Date With a Devil

by Anne Stuart

  “Can’t I just assure her that she is tougher?” Her voice sounded close to hysterical as she did as he asked.

  Hal, who’d been slowly sliding his backpack down his arm as he spoke, said gently, “Don’t panic. So far she’s just interested.”

  And as he said that, the cougar took several graceful, powerful steps toward her.

  It was all Kat could do not to scream and run.

  Hal quickly put himself between her and the cougar, and reached a hand inside his backpack, shouting at the animal and taking an aggressive step forward.

  The cougar sniffed the air, stiffened suddenly in a gesture Kat was sure meant attack, then ran off into the underbrush and disappeared.

  Kat fell forward against Hal’s back and simply stood there as the sound of a motor approaching broke the quiet. Apparently the cougar had heard it before it was audible to them.

  Hal turned to wrap her in his arms, her heart thundering in her breast. “I was almost breakfast for a cougar!” she exclaimed with a half laugh.

  “I promise I wouldn’t have let her eat you,” he said, handing her their precious half-filled bottle of water.

  She took a swig, wishing it was gin. “I hope not. That would have been hard for you to explain to my father.”

  A blue, midsized American car with a government emblem on the door pulled up in front of them.

  “Oh, Hal!” she said, putting the cap back on the bottle. “Rescue!”

  A deputy sheriff climbed out of the car and Kat took a step toward him, excited and relieved at the sight of another human being. Then she noted with plummeting spirits that his gun was drawn.

  Hal caught her arm and drew her back to him as the deputy approached, the sight of the gun changing the mood of the morning even more effectively than the presence of the cougar had.

  “Good morning,” Hal said, taking a step forward. “Our small plane crashed yesterday on the high meadow.” He pointed in that direction. “We…”

  “Put your hands up where I can see them!” the deputy barked at Hal. He looked very young. He was thin and pale and had an air of uneasiness about him that was contagious. He widened his stance and nervously waved the gun. Then he added for Kat’s benefit, “Both of you!”

  “But, we…” Kat began, unable to believe that now that they finally had help, he was holding them at gunpoint.

  Kat saw Hal comply and followed his example. Her throat was dry and the panic she’d held at bay since yesterday demanded release. Some rescue.

  “We’re on a freight errand from Portland,” Hal told the deputy calmly, “to pick up linens in San Francisco. We had a fuel line problem and went down just before the snow. We decided to wait for sunshine to make our way to Nugget.”

  “Nugget isn’t even on the map,” the deputy said. “How do you know where it is if you’re from Portland going to San Francisco? In a plane, yet.”

  “I fish near here in the fall,” Hal replied. “What’s the problem? We were just…”

  “Drop the backpack,” the deputy ordered.

  Hal lowered his arm and eased the pack to the ground.

  “That wouldn’t be full of Darla Montrose’s Harry Potter books, now would it?” the deputy asked, pulling the pack toward him and holding the gun on them as he opened it.

  Kat looked at Hal in bewilderment. He appeared equally confused.

  “’Cause we took a call not half an hour ago that two teens cleaned out her whole shelf of J. K. Rowling, stuffed the books into a pair of backpacks, and ran away. Planning to sell them in Bolen, are you, where they don’t even have a bookstore?”

  As he spoke, the deputy pulled out a wallet, a checkbook, a flashlight, and a copy of the current Patrick Larkin novel.

  “Rowling didn’t write that one,” Hal pointed out as the deputy perused it suspiciously. “And the young lady might be mistaken for a teenager, but do I look like one?”

  The deputy looked up into Hal’s face, and Kat saw the fear in his eyes. He apparently hadn’t been a deputy long enough to acquire the authoritative presence that could intimidate a large opponent.

  “Darla was pretty panicked,” he said. “Told the sheriff they held a gun on her. Might have mistaken you for younger.”

  “Okay,” Hal conceded, “but if Darla What’s-her-name is in Nugget, and we were running away, wouldn’t we be heading away from town instead of toward it?”

  The deputy didn’t seem to be listening. He looked up from the pack with a self-satisfied expression and produced a metal object that caught the sun and gleamed. A gun!

