by Ann Charles
They were going on a field trip, driving south to Gila Flats to pay a visit to the woman who’d tried to kill him and Claire. A trip that hadn’t been on his radar until late last night when Claire had called and filled him in on the latest excitement, including Sophy Wheeler being the one behind Dory Hamilton’s threatening phone call. Then Claire had put him on the phone with Butch. After hearing Butch’s plan, Mac had offered to keep him company on the trip to the prison since the purpose behind Sophy’s meddling likely had something to do with Ruby.
The sound of an engine coming closer made him look over. Butch’s pickup rolled into the parking lot.
Mac climbed into Butch’s passenger seat. “Your rig looks good. I can’t even see any dents.”
“Kate plays a mean game of demolition derby, but my buddy at Buck’s is a pro.” Butch pointed out the windshield. “There’s no problem leaving your truck here?”
“No. We subcontract with these guys. They know I’ll be back for it later.” Mac secured his seatbelt. “How was the drive here?”
“Uneventful.” Butch drove out of the lot and headed toward the Interstate. “It gave me some time to think about how to come at Sophy. She thinks I’m visiting to discuss buying the property her diner sits on.”
“You want the property across the street from The Shaft?” At Butch’s shrug, Mac said, “I wondered how you got her to agree to see you.”
“I’ve been in contact with her off and on since she was sent away.” Butch turned onto the entrance ramp, heading south on Interstate 19. “I agreed to keep an eye on her house and property for a year to give her time to decide whether to keep it or sell it.”
“Is she paying you for house sitting?”
Butch shook his head. “She offered, but I turned her down.”
“That was generous of you.”
“When I first bought The Shaft, she helped me out, recommending certain local suppliers, hooking me up with my accountant, sending patrons my way. We worked as a team—she covered breakfast and lunch, I catered to the afternoon and evening crowd.” Butch settled in the center lane and hit cruise control as the city buildings grew further and further apart, the desert landscape taking over.
“I don’t know if you remember The Shaft back when I bought it, but it was a real dive.”
Mac’s history in that part of the state didn’t go back that far. “You were in Jackrabbit Junction a while before my aunt married Joe and took over the R.V. park. By the time I came along, you were already in the thick of cleaning up the place.”
“It took a chunk of capital to get the bar up to health code standards, and I wanted a little better than that. Sophy did what she could to smooth out the inspections and to keep the money flowing by sending customers my way. I owed her for her help, so when she asked me to keep an eye on her place, I told her I’d do it on one condition—she’d let me buy Joe’s old El Camino.”
Right, the El Camino. The souped-up, midnight blue mean machine that Sophy had been storing in the same shed where she’d tried to blow a hole through Claire with her shotgun. “I wondered how you ended up with Joe’s baby.”
“It’s a sweet ride. I’ve drooled over it since moving to Jackrabbit Junction.”
“That reminds me of Mabel.” Harley’s sexy Merc had caught Mac’s eye from the first moment he had seen her out there in the moonlight.
Butch nodded. “That Mercury practically gives me a hard-on every time I see her. You think he’d ever consider selling it?”
“No.” Mac adjusted the vent to blow on his face. The western sun blasting through the window was starting to cook him. “She’s the love of his life. It shares the first place spot on the podium with my aunt. You should see the steam come out his ears every time Claire gets a scratch on her.”
“Maybe if I got him a deal on fixing her scratches, he’d let me take her for a drive.”
Mac looked over, wondering if Butch hadn’t realized yet that he was now almost part of the Ford-Morgan family and all that entailed. “Since you’re about to become the father of Harley’s first great-grandchild, you may be able to land some time behind the wheel in exchange for something else.”
“Like what?” Butch glanced his way, one eyebrow lifting. “A wedding band?”
Mac couldn’t tell by his tone if that were a good or bad swap. “I don’t know what. Harley is funny that way. He gave me advice on how to keep Claire from pulling a hit and run on me relationship-wise.”
