by Martha Carr
Panting, Rex trotted after him and made no attempt to correct his brother’s misconception.
Johnny slung the last bag into the bed of his truck and thumped a hand on the tailgate. “Where’s Amanda?”
“Out on the dock.” The screen door banged shut behind Lisa as she headed down the porch steps. “She said she wanted some fresh air.”
He sniffed at his hands and jerked his head away again. “I can’t blame her.”
Wiping his hands on his fresh pair of jeans, he turned toward the back of the house. Amanda was seated on the dock with her legs crossed, facing the water. Maybe now’s the right time to have that other talk I been meanin’ to have with her.
As she studied Johnny’s scowl, Lisa put her hands on her hips and glanced at the girl. “Is this what you guys have been doing for the last two weeks?”
“What?”
“She goes off somewhere and you hang back to stare at her?”
“She’s fine.” He leaned against the rear of his truck and hooked his thumbs through his belt loops. “The kid needs some space. I get it.”
“Or maybe she needs something fun to do.”
He snorted. “We been havin’ fun all day.”
“I don’t mean hunting or having a few laughs and a root beer float with a group of old men who could be her…great-grandfathers. Or watching you get gooed by a swamp monster.”
“Come on, darlin’. Don’t tell me that wasn’t fun from where you were standin’.”
The agent closed her eyes but couldn’t help a small smile. “Despite how much fun that was, I’m talking about normal kid stuff, Johnny. You know, with normal kids her age.”
“I ain’t buyin’ her a damn cell phone and tellin’ her to go meet new friends on FaceSpace.”
“On what?”
“Damn social media. The one with all the—”
“Yeah, yeah. Don’t get her a phone.” Lisa chuckled. “Let’s take her out.”
Johnny looked warily at the half-Light Elf woman. “Like shopping?”
“Maybe. If that’s what she likes to do.”
“Huh.” He looked at the dock and narrowed his eyes. “Well, if she does, we’re stayin’ away from wherever you bought your clothes.”
“Wow. Okay, forget the shopping. What do you do around here for fun?”
The dwarf rubbed his mouth and wiry red beard, then shrugged. “Everything we already did today. Usually without company.”
Lisa took a deep breath. “How about dinner?”
He smirked. “I’m flattered, darlin’. Truly I am. But I reckon us goin’ on a date probably ain’t what would make her happy.”
“Oh, boy.” She rolled her eyes in exasperation and they both chuckled. “I meant all three of us—”
“I know what you meant.” He pushed away from the bed of his truck, winked at her as he passed her, and turned to move to the side of the house. “I got somethin’ in mind. Gimme a minute.”
Shaking her head, she watched him but remained in the dirt lot to give him and his ward some space.
Luther and Rex bounded after him. “So what’s the plan, Johnny?”
“Yeah, where are we goin’, huh?”
“More hunting? Oh, man! We’re gonna make it three times in one day?” Luther yipped excitedly and Johnny snapped his fingers.
“Hush.” The dwarf took two heavy steps onto the dock and stopped. “Hey, kid.”
“Hey.” Amanda didn’t turn to look at him but she sat a little straighter.
He cleared his throat. “Whatcha doin’?”
“Nothing.” She gestured toward the end of the dock. “Obviously.”
“All right.” He clapped briskly. “Well, since you ain’t busy, come on. Let’s go.”
With a sigh, she stood and turned to face him, her shoulders slumped. “Where?”
Johnny scrutinized her dejected demeanor and fought back a laugh. Well, the mood swings are age-appropriate at least. I reckon it ain’t much more than that. Hopefully. “It’s a surprise. Come on.”
“Johnny, I don’t honestly want to—”
“Naw, you’ll want to. Trust me.” He waved her forward and Amanda shuffled toward him. “You ever been to a crab boil?”
“Um…I’ve seen crabs boiling.”
The dwarf chuckled and gave her back a few gentle pats when she stepped off the dock with him. “It ain’t the same thing at all, kid. Crab boil’s like one giant dinner party. I reckon you been to a few of those up north, huh?”
