by Cindy Myers
Shelly sank onto the opposite end of the sofa. Fear of what lies Mindy might put into her book warred with an aching desire to find a way to mend fences with her little sister. No matter how much the woman before her might annoy her now, she had once been the tiny blond baby Shelly had carried around like a doll. In those early years, before Mindy became too aware of “the legend of Baby Shelly” as Shelly liked to call it, Mindy had worshiped her big sister. And Shelly had adored her. Mindy had been the one person in her life who didn’t expect to gain anything by knowing her. Leaving her parents behind had been hard, but leaving Mindy had been even harder.
“You can stay here a few days,” she said. “We’ll talk.”
Mindy immediately relaxed her defensive posture. “Thanks,” she said. She surveyed the living room once more. “I guess this place isn’t so bad, considering you’re here in the back of beyond.” She focused on the toys in the corner. “The detective I hired said you had kids.”
Her stomach knotted at the prospect of introducing her boys to an aunt they’d never even known existed. “I have two little boys, Cameron and Theo. They don’t know about the whole ‘Baby Shelly’ thing,” she said. “So don’t tell them. They don’t need to know.”
“What about your husband? The detective said you had one of those, too.” She wrinkled her nose, as if a husband was an unfortunate acquisition, like a smelly dog, or a cat with fleas. “Does he know?”
“Charlie knows, but we don’t talk about it.” Confessing her true identity to Charlie had been one of the hardest things she’d ever done; she’d been sure he’d either want to capitalize on her fame, like the rest of her family, or he’d run as fast as he could away from her and the media circus that was always a threat if anyone stumbled on her real identity. When he’d done neither, she’d known he was a keeper. “I like to keep the past in the past,” she said.
“Right. Well, I’m not so crazy about the past, either, but I do like to think about the future. Especially a future where I have lots of money to spend.” She stood and hefted the suitcase. “Why don’t you show me to my room?”
Shelly led the way to the guest room up under the eaves. “It’s kind of small, isn’t it?” Mindy wrinkled her nose at the quilt-covered bed and four-drawer dresser.
“If you don’t like it, there’s a very nice bed-and-breakfast, the Idlewilde—or you can try the motel.”
“No, this’ll do.” Mindy plopped the suitcase on the bed. “You run on and I’ll get ready to meet the rest of the family. Won’t they be surprised to see me?”
Surprise wasn’t the word Shelly would use to describe her own feelings, she thought as she hurried down the stairs. Shock. More than a little loathing. And a puzzling nostalgia—not for the way things had been, but the way she’d always wanted things to be. She’d always wanted a close relationship with a sister who understood and sympathized with her. Instead, she’d gotten Mindy, who, to hear her tell it, had been born with a grudge against her famous sibling.
Maybe this visit was a chance to change that dynamic. She didn’t want to live the rest of her life wondering what would have happened if she’d made more of an effort to be the kind of sister Mindy needed. The kind of sister that Shelly really wanted to be.
Lucille Theriot leaned against the counter in her junk and antiques shop, Lacy’s, and frowned at the letter in her hand. Printed on thick, creamy paper with the state seal at the top, the letter didn’t bode well for the town. Missives from the state seldom did, a fact Lucille had learned in her six years as mayor of Eureka.
The string of cowbells hanging on the back of the shop door clattered and clanged as the door pushed open and Maggie Clark rushed in, flyaway strands of her red hair forming a halo around her head as she was backlit against the bright day. “Hi, Maggie,” Lucille said. “If you’re here to help with the decorations for Hard Rock Days, they haven’t come in yet. I’m hoping they’ll show up tomorrow.”
Maggie frowned. “Was I supposed to help you today? I can’t keep track of anything anymore.” She adjusted the baby sling across the front of her body, then pulled the door to, shutting out the rumble of a motorcycle driving past and the voices of a group of tourists on the sidewalk. August was the busiest time of year for the town, when vacationers flocked to the cooler mountains to admire the scenery and speak wistfully of wanting to live in such an idyllic setting “someday.” Most of those daydreamers, confronted with the reality of harsh winters and the remote location, sensibly stayed away, but a few let the mountains cast a spell, and remained here year round. Maggie was one of the ones who had stayed, having come to town a year ago to claim an inheritance, and never left.