“What was his advice?”
Mac chuckled, remembering that warm spring day inside of Harley’s stifling Winnebago. How he’d squirmed as Claire’s grandfather demanded to know what Mac had planned for the future when it came to Claire. “He told me that if I wanted to keep her from leaving me when things got serious, I needed to storm the beach with my guns cocked and take no prisoners.”
“No shit?”
“No shit. And when her tanks arrived, he said to call in for an air raid and level her defenses.”
“What’s that mean?” Butch asked.
“I wasn’t sure at the time and I’m still not positive, but I’ve thought about it off and on for a few months. I think he meant to dig in and hold steady whenever things got rough between us, and if she tried to retreat, swing around and come at her from another front.”
“You’re making me want to watch more World War II footage on the History Channel.” Butch hit his blinker and dodged into the left lane to pass an old VW bus. “You think that strategy would work on Kate?”
“I don’t know. Kate’s a different bird than Claire. She’s not as flighty when it comes to commitment.”
“I’ve never thought of Claire as flighty.” He shifted back to the right, the Interstate now narrowed to two lanes. “Especially with how she’s been digging in over at the R.V. park, putting so much work into repairing and cleaning up the place.”
Claire’s relationship with the R.V. park was different. That particular wooer would never slip in the middle of sex and tell her it loved her. It would never ask her to move to Tucson and leave her family behind. It would never risk asking her to marry it or unintentionally do something that might make her feel like her wings were being clipped.
Rubbing the back of his neck, Mac stared out his window at the passing fence line draped with tumbleweed garland. There was a lesson in there, damn it. Maybe he needed to start taking better notes.
“Claire enjoys working with her hands,” Mac told him. “She takes after her grandfather that way, I guess. I don’t know what Ruby would have done if Claire hadn’t come along to help with the R.V. park. The hands-on labor of love needed there is right up Claire’s alley.”
“Your aunt certainly put a lot of her own elbow grease into that place before Claire showed up. I was impressed that she made it profitable again.”
“Yeah, she was doing pretty well until Joe died and left her in a shitload of debt.”
“Joe always was an asshole first and foremost,” Butch said. “I don’t know what Ruby ever saw in him. She was too nice for him.”
“According to her, Joe could be quite charming, especially when he was throwing his money around. She believed that she loved him. I think in the end she realized that what she loved was the idea of escaping being a waitress in a small town in Oklahoma and running her own business somewhere far, far away.”
They rode for several miles in silence. Mac watched as they passed Green Valley, remembering the fire in his aunt when she’d first moved to Arizona. Those flames had almost gone out when Claire and Harley had arrived and filled her with fuel and hope again.
“Your aunt once told me that the R.V. park was her wedding present from Joe.” Butch changed lanes to pass a slow tractor-trailer. “I remember thinking at the time that Joe should have given her a pair of earrings instead, because fixing up that park was going to take as much blood, sweat, and tears as The Shaft when I got hold of it.”
“You’ve done an incredible job turning it around.”
“Thanks. It’s doing much better than I’d planned.”
“You don’t sound thrilled about that.”
“Don’t get me wrong, I’m not complaining because business is good. I just didn’t figure on it taking this much of my time. When I bought it, I was looking for a hobby project that would keep me busy while I tried to figure out what I wanted to do next. I never expected it to do this well, and I certainly don’t want to continue spending so much time there. My heart isn’t in it.”
Mac wondered what that meant for the future of The Shaft. Would Butch sell it? Was he already trying to line up a buyer?
Rather than prod where it wasn’t his business, he changed the subject. “I heard from Kate that you grabbed yourself several fine examples of Detroit steel at a classic car auction in Texas. What did you get?”
Butch filled the rest of the ride with tales of what he’d seen and bought at the auction, explaining his plans for each vehicle he’d acquired, inviting Mac to go with him sometime and see the auction in person. By the time they’d exited the Interstate and turned onto the road leading to the prison, Mac wanted to go over to Butch’s place, roll up his sleeves, and rebuild something of his own.