“Yeah. All the time.” A shadow passed over the girl’s face and she slowed as they walked across the grass along the side of the cabin.
Shit. Stay away from the old life in the city, Johnny. Don’t be an idiot.
He cleared his throat, at a loss for what else to say.
“It’s not gonna be like one of those, right?”
He glanced at her. “Do you want it to be?”
“Uh…no.” Amanda chuckled and wiped her hands on her pants. “And if you’re excited to go, I know it won’t be.”
“Uh-huh.” He grinned reassuringly and nodded at Sheila. “Hop in there, kid. It ain’t a house party in Manhattan but this is as fancy as it gets down here.”
The young shifter paused beside the Jeep and pointed at Agent Breyer. “Is Lisa coming?”
“It was her idea.”
The woman smiled. “Of course I’m coming—wait. What did he tell you?”
“Crab boil.”
“Yeah, I’m coming.”
Johnny whistled and the hounds raced toward him again. “Get on up, boys. We’re gonna have ourselves a time.”
“A crab time!” Rex leapt over the back of the Jeep and landed with a scrabble of claws on the empty floor in the back.
“We love crab, Johnny.” Luther stopped behind the Jeep, crouched, and sprang up. His back foot caught on the edge of the glass-less window, and he toppled forward over the side before his head popped up over the back seat and he panted. “Crab time!”
“Shrimp time!” Rex barked as Sheila’s engine roared to life.
“Food time!”
“People time!”
Luther cocked his head. “Hey, Johnny. Will there be people there?”
“Like friends?”
The dwarf glanced at them in the rearview mirror as Lisa braced herself against the passenger side door. “We’ll all have a good time.”
He eased Sheila forward in a tight circle to turn and smirked at the woman’s tense arm pressed against the door. “Are you okay?”
“What? Yeah, I’m—ah!”
With a wide grin, he floored the gas pedal and the Jeep hurtled down his dirt drive. Rex, Luther, and Amanda howled in the back.
Chapter Eleven
“See that place right there?” Johnny pointed down Riverside Drive at the shabby looking waterfront building in Everglades City, the front plastered with crooked signs of one-line menu items.
“City Seafood?” Amanda raised an eyebrow at him. “That’s as fancy as it gets down here?”
He glanced at his watch. “It’s a hell of a place to eat, kid. And it’s almost seven now. Just in time.”
Lisa stared at the sign in front of the restaurant. “They close at six, Johnny.”
“Uh-huh.”
“So you’re takin’ us to an after-hours crab boil inside a restaurant.” The young shifter wrinkled her nose. “It’s kinda disappointing.”
“Don’t knock the food, kid. But that ain’t where we’re goin’.” He skipped off the sidewalk on Begonia Street and headed across to the other side.
His two companions looked at one another in confusion. “So why’d we park right next door?”
“It’s the off-season.” He shrugged. “Free parking in the airboat tour lot.”
Luther and Rex trotted across the street beside him.
Amanda turned to look at Sheila and the two other cars nearby. “I think everywhere in this town is free parking. And I thought he liked airboats.”
Lisa c
huckled as they hurried after the dwarf and his hounds. “I think it’s the tour part he doesn’t like. Mainly the tourists. Come on.”
They passed only two more streets as they followed him down Camelia St. E and in five minutes, they’d crossed the entire width of Everglades City’s main street from the wide river on the west to the narrower one on the east. They turned again on the far side of Collier Avenue at Everglades Family Fishing and walked past riverfront properties lining the strand.
“Oh, okay.” Amanda nodded. “These houses look more like fancy party houses.”
“Maybe.” Johnny turned and waltzed through the next house’s yard toward the water.
“Johnny,” Lisa whispered and hurried to catch up with him as the hounds bounded through the reeds.
“Hey, Rex. Get that frog?”
“Where?”
“Right there—oh! Shit. Go, go, go.”
“Johnny, this is someone’s property.”
“Yep.”
“We can’t simply barge through their yard like this.”
“These folks only come here November through mid-May, darlin’.” He gestured at the huge, pastel-pink house with the sweeping front and back porches. “It’s almost June. They ain’t gonna know the difference.”
