Front Page Love

by Paige Lee Elliston

  The chief glanced at them cursorily and handed them back. “You know,” he said in an almost conversational tone, “bothering honest businessmen can get a person in trouble in my town.”

  “Look, Mr. Craig—”

  “It’s Chief Craig,” the man said, his tone now harder. “And you look, Ms. Downs—I don’t allow harassment of my constituents by scribblers from throwaway newspapers. Are we clear on that?”

  Julie took a breath and held it for a moment before speaking. “I’m afraid I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she said.

  There was no mistaking the steel in Craig’s voice now. “You know exactly what I’m talking about. If I see one word about the Bulldogger in your scandal sheet or hear that you’ve pestered Castle again, you’ll have a lot more trouble than you can handle.”

  Julie bit back a response. She broke eye contact with Craig and stared straight ahead through her windshield. She heard the chief’s boots move on the gravel of the road as he began to turn away from her truck. “No ticket this time—just a warning. Get that bad taillight fixed,” he growled over his shoulder.

  Julie watched in her rearview, hands white-knuckled on her steering wheel, as Craig climbed into his Blazer. The roof lights went out, and the engine started, and the SUV swept past her truck. Then, he was gone from her vision after he rounded a curve. Julie sat very still, not moving to turn the key, to drive away.

  Should I call Nancy and tell her about this? Should I get in touch with the state police? She took several deep breaths and exhaled slowly, evenly, unclenching her death grip on the steering wheel. It’s my word against that of the chief of police. My taillight is broken—even though he broke it. There’s no record of the conversation, of his threats, of his attempt to intimidate me.

  The yoga-style breathing helped a great deal. Within a couple of minutes the quiver was gone from Julie’s hands and her thoughts were no longer racing. I’ll keep this to myself for now. I’m off the story, and I have no reason to see Castle again. Nancy’s working on something to do with Craig. I’ll leave him to her.

  Julie tugged her shoulder harness into place and started her engine. She noticed the partially unwrapped roll of Tums on the passenger seat. At least the stress of the encounter had forced her to forget about her upset stomach. She eased away from the side of the road and headed for home. She’d made a decision—at least a decision of sorts. Why then, she wondered, did she feel so uneasy?

  Danny was on an extension ladder leaning against the top of the big sliding front door of her barn when Julie rolled up her driveway. He was near the top of the ladder, swiping at the track upon which the wooden door rode, with a section torn from a burlap grain sack in one hand and an old-fashioned spouted oil can in the other. Sunday stood nervously at the bottom of the ladder, peering upward. The first thing Julie heard when she got out of her truck after parking it next to Danny’s truck was a high-pitched, intermittent whining sound that varied in tone, almost as if the frightened dog was attempting to communicate some bizarre canine language.

  “Almost done, Julie,” Danny called down without looking too far away from his work. “The track was really packed—it’s no wonder we could hardly open the door Saturday.”

  Sunday raced to Julie, whined for a second, and then ran back to his post at the base of the ladder.

  “Looks like somebody doesn’t like to see you way up there,” Julie said. “This poor ol’ dog is gonna jump out of his skin.” After a moment, she added, “It isn’t my favorite thing either. This ladder looks a bit . . . rickety, doesn’t it?”

  “It’s a little beat up,” Danny answered, “but it’s a good, sturdy ladder. Made out of maple.” Then he mumbled, “Or something. Anyway, I’m almost done.”

  Sunday increased his whining on hearing Danny speak. Together, the dog and Julie watched as Danny finished up the job, dropped the piece of burlap, and began downward, holding the oil can in one hand. Sunday’s carrying on stopped the moment the man was on solid ground.

  “It’ll be smooth as can be now,” Danny said proudly. “And look—your kitchen window is in. All you gotta do is paint the frame and replace that length of siding.”

  “Wow! Thanks a ton, Danny. You’re a regular Mr. Fix-it. You charged the window to me, right?”

  Danny nodded. “Got a good deal on it too. Whew—it’s hotter’n blue blazes up there.”

  “C’mon—let’s go inside. Get out of the sun. I’ve got a big pitcher of iced tea all set to go.”

