The Law and Ginny Marlow

by Marie Ferrarella

  This time she was coming up empty.

  The angry look on Jenny’s face picked apart the unraveling ends of what was left of her temper. Ginny had to struggle not to let the full force of it loose.

  Why was it that with the person who mattered most in her life she could never put into words what she was feeling? Couldn’t make Jenny somehow understand if not everything, then enough to resolve this uneasy schism between them and bring about its end? Ginny was dynamite when it came to putting together briefs or standing up in court and addressing the jury or the judge. But none of those skills seemed to stick when it came to talking to Jenny.

  There didn’t seem to be a right way to talk to the girl anymore, she thought, fighting frustration. Or a right way to approach her for that matter.

  Despair, dressed in anger, coaxed a fresh round of words from her mouth. “How could you do such a stupid thing? Running away never solved anything. Do you have any idea what could have happened to you? Any idea at all?”

  When she thought of all the things that could have happened to her sister out on the road all alone, she wanted to cry. Most of all, she wanted to shake Jenny until her brains fell into place again.

  Jenny raised her chin, daggers shooting from her eyes. There was only the slightest hint of hurt. “To you everything I do is stupid.”

  She was probably just imagining the hurt, Ginny thought. Lately Jenny was far too tough-skinned to be hurt by anything she said. She was the one whose heart was bleeding.

  “No, not everything, but this certainly was.” Ginny curled her hands into fists, keeping them on her hips since pummeling Jenny into the ground was tempting but unthinkable. “You can’t deny that.”

  The look on the young face was almost savage. “I can deny any damn thing I want. You think because you pay for my things, you own me.”

  It seemed they were doomed to go around this point again. Where had Jenny gotten such a ridiculous idea? She’d never remotely said anything to make her sister feel that way.

  “I never wanted to own you, but you do owe me—”

  Jenny’s head jerked up, triumph in her eyes as she won her point. “Ha!”

  Why was every exchange of words a battle? Why couldn’t they just talk? Ginny looked at her sister’s face and searched for the girl she used to know. “You owe me some respect.”

  Bitterness twisted Jenny’s young mouth.

  “It’s a two-way street,” Jenny spat out.

  Ginny wanted to lash out at her. Instead, she managed to keep her cool. “When you do something I can respect, I will.”

  “Right.” Arms crossed, Jenny swung away from her sister, only to see the sheriff standing there. She hadn’t heard him come in. “Well, what are you looking at?”

  Annoyance rose another notch inside Ginny. She’d taught her sister better than this. “Jenny, you can’t mouth off at an officer of the law, that’s what got you here in the first place.”

  Jenny shot Ginny a hostile glare over her shoulder, tossing her head. Long, brown hair swept along her shoulders. “You should talk.”

  “Yes, I should.” She’d be damned if her sister was going to continue embarrassing her this way. “I’ve got more experience than you do.”

  Anger succeeded in nudging away the last of Jenny’s fear. Once her sister had turned up, the specter that had ridden along with her like a silent, ghoulish companion slowly began to slip away. Jenny’s eyes grew into smug slits as she regarded Ginny.

  “Seems to me we’re both in the same boat. On the inside of this two-bit cell, looking out at a two-bit sheriff.” She flounced down on the bunk. “Fat lot of good your experience did either one of us, much less you.”

  Quint appeared completely unaffected by the exchange, other than to seem mildly amused. “I see we’re not making any progress here.”

  Ginny’s look was frosty as her eyes swept in his direction. She didn’t care for the pronoun he was carelessly bandying about at her expense.

  “I don’t know about you, but I’m not,” she replied icily. “She’s been like this for the last year. Two,” she amended.

  Jenny resented being referred to in the third person. “I didn’t think you noticed anything about me.”

  Pouting, Jenny slanted a long look toward the man standing behind the sheriff. She wondered if the deputy was his younger brother. They looked kind of alike, not like her and Ginny. She looked nothing like Ginny, she thought. Ginny was the pretty one, the one who always got all the attention. The one who would have looked good climbing out of a mud puddle.