The trip through the security gates at Gila Flats went smoothly. They parked in the prison lot along with a handful of other guests arriving in time for visiting hour.
Butch started to pull his keys from the ignition but then looked over at Mac. “I’ll leave the keys here with you. I don’t expect to be more than twenty minutes, thirty tops.”
Mac nodded. “Why are you doing this, Butch?” He’d wondered that since they’d spoken on the phone last night. “This is Ruby and Claire’s mess, not Kate’s.”
“I’m the only one who can get Sophy to talk. You and I both know that. She’s not going to give you an inch, nor anyone else, especially your aunt and Claire.”
That was true. “This is going to mess up things for you when it comes to Sophy. You have a decent history together, but after today you’ll have gone to the dark side.”
“She went to the dark side when she got herself mixed up with Joe again and killed his cousin.” Butch frowned over at the doors where people were entering the prison. “Whatever respect I had for her disappeared when she tried to take out you and Claire. I agreed to watch her place because I repay my debts, and that seemed harmless enough.” He pushed open his door and stepped down onto the asphalt. His lips flat-lined when he turned back to Mac. “If she’d have just let sleeping dogs lie and kept to her own business in prison, I would have followed through for the year we agreed upon. But now she’s back to harassing your aunt or Claire or both, and I can’t abide that, especially with you guys being practically family now.”
Family. Huh. So if Butch married Kate, that would make Ruby his step-grandmother-in-law and Mac his … hell, that was too twisted to figure out. It’d be simpler if Claire would just say “I do” and make them brothers-in-law.
“I’ll be here when you’re done. Watch her tongue, it’s forked and pointy.”
“Better to face her tongue than the wrong end of her favorite shotgun.” Butch closed his door and headed toward the prison’s visitor entrance.
Mac cracked his window to let in some fresh air and leaned back in the seat. Everyone who had come to visit an inmate was now inside, and a silence fell over the parking lot.
He yawned. The long hours at work had been taking their toll on him, and he still needed to drive back to Jackrabbit Junction tonight after Butch dropped him off at his pickup. There was always the option of sleeping in his own bed and heading east tomorrow, but he wanted to wake up next to Claire.
Claire. Soft, curvy, warm to his touch.
He yawned again.
His thoughts turned to Butch’s comment on how Claire was working so hard to fix up the R.V. park.
She’d told him to take the promotion, assuring him she wanted to join him in his travels, but he wasn’t born yesterday. She was lying. Well, maybe lying was too strong, but she didn’t really mean it, not in her heart.
Yet she was willing to sacrifice what she wanted for him.
Was he willing to make sacrifices for her? And how big?
Claire.
Her big brown eyes, sweet smelling hair, sexy skin, heated touches …
His thoughts switched to fleeting dreams, flying by too fast to catch and hold.
The sound of the pickup door opening made him jerk upright.
“Hey, sleeping beauty.” Butch shut his door and started up the pickup.
Mac rubbed his hand over his eyes, shaking the sleep from his brain. He checked his watch. Butch had been gone for almost a half hour.
“How’d it go?” he asked. “Did she admit she put Dory up to making that phone call?”
“Yes, with a little coaxing. She also admitted a couple of other things.” Lines crisscrossed Butch’s forehead. “I’m not sure what to believe.”
“What do you mean?” Mac frowned across the cab.
“For one thing, she said she had Dory send your aunt the letter about the Humdigger mine.”
How in the hell had Sophy found out that Joe owned that mine? Had she known all along, or had she been using her spare time in prison to dig deeper into Joe’s past?
“What else did she say?” Mac asked.
“You know that line Dory gave on the phone?”
“He’s coming for you?” Mac repeated Dory’s words.
