Dance of the Winnebagos

by Ann Charles

  Mac started laughing, his chest shaking, which made her want to dump all of his expensive toys down the nearest shaft.

  She grabbed the only thing she could find—a dirty pair of Gramps’s socks—and threw them at him one at a time.

  He blocked her missiles and grabbed her by the shoulders. “Claire, listen to me.”

  She jabbed him one last time in the ribs with her knuckles, finding a little satisfaction from his grunt of pain, before looking up at him. The intensity burning in his eyes made her kneecaps melt. “Don’t look at me like that. You’re not playing fair.”

  His gaze grew even more devilish. “I didn’t run off to get away from you.”

  He smelled like sage and sunshine. “How do you always manage to smell so damned good?”

  He ignored her question. “I had to go take care of a work emergency that cropped up.”

  “Oh.” The fire left her core and seeped to her cheeks. Well, crud. Wasn’t she the foolish one? There was nothing like ranting and raving at a guy about being rejected to show just how desperate she was for him.

  “Plus, Steve called while I was home. He got the report back on the bone sample. Based on what he called ‘growth plates,’ the bone belonged to someone over the age of twenty-five.”

  Claire nodded. Arnie must have been in his 40s or 50s.

  “His ex-girlfriend also measured the level of nitrogen and the amount of amino acids in the sample. Judging from the results, we’re betting the bone was Arnie’s, but the only way to be certain would be to find the rest of him. You interested in joining Sheriff Harrison’s search party?”

  “No way.”

  “I’d hoped you’d say that.” Mac pulled her closer. “Now that I’m back here, I’m not leaving until I convince you to come with me.”

  How fast could one’s heart beat before it exploded? She licked her lips. “Come with you where?” If he meant go with him to get a beer at The Shaft, she was going to knee him in the ’nads. This falling for a guy business was for the birds.

  “Home,” he said, kissing the bruise on her forehead. “With me.” He breathed another kiss onto her cheek bruise. “To Tucson.” His teeth nipped her lower lip.

  If he didn’t kiss her properly soon, her lungs were going to collapse from a lack of air intake. Her toes tingled, ready to jump. But before she took a leap of faith based on his words, she needed to clarify one more thing. She’d sprung to the wrong conclusion too often lately. “You mean for a visit? Like a sleepover?”

  “Like an unending sleepover.” He grinned, but uncertainty wavered in his voice, his eyes. “Or however many you want.”

  Her heart swelled, just like the Grinch’s on Christmas Day, until it rattled against her rib cage. “You like me that much?”

  He pulled her tight against him. “Yeah, can’t you tell?”

  She nodded, smiling away the jet streams of anxiety streaking through her mind. “I’m kind of stuck on you, too,” she said, slipping her hands under his T-shirt.

  “Claire,” he warned, backing her up until her thighs butted up against the bed, “I want an answer first.”

  “I’ll think about it.” She pushed onto her tiptoes and nibbled on his earlobe. “You might need to work on convincing me a little. This time without the tool belt.”

  Her T-shirt was over her head and on the floor before she could take another breath. Shit. “How do you do that so damned quick?”

  Mac pushed her onto the bed. “You want convincing, I’ll give you some.” His shirt followed hers.

  “As Manny is fond of saying, ‘Ay yi yi.’” She trilled her tongue and wiggled up the bed.

  His gaze raked over her from head to toe and back again. “You tempt me, Siren.”

  Someone pounded on the front door. Mac hesitated, his hand reaching toward her.

  “Ignore it.” Claire sat up and grabbed his wrist.

  The pounding came again, harder this time. “Claire, open the damned door!” Gramps hollered. “I need Mabel’s spare keys.”

  “Go away,” she yelled back. “We’re busy.”

  Mac closed his eyes and shook his head. “I’ll never hear the end of it now.”

  There was a long, silent pause from outside. Then, “You got an hour, then I’m coming in, even if I have to pry the damned door open.”

  “Such a crusty old buzzard,” Claire said, unbuttoning Mac’s fly. “I don’t know what your aunt sees in him.”

  Mac glanced over his shoulder. “I’m afraid she sees a way out of this mess that doesn’t cost me any money.”