  Ginny stared at her. How could Jenny say something so stupid? Did she actually believe that? “I noticed everything about you.”

  Jenny rolled her eyes and made a noise between her teeth that indicated her feelings on the subject. “How could you, you’re always working, always at the office from dawn to midnight. You even sleep there.”

  Yeah, Quint thought, he would have pegged her as a workaholic. The conservative suit, the no-nonsense attitude. The “in a hurry” attitude. But the hair, he thought, the hair that tumbled about her face like a dark chocolate storm indicated that there was still definitely hope of getting her to cross over.

  He nodded toward the pouting teenager, his eyes on Ginny. “Sounds like she might have a reason for her grievances.”

  Ginny flung him a warning look. It was bad enough he had them locked up for his own amusement. This was a family matter and something he had no business interfering with. “I’ll thank you to keep out of this.”

  The lady looked positively lethal, Quint thought. Made him kind of glad he’d never have to be on the wrong side of the table opposite her in court. He bet she was dynamite, strutting her stuff.

  “Sorry, I’m here to uphold the peace, and from what I’ve been hearing, there isn’t much peace to uphold inside here. Maybe the two of you might feel better on a full stomach.”

  He’d probably slip something into the food. She wouldn’t put it past him. Ginny remembered what Sheriff Dewey had been like back in Smoke Tree.

  “I’ll feel better once we’re out of here,” Ginny said tersely.

  But Quint shook his head. “Not from what I just overheard.”

  She couldn’t believe this was happening. “There’s a little thing called the Bill of Rights that says you can’t keep us here indefinitely.” Ginny could feel Jenny’s eyes on her, waiting to see what she did next.

  “That’s true,” he allowed, but he made no move to open the cell.

  Ginny felt like screaming. She wrapped her hands around the bars, coming as close to the infuriating man as the barrier allowed. Bill of Rights notwithstanding, she and Jenny were at this man’s mercy unless she could get help.

  “I have a phone call coming.”

  Quint nodded slowly, as if he were mulling it over. “That you do.” He could see the fury building in her eyes. She had beautiful eyes, he thought. Even if they were shooting sparks. Or maybe because of it.

  Unlocking the door, he stepped back to let Ginny out. But when Jenny bolted to her feet and made a beeline for the exit a second later, he placed his hand up, blocking her way.

  “Not you, little one. We’ve only got the one phone.”

  “Figures.” Jenny spat out the word. She did it strictly on principle. There was no one she knew to call who could get her out of this jam, or even come—other than the woman who was already sharing the cell with her. If there had been someone to call, she wouldn’t have hitched her way up here to this godforsaken place after that jerk Kyle ran off with the last of her money, leaving her stranded.

  She glared at Quint as he closed the cell door again and locked it.

  “Keep an eye on her, Carly. She looks like a slick one.” With a knowing smile, Quint winked in Jenny’s direction as he carefully escorted her sister out.

  Shooting a frustrated, disgusted look at Carly, Jenny flounced back on the bunk. Carly leaned against the back wall, content to do exactly what Quint told him to and just look at Jenny unt
il the others returned. He’d had worse assignments.

  Shutting the door that separated the cells from the office behind him, Quint indicated the black object on his desk. An antique in today’s world, the telephone, he found, was not without its charm.

  “There’s the phone.”

  Ginny stared down at it. She’d only seen its likeness in an old photograph she had of her late grandmother. “A rotary dial?” She circled the desk, as if not certain how to approach the telephone. “Who does this office belong to, Alexander Graham Bell?”

  If she meant to rile him, she was going to have to do a lot better than that, he thought. “Came with the office. I figured it had a lot of history attached to it.” He knew for a fact that it had sat there since Serendipity had had a sheriff’s office. “I’m big on history.”

  Ginny bit her tongue from uttering the first retort that came to mind. Not that it made any sense, it would just let her vent some of the frustration she was feeling. But that would do absolutely no good.

