After Cat rang up his items, he handed her a fifty and she opened the till. Reaching for another bill, she held it up to the light and her face paled. “Ah, shit!” The young woman darted from out behind the counter and ran for the door. “Shit! Shit! Where the hell did she go?”
“Who?”
“The woman who just left.”
“Is there a problem?” Yeah, he definitely had one too.
The woman swiveled around on worn Converse and waved the bill through the air. “That bitch just passed off a fake twenty. Now I’m going to have to call the cops and have my wages docked. Worse, I’ll be fired. Randy told me if I screwed up one more time my ass was gone. I’m lucky to even have this shitty job.” She stomped back to her position at the register, pressing her fingers into her temples. “I hate this job.”
“Are you sure there hasn’t been a mistake? Maybe she wasn’t the one who handed you the money.” He wasn’t sure why he needed to defend Miss Huff who’d made it obvious she wasn’t friendly.
“I know what I’m looking for.” Cat must have realized what she admitted to because she turned pale. “I think I know what I’m looking for. Here, look for yourself.” She tossed him the bill with a scowl.
He held the twenty up in the light and tilted it back and forth. Sure enough the numeral in the lower right-hand corner didn’t shift colors from green to black. Although the paper felt crisp like real money, it definitely was counterfeit. Although he didn’t know Miss Huff, and probably wouldn’t see her again, being a good judge of character was a major reason why he was skilled at his job. But something didn’t seem right that the mystery woman would hand off a fake bill, right here, and so easily. She could have received the counterfeit from another business, however that didn’t seem likely this far from a metropolitan city. Cheyenne was sixty miles away and most counterfeit was found further up north, way north…
Most counterfeit money was created in rural facilities in Peru, hoarded in stash houses until packed up and shipped. Zander had investigated a case involving counterfeit money and the goods were coming into the country hidden in luggage, pottery, and even children’s toys. A few large criminal groups were known to pass the product off to “splinter groups,” those that control the streets. They were skilled at getting a huge financial gain in a short amount of time, before the FBI could respond and catch them. Once agents moved in, the criminals were long gone, and the goods were dispersed. Zander and his team had located several factories where the money was manufactured. The undercover team moved in quickly to shut it down, but others popped up within days.
“It is fake, right?” Cat asked.
“Yeah, it’s fake.”
“My boss is going to kill me. I’ll lose my job for sure,” she swiped a hand through her short, pink hair.
“I tell you what, how about I trade a real twenty for the fake one?” He withdrew the bill and plopped it onto the counter. Her eyes lit up.
“You’d really do this?”
“Sure. I wouldn’t want you to get fired over a mistake.”
Cat grabbed the money and clutched it tightly. “You won’t tell him, my boss…you know…about this. I’m turning my life around and don’t want any trouble.”
“No worries.” He wasn’t sure what trouble the girl had been into in the past, but everyone deserved a second chance.
Once the transaction was made, he grabbed his bag of items and before he even climbed into his truck, he dialed his brother Cullen. After the second ring, his brother answered. “Hey, you’ll never guess what I just come by?”
“That you’re a shithead for taking all the leftovers?” Cullen drawled.
“No. A Peruvian note.”
“What the fuck? Serious? In Crooked Creek?”
“Yeah.”
“Where exactly?” Cullen asked.
“The gas station a few miles from my place. And by the way, I took the leftovers because when you’re hungry you can walk down the street and grab a burger. I don’t have that luxury.”
“No one said you had to move all the way out there to nowhere land, buddy.”
“You’re just jealous. I’ll think of you while I’m eating the leftover casserole.” He clicked off, tossing his phone onto the passenger seat next to the leftovers that his mom had packed up.
The snow was falling hard and he could barely see ten feet in front of him by the time he pulled up next to his cabin. He climbed out of the truck and raced for the door, stepping inside to wipe his boots when his ten-year-old Golden Retriever greeted him. “Hey there, Susie-Q. I got you those biscuits you love.”