“A house party where the owners aren’t home?” Amanda’s mouth dropped open in excitement. “Awesome.”
The dwarf snorted. “This was a good idea. Y’all got a hell of a lot to learn ʼbout how things work down here.”
“So no house?”
“No house.” He led them upriver along the railroad track at the edge of the land before it gave way to the swamp on their right. Finally, he stepped onto the dock that stretched across the narrow river at the front of someone else’s property and pointed at the swamp. “Mind the ʼgators. They tend to get a little excited when it starts to warm up.”
Amanda grinned. “Cool.”
“Jesus.” Lisa stepped gingerly onto the wobbling floating dock. “He’s leading us through an alligator pit.”
“It might be they’re somewhere else. I simply said mind ʼem.”
Rex and Luther returned from their sprint through multiple waterfront properties and leapt onto the dock with a scrabble of claws. They raced past Amanda and Lisa—and made the woman freeze with her arms straight out on either side—and even darted ahead of Johnny into the underbrush. “Crab time, here we come!”
“Oh, man. Oh, man. Johnny! Why’d we wait so long?”
The hounds disappeared into the thick growth without waiting for an answer and uttered a single bark each.
The dwarf stepped off the end of the narrow dock with a squelch of mud and turned to offer Lisa a hand. “It looks steadier than it is. That’ll clear up.”
“Uh-huh.” She narrowed her eyes at him and smirked as she took his hand slowly. “This how you reel ʼem in, Johnny? Scare the ladies with a warning about ʼgators, then pull out the minor chivalry?”
He snorted. “Only when I bring ʼem out here.”
“Oh, yeah? How many women have you brought out here to a crab boil in the middle of nowhere?”
“Only you, darlin’. And the kid.” Johnny turned and strode through the mud and reeds and the thick branches that hung low over the swamp. “Watch your step too. There’s a path but it ain’t been cleared in a couple of decades.”
Lisa laughed and hurried after him, ducked under the branches, and swiped vines aside. She grimaced when some snagged her hair but moved forward without hesitation.
Amanda jumped off the dock, splashed a huge puddle of mud and water everywhere, and spattered her jeans. She turned to look at the houses along the water and smirked. “This is gonna be good.”
They proceeded for another ten minutes along the alleged path Johnny seemed to know like his own back yard. Lisa couldn’t see anything remotely resembling a walkway but at least she hadn’t gotten any swamp water in her boots.
Finally, muted Bluegrass music and a few dozen voices could be heard somewhere ahead, followed by Rex and Luther’s excited barks. “We’re here!”
“Johnny, hurry up before they eat all the food.”
“Hey, Rex. Check it out. Chum buckets.”
“Yes!”
The dwarf pulled aside a particularly large fern and held it back until Lisa and Amanda passed through.
“Woah.” The young shifter’s eyes lit up as she took in the open clearing in the Everglades—a huge circle of dry land complete with tables and chairs, a rickety-looking shed with only three walls, four tall wooden tables positioned end-to-end beside the shed, and a firepit covered by a grate with another sheet of metal on top. Mason-jar lanterns hung from the shed and along thick ropes strung from the roof into the higher branches of the closest trees, and at least two dozen people milled around, talking, laughing, and drinking.
The girl folded her arms and gave him a bemused glance. “This isn’t a real place, is it?”
“Well, you ain’t dreamin’, kid. You won’t find this on a damn tour map, but for us locals, this is as real as it gets. Come on.”
“Is this here all the time?” Lisa asked, her eyes wide as she followed him absently toward the tables where no one had sat to eat yet.
“’S long as the storms don’t blow it away.” He smirked at her. “Is this fun enough for ya?”
“Oh, yeah.”
“Hey! Johnny!” A skinny man in denim overalls without a shirt under them and thick construction gloves stopped in front of the metal-covered fire and raised a hand. “Ain’t seen you out here in a while.”
“I ain’t had the itch to the drive all the way out to experience the Everglades City.”
The man snorted and stooped to pick up the huge burlap sack on top of the metal sheet. “Well, it’s about damn time you showed your ugly mug ʼround here. Grab a drink, yeah? I’ma dump these and start handin’ shuckers out.”