  “What are you talking about?” She paused, her fingers clutching the waist of his jeans.

  “The mines.”

  “What about them?”

  “Your grandfather is buying them. Didn’t he tell you?”

  Claire blinked, repeating Mac’s words in her head a couple of times. “You mean Ruby’s mines?”

  Mac nodded.

  “He failed to mention that small detail.” Claire covered her face with her hands and flopped back onto the bed. “God! Mom’s going to kill me.”

  “What business is it of hers?”

  “None, but she won’t listen when I tell her that.”

  “Maybe it’s time for Harley to spell it out for her.” Mac straddled Claire and pulled her hands away from her face. “Harley is a big boy. I have a feeling nobody is going to push him around any time soon, not even Ruby—although she may be able to sway his opinion every now and then.”

  Mac kissed the tip of her nose.

  “I wonder if Gramps plans on staying down here.”

  Mac’s mouth moved to her neck. “Ruby seems to think so. He wants her to get the bank off her back so she can fix the things around here that have been broken for too long.”

  Claire squirmed under Mac’s lips. “Grandma would be happy to hear Gramps saved her favorite valley.” And grave.

  She raked her nails down his back.

  “Mmmmmmm.” He buried his face in her cleavage. “You smell like chocolate.” He unclasped her bra.

  “I had a Ho-Ho earlier.” She shrugged off the flimsy bit of pink fabric. “Some of the frosting dropped down the neck of my shirt.”

  Mac stared at her chest for several seconds. Then he met her gaze, and her world tipped on its side. “Come live with me in Tucson, Claire. My life sucks without you.”

  Under the smoke and fire burning in his eyes, something smoldered that warmed her clear through to her split ends. “Well, when you look at me like that, how can I refuse?”

  His grin sat crooked on his lips. “I promise to keep the cupboards stocked with Moon Pies.”

  “Do that and you’ll never be able to get me out of the house.”

  “It’s all part of my evil plan.”

  She pulled him down on top of her. “Shut up and have your wicked way with me.”

  And he did.

  But for only an hour—this time.

  Chapter Twenty-Five

  (Four Days Later) Sunday, May 2nd

  “So, are Mac and you going to get married this summer?” Jess asked Claire, blinking those long red lashes innocently.

  But Claire hadn’t just climbed off the train from Naïve-ville yesterday. She dropped a dollar in Jess’s hand and tore open the pack of Twinkies.

  Ruby, who was busy stocking bags of sour cream and onion potato chips on the store shelf, laughed under her breath.

  Claire shot her a knock-it-off glare, but Ruby ignored her.

  “Who wants to know?” she asked Jess. Ten dollars said Gramps put the girl up to this.

  “Nobody. You know us teenagers, we’re just full of curiosity.” Jess’s dimples were showing, her giggle forced.

  She was definitely full of shit.

  “Well, you tell Mr. Nobody that all bets are off when it comes to that subject, so he should focus on what he’s going to tell his daughter when she calls tonight.”

  “When are you and Mac heading for Tucson?” Ruby asked.

  Claire leane
d against the counter. “As soon as he’s ready.”

  “You don’t want to talk to your mom?”

  “I’d prefer to be in Antarctica when the phone rings.”

  “You think it will be that bad?”

  The worry lines on Ruby’s brow spurred Claire into a lie. “Nah. She’ll just talk loud and interrupt Gramps a lot. If he’s smart, he’ll hang up and you’ll change your phone number.”

  “I haven’t had to deal with adult children before.”

  “Hey! I’m an adult,” Jess said. Claire and Ruby both shot her a yeah-right smirk. “Almost! In two years, I’ll be legit.”

  “Lord help us then,” Ruby said, a twinkle in her eye when she glanced at her daughter.

  “Where’s Gramps?” Claire asked around a mouthful of Twinkie. She needed to talk to him about the flight she and Mac were going to make to South Dakota next weekend. Find out what he wanted boxed and shipped sooner rather than later.

  “He’s in the back fixin’ to wash up the breakfast dishes. Manny is yakking his ear off about his hot date last night.”

