A smile spread over my face before I could stop it. Not to sound like an ogling woman, but Dot was right. I didn’t hate the uniforms. There was something about a man who’d give up his life for a stranger that got me right in the heart every time. Soldiers, firemen, lawmen. I shook the last thought from my mind. It was no secret I’d been idiotically developing a crush on our new sheriff for a year. Unfortunately, he’d sooner put me in lockup than a lip-lock.
I angled into the last available parking space in front of the ice cream shop and shifted into PARK. The line snaked around the building. “Wow.”
Dot met me on the sidewalk. “At least we can chat while we wait. Did I tell you I love this outfit, by the way? You look super cute. Very country chic.”
I stared down at the faded jeans I’d owned at least a decade. The holes at the knees were earned, not purchased. My black fitted Patsy Cline T-shirt was a Christmas gift from Granny, and the sneakers on my sockless feet were probably from high school. Given I was twenty-nine years old, they really shouldn’t have impressed. “Thanks,” I said, taking up the end of the line.
“Did you cut your hair?” she asked, now scrutinizing me.
I squirmed under her keen and knowing eye. “No.” I tugged the length of my mousy brown locks over one shoulder and averted my eyes. “I used my blow-dryer.”
“And you’re wearing makeup.”
I made a sour face. “It’s ChapStick and some mascara.”
“Makeup.” Dot beamed.
“Stop it.”
Her smile widened, and I squirmed. Dot thought I’d begun paying more attention to my appearance since my aforementioned crush had begun.
I tried not to think about the crush at all.
A broad shadow fell over us as we shuffled forward with the ice cream line. “Excuse me.” A handsome stranger rubbed one hand through his tousled sandy hair and smiled. “I don’t mean to interrupt, but I think I’m lost.” He chuckled. “No. That’s not true. I’m definitely lost.” His brilliant blue eyes twinkled as he moved the hand from his hair to his neatly trimmed beard, managing to look slightly bashful and instantly more endearing.
“Well, where are you headed?” I asked.
The man’s brows crowded together. He pulled a folded sheet of paper from his back pocket and gave it a glance. “The Murphy Farm.”
Dot rocked back on her heels. “Are you one of the Civil War reenactors?”
“Kind of,” he said. “A friend’s dad asked me to fill in for him. He said something about this usually happening last month, and I guess he couldn’t do it this month, so I came in his place. My family’s here too. We’re making a whole vacation of it.” He lifted and dropped his hands in a show of defeat. “Lemonade from lemons, right?”
My traitorous gaze dropped to his left hand. No wedding ring. “Your family will have a great time. There are always plenty of activities for children.”
He puckered his brow. “I don’t have any children.” A moment later, his eyes widened. “No. Not that kind of family. I meant my parents. We’re meeting my brother here, but he’s also not a child. My sister has kids, but she’s not coming. Not her cup of tea.”
I smiled back at him, thankful I’d worn the ChapStick and mascara. “The fort is about five miles north. You can take the county road out of town,” I said, pointing to signs on the next block. “Make a right at that stop sign, then follow the markers. You can’t miss it once you get on the right road.”
“Okay,” he said, nodding, but making no move to leave. “Thanks.”
Dot looked from his face to mine. “Tell you what,” she said, pulling a pen and receipt from her purse and scribbling on it. “Call this number if you need anything else while you’re in town this week. Winnie is an expert on Blossom Valley and everything in it.”
He smiled. “Is that so?”
I laughed, simultaneously wanting to hug and smack Dot. “That’s me. A regular BV Wikipedia.”
The line moved again, and he took a step back. “Great. I’ll leave you to your ice cream. Thanks for the directions.” He lifted the receipt before tucking it into his back pocket with the refolded flyer. “And for the number.”
I inched forward with the line, refusing to watch him go. My phone rang before we reached the ice cream shop’s door, and I answered eagerly, hoping it might be Granny. She’d gone to the Roadkill Cookoff in Marlinton with two girlfriends and a new turkey chili recipe, and she hadn’t bothered to call or check in all weekend. “Hello?”
“Winnie?” a man’s voice asked.
“Yes?”