Johnny raised a hand in acknowledgment, and the man hoisted the burlap sack off the fire to take it toward the row of tall, sturdy wooden tables.
“Shuckers as in for oysters?” Lisa muttered.
The dwarf snorted. “You don’t eat oysters in a month, don’t have an R.”
She wrinkled her nose and frowned at him. “You know, you were much easier to understand when we were in New York.”
Johnny rubbed his nose and smirked. “This is home, darlin’. I’m only loosenin’ up. Look. Clive’s dumpin’ crab on that table. Steamed ʼem all together—either softshell or blue. I can’t see from here. We let those babies cool off, and then the horde will start swarmin’ like a pack of starvin’—” Goddamnit. How many poorly timed wolf analogies are there? “Well, you get the idea. Come on.”
“Okay…” The agent seemed fixated on the dozens of crabs with fist-sized bodies that Clive tossed out of the steaming burlap sack onto the tables. He spread them out with his gloves. “Where are we going?”
“To get a drink.” The bounty hunter winked at her and headed toward the small crowd—a bearable size for him—and beyond them to the open-front shed.
“Johnny.” A man missing most of his teeth grinned at them and his lips folded over his empty gums. “What the hell are you doin’ here, man?”
“I had to clear the place out at least once before it got too damn hot, Marvin.”
The man wheezed with laughter and lifted a beer bottle toward him.
“My days. Johnny Walker.” A tall woman with frizzy blonde hair pulled away from her face with a large plastic clip put a hand on her hip and regarded the dwarf with a broad grin. “Well, now it’s a real party. Ain’t it?”
“Not unless you brought your shrimp.”
“Honey, when have you ever seen me without it?” The woman darted Lisa a glance and her smile faded a little. “Who’s your friend, Johnny?”
“Lisa Breyer. This is Hannah Bender.”
A man in full camo from head to toe who stood slightly behind the woman snorted, but he looked away and focused on his beer when Johnny glanced warningl
y at him. You’d think grown-ass men would quit findin’ that funny.
Lisa smiled sweetly—mostly—at the blonde woman. “Hannah makes the best damn blackened shrimp I ever had,” the dwarf told her. “She still won’t tell me what she uses.”
Hannah winked at him. “Family recipe, Johnny. You know there’s only one way you’ll ever get it outta me.”
“Uh-huh.” With a smirk, he moved past her toward the shed and Lisa followed quickly.
“Nice to meet you.”
The woman grinned at her and batted her eyelashes. “You too, honey.”
As soon as her face could no longer be seen, the agent’s smile disappeared. “Honey. That one gets me.”
“It’s only Southern hospitality, darlin’.” Johnny looked at her over his shoulder and raised an eyebrow. “Is darlin’ off the table too?”
She gave him a small smile. “Not when you say it.”
“Uh-huh.” He led her around the front of the open shed and her eyes widened when they stepped inside.
“Wow.”
“Johnny!” A huge man stood behind the slightly crooked bar built into the back of the ramshackle structure and his muscles bulged beneath his tight white undershirt. “Well, hot damn. Good to see you, brother.”
“Chuck.” He inclined his head and approached the fully stocked bar.
A single deep shelf ran the length of the shed’s sidewalls, both of them covered with serving dishes of different sizes and colors and each holding a different home-cooked side dish. At least three different variations of mac ʼn cheese, scalloped potatoes, and coleslaw were immediately visible, along with summer salad and Caesar salad. Corn cobs slathered with butter and paprika were piled on a platter beside green beans cooked with bacon. A basket of still-steaming biscuits covered in a checkered cloth filled the shed with an aroma that made Lisa’s mouth water.
The self-appointed bartender bent behind the bar and emerged with a rocks glass and a bottle of Johnny Walker Black Label. He grinned at the dwarf as he poured four fingers into the glass. “Folks was startin’ to worry when you didn’t show up for the last…what? Three cookouts?”
He took his whiskey and sniffed. “You know I don’t roll around here—”
“During tourist season. Yeah, Johnny. We all know.”