  What she’d said to her sister was true. It wouldn’t do to antagonize the sheriff although the thought was sorely tempting.

  Very gingerly, expecting the phone to fall apart at any second, she placed her fingers in the holes one at a time and dialed. Ginny watched in veiled fascination as the dial returned to its original position each time with a smart little “click.” On its last go-round, she actually heard the phone on the other end ringing.

  Raising her eyes, she saw that the sheriff was watching her. It took effort not to shift. “I’m surprised this thing works.”

  His smile was easy and engaging as she leaned a hip against the edge of the desk. “Lot of things around here might surprise you.”

  She raised a brow as she waited for the pickup on the other end. If this man thought to impress her, he was mistaken.

  “I doubt that, and I’d appreciate a little privacy.” She gestured him away.

  Amiable, Quint moved aside, but he took care not to let her out of his sight. He figured she wasn’t going anywhere without her sister, but that was about all he felt confident about.

  Ginny’s heart sank. When the other end finally picked up, she heard a recorded message telling her that there was no one available to take her call right now.

  She grabbed the receiver with both hands, willing someone to miraculously materialize.

  “Cliff, are you there? Cliff, if you are, pick up. Pick up the phone, Cliff! This is Geneva Marlow. I’m stuck in—” Suddenly blank, she looked at the man who was her jailer.

  “Serendipity,” Quint supplied easily.

  Ginny rolled her eyes. The town’s moniker was a complete and utter misnomer.

  “Serendipity, Montana. The number here is—” She looked at the faded, perfectly structured numbers on the dial and recited them into the receiver. She was surprised that they were so clear and so neat. “Damn,” she swore as she heard the machine cut her off before she was able to give the last number.

  All right, so her assistant wasn’t there. She’d just call David Fontaine. It would give the junior partner a laugh, but right now, she was desperate. She’d deal with the consequences of this later.

  She’d only managed to dial one number before the sheriff placed his hand in the way. It wasn’t a very large hand, not the kind belonging to a Neanderthal, but it looked exceptionally capable of keeping her from dialing.

  “What are you doing?” he asked mildly.

  Maybe he was just simpleminded. “Making another call.”

  Quint shook his head. Very deliberately, he removed the telephone from beneath her hand and placed it on another part of the desk. “’Fraid not. The law allows for one call.”

  She had to struggle not to sputter. He made her so angry, she was having trouble seeing straight. “But it was an answering machine.”

  Very carefully, he took hold of her elbow, guiding her back to the rear of the jail and the cells. “The law doesn’t say there has to be someone breathing on the other end when it’s picked up, it just says one call.”

  If that wasn’t the most pigheaded, infuriating… She stopped to collect herself and took a deep breath. There was nothing to be gained by telling him what she thought of him and his strong-arm ways. That could keep until she and Jenny were out of here.

  “All right, I don’t need David.” Ginny’s voice was terse, strained. “I can represent myself and my sister.” If he grinned any harder, that granite head of his was going to crack, sending all the rocks he had within it tumbling out. “Okay,” she demanded wearily, “what are you smiling about?”

  “Nothing, I just recalled that old line about the man who represents himself in court has a fool for a client.” She looked like a volcano about to erupt, Quint thought. He had a very healthy respect for volcanoes, especially sexy-looking ones. “But that only holds for a man, of course.” He underscored his comment with a wink.

  Ginny stiffened. She didn’t like the wink. Liked less what it seemed to do to her. She felt as if she were receiving tiny shock waves being telegraphed through the air. Had to be the empty stomach, she thought. She always fared worse on one, but there just hadn’t been time to eat. There never seemed to be enough time anymore, and arguing with this man was eating up a precious supply of it.

  She pulled her elbow away. “I demand to see the judge.”

  Quint took hold of her elbow again, this time more firmly. He knew just how to hold it to keep her in place. “Now we’ve been all through this, Geneva. The judge is away.” He opened the cell and ushered her inside.

