Christmas with Carlie
Page 28
Hazel grimaced. “The way the market is around here, you’re not going to find a buyer if they have to invest in major repairs.”
Vaughn barely refrained from rubbing his eyes with his knuckles. His halfhearted search for Uncle Em’s whiskey stash had now become critical. He didn’t have the money to invest in major repairs. His chances for getting a loan weren’t good, either. Not when he was already stretched thin. Rent ate up most of his pay.
He thanked the sisters again for the food, apologized for not being able to offer them coffee and walked them out, then shut the front door and glanced at the second floor. That cat could be up there having kittens right this moment. In his bed.
Oh, hell, no. Vaughn grabbed his cell and headed for the stairs. Why hadn’t he asked June for the vet’s number? Before he could do a search on Wilmer Fish, he noticed a text from Whitby.
Forgot to mention it’s a paid position. Let’s talk salary over dinner. Cal’s Diner @ 7? I’m buying.
He hesitated on the top step. As his thumb hovered over Reply, his ringtone blared into the silence. With a sigh, he lifted the phone to his ear.
“Hey, Mom.”
“You said you’d call.”
“I got caught up in something.” He worked his way toward the room Aunt Brenda had assigned him during his summer visits. So much for hoping the second floor wouldn’t also be packed to capacity. It was standing-room-only up here. And it reeked of mothballs.
He stopped in the doorway of the guest room and exhaled. Even his bed was piled high with crap. Though maybe that was a good thing, considering the twin-size mattress looked about five times smaller than he remembered.
His mother gave a disapproving huff. “Do whatever it is you need to do and spend the rest of your break with us. Your father has someone he’d like you to meet.”
Vaughn tightened his grip on his phone and swung toward the master bedroom. “I thought I made it clear. Enough with the ambushes.”
“Don’t be stubborn. So we scheduled a few dinners. You have to eat.”
“Mom. I have a job waiting for me in Erie.” At least, he hoped he did. “I’m not changing my career.”
“Plenty of people your age and even older have made the decision to steer their professional lives in a new direction. It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”
“I’m not ashamed, I’m resolved. I’m proud of what I do. I plan to continue doing it.”
“Vaughn.” His mother’s voice gentled. “You know your father and I would rather you find a job with actual earning potential. We’re trying to look out for you. Don’t you want to be able to afford a house someday? A family? Don’t you want to have money to travel when you retire?”
He did have a house. His uncle’s house. But it was only partly his, and it wasn’t in Erie. Not for a moment would he consider staying.
As his mother talked about the trips she and his dad had taken and all of the places they planned to go, Vaughn peered into his uncle’s bedroom. Score. The bed was empty. No junk, no cat in labor.
He propped a shoulder against the doorjamb and listened to his mother describe the luxury car he could afford if only he earned a decent paycheck.
Most law enforcement parents would worry about their son or daughter getting hurt in the line of duty. Vaughn’s folks worried what the neighbors thought of their blue-collar son.
“So when can we expect you?” his mother asked. “I think you should talk to the man from the securities firm first—he has a personal driver and a summer house in the Hamptons.”
“Not interested, Mom.” Did she ever get tired of hearing it? ’Cause he was sure as hell tired of saying it. “Even if I were, I don’t have the time.”
“You don’t have the time to visit your own parents?”
“Not when they won’t stop campaigning against my job.”
“And anyway, how complicated can it be to put up a For Sale sign?”
Basically what he’d said to Whitby. So why didn’t the suggestion sit well?
“It’s more involved than that.” Just to be difficult, Vaughn added, “Plus they want me to pinch-hit as a deputy while I’m here.”
Her reaction didn’t disappoint. “That’s not going to happen,” she said flatly. “As if wasting your potential chasing hardened criminals around the city isn’t bad enough.”
Vaughn rolled his eyes. “There’s a lot more to the job than that. By the way, crime rate’s a lot lower here.”
“So is the standard of living. What’ll I tell the securities broker, that you’re busy breaking up a moonshine ring? Please be serious. You’ll damage your prospects. You know very well your father and I are not going to let you bury yourself in the country playing cops and robbers with your uncle’s cronies.”
She wouldn’t let her uncle’s arrest go. Never mind that Vaughn was still holding his own grudge. His mother didn’t blame Sheriff By-The-Book Tate, but Vaughn sure as hell did. “I’m twenty-eight, not twelve,” he said. “If I want to play cops and robbers, I’ll play cops and robbers and you can’t stop me.”
He winced at his juvenile tone. After muttering his goodbye, he straightened, drew in a breath and prepared to flush a pregnant cat from her hiding place.
Or maybe he’d just join her there.
* * *
WHEN SPEEDY PETE drove past Lily Tate sedately enough that she had time to register his smirk, she realized she’d been had. Squinting after his faded gray Jeep as it disappeared around the bend, she lowered the radar gun and swore. The last time Pete Lowry had driven that slowly, he’d been bringing up the tail end of the Christmas parade, putt-putting down the center of State Street hauling a flatbed crammed with the high school football team, the cheerleading squad, three dozen bales of hay and a celebrity Holstein named Priscilla Mae.
Somehow the smug so-and-so had known Lily was parked at the entrance to the old logging road. But how? The only vehicles she’d seen that afternoon had all been headed in the same direction, away from Castle Creek.
She lifted her hat and blotted the sweat clinging to her bangs. She blinked against the perspiration that stung her eyes and wriggled her shoulders, desperate to free her skin from the short-sleeved uniform shirt plastered to her back. But that wouldn’t happen until she was back in the air-conditioned courthouse, and that wouldn’t happen until she managed to actually write a citation.
Two hours in the August sun and she hadn’t issued the first ticket. Today’s lack of revenue would not please the mayor. He’d probably auction off her parking space again. Not that she minded the walk, but it always seemed to rain the week she’d been relegated to the back of the lot.
She huffed in exasperation and grabbed at the car door. Time to find out why everyone was driving like the road was coated in ice.
The moment she dropped into her seat, she heard a rattling sound. What the—oh. She plucked her cell free of the plastic cup holder. When had she put it on Vibrate? A glance at the screen had her wincing. Burke. Again. She pressed Ignore. The man had to be as tired of hearing no as she was of saying it.
She started the car, then lightly bounced her forehead against the wheel. All she wanted was to do her job. Stay busy. Enjoy her privacy.
Forget.
But the mayor was determined to make her job harder, Burke Yancey wouldn’t stop asking her out and every time she heard a child laugh—
She pressed her hands against her chest, where sudden pain sliced deep. After a few breathless seconds, she filled her lungs, sat up straight and reached for her seat belt.
Focus. She had a job to do. And doing that job meant finding out why every driver in Castle Creek had suddenly developed a feather foot.
It didn’t take long.
Copyright © 2016 by Kathy Altman
ISBN-13: 9781488006937
Christmas
with Carlie
Copyright © 2016 by Julianna Morris
All rights reserved. By payment of the required fees, you have been granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right to access and read the text of this e-book on-screen. No part of this text may be reproduced, transmitted, down-loaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher, Harlequin Enterprises Limited, 225 Duncan Mill Road, Don Mills, Ontario, Canada M3B 3K9.
This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously, and any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, business establishments, events or locales is entirely coincidental. This edition published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.
® and ™ are trademarks of the publisher. Trademarks indicated with ® are registered are registered in the United States Patent and Trademark Office, the Canadian Intellectual Property Office and in other countries.
www.Harlequin.com