  They walked to the kitchen door side by side, Sunday trailing behind. “Business slow today?” Julie asked as she opened the door. “Hey!” she exclaimed. “You put a new thingie in the door!”

  Danny laughed. “Those thingies are called linchpins, and yep, I replaced them and tightened up the plates. Just another service of Mr. Fix-it, jack-of-all-trades—”

  “And master of none,” they finished together.

  Danny sat at the kitchen table while Julie poured iced tea. “Yeah, it’s slow today,” he answered her earlier question. “No clinic appointments and no field calls either. I’ve got my cell with me in case of emergencies, but no calls so far.” He took a long drink of iced tea. “What about you? All done for the day before noon? I figured I’d be long gone by the time you got home.”

  “I’m glad I caught you then—a man needs a cold drink after fixing barns and houses. I don’t have much going on right now either. I dropped my first piece in my series at the office.”

  “What was the reaction from your boss to this one?”

  “Nancy liked it.” Julie beamed. “It’ll run a week from Wednesday, and the advertising for it will start tomorrow.”

  “That’s great, Julie.” Danny drank again. “So here we are, both working banker’s hours with nothing much to do.”

  “Mmm. Feels kind of good,” Julie agreed. “If one of us had a swimming pool . . .”

  Danny smiled at her, and she could see his mind working.

  “What?” she asked.

  “I have an idea. I was at the Tozek ranch last week. Myron and I had to use his ATV to get to a pond way back on his land, past that south pasture of his. It’s a couple of miles, and the ground is too rough even for a truck. He had a colicky cow that he didn’t want to move. I didn’t even know there was a pond back there—but you ought to see it, Julie. It’s spring fed and crystal clear. Myron says it’s quite a bit lower this year than it has been in the past, but it’s still maybe five feet or so deep in the middle. He said there are people there daily—teens and adults. There was a bunch of Boy Scouts there the day I was.”

  “Sounds nice,” Julie said. “Most of the ponds I’ve heard about are either mud puddles now or completely gone.”

  “Myron offered me the use of the pond for a swim. Since we’re not doing anything, how about it? Feel like cooling off?”

  “Walking out there in this heat?”

  “Why walk? We hook up your trailer, load Drifter, go to my place and pick up Dakota, and off we go.”

  Julie hesitated, and then a smile took over her face. “Let’s do it!”

  “The water’s so cold it’ll crack your teeth. Imagine how it’d feel on a day like today. Plus, our horses have been getting very little use. It’ll be good for them too. Heck—we don’t even have to saddle them. It’s only a couple of miles. We can ride bareback.”

  “Yeah,” Julie said. “Sounds great.” She grinned at Danny. “You said the water’s cold?”

  “We’ll have to dig through a foot of ice to even get to the water.”

  “A foot?”

  “Absolutely. At least a foot.”

  Julie was on her feet and dashing to the stairway. “Then let’s get in gear,” she called over her shoulder. “I’ll get into my bathing suit and grab a couple of towels.”

  By the time Julie came out of the kitchen door, Danny had backed her truck around to the front of her two-horse trailer and was plugging in the brake-light connection. Julie checked the union of the tr
ailer and the ball installed on her rear bumper and made certain the safety chain was properly attached. Then she fetched Drifter from his usual place under the trees in the pasture. Fortunately, he hadn’t rolled today, and his back and withers were clean.

  The heat in the open pasture was an aggressive and tenacious beast. Silky sheets of it shimmered from the arid ground in front of her and bore down on her Stetson with a palpable weight. For a brief moment she reconsidered the entire adventure—but then the thoughts of actually being cool—perhaps even cold—were so enchanting, so beguiling, that she quickened her pace leading Drifter back to the barn.

  The horse loaded easily and calmly, as he’d been trained to do. He walked up the ramp at the rear of the trailer with no silliness and moved to his position on the right side of the central divider. Julie snapped his halter to a short lead line, attached the butt-strap behind him, and closed and latched the back door. She moved to the driver’s side of the truck, climbed in, and smiled at Danny. Then, they were off.