“Just checking to see if your friend gave me a bogus number,” he said. The jovial tone immediately put the handsome stranger’s face in my mind. “Thanks again,” he said.
I made a weird, strangling sound, but he’d already hung up.
“Oh my goodness. Was that him?” Dot asked, grabbing my arm and wiggling it. “What did he say?”
“He wanted to see if you gave him a real number.”
Dot did a quiet squeal and marched in place. “He was so cute!”
He really was, but my mood drooped slightly as I stared at the darkened phone screen. “I didn’t get his name.”
Dot took my cell and tapped on the screen, then returned it to me. “There. All fixed.”
She’d added his number to my contacts list and assigned him a name. “ ‘Tall, Dark, and Yummy?’” I asked before expelling a bark of laughter.
“Wasn’t he?” she challenged.
Thankfully, it was my turn at the counter, so I ignored her.
I placed an order for a massive chocolate malt, then stepped aside so she could order.
I couldn’t put my finger on a specific reason, but something about the man had felt strangely comfortable to me, like I’d known him long before we’d met. I smiled. Write a romance novel, why don’t you? I told myself. Tighten up, Montgomery.
A few sips of chocolate malt cleared my head as Dot and I walked back into the sun. “What’s going on over there?” she asked, pumping the straw in and out of her thick vanilla milk shake.
“I don’t know.”
A clutch of people had gathered behind my truck to stare at the ground. My stomach pinched as I realized I might’ve somehow hit a squirrel or chipmunk and not even known.
“Hey,” I said, moving around to join the group. “What’s going on?”
I followed their gazes to a dark puddle forming beneath my tailgate.
“Deer season hasn’t started yet,” an older man said. “If you’ve got a buck back there, he’d better have been hit with a bow. Not a gun.”
“It’s not a buck,” I said, offended by the accusation and concerned by the growing puddle. “I don’t hunt.”
“What is it, then?” he asked.
I gave the drips another look, and my stomach churned with awful memories.
The man was right. Gun season for deer didn’t begin for another few days, but the fact was irrelevant. All I’d done today was make a pickup at the pumpkin patch. Pumpkins, gourds, and hay, nothing that would spill or bleed.
Dot moved in close, uncertainty rolling off her in waves. “Did you order anything from Potter’s place that would leak like that?” she whispered, probably already knowing the answer.
“No.”
I reached for the tarp’s edge, breath held, back rigid, then peeled the protective covering away.
Dot screamed, and I jumped back, stumbling over my feet and nearly toppling onto the pavement.
Mr. Potter lay lifeless among the pumpkins and fall décor in my truck’s bed. A deep and clearly fatal head-wound scored the back of his skull.
Chapter Two
Sheriff Colton Wise and his deputies arrived within minutes. An ambulance, crime scene team, and coroner’s van weren’t far behind. Emergency vehicles clogged the street between wooden roadblocks that had seemed to manifest from nowhere.
Dot and I sat uselessly on the curb near my front bumper, horror-struck and in stunned silence. N
either of us was able to comprehend the unfathomable discovery or resulting scene unfolding before us.
Why would anyone hurt Mr. Potter? He was beloved. A local icon who spread joy with his pumpkins, corn maze, and wholesome family activities.
My gut demanded that whatever had happened to him was some sort of accident. It didn’t make sense that it could be anything else, despite the gash on his head. Except he couldn’t have covered himself with my tarp and secured the bungee cords. Only the person responsible for Potter’s death would have done that. Anyone else who might’ve happened upon him would’ve called for help.
I pressed a fist against the ache building in my chest.
Dot leaned her shoulder to mine for a long beat, offering a silent share of what remained of her strength and emotional stability.
Colton headed our way a moment later, a deep scowl on his handsome face.
“Dot,” he said, bracing broad palms over narrow hips. “Winnie. Either of you have any idea how this happened?”
I shook my head.
“Is he dead?” Dot asked, the words catching and cracking in her throat.
I patted her knee. If by some freak chance, Mr. Potter’s slack expression and lack of breath and heartbeat had meant nothing at all, surely the expanding puddle of blood beneath my truck confirmed his demise.