The brown-eyed girl looked up at him, tongue hanging out, lopping back and forth. It was much better than the snarl he received from the brunette at the gas station.
“Not that you care, but I met an ice queen on the way home. What did you do of importance today?” The dog continued to stare. He nuzzled her behind the ear and she rewarded him with a satisfied whimper. “Yeah, I know. It gets lonely out here in the boondocks, doesn’t it, girl? Thankfully, that’s why I stopped off and bought a few items before the snow really hits. I even grabbed those cookies with the big chocolate chips.” He hoped the Ice Queen was enjoying her peanut butter cookies.
He'd heard the weather forecast and since the weatherwoman predicted a foot of snow by morning, he gathered those who lived in Wyoming were now holed up indoors after grabbing a loaf of bread and milk earlier. Traffic had been congested near his parents’ house. What should have been an hour’s drive turned into an additional thirty minutes because of the snowy conditions which included the time he spent shooing a heifer who decided she wanted to stand in the middle of the road. Thank goodness she was the only one out on the country road.
Toeing off his boots on the welcome mat, he removed his weapon and placed it on the closet shelf and unhooked his leather belt to place it next to his hat on the hook. He gave Susie-Q one more scratch. “You hungry, girl?” The dog bounced and wagged her tail, her long tongue seemed to take on a patterned wave too. Susie-Q followed him into the kitchen and she took a well-behaved seat at her food and water bowls. He filled the first bowl with water and scooped a large tin can with food and dumped it in the second bowl. The dog dug in, chewing on the special beef and vegetable blend for a good five minutes before lapping up half the water.
He stepped down the hall, grabbed his laptop and came back feeling a mite hungry himself, anticipating the leftovers, when he found the container of food on the kitchen floor with Susie-Q licking the last of the potatoes. Somehow Zander felt this was karma after he’d taken all the leftovers. Opening the refrigerator, he frowned. Because he was always working, it was easy to forget he had a refrigerator and a stomach to fill. He searched the contents. A bottle of beer. An expired carton of eggs. A dried up brown lemon which he couldn’t remember why he had it in the first place, and a half-eaten block of Colby Jack. Popping the lid to the bottle and breaking off a chunk of the cheese, he munched. Susie-Q was waiting patiently by the backdoor. “I hope you enjoyed my mother’s cooking. Alrighty. Go and have fun in the snow.” The dog’s tail wagged and she twirled. She did tricks if it meant she’d get to play. He opened the door and she barked. “Want me to throw your ball?” Again, she twirled. He stepped out onto the deck, found the ball buried in the snow and gave it a toss. Susie-Q happily trounced after it, kicking up slush as she went along.
The dog brought the toy back obediently and Zander was ready to throw it again when he saw something suspicious. In the neighboring yard’s shed he saw the glow of a flashlight. The property had been empty since Agnus Makelti had passed away. Snapping his fingers, the dog ran inside. Zander hurried to grab his gun and pulled on his old, dirty work boots that he kept sitting next to the door for when he fed the horses.
“Come on, girl,” he said to Susie-Q.
The snow was now coming down hard as he reached the dilapidated wooden fence that separated the properties, he wished he’d thought enough to put on a coat. The chambray
checked shirt and jeans didn’t help much against the below freezing index chill. His balls were about the size of walnuts, never good for a man in any situation.
Gun held in both hands, aimed at the ground, he pulled off several slabs of the rotten boards and slowly slogged his way across the snow-covered property toward the shed. The light still feathered across the window and he heard faint thuds of things being tossed around inside of the dilapidated building. Was it being ransacked? What would anyone find in a building being held together by a splinter and a nail?
Once he found out who drug his ass out into the cold, wet snow he’d throw a pair of cuffs on them and they’d pay. He had plans…maybe not anything more than dropping onto the couch cushion, eating his cheese and cookies, and drinking his beer. This being the first night he’d been home to relax in a damn week, he selfishly wanted to watch a movie.
Slowly approaching the outbuilding, he could barely see the silhouette of the burglar through the cracks in the glass window.