“I’d say you have a good excuse.” Lucille laid aside the letter and reached both arms out for the baby. She didn’t make a conscious decision to hold the baby—she just couldn’t help herself. Besides, Eureka’s youngest citizen was her godchild. She couldn’t see little Angela Clark and not hold her.
Smiling, Maggie unhooked the sling and handed over the sleeping infant. Angela stretched her little arms and legs in sleep, then curled into herself again, sucking at the pacifier between her lips. “How’s my darling angel?” Lucille asked, smiling at the infant.
“She looks like an angel now, but she was a little demon at two this morning.” Maggie sank into a chair with the universal weary look of a new mother. “She refused to go back to sleep. Fortunately, our rooms are pretty soundproof. So I don’t think she woke any of our guests.”
Maggie and her husband, Jameso, managed the Idlewilde Bed and Breakfast, but they also held part-time day jobs, Maggie as a reporter for the paper, the Eureka Miner, and Jameso tending bar at the Dirty Sally Saloon. “I don’t believe your mama,” Lucille cooed to the baby, who had opened her eyes and was staring up at her. “You would never be anything but a little angel.”
“Maybe next time she wakes up howling, I’ll bring her to your house.” Maggie covered her mouth to hide a yawn. “Anyway, I came over here to warn you.”
Lucille reluctantly looked away from the baby. “What did you come to warn me about?” she asked.
“A guy stopped by the paper looking for you. A private detective named Duke Breman.” She fished a business card out of the pocket of her jeans and handed it to Lucille.
Lucille studied the card, a white square with embossed black lettering. “ ‘Duke Breman, Private Investigations, Austin, Texas,’ ” she read. “He’s a long way from home.”
“He said it was urgent that he talk to you.”
“What did you tell him?”
“I sent him over to the library.”
Lucille smiled. “You’re an evil woman, Maggie Clark.”
“I thought it wouldn’t hurt to have Cassie give him the once-over before he got to you.” Cassie Wynock, the librarian, suspected every newcomer to town of being up to no good and didn’t suffer fools gladly.
“Did he say why he’s looking for me?” Lucille rocked the baby in her arms.
“No. He was pretty tight-lipped. Good-looking, though. Cassie might decide to be nice to him.”
“How old a man is he?”
“Fifties? Dark hair, graying at the temples. Lines around the eyes—brown eyes. About six feet tall, nice shoulders. Like I said, good-looking.” Maggie grinned. “Maybe he wants to ask you out.”
“I’m sure strangers are flocking to town to date me.” Lucille moved behind the counter, using the excuse to turn away from the younger woman and hide the flush of embarrassment that still warmed her cheeks whenever she thought about her last romantic relationship. Gerald Pershing had been a handsome stranger in town, also from Texas. He’d wooed her, then swindled the town out of most of its budget. When the town council had managed to trick him into giving them part of the money back, he’d returned and continued his pursuit of Lucille, while also trying to milk more money out of the town coffers. He’d left a couple of months ago and Lucille prayed she’d seen the last of him.
“You’ll let me know wh
en you find out what he’s up to?” Maggie asked.
“Are you asking as a reporter or a friend?”
“Both.” Maggie shoved up out of the chair and came to lean on the counter. “News is pretty slow this time of year. Until Hard Rock Days, we have to make do with the occasional tourist lost in the mountains, or a traffic jam caused by a timid RVer on the mountain passes, but that’s it.”
“Hard Rock Days is one of our biggest claims to fame,” Lucille said. “Though that isn’t saying much, I guess. Still, we get a good crowd to see the drilling and mucking competitions.”
“Watching guys slam hammers down onto steel drills and haul carts full of mine waste always makes me nervous,” Maggie said. “It looks so dangerous.”
“It is dangerous,” Lucille said. “Though not as much as it probably was for real miners. Still, the ore-cart races and drilling competitions are a good way to remember the miners who are the reason Eureka is even here.”