  Sunday wasn’t pleased when Danny ordered him into the mudroom at his home, but as ever he obeyed, if a bit reluctantly. The two-mile trek would be too much for a collie carrying a full coat. Dakota, Danny’s Appaloosa gelding, loaded as readily as Drifter had. The two horses snuffed at one another from opposite sides of the divider, but they’d been used together before, and there was no squabbling between them.

  As Julie drove, Danny called Myron Tozek and told the rancher he was taking him up on his kind offer, and that he and Julie were going to ride their horses to the pond. When he’d disconnected, he said to Julie, “Myron says to leave the trailer at his second gate and just go cross-country over what should have been his wheat crop. He said there’s nothing there we can hurt.”

  Julie nodded. She knew where the gate was—and also knew that rather than allowing passage to Myron’s combines and tractors to his nine-hundred-plus acres of wheat, the fence and the gate did nothing but keep tumbleweeds confined. She pulled well off the road, and they unloaded their horses. Danny opened the gate, and when they’d passed through it, he secured it again. Farm manners were farm manners—drought or no drought.

  They gathered their reins and swung aboard their horses, riding bareback, as they’d decided. The horses worked well, seemingly revitalized by the change of scenery, shedding their heat-generated lethargy. Julie and Danny settled their mounts into a comfortable jog and rode straight across the huge and barren section of land. Julie looked behind them once and was reminded of the western movies she’d loved as a youngster. A thick, narrow cloud of dust hung in the air, raised by the horses’ hooves.

  “It’s a good thing we didn’t rob a bank,” she told Danny, motioning him to look back. “The good guys would find us in a second.”

  The pond was perfect—a jewel in a desert, pretty enough to be a mirage. It was small—maybe a quarter of an acre—and loosely surrounded by willows. A few cattle stood in the water, drinking. A few others eyed the horses and riders suspiciously. The Scouts were back, throwing a ball at one another at one end of the pond in a game that apparently involved a great deal of yelling, laughing, and dunking.

  “Myron didn’t see any reason not to let the cattle wander over here to drink,” Danny explained. “But there’s no pasture for them. They drink and then head back. That’s how the cow I treated came to be out here.”

  “I don’t know if it’s because it’s so stunning in itself or because I haven’t seen anything like it in a long time—but it’s gorgeous. Let’s tie these guys and hit the water!”

  For the tiniest part of a second Julie was disappointed as she cleaved the pond’s surface. Then, when she’d penetrated the foot or so of sun-heated water and moved her body deeper, she was struck by an almost electrical shock of delightfully arctic springwater. The cold poured over her, and the physical transformation from the ninety-plus degrees and brazen sun to the pristine clarity and gripping frigidity of the pond’s bottom was purely delicious.

  Danny, a yard or so to Julie’s side, flashed her a thumbs-up hand signal. She returned it. They surfaced together, sucking air, invigorated and laughing from the joy of the experience. They swam toward the Scouts’ game, and a couple of the boys recognized Danny. “Doc Pulver—wanna play bombardment?”

  “Maybe in a bit,” Danny called. “Thanks for the invite.”

  After savoring the chilliness, Julie noticed that a strange and long absent physical phenomena had taken place: she was shivering. She turned to shore and swam gracefully, gliding through the upper layer of warmer water. Danny joined her, and together they waded to shore and sat on the towels Julie had brought, letting the sun dry them.

  “Those boys must be immune to cold,” Julie said, motioning toward the Scouts.

  “The water’s shallow there where they’re playing—warmer,” Danny pointed out. “Even so, I can remember playing water polo when I was eleven or twelve and having my lips turn blue from the cold. Kids don’t worry about stuff like that.”

  For the first time in a long time, the sun seemed benign as it dried them.

  “I’m glad we did this, Danny,” Julie said. “I think I needed it, or something like it. A break, I guess. It’s good to escape for a couple of hours.”

  “Yeah,” Danny agreed. “I’m glad I could do this—not only to cool off but to spend some time with a good friend. It kinda recharges the batteries. I wish we could have brought Sunny, though. He’d love this.”