  Kat’s mouth fell open. She looked at Hal.

  “I have a permit for that,” he told the deputy. “I always carry it when I travel.”

  Kat closed her mouth. That sounded logical. She couldn’t imagine why a waiter needed a gun, but she remembered him reaching into his backpack when the cougar approached her. She was sure if the cougar had decided to taste her, she’d have been glad he had it.

  The deputy, however, seemed determined to put a criminal spin on it. It apparently confirmed his worst suspicions about who was responsible for the theft of Darla Montrose’s Harry Potter books.

  He tucked Hal’s gun in his belt as she’d seen cowboys do in western movies, and gestured Hal toward the pack with his own gun. “You’re just making it all up. Put your stuff back in it and get in the car,” he said.

  As Hal complied, the deputy made a call on his radio.

  “I’m coming in with the two that stole Darla’s books. Yeah. Well, I got the backpack, but no books. They either stashed them somewhere, or handed them off to an accomplice.”

  Kat concluded that she had to be losing it because she wanted desperately to laugh. He made it sound as though plutonium had been stolen.

  “Got a gun, too,” the deputy went on. “Claims to have a permit. No, they were on foot. Said their plane crashed on Wilson’s Meadow. Right. I’m on my way in.”

  The deputy handcuffed them, ushered them into the back seat behind the protective screen, then climbed into the front and drove off with a screech of tires and a dangerous slip in the snow. But he regained control and drove toward town.

  “We could leave this part out of the story we tell the kids,” Kat said, holding up her cuffed hands. “In fact, I’m not dating you anymore. I’ve spent twenty-seven years without crashing in a plane, attracting a cougar and getting arrested.”

  “We haven’t been arrested,” Hal said with a smile, taking her cuffed hands in his. “We’re just invited for questioning.”

  “At gunpoint.”

  “Newbies are always a little overzealous. He probably has dreams of making the big collar.”

  “Collar?” she asked.

  “Arrest,” he replied. Then when she seemed surprised he knew law-enforcement jargon, he shook his head at her. “Don’t you ever watch NYPD Blue? Law & Order?”

  She didn’t, and she had other things on her mind anyway. “Why do you carry a gun?”

  “It’s a good idea in the wilderness.”

  “We were going from Portland to San Francisco.”

  “I’ve had a permit since I was in the Navy. And travel can be unpredictable. Or is that too much of an understatement given the circumstances?”

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  AND IT’S HARD being a cop without one, Hal thought.

  He almost said the words aloud, but Kat was already upset. And when you were riding in the cage of a sheriff’s car wasn’t the time to find out you’d been lied to.

  When they arrived at the Gold County Sheriff’s Office, Hal discovered to his surprise that he had found Mayberry. It wasn’t on the Oregon Coast, but in the California mountains.

  The office was one big room with two barred jail cells in the back, one of them occupied by an alcoholic, judging by the smell of cheap whiskey that filled the room.

  A big man with a thick shock of gray hair and a wide, ruddy face sat behind a desk. He looked up when the young deputy moved them toward him. Hal saw the sheriff look t
hem over, his expression changing from pleased victory to frowning concern.

  “Darla said they were teenagers,” the sheriff said to the deputy as he pulled up chairs for them near his desk. “A boy with a ring in his eyebrow and a girl that looked pregnant.” The sheriff’s eyes went to Kat’s stomach, disguised by Hal’s jacket.

  She opened the jacket so that he could see her small, belted waist and flat stomach in a pair of jeans.

  “The ring could have been removed,” the deputy said, looking not at all discouraged, “and the pregnancy could be a disguise. And here’s the topper.” He placed the gun on the sheriff’s desk. “I think the whole plane thing is a cover-up.”

  The sheriff shook his head. “Weather service plane reported seeing a downed plane on Wilson’s Meadow.”

  He looked at the gun, then into Hal’s face. Hal could see that the sheriff was a smart man. This was a small town, but he’d just bet he kept its security tight as a drum and nobody messed with him.

  “Deputy Daggatt here says you have a permit for this,” the sheriff said. “So you won’t mind if we just check that out.”

