He just wants some attention."

"Then he should get a lap dog." Doc buttoned his
shirt sleeves. "Tell me more about this guy."

"I told you most everything last night."

"No, you mentioned he was from Vegas and had money, but
then Addy had some emergency with her cat and a gerbil, so you had to hang up
for a few minutes."

"Right, the gerbil." I scrubbed my hand down my
face. "Bogart had nosed into The Duke’s cage and got his head stuck inside
the exercise wheel. Unfortunately, The Duke was in the midst of exercising and
got stuck between the wheel and Bogart’s neck. So, all hell broke loose."

"The cat tried to eat the gerbil?"

"No, Bogart’s a vegetarian."

One of Doc’s eyebrows lifted. "A vegetarian cat?"

"Yeah. Go figure. I told Addy she should have called
him Gandhi, but she likes to name her pets after my favorite actors. She thinks
I won’t make her get rid of them then."

Doc undid his pants. "That explains Elvis, the chicken."

"Bingo." I watched as he tucked his shirt in,
resisting the urge to reach inside his pants and help. "Natalie says using
the King’s name like that is just wrong, but when Addy gets something fixed in
her brain, nothing short of electroshock therapy can change her mind."

"That apple fell straight from the tree," he said,
zipping up.

I dragged my focus back up to his face. "What’s that
supposed to mean?"