“Don’t let Cassie hear you say that. According to her, her ancestors founded the town to bring civilization to the wilderness.”
“They came here looking for gold like everyone else,” Lucille said. She handed over the letter with the state seal. “Here’s something for the paper. The state wants us to come up with a plan for managing noxious weeds.”
“Noxious weed? Do we have a pot problem in Eureka?”
“Noxious weeds, plural. Invasive species and things like that. We’re supposed to pull them, poison them, or mow them down with goats.”
“Goats?”
“It’s the preferred method.” Lucille leaned over and pointed to a group of addresses at the bottom of the letter. “There’s a list of people who rent goats to cities to control their noxious weeds.”
“So is Eureka going to rent goats?”
“I’ll have to take that up with the town council.”
“That ought to make for a livelier-than-usual meeting.” Maggie folded the letter. “Can I keep this long enough to make a copy?”
“Be my guest.” Lucille turned her attention back to the baby, who’d fallen asleep again.
“I’m tempted to wake her so she’ll be more likely to sleep tonight,” Maggie said. “But she looks so sweet, I haven’t the heart.”
“I take it Jameso’s working this afternoon?” Lucille said. Maggie and her handsome husband usually traded off childcare and duties at the inn.
“Yes. Now that Olivia’s left the Dirty Sally, they’re always short-handed. You wouldn’t think in a town this size, where there aren’t that many jobs, that it would be so tough to find a new bartender. But so far no one has stayed more than a few weeks.”
“Being on her feet all day was getting too hard for Olivia.” Lucille’s daughter was five months pregnant with her second child.
“Oh, I understand,” Maggie said. “And Jameso doesn’t mind, not as much as I do. I’m hoping they’ll find someone to fill the position soon, so we can have a few more nights home together.”
The door jangled open to admit Cassie Wynock, gray curls bobby-pinned close to her head, prim gray skirt swirling about her calves above her sensible oxfords. “What have you done now, Lucille?” she demanded.
“I don’t know, Cassie. What have I done?”
“A private detective came to the library looking for you just now. He said his name was Duke.” She wrinkled her nose. “That can’t be his real name. What mother names her child Duke?”
“Maybe she was a fan of John Wayne,” Lucille said, her expression perfectly sober. Cassie wasn’t known for her sense of humor. Lucille wondered if she even had one.
“He said he was from Texas. You certainly seem to attract a lot of attention from men from that state.” Cassie sniffed.
“Remarkable, since I’ve never been there,” Lucille said. “What did you tell him?”
“I sent him to the Last Dollar. I wanted a chance to question you before he got here.”
“Maybe he’ll eat Janelle and Danielle’s pie and forget all about you,” Maggie said. The café, next to the Dirty Sally, had the best food in town.
“Why is a private detective looking for you?” Cassie asked.
“I don’t know. I haven’t done anything.” Lucille didn’t do a very good job of hiding her annoyance. Cassie brought out the worst in her. Well, Cassie brought out the worst in most people.
The phone rang. Lucille returned the baby to Maggie and went to answer it, grateful for the interruption. “Hello?”
“Lucille, this is Danielle.”
“Oh, hello, Danielle.” At the sound of the name of one of the two owners of the Last Dollar Café, the other two women leaned toward Lucille, listening.
“There’s a gentleman here looking for you. He’s a private detective. What should I tell him?”
“You can send him over to the shop. I can’t imagine what he wants with me, but I don’t mind talking to him.”
“Okay, I’ll do that. I tried to talk him into eating lunch first, but he seems pretty intent on finding you.”
“He doesn’t know what he’s missing, turning down your lunch special,” Lucille said.
“You’re so sweet. I’ll send him over, if you’re sure it’s okay.”
“Thanks for running interference, but I don’t mind talking to him, really.”
She hung up the phone, then shuffled through some papers on the counter.
Cassie was the first to break. “Well? Is he coming over?”
“He is. Don’t you have work to do at the library?”