  “Not at all,” Hal replied. He only hoped that his cover remained intact when the sheriff finished the gun permit check. “And you can check Herrick Field right outside of Portland where I filed a flight plan to San Francisco. Left 8:42 a.m. yesterday.” He rattled off his plane’s ID number.

  The sheriff wrote it down. He asked a lot of basic questions, then smiled at them. “Daggat’ll get you coffee and a couple of the bakery’s butter horns.”

  “Sheriff…” Daggatt began to complain, then at a look from the sheriff, took off out the door.

  The sheriff pointed to the second cell. “You two have a seat in there for a while and I’ll check you out. It’s the most comfortable place to wait. Leave the door open.”

  “Sheriff.” Kat remained in her chair. “Could I use your phone to call my father in Portland? I’m afraid he’s beside himself with worry because he expected us home last night, and I was unable to get a signal to use my cell phone.”

  “Of course, you can.” The sheriff smiled. “But not just yet. I’m waiting on a call. Won’t be very long.”

  Hal and Kat walked into the cell and sat in the middle of a cot covered in a blue chenille blanket. It was surprisingly comfortable.

  Kat grinned at Hal and gave him a look under her lashes that revved his pulse. “It’s a good thing you’re such a great lover,” she whispered, “because this is by far the worst date I’ve ever had. I could probably get on Jay Leno’s worst date segment. This is one for the Guinness Book of—”

  He cut her off with a kiss. He couldn’t believe her sense of humor remained intact after all she’d endured in the past twenty-six hours.

  “I’ll make this up to you,” he promised, guilt riding him with spurs. “When we get home we’ll take a long weekend in Seaside to rest and recover. And we’ll look around for the right spot for your restaurant.”

  She leaned into him with a surprisingly contented sigh. “It’ll be a while before I can seriously look for a place. I have to prepare my father, see about getting financing. I have a little saved, but not…”

  “I have a small inheritance from my grandmother,” he interrupted, “sitting in the bank doing nothing. You can have it.”

  “What?” Her eyes widened in astonishment. “Ha-al!” she said. “I couldn’t. I mean, you must have dreams you want to realize? What if I failed? What if I lost it all?”

  She didn’t seem capable of failure. “I can’t imagine that happening,” he said, “but if you did, we’d just try again.”

  “I want you to have your dreams, too,” she insisted. “The long weekend is a good idea, but we’ll talk about what to do. I want to know what’s in your heart.”

  “My dreams are modest, actually,” he said. “Find a warm, loving woman, get married, have sons…”

  “Sons?” she asked worriedly. “You didn’t tell me you wanted sons.”

  “I’ve adjusted that part of the dream to daughters,” he assured her.

  She smiled with startling brightness. “You know, with your experience in a restaurant added to my experience in the business, I’ll bet we could have a dynamite place! Would you want to be partners in a restaurant?”

  Before he could reply, Daggatt arrived with their coffees and Danishes, glowering as he delivered them, clearly not pleased with the sheriff’s doubts about their guilt.

  Then the telephone rang on the sheriff’s desk, and he picked it up. “Hey, cupcake, how are you?” he asked. Then after listening a moment, he said, “I know you’re having a party, but Grandpa’s busy today. Grandma and I are coming down Saturday, though, to take you someplace really special, okay? Okay, sweetheart. Be a good girl. I’ll see you then.”

  He hung up the phone, then turned it on his desk so that it faced the chair in front of it. He beckoned to Kat.

  “Sorry for the delay. My granddaughter’s birthday is today and I didn’t want her to think I forgot her. Made her mom promise to let her call me as soon as she got home from her ballet lessons. Maybe some day the taxpayers will agree to give us two lines in here.”

  Kat and Hal exchanged a smile over the sheriff’s obvious weakness for his granddaughter, and then Kat went to his desk to make her call.

  She dialed her father’s home first, presuming he’d be there at this hour, but when there was no answer, she called the restaurant. She was surprised when an unfamiliar voice answered with a simple, “Roth!”

  “Ah…hello? Captain…Roth?” she asked, wondering what he was doing there before opening. “It’s Kat.”

