"The next morning they robbed the bank and had a shoot-out with the local sheriff." Holt finished the story with more details than she knew. "Miraculously they escaped into the mountains. The band returned a week later, on their way to Mexico, and kidnapped one of the local maidens. She never returned."
"A history major?" Lacy asked.
His expression became animated. "Silver Creek has a vivid history that should be preserved. It's up to us..." He halted. "Well, up to the citizens to preserve it."
"We really want to create a lively town again and hope to utilize these grand old buildings." She lifted her chin.
"I can do it," Holt said confidently. He stuffed both hands in his pants pockets and let his gaze roam the grounds. "This old plaza would be perfect for an old-fashioned gazebo."
"A gazebo?" She squinted in the direction he was looking, and her imagination began to work on the idea he'd tossed out. "Yes, a gazebo. With wandering stone sidewalks and scattered flower gardens. This could be a lovely park, a gathering place for families. Picnics and Sunday afternoon bands and a theater-in-the- round for summer nights..."
"And an ice cream store," Sofia said as she grabbed her dad’s leg and held on. "Are we ready to go? I’ve got an urge for Rocky Road."
He put his hand on her head. "Sofia – "
"Okay Holt, the job’s yours if you want it."
He looked up quickly. A smile spread on his angular face. "If you're offering it now, I'll take it now."
"Agreed."
They shook hand, eyes meeting and locking briefly. Then they went back to the office where he signed a few papers.
"Is two weeks enough time for you to take care of your business and get here?"
"Yes. That's fine. And thank you, Mayor Donahue."
"Please, call me Lacy. We're very informal around here. Welcome aboard, Holt." Lacy shook his hand again, his large, warm hand. She felt his power surge through her. "You'll need to find a place to stay," she managed to sputter. "Our Chamber has a complete listing of available homes. It's on West Third."
"Thanks. We may as well take care of that while we're here."
"Are we going to stay here this time, Daddy?"
"Looks that way."
"Long enough for me to have a puppy?"
"We'll see," Holt said.
Sofia faked a slap to her forehead."Oh no! Here we go again!"
Lacy felt that the smartest thing Holt Henderson did was to bring his darling daughter to his job interview. As they left, she could hear Sofia say, "But Daddy, how can we live someplace where they don’t even have an ice cream store?"
In that moment, Lacy promised herself to provide an ice cream stand, even if she had to fund it herself. She stood at the front office window, smiling while she watched the two of them stroll down the sidewalk. It occurred to her that the main reasons she hired the tall, lean man was because he had big hands and a darling daughter. And what he did to her libido on a hot summer day.
Lacy returned to her desk to tackle writing another grant. What a relief to have found someone so qualified and experienced. She could hardly wait to report to the committee.
Scarcely a minute later, her office door rattled open. A black cat darted across the doorway and a little girl squealed. Lacy looked into the face of the man she'd just hired. Holt.
"Call the police!" he demanded. "My Jeep's been stolen!"
CHAPTER THREE
Lacy’s heart leaped to her throat. "I’m sure there’s been some mistake! No one would – "
"Somebody mistakenly drove off in my Jeep?" Holt's brown eyes swept over her desk. "Where's your phone? Mine doesn’t work in this one-horse town. Call the cops—"
"H-hold on a minute." Lacy stood and braced her thighs against the desk to steady her body and her nerves. She certainly didn't want to culminate Holt’s job interview with a call to the sheriff. But she didn't want to lose him to car theft.
"Let's check this out first." Her body stiffened, and one hand reached out as if to halt him from further action. Her mind raced as she tried to determine what to do. One wild hope was that he was wrong and would remember that his car was actually parked on the other side of the building. They’d walk out, and there it would be, safe and sound.
"No, I didn't forget where I parked it," he said in answer to her silent hope. "What else do you want to check out before calling the cops?"
"Well, uh..." Lacy's thoughts tumbled wildly but only one popped out. Do something to stall and maybe the situation will improve. How, she didn't know. "Tell me exactly what happened."