“Sharon is there. I don’t need to hurry back.” She sat in a chair by the door, feet together, hands primly in her lap, back straight.
Lucille turned to Maggie, who held the baby against her shoulder. “I’d never hear the end of it from Rick if I left now,” Maggie said. Rick Otis owned and edited the Miner. He would probably consider the arrival of a private detective in town as pertinent news.
Lucille shrugged and resumed opening the mail. It probably wouldn’t hurt to have witnesses to whatever this Duke fellow had to say. She slit envelopes and unfolded the contents, only to transfer all of it to the recycling bin at her feet. Most of the mail was advertisements or catalogues from various galleries and auction sites she dealt with. Mingled with mail for the shop were communications for the city, but Eureka didn’t even have a town hall, and few paved streets, so they weren’t likely to need a new computer system or the latest in hazardous waste disposal.
The cowbells jangled and all three women turned to watch a tall, dark-haired man enter. Lucille’s first thought was that Maggie had not been kidding when she’d said the guy was handsome: dark hair, craggy features, brooding brown eyes, and enough silver in his hair and lines around his eyes that she didn’t feel like a perv lusting after him.
He didn’t flinch at the trio of women staring at him. He nodded to each of them. “I’m looking for Mayor Lucille Theriot,” he said in a deep, velvety voice.
“I’m Lucille.” She resisted the urge to smooth her hair. “What can I do for you?”
“Duke Breman.” He offered his hand and she shook it. It was softer than she’d expected, smooth and warm, but with a firm grip.
“What can I do for you, Mr. Breman?” she said again.
He glanced over his shoulder at Maggie and Cassie. “Is there some place we can talk privately?”
“No, there isn’t,” Cassie said. She stood and joined them at the counter. “If you have something to say, you might as well say it in front of God and everybody. There are no secrets in a town this small.”
“You’re the librarian, right?”
“Yes.” Cassie stood up straighter, but at only five foot two inches, it didn’t make her look any taller. With her cap of gray curls, white blouse, gray skirt, and sensible shoes, she looked like a stern Sunday school teacher.
He shifted his gaze to Maggie. “And you’re the reporter.”
She nodded. “My husband and I also run a bed-and-breakfast, the Idlewilde, if you’re l
ooking for a place to stay.”
“I’ll keep that in mind. I’m not sure how long I’ll be in town.” Duke returned his attention to Lucille. “I take it you already know I’m a private detective.”
“Yes. And I can’t imagine what you want with me.” When he hesitated, she added, “You can go ahead and talk in front of these two. They’re right that we don’t have many secrets around here.”
“I’m looking for a man named Gerald Pershing. I understand you’re a friend of his.”
Cassie gave an un-ladylike snort. Lucille glared at her. “I know Mr. Pershing,” she said. “I wouldn’t say I was his friend.” What exactly did a woman call a former lover turned adversary?
Duke took a small notebook from his jacket pocket and consulted it. “But he and the town of Eureka did share interest in a gold mine in the area, the Lucky Lady?”
“That’s right. Gerald sold his shares in the mine to the mine manager, Bob Prescott, and left town at the end of June.”
“Do you know where he was headed when he left here?” Duke asked. “Or where he is now? Has he been in contact with you since he left?”
“No to all those questions,” she said.
“Is Gerald missing?” Maggie asked.
Duke glanced at her, then turned back to Lucille. “No one has heard from him since he left Eureka. I was hoping he’d been in touch with you.”
“What’s the old reprobate done this time?” Cassie asked.
Duke looked pained. “I’m not at liberty to say.”
“I take it you’re working for a private client, not law enforcement?” Lucille asked.
“Yes.” He tucked the notebook back into his pocket. “I’d like to talk to you more, but it doesn’t look like now is a good time. May I call you?”
“If you like.” Lucille tried to look more nonchalant than she felt. In fact, her heart was racing as if she’d run down the street. “My number is in the book.”
“I’ll be in touch, then.” He nodded to each woman in turn. “Good afternoon, ladies.”
When he was gone, Lucille sagged against the counter. “Well,” she said.