“Afraid so,” Colton said, his tone flat, his features carefully fixed into the perfectly unreadable cop-mask I hated. “And you just found him like that? Riding under the tarp on your truck bed?”
I nodded.
“Did you see him in town before you got ice cream?”
I froze, momentarily mistaking him for a mind reader. Then I recalled the ice cream shop behind us and forgotten drinks at our sides. “No.”
“We’d just come from his place,” Dot said. “Mr. Potter owns Potter’s Pumpkin Patch. Do you know it?”
Colton widened his stance. “I do. That’s where the rest of your load came from?”
“Right,” Dot said. “We stopped there to pick up an order for the orchard’s Fall Harvest Festival.”
“Did you see Mr. Potter while you were there?” Colton asked, eyes narrowing as he mentally put the story together.
“No,” Dot whispered, then turned to stare at me.
“I did,” I said hoarsely. “He sent me inside to pay the bill while he went to load the truck. That was it.”
“So, he was killed back at the pumpkin patch.” Colton checked over his shoulder. The coroner and his men were moving Mr. Potter onto a gurney. “This isn’t our murder site.”
I shut my eyes to stop the tears from falling again. It had taken me several minutes to pull myself together the last time the tears had started. “Someone hit him with something.”
Colton turned back to us. “Probably with a shovel. I’ll know more in a day or two. Can either of you think of anything you saw or heard at the pumpkin patch that could be related to what happened to Mr. Potter? Anything that might’ve struck you as unusual? Even if you dismissed it at the time. It could matter now.”
I racked my brain for some small detail that would send Mr. Potter’s killer directly to jail, but found my thoughts too jumpy and scattered to recall anything other than his lifeless body under my tarp.
Colton’s gaze swept continually over the crowd, assessing, evaluating, missing nothing. He’d arrived in his usual version of a uniform: blue jeans, a Jefferson County Sheriff’s Department T-shirt, and a ball cap. Sometimes he wore the big brown hat or uniform button-down, but I couldn’t recall the last time I’d seen him in all the proper pieces at once. Today, he’d removed the ball cap upon arrival, out of respect for Mr. Potter, which was nice, but the move hadn’t made it any easier for me to read his expression.
“Why don’t you give me a rundown on your time at the pumpkin patch?” he asked, turning sharp blue eyes on me. “Start with your arrival, then move through your steps until you discovered him in your truck.”
I wet my lips, then did my best to comply, though the details were a little fuzzy. Overall it had been an absolutely ordinary day. Hadn’t it? The crowd at the pumpkin patch was surprising, but only because I hadn’t known about the Family Fun Day. And I’d forgotten the John Brown reenactment had been rescheduled, bringing our usual October tourists into town now. “Wait.” A flash of Mr. Potter’s uncharacteristically sour expression came to mind. “He looked upset when I saw him,” I said. “I asked if everything was okay, and he said he was fine, but it didn’t seem like that was true.”
Colton scraped a hand through his hair. “All right. I need written statements from both of you, but I can swing by and pick them up later. You probably want to get home. I’ll have a deputy take you.”
“I’m fine to drive,” I began, then realized a moment too late. “You’re taking the truck.”
“Crime scene,” Colton said. “The bed needs to be processed before we can release the vehicle.”
I slouched. “Right.”
He fixed me with an exasperated look and sighed. “You have some kind of luck, you know that? You’ve been present at almost every murder scene since I became sheriff, and probably at more crime scenes than most lawmen.”
I lifted my finger at him, and my cell phone rang, successfully halting my rebuttal of his pointed and mildly accusatory statement. I dropped my gaze to the buzzing device beside my chocolate malt cup. I snatched the thing off the curb and rejected the call, turning the illuminated screen facedown on my lap.
Colton’s gaze raised and locked with mine. “You sure you want to miss a call from Tall, Dark, and Yummy?”
The phone rang again, and Colton crossed his arms.
I held his stubborn gaze as I answered. “Hello. This isn’t a great time,” I said.
“I guess not.” The voice on the other end was deeper than I remembered, more tense and hurried. “There are emergency crews all around the ice cream shop. What’s going on? I was nearly to the fort when all these vehicles went racing past me. I followed them back.”