He glared at her. His lips thinned as he spoke deliberately. "I parked on the street beside this building an hour ago, and when I returned, it was gone. Zip. Nada. Tire tracks in the dust leading—" he gestured dramatically "—into the sunset."
"Exactly uh, where?" She moved from behind the desk and toward the window that held the dripping air conditioner. "Show me."
He hovered close behind her and pointed to the street where no cars were visible. She could smell his deep woods scent and took an extra breath. She could feel his presence, his heat, even his anger. And she shivered slightly.
"I parked out there, in front of that mesquite tree. I was right across from the hoop where two teenage boys were playing basketball. As you can see, neither boys nor Jeep are there now. And we did arrive in a wheeled vehicle. Need proof?" He rattled a set of keys in front of her nose. "Someone must have hot-wired it. Something teens are prone to do if they're bored on a hot summer day."
"Don't jump to conclusions, Holt."
"You don’t see the kids, do you? No kids, no Jeep. Put the two together."
Lacy shook her head and her heart sank. The situation was sounding worse, not better. She resigned to doing her civic duty. "Give me the description. And license. I’ll call the sheriff’s office."
"A five-year-old Jeep, silver and black. Because of its age, only insured for liability, not collision or theft. So if it's stolen, it's gone. Tough. I'm out of wheels and outta luck. Stuck."
"Does this mean we won't have a Jeep anymore?" Sofia had been standing near her father, holding his hand.
"Yep." He shrugged.
"No it doesn't, honey," Lacy responded to Sofia and stooped down to touch her arm. "We'll get it back. Soon. Don't worry."
"I can describe the two kids who were playing basketball," Holt said fiercely. "One was tall and blond, the other was dark and tough looking."
"They could play basketball real good," piped Sofia. "And the tall one could jump real high."
Lacy swallowed hard. She was almost sure the blond he referred to was the math teacher, Sandy Amado's young brother-in-law, Steve. Basketball was his favorite sport and she saw him almost every day in the playground practicing shots. Surely he wouldn't get involved in a car theft. Maybe it wasn’t him. The dark one, she thought, was a kid named Roman. She didn’t know much about him, but had seen him hanging around this summer.
Holt faced her in a defiant stance with feet wide apart and arms folded across his chest. "Are you going to do something?"
"Please find our Jeep," Sofia added with a little whine to her voice. "We need our ice cream."
"Sofia, please hush," he muttered in a low voice.
Lacy glanced distractedly at the sweet-faced child, who folded her arms to mimic her father. There was no sympathy in her brown eyes, either.
Holt's voice softened. "Look, I hate to accuse those kids. But you've got to admit, it doesn't look good for them."
Lacy nodded miserably. "You're right. I just wish we could get to the bottom of this without involving the sheriff. For the kids' sakes." There seemed no alternative. After all, the man's vehicle was nowhere in sight, and chances were, his observations of kids plus empty Jeep had merit.
They were interrupted by a triple knock on the open office door. A vision in bright pink stepped in. "Is this the mayor's office? Somebody said there was an AC emergency here."
Lacy gaped at the woman dressed in bright
pink coveralls and high-topped work boots. Low on her hips dangled a workman's belt, from which hung several hand tools.
"Hi Mayor. I’m June, like the month, or the bug, here to check on that thing." She headed directly for the drippy window unit.
"Bug?" Lacy snapped. "Great timing."
"Sorry to interrupt, but I got to get this job finished. More customers are waiting." The woman angled her hip prominently and propped one hand on it. "You probably think I can't fix this machine because I'm a woman."
" No, that's not it at all. I would never — "
At that very moment, a black cat darted out the door and down the hall. Sofia squealed and took off after it. "Here kitty!"
"Sofia Marie Henderson! Come back here!" Holt demanded and took off after her.
"What’s that damned black cat doing here?" Lacy snapped.
"Oh, it’s a good sign. Somebody’s going to have good luck today," June said, and went about her work on the AC.