Butch nodded. “Well according to Sophy, she wasn’t talking about any hit man coming for Ronnie. Hell, she didn’t even know Claire’s sisters’ names.”
“That will ease Ronnie’s mind.”
“Grady’s, too,” Butch said. “I don’t think the Sheriff has gotten a full night’s rest since Ronnie came to town.”
“She has a way of messing with your calm.” Mac knew first hand after living with her for a month. “If Sophy wasn’t talking about a hit man, who was she talking about?”
Butch shot Mac a quick frown. “I think prison life is getting to Sophy, scrambling her gray matter.”
“Why’s that?”
“Because she claims that the ‘he’ she was talking about in her message to Ruby was someone it can’t possibly be.”
“Who?”
“Joe Martino.”
“What?!”
“Yeah, for some bizarre reason, Sophy doesn’t believe the man is really dead.”
* * *
If this insanity kept up, Butch was going to need to change the name of The Shaft.
Ronnie was thinking that “The Madhouse” was more appropriate these days, what with the place full night after night with rowdy customers. Currently, it was standing room only. Those who couldn’t get a table were waiting with drinks in hand for one to become available. Slipping through the bodies was like wading through spawning salmon.
With Butch not home from Gila Flats yet this evening, Ronnie and Claire were both chipping in. Ronnie waited tables while Claire ran the bar so that Gary the bartender could help in the kitchen. If this didn’t slow down soon, they were going to need another waitress or two and a hostess to keep things orderly.
Ronnie dropped onto a barstool exhausted, her chin resting on her palm. The Shaft buzzed and crackled with energy around her. On the jukebox, the late great Marty Robbins sang about his white sport coat and pink carnation, but the dance floor was too busy for anyone to swing and sway to the music. Ronnie tried to relax for a couple of minutes while Claire poured drinks for one of her tables.
A hand on her shoulder made her turn.
“My feet are killing me,” Katie said, her face drooping with signs of exhaustion.
There was nowhere else to sit, so Ronnie started to rise to give her sister the stool.
“Sit still. Just let me lean against you for a moment.” Katie’s back pressed against hers. After a moment, she said, “Your FBI buddy is playing pool again tonight.”
Good. It was nice to have him around, especially with what she’d learned about Pe
te, the camper owner. Sort of like having a Doberman Pincher chained up within reach. “Mississippi should help us wait tables,” she told Katie. “After all, our taxpayer money helps pay his salary.”
“I agree. The black apron will match his Johnny Cash outfit tonight.”
Ronnie glanced over her shoulder at the pool table area. As if he had a tracking device on her eyeballs, Mississippi looked up and caught her glance. He gave her a two-finger come-hither wave. She gave him a one-finger hold-on reply, the nice finger this time. Claire was almost done filling her drink order.
As soon as Claire finished, Ronnie gave up her stool to Katie and parted the Flesh Sea. She dropped off the drinks, tucked her tray under her arm, and joined Mississippi at the pool table where he was wrapping up a game of Eight Ball.
“I need to talk to you for a moment.”
“All I have is a moment, so let’s get to it.”
“Not here. We need privacy.”
That couldn’t be good. “How about Butch’s office?”
He nodded. “You go first. I’ll follow after a minute or two.”
Dropping off her tray at the edge of the bar, she passed through the swinging doors and waited for him in the empty office.
Mississippi followed shortly, closing the door behind him.
“What’s going on besides you dressing up like Johnny Cash tonight?” she asked.
Mississippi brushed some lint off his sleeve. “What can I say? I’m a big fan of the man in black.”
“So was Ruby’s dead husband.”
“I noticed.” He straightened the cuffs of his shirt and then hit her with a double-barreled frown. “I have bad news.”
“I didn’t figure the lottery commission sent you with a big check. Let’s hear it.”
“Your ex-husband rolled over on a big ticket player today. The FBI is paying the felon a visit en masse soon.”
“Isn’t that a good thing for the FBI?”
“Yes, but not for you.”