Nearly Departed in Deadwood (24 page)

      “Since birth, according to her mother.” I tried to swing the subject back to his occupation again. “She says you’re meeting again on Thursday.”

      “She invited me to lunch at her place.”

      My stomach felt like he’d bounced a bowling ball on it. “Oh.”

      “But I already have a lunch appointment that day.”

     
Whew!
I grinned in relief.

      “So she’s going to cook me dinner, instead.”

     
Shitfire!
My grin flipped upside down. I stared out the window so I didn’t have to try to school my features while I beat back my hostility toward my best friend.

      “Natalie is a good cook,” was the only compliment I could spit out between gritted teeth at the moment. Jesus, I had to find a way to tame the jealous ogre clubbing around inside of me before Natalie’s visit tonight, or she was going to catch on that I had a silly crush on the guy she was doing her damnedest to bed.

      “Do you have any brothers or sisters?” Doc asked.

      “One of each. My brother travels the world as a photojournalist. His home base is in Rapid, but we usually only see him at Christmas and the twins’ birthday, if he can swing it. Layne is a huge fan of his uncle Quint.” I leaned my head back against the headrest. “I just wish he could hang around more. My son needs a male role model. I’m afraid living with three women is warping his young mind.”

      “What about your sister?”

      “I don’t know. I haven’t talked to her since I caught her in bed with my boyfriend when the kids were toddlers.”

      “Ouch.”

      “Yeah, that’s not the half of it.” But now was not the time to reach into that pile of dung.

      “Tell me about growing up in Rapid City,” Doc said, apparently picking up on my unwillingness to explain the sister-subject in more depth.

      The remaining half-hour trip to Harvey’s whizzed by, along with the pine trees lining the road, as I talked about cold winters at home on the prairie and hot summers with Aunt Zoe in the hills.

      Harvey banged open the screen door as Doc and I crawled out of the Camaro.

      “Oh, Violet, I almost forgot.” Doc grabbed his satchel and pulled a small, thin box wrapped in brown packaging paper from it. “This is for you.”

      I raised my brows. A gift? For me? From Doc? What was the occasion?

      “It’s not from me. Natalie stopped back by after her appointment and asked me to give it to you.”

      Oh, right. I smacked myself mentally for pipe-dreaming again and I took the box from Doc. Calamity Jane’s address covered the front,
Attention: Violet Parker
was handwritten on the lower left corner. I fingered one of the taped ends as we walked toward the porch.

      “What’s that?” Harvey asked as I climbed the porch steps.

      “I don’t know. It must have come in the mail today.”

      “Well, quit diddling with it and open the damned thing.”

      Doc leaned against the porch railing as I tore open the package. Inside, I found a box of chocolates.

      “Graceland’s Finest,” Harvey read the words printed on the box.

      A picture of Elvis in his famous white, rhinestone-studded jumpsuit covered most of the box top. I opened the lid and found a yellow envelope with my name scrawled on it. Chocolates shaped like the King lay underneath, the smell of sweet cocoa hovered around me.

      “Let me hold these for you.” Harvey took the chocolates from me as I ripped open the envelope and withdrew a card with a field of daisies pictured on the front.

      I looked up at Doc, my shoulders tense. There was no doubt in my mind who had sent these now. Doc frowned back, his dark brown eyes holding mine. He knew, too.

      “What’s it say?” Harvey asked through a mouthful of chocolate.

      I opened the card and read aloud:

     
The roses will be red,

     
For Violet, who I’ll woo.

     
The Wild Pasque, Friday at seven.

     
Join me—dinner for two.

      “Woo wee, girl.” Harvey whacked me on the back. “You just keep reeling in the weirdos and freaks, I swear.”

      “Yeah. Lucky me.” I read the poem again, my left eye began to twitch midway through it.

      “You’re not going to go, are you?” The tone in Doc’s voice made it clear what he thought of the idea.

      I closed the card, my gut queasy, quivering. “I don’t know.”

      “You don’t know?” Doc’s question rang with incredulity. He crossed his arms, his jaw clenched. “Have you considered that this admirer could be dangerous? Don’t let the daisies fool you.”

      “Or the chocolate.” Harvey grunted as he chewed. “Damn, this is good stuff.”