Yeah, right. Lacy sighed and gave the street one last glance before calling the sheriff.
She gasped aloud at what rolled into view. A black- and-silver Jeep! Intact! She practically jumped up and down. "There—here! Is this it, Holt? Holt!"
He lunged back to the window and touched her shoulder for balance. "Damn joy riders! I'll show them—" With one long stride, he was out the door, his woodsy fragrance lingering in the air. And leaving her shoulder tingling.
Sofia raced after her father.
"Nice looker," June remarked. "See? Something good has already happened. Cute kid, too."
Lacy gestured futilely at the air conditioner. "Something good? I don’t think so! This may ruin everything I've worked for." She dashed after the other two.
They all converged on the Jeep as it pulled to a stop. "Oh no!" Lacy groaned when she recognized Steve Amado, Sandy’s young brother-in-law in the passenger seat. Roman, the darker one, was the driver.
"Get out of my Jeep, you hoodlums!" Holt demanded, jerking on the door handle.
Both boys tumbled out, and Steve mumbled immediately, "Sorry Mayor Donahue. Please don’t tell Sandy."
Hands on her hips, she glared at him. "I just can't believe this, Steve."
The boy shuffled and kept his eyes to the ground.
The other kid spoke up. "We didn't mean nothin', man—"
"Who are you?" Lacy asked.
"I'm Roman Barrios. Look, I didn't mean no harm."
"Any harm," Lacy corrected.
The dark-eyed kid nodded. "Right, any harm. We thought we could take a little spin before you got back. No big deal."
"No big deal?" Holt folded his arms across his broad chest and glared angrily at the two. "What gives you the right to take a little spin in my Jeep?"
"Hey, man. We jes' did it. For kicks."
"We intended to bring it back all along," Steve explained. "Before you got back."
"You can't just get in other people's vehicles and drive around," Lacy implored.
"That's called stealing, man." Holt's expression was grim. "Did you wreck it? Wonder what your folks would say about this. Or the local police."
The boys looked up at him in alarm, and both spoke at once. "Oh no, please don't do that! We didn’t wreck it or nothing. Just drove around."
Lacy feared Holt might still want to press charges. He certainly had every right. But she noticed that his expression had softened as the boys apologized. "Please Holt, let's talk this over and, uh, settle it some other way. I have an idea."
"Don't tell me you're one of those who goes light on offenders." He looked accusingly at her.
"Absolutely not. I think people should be responsible for their acts."
He turned back to the boys. "If you had wrecked that Jeep, I could have lost my only vehicle. And you could have been injured. I don't have insurance to cover it. Do you?"
They shook their heads. Obviously 'insurance' was a foreign word to them. The boys looked whipped.
"Could we work out some kind of deal?" Lacy hoped Holt would go along with her plan. A court appearance over this wouldn't help any of them, and the kids might end up in juvenile detention in Tucson. "Since I can vouch for Steve and his family, don't you think we can do something about this without calling in the authorities?"
Holt pressed his lips together and thought for a minute. "I don't know. They need to learn a lesson here."
"I'm willing to supervise some instructional punishment," Lacy offered. Her gaze lingered on Steve. "Your brother would be so disappointed, Steve."
"Please don't tell Jay, Mayor Donahue," Steve mumbled, keeping his gaze on his toes. "He'll be furious."
"Look, dudes, it... it was my idea," Roman admitted when he could see Lacy's attention centering on Steve. "I hot-wired it, and Steve just went along for the ride. We thought sure we could get back before you came out. And we never intended to hurt anything. Or anybody."
"Thank you for admitting your part in this, Roman. But both of you are guilty, and both of you must pay somehow."
She turned to Holt. "I think our high school principal said her office needed a fresh coat of paint. What if these boys volunteered to do it, Holt? Would you be satisfied with some hard work as their punishment?"
Holt nodded slowly. "Okay. Sounds like a good resolution."