  Claire rolled her eyes. For Manny, every date was hot. He made sure of it by wearing his infamous homemade Chili Pepper cologne—it’d burn a hole through anyone’s sinuses.

  Slipping through the curtain, Claire paused on the kitchen threshold at the sight of Gramps in a blue-checkered apron. A laugh escaped her lips. She needed a camera.

  “Buenos dias, mi amor.” Manny leered at her as usual. “Mac wanted me to tell you he changed his mind and has left without you.”

  Claire clutched her heart with soap-opera like drama. “Really?”

  “Sì. He said you were to come stay with me and take care of me for the rest of my golden years.”

  “Mac?” She turned to the man sitting opposite Manny, his face buried in the Arizona Daily Star newspaper. “Is this true?”

  Mac lowered the paper to the table, his gaze traveling over her shorts and Jessica Rabbit tank top very slowly. He shrugged. “A life with Manny would be spicy, to say the least.”

  Claire grinned.

  Mac winked at her, then returned to his paper.

  “Did Chester make it out of here alone?” she asked Gramps.

  “Nope. He’s following Candy home. Says he’s going to stay with her for awhile and let her sweeten him up.”

  “She’ll kill him first—he’s diabetic.”

  “Ahhhh, what a way to go,” Manny said, sipping his coffee.

  There was a loud clunk from the rec room, then a squeal. The air conditioner rattled like a penny in a tin can.

  “That’s it. I’ve had it with that piece of shit.” Claire marched over to the brown beast and gave it several Fonzy-punches on the side, but the thing just rattled louder.

  “Claire,” Ruby said from behind her. “Don’t worry about it. I’ll just go buy a new one in Yuccaville tomorrow.”

  That would be admitting defeat. Besides, Ruby might not have the bank biting at her heels, but she wasn’t exactly floating in riches, either. “No way am I giving up that easy. This is personal now.”

  Manny came in from the kitchen, Gramps followed with the dishtowel still in his hands.

  “Where’s my tool belt?” she asked.

  “In my bedroom,” Mac said, leaning against the kitchen doorway.

  Claire’s shoulders tightened at Manny’s bark of laughter. She could have done without everyone knowing that intimate detail.

  Ruby lifted a toolbox from behind the bar and set it on the counter. “Here.” She handed Claire a hammer and screwdriver.

  Minutes later, the plastic face grate lay in pieces on the floor. It hadn’t been very cooperative.

  Mac held the flashlight as she reached past the blower wheel for the clamp holding it on. The clamp was loose, easy to wiggle. Her fingers brushed something cold and hard loosely duct-taped next to the clamp. “What’s this?”

  “What’s what?” Mac asked.

  “This?” She pulled her hand out and opened her palm to show him what she’d found.

  “A skeleton key,” Ruby said, picking it up.

  “That’s what was rattling all this time,” Claire said.

  “I thought Joe bought this air conditioner new. I have a user manual for it down in his filing—”

  “Wait a second!” A light blazed in Claire’s head. She plucked the key from Ruby’s hands and raced down the basement stairs two at a time. Mac and the rest of them followed.

  Joe’s office smelled the same as usual—like old paper and cured leather.

  Claire hit the lights. She grabbed the antique writing box from the floor and placed the square box on Joe’s desk. The group circled her, watching.

  The key slipped into the keyhole without a hitch. Claire turned it, heard a clink, and flipped open the top.

  The underside of the lid had what looked like a chalkboard on it. Claire lifted the inkwell, pounce pot, and pen from the rectangular tray in back. The flat wood surface that angled down from the inkwell tray was split across the middle. Under it were two secret cubby holes.

  She opened the first cubby hole, and nearly choked on her tongue.

  Bound stacks of crisp one hundred dollar bills filled the compartment.

  “Holy frijoles!” Manny whispered.

  Claire opened the other cubby hole to reveal more hundred dollar stacks packed sardine-tight.

  “Oh, my,” Ruby said, her hand on her forehead.

  Claire looked up at Mac. He was frowning down at the money, his lips moving. Calculating, she guessed. She turned to Ruby. “Looks like Joe was saving for your future after all.”

  Gramps scowled.