      I glared back. “You have any other idea on how to get him to stop watching me? Sending me these creepy poems?”

      “Ignore him. He’ll go away soon enough.”

      “He knows where I work. Finding out my home address would be simple. It’s not like I’m in the witness protection program.”

      That shut Doc up for the moment.

      “Don’t worry,” Harvey assured Doc, offering him some chocolate. Doc shook his head. “Me and Bessie will hang out in the parking lot. Make sure she makes it in and out of the restaurant in one piece.”

      “Who’s Bessie?” Doc asked.

      “His shotgun,” I answered.

      “Oh, Christ.”

      “You sure you don’t want me and Bessie to come along tomorrow?”

      Harvey held out the chocolate Elvis toward me, which I took and bit in half. I barely tasted the sweet chocolate or the raspberry filling as I chewed on the King’s head.

      “What’s tomorrow?” Doc’s eyelids were narrow as he looked back and forth between Harvey and me.

      “A lunch date with Jeff Wymonds—her number-one kidnapping suspect.” Harvey pulled open the screen door and leaned against it. “Come on, I need a drink. We can talk about this inside.”

      Doc didn’t budge. A vein throbbed near his left temple. “Do you have some kind of a death wish, woman?”

      “No, I just—”

      “Hurry up,” Harvey grabbed my arm and tugged me toward the threshold. “Before the flies get in.”

      Stuffing the card in my purse, I stepped inside Harvey’s house, Doc huffing and grumbling on my heels.

      “Welcome to my humble home.” Harvey walked around Doc, who’d stopped short in the entryway. “What’ll ya have to drink?”

      “Something strong and burning,” I answered. I wasn’t driving, and Calamity Jane’s was a half hour away—plenty of time to sober up before returning to my desk.
If
I decided to go back there today. “What’s going on with the funny noises behind your barn?”

      “Not much. Been quiet lately, but I set out some big ol’ traps in the woods just beyond the barn. Unless it’s a bear, those traps will catch whatever’s sneaking around back there and hold on tight.

      “Is that legal?” I asked.

      A choking gasp came from Doc. I looked over my shoulder.

      His face almost gray, his eyes fluttered shut, Doc swayed. I reached out to catch him as he started to fall, his weight sending me reeling backward into a coat tree.

      “Doc, are you okay?” My shoulder blades burned where the coat hooks jousted me.

      “Outside,” he whispered, his whole body shaking.

      “What in tarnation?” Harvey raced over and helped me steady Doc.

      “Let’s take him out on the porch, get him some fresh air.”

      A minute and lots of cursing and grunting later, Harvey and I eased Doc onto the porch swing. The chains creaked under our weight as I sat next to Doc, unsure where and whether to touch him while he held his head in his hands and took deep breaths.

      “Go get a cold washcloth,” I told Harvey, wanting a moment alone with Doc. I waited for the screen door to slam before turning to Doc. “What in the hell just happened in there?”

      “Allergies.” He spoke through his fingers.

      “Don’t give me that allergy-baloney again.” I crossed my arms, frowning at the back of his head. “Harvey doesn’t have a single gardenia-scented air freshener in the house.”

      “Something else must have set me off.”

      He sounded like he was telling the truth, but my gut screamed “liar liar, pants on fire!” I clutched Doc’s forearm. “Look me in the eyes and swear it was just allergies.”

      Doc lowered his hands and stared at me, his eyes red-veined, his cheeks and forehead still pasty. “I swear, it’s just something I’ve dealt with since I was a kid.”

      I stared back, wanting to believe him.

      I really did.

      But ...

     
Chapter Sixteen

      “Remember that gem I was telling you about last week?” Mona asked me after Doc ditched me back at Calamity Jane’s.

      I dropped my purse on my desk and swung by the coffee maker for a hit of caffeine to spur me through the last two hours of work. “Sure. It was about $50,000 out of Doc’s price range.”

      Mona waved away my frown. “Don’t worry about the price.”

      No problem. While we were visiting Fantasy Island, I’d like a million bucks and Salma Hayek’s body, too, please.

      “I’ll have the place ready to show on Friday. Bring your client by at lunch.”

      “Okay.” I sat down with my cup of coffee, flipped open my daytimer, and riffled through several empty pages.