  Friends?

  Julie avoided the “friends” comment, not at all sure how Danny had meant it. “Maybe when things cool down, we can bring him out. Does he like the water?”

  Danny laughed. “He loves it. Wait until you see him after he’s been chasing sticks and is completely soaked. That big dog looks like a drowned rat when his coat is sticking to his frame.”

  “Yo—Doc Pulver! Come on, we need another player!” One of the Scouts waved at Danny.

  “Umm . . . would you mind?” Danny asked.

  Julie flashed on an image of a young boy asking for a cookie. She smiled at Danny. “Go get ’em,” she laughed. “I’m happy just to sit here and feel good.” She pretended to sulk. “Anyway, they didn’t invite me.”

  “Give them a few years, and they’ll invite you and ignore me,” Danny said.

  “Go play with your little friends,” she said with a laugh. She settled back on her elbows and watched Danny lope over to the group of boys. It’s funny how men never really grow up, she thought. How they remain kids—boys—in so many ways. The game of bombardment was a simple one—whack the other players with the ball before they had time to duck under water. Danny was being hit far more often than he was hitting the others, and Julie noticed that many of his throws were wildly off target. When Danny did strike a boy with the ball, the throw was invariably an easy toss. That simple kindness touched Julie’s heart to the point where she had to swallow hard a couple of times to remove the lump in her throat.

  Intrinsic kindness—how rare that seems to be, and how much of it Danny has. His comment about good friends came to mind. Is that how he sees me? As a friend rather than as something more in his life? But then why did he kiss me the other day? The lazy, uncomplicated pleasure of the afternoon seemed to recede from Julie like an ocean tide. How much time does a guy need to realize that a woman is interested in him—interested beyond friendship?

  She stood and walked to where they’d left the horses. Drifter was half asleep, standing in the speckled shade provided by a willow tree, and Dakota, tied a few yards away, looked as bored as a horse could possibly be.

  Julie shook her head, attempting to chase away the irritability that had so suddenly taken over. Shouts and laughter from the boys—and from Danny—reached her.

  This is absolutely and unremittingly silly, she scolded herself. It’s a fine afternoon. Why wreck it? What’s going to happen will happen. What else can I do? Send him a Candy-Gram? Sing under his window? Again, a headline stood boldly and clearly in her mind:

&
nbsp; Surly Woman Sulks, Destroys Good Time

  When she returned to the towels, Danny was on his, leaning back on his elbows, eyes closed, letting the sun dry him.

  “Kids wear you out?” she asked, sitting on her towel.

  Danny smiled, his eyes still closed against the sun. “Those kids know what fun is. They’d rather be right there playing their game than anywhere else in the world.” He reflected for a minute. “I’m enjoying myself more today than I have in a long time. I . . . I’m glad you’re here.”

  “I’m glad I’m here too, Danny,” Julie said softly. Now, if he’d take my hand . . .

  He didn’t. Instead he looked over at the Scouts, who’d finally left the water and were packing their gear into backpacks. “I guess we ought to get back too,” Danny said. “I’ve got a desk covered with papers I need to push around.”

  “And I’ve got some calls to make. Oh—also—I’d like to interview you Wednesday at dinner for my next drought piece. I’m going to focus on what’s happening in the cattle and horse industries.”

  “Sure,” Danny agreed quickly. “I just got a batch of statistics from the state that might be something you’d like to look at. Peripheral stuff, in a sense—but not so peripheral when you think about it. Feed grain harvests, hay—all that.”

  “That’d probably save me some Internet research time. Thanks. But we’ll probably bore poor Ken to death with our shop talk.”

  “I doubt that very much,” Danny said.

  Julie met his eyes. “What do you mean?”

  “I think the guy’s interested in you, Julie.”

  She felt her heart beat faster. “What makes you say that?”

  “Well . . . the way he looked at you several times Saturday night—stuff like that. He wanted to know how long we’d . . .” He hesitated. “He wanted to know things about you. Nothing really intrusive and nothing personal, but it seemed like more than normal curiosity. That’s all.”