She rushed ahead. "I'll see that they pay for your inconvenience and bother. They'll regret this little spin in your Jeep, I promise. And I think I can assure you, it'll never happen again. Will it?"
"No, sir," both boys mumbled at the same time, shaking their heads and looking to Holt for approval of the idea. "It won't. Never. Never."
He studied each youth with a steady, penetrating gaze.
"Fortunately no one was harmed, and you do have your Jeep back. All safe." Lacy gazed up at him hopefully. "I'm sure they took it without thinking of the consequences."
Holt sighed. "You have a point. It would serve no good purpose to drag the police into it now. But boys—" he paused to point a finger at each of them "—if anything like this happens again, you can bet that I’ll show no mercy."
The boys, looking numb, nodded mutely. They probably would have agreed with anything he said if he'd just drop it and leave town.
"Thank you, Holt," Lacy said, shaking his hand and indicating for the boys to do the same. "Mr. Henderson. Better apologize and make friends. He'll be back, won't you?"
Holt gripped each boy's hand firmly, then gently helped Sofia climb into the Jeep. "See you in two weeks," he said tightly to Lacy.
"Thanks, Holt. They'll remember this close call." She waved and he drove away. Then she folded her arms, tapped her foot and glared hard at the boys. Now she could show her anger. "You two got off easy, you know that? Just because he’s a decent guy."
"Yes, ma'am," Steve mumbled. "Thanks for helping us out of a jam. You won't tell Sandy and Jay, will you, Mayor Donahue?"
Lacy shook her head. Should she? Sandy deserved to know when the boy was in trouble. On the other hand, Jay was working out of town, leaving Sandy responsible for Steve. This news would only add to her anxiety. Anyway, Lacy felt that she had the situation under control. "No, I won't tell her about this, Steve, but 1 want your promise to stay out of any more trouble. And you..." She turned to the other boy. "Have you recently moved into town?"
"I live out that way." Roman gestured to the west.
"Do you have family here?"
"Just my aunt."
Lacy observed that Roman's eyes shifted as he spoke, and she tucked the information away. "Will you be going to school here, Roman?"
"Yeah, probably."
"How old are you?"
"Sixteen."
"Then I expect you to enroll in high school for the next semester and to attend regularly. I'm going to check on you."
"Yes ma'am."
"I have an idea." Lacy smiled grimly. "There's another chore you two might do to make up for this little joyride. Mr. Henderson will be moving to town in a couple of weeks. He could always use so
me strong guys to help move his furniture."
"Yeah, we could do that," Steve said, nodding.
"Easy," Roman added. "Does this mean that we don't have to paint that room you were talking about?"
"No, you’ll do both," she said firmly, giving them each a narrow- eyed glare. "Report to the school office at eight in the morning. And you're still getting off light." She wheeled around and returned to her office.
Hot, stuffy air greeted her. June, down on her knees in front of the silent air conditioner, gave a low groan. "Bad news. And I was sure that black cat was here for something good."
"What now?" Lacy felt like laughing – or crying. In light of everything else going on, the AC was minor.
"I think this old unit has taken its last gasp."
"So what's new?" Lacy moaned and appealed to the ceiling and beyond. "What else around this place is going to go wrong?"
"I'm afraid it just isn't worth the price of a condenser to repair it." June gathered her assortment of tools and began to stuff them into her belt.
Lacy sighed heavily. There was no money in the budget for an air conditioner right now. "Well, summer's almost over. We'll just have to manage without it."
"Since I couldn't fix the thing, I won't charge for this service call. You—and the city of Silver Creek—look like you could use a little break."
"Thanks." Lacy gave the repairwoman a grateful smile and shook her head. "We need all the breaks we can get."
"I was sure that cat was here for something good," June mumbled as she left.
Lacy glared at the offensive and now-silent air conditioner. She felt the urge to punch the damned thing, to kick it out of the window and into the street. Instead, she raised the window above it in an effort to get some air stirring. A warm breeze ruffled her red hair.
Under The Desert Sky (Desert Sky Series) Page 3