“Why would you do that?” I asked, suddenly unconcerned with Colton’s disapproval and extremely worried Dot had given my name to a stalker or lunatic. Who chased emergency vehicles to crime scenes while on vacation? Or ever?
A car door slammed on his end of the line. “I’m here. What happened?”
“There was an issue with my truck,” I said. “It’s fine. I’m fine. You shouldn’t be here.”
Colton shot me an incredulous expression.
“Too late. I am here.” This time, Tall, Dark, and Yummy’s voice came in stereo, both through the phone and on the air.
Colton’s head jerked up and turned in the newcomer’s direction. Shock swept across his features at the sight of my new friend’s approach.
The tall man smiled. “I thought that was you.”
“It’s me,” I answered at the same time that Colton asked, “What are you doing here?”
Dot cocked an eyebrow. “You two know each other?”
Colton’s frown returned. He trailed his gaze over my face, then stared at my phone.
I disconnected the call and tucked the device into my pocket as I stood.
“This is my baby brother,” Colton said. “Blake. This is Winnie and Dot.”
“We’ve met,” Blake said, clapping his big brother on the back and shooting me a smile.
“Your brother?” The realization was like a bucket of ice water to my head.
I’d looked Colton up online after we’d first met, and he’d accused me of murder. He didn’t have a social media presence, but his mother did, and I’d gotten a fast rundown on all things Wise from there. “Blake,” I said softly. “The Marion County sheriff.” I nearly hung my head in defeat and humility. No wonder he’d looked familiar. He looked like his brother and the photos I’d seen of him last year.
Blake shot me a quizzical look and laughed. “How’d you know that?”
“Oooo,” Dot said. “Another sheriff. More Wise men in uniform.”
“Some are wiser than others,” Blake said. “Do you guys need a ride home?”
Dot and I both said, “Yes.”
Colton said, “A deputy can do it.”
Dot cocked a hip and made a crazy face at him. “Which one? Because it looks to me like all your men have their hands full.” She gestured toward the busy, crowded street.
Colton examined the scene while Blake grinned. “What about your granny?” Colton asked.
“She’s in Marlinton for the Roadkill Cookoff,” I told him. “She’s in a chili competition.”
Dot frowned. “I didn’t think she liked chili.”
“Grampy didn’t like chili,” I corrected. “Apparently she does, and she’s determined to win a ribbon for her family recipe.”
“Sheriff!” A familiar, high-pitched voice screeched, turning us all in Birdie Wilks’s direction.
Colton groaned as Birdie hurried our way, a line of women trailing like ducklings behind her.
“Sheriff! Is it true? Is that Jacob Potter they’re hauling away?” She pointed wildly at the coroner’s van easing past the wooden barricades. “Is he dead? Where was he found? How did it happen?” Thick rivers of tears rolled over her round, heavily rouged cheeks. “He’s my best friend’s husband. Has anyone called Hellen?”
Colton rubbed his chin.
I wrapped Birdie in a warm hug, and Dot offered her a tissue from her purse.
Birdie’s ladies stood back, looking unsure if they should come any closer, given the generous amount of clearly visible crime scene tape several feet behind them.
“I have to call Hellen,” Birdie cried.
“Now, Mrs. Wilks,” Colton began.
Birdie pulled out of my embrace, the billowing sleeves of her emerald blouse lifting on the wind. “Don’t you ‘Mrs. Wilks’ me, Sheriff Wise. If my best friend’s husband is dead, she deserves to know.” Birdie liberated her phone from a massive quilted handbag and dialed. She pressed the device to her ear with one dimpled hand and tapped her foot. A moment later, she let her shoulders droop and returned her phone to her bag. “No answer. We’ll have to go and tell her ourselves,” she told the women who’d crept back nearer the yellow tape. “Winnie,” she said, spinning back to me. “You’ll find out who did this, and you’ll make it right. Won’t you?” She pressed a soft palm to my cheek and implored me with her tear-filled eyes. “I need you to do that for me, okay?”
The Cider Shop Rules Page 2