      When Jane hired me almost three months ago, I’d had big plans, and even bigger dreams. Looking back, I should have saved the thirty bucks I paid for the fancy datebook and gotten one of those credit-card-sized yearly calendars instead. At least the tip chart on the back might have come in useful.

      I scribbled Doc’s name on the page. I’d have to give him a call to make sure he wasn’t going to be too busy sleeping with Natalie on Friday to view the place with me.

     
Meow!
I sat back, lowered my pen. Whoa. I needed to cage that sabertooth tiger before she bit the wrong hand—like Natalie’s, when she came over tonight to gush about Doc.

      My desk phone rang. I silently offered a certain chicken for sacrifice to the Realty Gods in exchange for someone calling to buy a home, a trailer, a tool shed, a dog house, anything. “Calamity Jane Realty, Violet speaking.”

      “Hey, Vi.” Natalie said.

      Damn. Addy’s chicken would cluck and peck for another day.

      “I was just thinking about you,” I told her.

      “Something good, I hope?”

      “Of course,” I lied.

      “Sweet, because you’re going to be upset with me.”

      “Why?”

      “I can’t come to dinner tonight. Mom just called. Dad has some kind of stomach flu, and with Mom’s hip out of commission, she needs help. So I’m headed out to Hill City for the night.”

      Darn, no Doc-fantasy details. Woe was me. “That’s okay. We’ll do it another night.”

      “How about tomorrow?”

      “No, Wolfgang asked me out.”

      “Where are you going?”

      “I don’t know, but he mentioned having a surprise for me.”

      “I hope it’s something erotic and edible.”

      “I’d settle for just edible.”

      “Well,” Natalie continued, “Thursday won’t work for me. I’m having Doc over for dinner that night—and breakfast on Friday, if everything goes as planned.”

     
Blah blah Doc blah sex blah blah
. “That sounds fun.”

      “How about Friday?”

      “I have plans.” With a secret-admiring psycho. “Saturday?”

      “It’s a date. With any luck, we’ll both have lots of juicy details to share by then.”

      “Definitely.”
If
I was still breathing after my dates with Ted Bundy and the Son of Sam.

      We shared goodbyes and I hung up to find Ray off the phone and grinning at me.

      I scowled at him. “What?”

      His grin spread toward his ears. “I’m just imagining what you’ll look like wearing a McDonald’s uniform.”

      “Jesus, Sunshine,” Mona said, disgust lacing her tone. “Can’t you just lay off Violet for one day?”

      “I’d sooner lay on her, but I don’t dawdle with the help.” He laughed at his own joke. “Although, she’d probably fill out a French maid uniform nicely—in the hips, anyway. Those miracle bras do wonders.” He winked at me. “You should try one.”

      I reached for my cup, planning to poach his trouser trout with some steaming coffee, but I heard Jane’s office door open just as my finger wrapped around the handle.

      “Violet,” she said, “are you available this afternoon?”

      I carved a smile onto my cheeks. “Sure.”

      “I need your help. The old Sugarloaf building in Lead is for sale. I want to know more about it. Can you run over to the library and see what you can dig up?” She held out a Post-It with an address on it.

      Oh, God, the end was near. Jane was using me as her personal errand girl now. Shouldering my purse, I stood and took the address from her. “Will do.”

      “I have an appointment in Sturgis this afternoon, so just leave whatever you find on my desk.”

      I followed Jane into the hallway that led to her office and the back door, flipping Ray the bird behind my back as I walked. The sound of him blowing me a kiss almost made me turn around and go poke him in the eyes Three-Stooges style, but I straightened my shoulders and stormed to my Bronco instead.

      During the short ride to the library, I practiced perfecting my comebacks and insults for my next round in the ring with Ray. The sight of Doc’s Camaro parked in front of the library made me frown. I pulled in behind it. What was
he
doing here—again?

      Doc had recovered from his allergic reaction at Harvey’s after a glass of lemonade, but he’d stuck to the porch swing the rest of the visit, requesting a rain check on Harvey’s offer to show him the house. Harvey had supplied a plate of cold-cut sandwiches for lunch, and later handed off a thick folder to Doc as we climbed into the Camaro.