  “Oh.” There was noisy throat clearing, then a hastily mumbled, “Let me get your father.”

  Then her father’s robust voice said, “Umberto’s Tuscan Grille.”

  “Dad!” she exclaimed. “It’s me!”

  “Hi, Kat,” he replied cheerfully—and without a suggestion of the angst she’d been so sure he’d be suffering. “How are you? Did you get the linens?”

  Did you get the linens? She was struck speechless. “Dad.” She got that out, then tried to imagine what could account for his complete lack of surprise at the sound of her voice, at his complete lack of emotion at the discovery that she was alive.

  Was it possible that her usually detail-obsessed father hadn’t called her at home to make sure she’d picked up the linens and delivered them to the restaurant? But how could he not have known when the linens hadn’t been there this morning for tonight’s party?

  “I’m calling you from California,” she said, feeling as though she had to paint him a picture of what had happened. “Hal’s plane crashed in the mountains and we had to stay in it overnight. Then we were walking to town…”

  “Plane crashed,” he repeated in a shocked tone that had a strange ring to it, as though he didn’t quite know how to react. “Are you all right? Is Hal okay?”

  “We’re both fine,” she replied in mild annoyance. “But I can’t believe that these linens were so important to you that you sent me by plane to get them, then didn’t even notice when they weren’t there. And you didn’t even notice that I hadn’t come home!”

  “Kat…” He began, then stammered, “I…we…ah… Ferreira’s party will go fabulously, even with the old linens.”

  “What?” she demanded. “Well, if you don’t care about the new linens, weren’t you even worried about what had happened to your daughter and your favorite waiter?!”

  She was losing it; she could hear it in her own voice. She’d remained fairly levelheaded under difficult conditions, but not even having been missed was more than she could take.

  Suddenly, Hal took the phone from her and rubbed her back gently while he spoke to her father.

  “Mr. Como,” he said with a strained little smile in her direction. “It’s Hal.”

  “HAL!” the old man exclaimed. “You were shining her on about the place crash to keep her overnight, right? You didn’t really crash the
plane?”

  “Not deliberately, no,” he said, thinking that was an honest reply that wouldn’t give him away to her. “We had a fuel line problem. But your daughter’s fine. We’ll get to an airport and take a commercial flight home. Maybe you should have the linens shipped after all.” This part of the conversation would be trickier. “Was last night very busy?” He fished carefully while Kat paced the office, clearly in an emotional snit.

  “We got him!” Berto said triumphantly. “And his safecracking buddy! I may even get a reward from the savings and loan for helping foil a robbery. Though, hell, I’d be happy if they just send the staff here every day to have lunch!”

  The sheriff, while pretending to give him privacy, sent the occasional questioning look his way.

  “Well, I’m happy to hear it went well,” he said carefully.

  “But now Kat’s upset because I wasn’t worried about the two of you!” Berto groaned. “She doesn’t know I wasn’t expecting you back last night, so she thinks I’m an unfeeling father.”

  “No, of course not,” he said with a smile in Kat’s direction, “I’ll try to explain that to her.”

  “What?” Berto demanded. “Explain what?”

  “I appreciate your confidence in me, Mr. Como,” Hal said, the answer for Kat’s benefit not quite aligned to Berto’s question.

  “I have no idea what you’re talking about,” Berto said, “but if you can stop her from thinking I’m a horrible father, I owe you big. Let me know when to pick you up at the airport.”

  “Yes. Okay. I’ll call you as soon as we know what time we’re arriving.”

  They went back to the cell and their Danishes and coffee.

  “I don’t understand,” she said sitting beside him on the cot. “This whole thing has been strange from the beginning. I can’t believe I was missing overnight and he wasn’t even concerned!”

  “That’s because you were with me,” Hal said. He waggled his eyebrows wickedly. “He said he knew there’s been something between us since I first came to work, and he just thought we’d finally acted on it.”

  She looked as though she might believe that, then she shook her head. “No, no. He knows me! He knows I’d never leave a job unfinished. He sent me to get linens! I’d have delivered them to the restaurant, and then made love with you.”