“Shit!” a soft voice muttered from inside.
Stepping around to the open door with Susie-Q growling at his feet, Zander lifted his gun. “Don’t move!”
~~~**~~~
Arguing with herself on exactly why she moved to Crooked Creek, Wyoming, Wynn never did come up with a suitable answer outside of owning a house there, if it could be called such. The state was so damn cold that even Frosty would jump the first train out. She’d forgotten to pack herself snow boots and winter clothing because her insane ex-boyfriend handcuffed her and fell asleep blocking her closet door. After spending most of the day cleaning on hands and knees, scrubbing floors and cabinets, washing linens and bleaching walls, she’d gotten the bright idea to go to the gas station to use the pay phone. She managed to grab a few grocery items, but she hadn’t planned on running into the cocky cowboy, although a good-looking cocky cowboy he was. Who did he think he was coming onto her so openly? Did she look like the little woman needing a brawny man? Grr.
She had been dog-tired and ready to call it a night, but there was no way in hell she could sleep without some sort of heat in the house. She’d tinkered with the antique furnace for hours only to find out that it was broken on one of the coldest days of the year. Perfect.
Thankfully, every room in the house had a fireplace, but the problem remained, fireplaces needed wood to burn and after finding only a handful of kindling, she’d run out. With no axe and without the beard and brawn of a woodsman, she was running out of options so she wouldn’t freeze to death. Backed into a frigid corner, she decided the best place to find wood was in the shed—or rather, the shed itself. She even found an old axe in the dilapidated shack. Clearly though, she didn’t think ahead. Her tennis shoes and socks were soaked as well as the jeans she wore. And she’d fallen twice in the snow. Nice. Her nose felt cold enough to crack and her fingers were purple. Thankfully, she’d found a balaclava left over from her grandmother’s things that kept her face and ears from frostbite and an oversized sweatshirt from the clothes she’d packed helped keep her warmer. The shed had been ramshackle twenty years ago when she’d visited, but now it had more holes in the wood than a piece of Swiss cheese.
And the flashlight blinked, threatening to die.
Bouncing the bum flashlight against her palm, she hoped the battery lasted for a few more minutes. She’d found a loose board in the flooring, pulled up several dry rotted slabs just as soon as she heard the words, “Don’t move!”
What the hell?
Swiveling on her heels, she blinked against the light being shone in her eyes.
“Hands up!” the person bellowed.
Doing as he demanded, she blinked, trying to make out the tall, large shadow on the other side of the flashlight. Several thoughts flashed through her head. Had Rory found her already? No way. He could barely follow the directions being navigated by a GPS let alone actually read a map to find his way through the mountain ranges of Wyoming. Crooked Creek was so small on a map, one would easily mistake it as a speck of dirt and brush it off. She also bargained he’d get nowhere in his luxurious Cadillac on the snow-covered roads that were probably a sheet of ice now. She’d been sensible enough to rent an SUV at the airport, thankful for the kind man behind the counter who’d agreed to allow her to rent one without a credit card. It took a chunk of her money, but how else would she have gotten to the small town?
“Lift your hands higher!” the voice shouted.
The last thing she’d do is allow another man to boss her around. “Wait just a minute. I don’t know who you think you are, but I’m not lifting my hands,” she lowered them in rebellion, but not entirely. Sure, she’d never been good at being told what to do, but if this was one of Rory’s hired men coming to get her, she wouldn’t go down without a fight. The slabs of wood were right at her feet and if she managed to get her hands on one....
“I won’t tell you again. Now drop the flashlight and lift your hands. My dog is dangerous. You might get bit.”
The dog whimpered.
She almost laughed.
“I live here.” Her voice trembled a bit. She didn’t like having a gun pointed at her. Who knew what nutcase had his finger on the trigger. Someone who dared come onto her property and hold her at gunpoint, that’s who.
The man’s raw chuckle made the hairs on her neck stand. “Good try, but this place has been empty for over a year. I’d know if someone lived here considering I live next door.”