  The clang as the door shut again seemed to echo in her head. This just couldn’t be happening. “Do you intend to keep us here overnight?” she demanded.

  “Looks that way.” Maybe if Ginny thought she had no choice, Quint mused, she and Jenny would band together instead of be at each other’s throats.

  She was going to rake this hustler over the coals when she got out of here, Ginny vowed. With or without the law behind her. She fixed him with a no-nonsense look. “My sister and I are not going to spend the night in a cell and sleep on a cot.”

  He’d had already given that some thought. “There might be a way around that.”

  Ginny’s eyes narrowed. With all her heart, she wished she’d taken her tape recorder with her. No matter, her word would have to do. Hers against his. All she had to do was get him somewhere where the phones had keypads on them instead of dials with holes. Until then, she had to be very careful.

  “And just what might that be?” Suspicion underlined every syllable.

  He exchanged looks with Carly. “You could spend the night at the ranch.” It wouldn’t be the first time he’d brought home a so-called prisoner, someone needing just a touch of rehabilitation within an understanding atmosphere.

  “The ranch,” she repeated, staring at him. The least he could do was attempt to be devious. He wasn’t even trying.

  “The Shady Lady,” Quint clarified.

  Oh, God, a brothel, Ginny realized with horror. Everything fell into place, crystal clear. This sheriff with the drop-dead smile and long lashes was into white slavery. She wished she had been more explicit in the message she’d left Cliff so he’d know where she was. And then she remembered. The detective she’d hired to find Jenny knew where she was. Cliff could—

  Belatedly she realized that Cliff and the detective didn’t know one another from Adam. The connection could never be made.

  And she and Jenny wouldn’t be found until it was too late.

  Horrified, Ginny moved her body in front of Jenny’s, instinctively trying to shield her. “If you think for one minute that I’m going to let you take my sister to some brothel—”

  “Brothel?” Carly scratched his head, completely mystified. “What’s she talking about, Quint?”

  Broad shoulders rose and fell. “Damned if I know.”

  He was doing that deliberately, Ginny thought. “Don’t play the innocent with me. It won’t wash. You’re a lot smarter than you let on.�
� And she was on to him.

  His smile lazily crept along his lips again. “Nice to know you think so.”

  Ginny raised her chin. “But I’ll kill you before I let you touch my sister.”

  She’d finally managed to lose him, he thought. “Touch your sister?”

  Yeah, right, he didn’t know what she was talking about. She really believed that, Ginny thought sarcastically. “You lay one hand on her—just try to get her to that ranch and I’ll—I’ll—” Lost for a weapon, Ginny pulled her high heel off and held it up like a stiletto knife instead of a stiletto heel. “—I’ll hurt you.”

  She looked adorable, Quint decided, brandishing her shoe as if it was some sort of martial arts weapon. It would take almost no effort on his part to quickly disarm her. For now, he allowed her to clutch the shoe. What was hard was keeping the grin off his face.

  “I’m sure you could, but why would you hurt me for taking you to my parents’ ranch?”

  She looked from the sheriff to the deputy. “Parents’ ranch?”

  It was worse than Ginny thought. The whole family was in on it.

  3

  Half-formed thoughts spun around Ginny’s head as she tried to find a safe way out of the situation. At all costs, she had to protect her sister. Granted it was two against two and the deputy wasn’t quite as broad and strong looking as the sheriff was, but the fact that she and Jenny were standing behind bars definitely tipped the scale in her disfavor.

  Ginny mustered the sternest voice she could manage. She was a lawyer and this was the most important argument of her life. She had to win it. Head high, she looked the sheriff straight in the eye.

  “You let us go right now, and I won’t tell anyone about this incident.”

  It was a lie. She had every intention of blowing the whistle on this two-bit white slaver, but she couldn’t do that if she wasn’t free. The first order of business was getting Jenny and herself out of here. The rest would fall into place quickly enough after that.

  “What incident?” Quint leaned his shoulder against the bars, curiosity taking a good toehold. Just what was going on in this woman’s mind?