  “If those are really bundles of hundreds like the wrappers say,” Mac said, his eyes still on the money, “there’s close to a quarter million dollars sitting here.”

  Ruby plopped down into the leather chair, her face full-moon pale. “Oh, my,” she said again, more breathlessly.

  Manny let out a long, slow whistle.

  A grin surfaced on Claire’s lips. She couldn’t help it. Finally, Ruby would be able to sleep at night. “You told me Joe used to ramble about having money somewhere, but couldn’t remember where he’d put it.”

  “I did,” Ruby fanned herself with her hand. “But I never believed him. I thought it was just a side-effect of the stroke.”

  Mac shook his head. “Damn. That’s a lot of cash.”

  “Guess you won’t be needing me much around here after all,” Gramps said, still scowling.

  Claire frowned at the old buzzard. Typical man. If a woman didn’t need him, why would she want him?

  “Don’t be silly, honey.” Ruby smacked Gramps’s forearm. “I’d need you even if that there box was full of gold bars.”

  Gramps grunted, but the scowl faded.

  Mac rounded the desk and wrapped his arms around Claire, pulling her back against his chest. “Let’s go. They don’t need us here anymore.”

  He towed her towards the door.

  “Where are we going?” she asked as he led her up the stairs.

  “Tucson.” Dropping his arm around her shoulders, he directed her toward the backdoor. “There’s a new four-poster bed there to break in.”

  She stopped in her tracks just outside the door. The warmth radiating through her had nothing to do with the Arizona sunshine.

  “MacDonald Abraham Garner, I’m not an easy woman.”

  He planted a hard kiss on her lips. “I’m counting on that, slugger.”

  The End ... for now

  Sneak Peak!

  Want a sneak peak at Ann Charles’ second book, Jackrabbit Junction Jitters*, in the Jackrabbit Junction Mystery series? Read on ...

  *Jackrabbit Junction Jitters will be available online in mid-2012

  JACKRABBIT JUNCTION JITTERS

  Chapter One

  Jackrabbit Junction, Arizona

  Wednesday, August 11th

  “What do you mean we have to hoof it?” Claire Morgan slid out of the passenger side of
the old Ford pickup and joined her grandfather. Gramps stood grimacing at a front tire that appeared to have melted under the setting sun. “Can’t you just throw on the spare so we can get out of here before the storm hits?”

  “There is no spare,” Harley Ford grumbled. He reached for the grocery bags in the pickup bed.

  Claire fanned her T-shirt and squinted through her sunglasses at the cumulus cloud puffing like a microwaved marshmallow as it raced toward her. Lightning lit the inside of the massive cloud paparazzi-style.

  Across the valley, just past the dusty pit-stop of Jackrabbit Junction, a towering vortex of dirt churned devilishly. Gusts of sun-baked air whooshed past her, pelting her cheeks with invisible grains of sand, garnishing the roadside barbed-wire fence with plastic bags and tumbleweeds.

  She swiped at the sweat dripping down the side of her face. The August sun and gravy-thick humidity had liquefied her makeup hours ago. She couldn’t wait for the storm’s cool rain to take the sizzle out of the evening air. “Maybe we should just wait this out. Sit in the cab and watch the storm pass.”

  Monsoon season in southeastern Arizona offered trial and tribulation in biblical fashion: floods, sandstorms, and lightning. Throw some locusts into the mix, and it would be the plagues of Moses tailgate party.

  Gramps passed her one of the grocery bags. “Next you’ll want to hold hands and sing campfire songs.”

  “Is that how you wooed Ruby?” Claire grinned, referring to her soon-to-be step-grandmother. “Serenaded her with Koombyah and Do Your Ears Hang Low until she agreed to marry you?”

  Thunder rumbled across the valley, sounding an early warning. A violet curtain of rain draped from the colossal cloud, veiling the mayhem behind it.

  “My love life is off limits to you this visit, wiseass. Don’t forget it. Now quit wasting time whining and grab your stuff. It’s not even a mile to the R.V. park. Besides, I have something to tell you, and I’d rather not be within arm’s-length when you hear it.” He raced toward the Dancing Winnebagos R.V. Park as fast as a seventy-year-old with a trick-hip could giddy-up.