There was something about his voice… “Wait. You sound familiar. Are you the cowboy who asked to show me around Crooked Creek?”
After a good measure of hesitation, he said, “You’re trespassing. Get your hands up where I can see them.”
With an exaggerated sigh, she reached up and dragged the hat from her head. “It is you. The cookie man. And I am Wynn, the granddaughter of Agnus Makelti who left me her house.”
“Sunofawitch. What the hell?” The words dripped off his lips like a tire losing air.
“Sorry, I didn’t send out a town memo saying that I was moving in, but it was sort of last minute. Think you could lower the gun? I don’t trust my life to a frozen, trigger finger.”
“I could have shot you” he grumbled.
“For being in my shed? Or because I didn’t take you up on your invitation for a date? Yikes. Have things changed that much around here?”
“Still have the snark, I see. And I didn’t ask you on a date. I asked if you’d like for me to show you around. That’s called hospitality. They don’t have that where you come from?”
“I wouldn’t exactly call this hospitality,” she huffed.
“I was defending the property.”
“If you don’t object, can we take this inside? I’m forming icicles on my icicles.”
Another too long hesitation and finally, “Okay. Come on, Susie-Q.” With a click of his tongue, the dog followed him, retracing the footsteps she’d made. When they came upon the large impression in the snow where she’d fallen, Zander chuckled. “Snow angel?”
“Funny.” She stomped past him, clenching her teeth against the icy wind and pushed open the door that squeaked loudly in protest. She stepped into the semi-warm kitchen and took off her wet sweatshirt. Thankfully, the seventeen-hundreds-something cookstove gave off a little bit of heat from the last of the kindling. Opening the door to poke the contents, she bumped her numb fingers and an ache traveled up into her wrist. “Shoot!”
“How long were you outside? You’re a pretty shade of blue.”
“Great. Thank you.” Wynn turned and came face to face with sex appeal in nice fitting Wranglers. He was standing three feet from her now, eyes blazing and hair tousled. A lock of the dark mass had fallen over his forehead making him look a lot younger. She guessed he was thirty, maybe thirty-two, but she’d never been good at gauging a person’s age…or their personality.
At least he’d pushed his gun into the waist of his jeans, but he stood in a stance that reminded her of a warrior preparing for ba
ttle. She guessed they weren’t on the best of terms and, admittedly, she hadn’t been nice to him earlier. Not that she needed to defend herself, but she didn’t trust anyone now.
His steely eyes glinted with danger as they bore into her—seducing her. She tried to focus on anything and not the thudding of her heart knocking against her ribs. She shouldn’t be thinking how good looking he was, or how nicely his clothes fit him, or how he stood tall and broad. He stared back at her pensively, not the least bit modest, and she felt the need to throw him a log of wood to gnaw—or maybe her body would work fine too. He looked powerful enough to bite through nails and spit them out like a wad of tobacco. Yeah, he wasn’t any happier to see her than she was him. Who cared? She didn’t owe him anything, although she couldn’t deny the teeny tiny flicker of awareness between her legs that she hadn’t felt organically in a long time. This here, standing in front of her was what outside folks would call a “real cowboy.” She was in cowboy country, after all.
“I don’t take too kindly to being pulled out of my warm house by someone who didn’t have better things to do than throw shit around in a shed,” he grumbled.
Fighting the smile that ached to erupt, she knew it would only stir the pot. That’s not what she wanted, at least not on the first day in town. She needed to make friends, not enemies, and Wynn had a feeling this man would be the best type to have on her side. “I’d offer you a cup of coffee, but as you can see, things are a bit out of place around here.” She ambled up to the dog and held out her hand as an offering for him to sniff.
“She doesn’t take up to strangers very quickly,” he warned.
“This precious girl?” Wynn bent to one knee and gave the dog a good scrub behind the ears. “She’s real scary there…a real tiger.”
Did she hear him growl?
Wynn brought her chin up, looking at him, noticing the hard set of his jaw. “I don’t recall you telling me your name.”
Wanted by the Lawman Page 4