by Beth Ciotta
Shy whimpered.
“Tell me about it.”
The door swung open and Officer Anderson peeked in. “She’s not a goon, but she’s kinda weird,” he whispered. “Says she’s a business associate of yours. I told her you weren’t up for business and she burst into tears. I—”
A woman squeezed between Andy and the doorjamb. Tight clothes, big hair, sparkly sneakers. “Kylie McGraw?” she asked in a scratchy voice.
Kylie nodded.
The woman moved closer and therefore grew less fuzzy, given Kylie’s restricted vision. She could see now that the blonde was not only well endowed, but gorgeous—except for the black mascara streaking down her face—and clutching a metallic shoe box to her Dolly Parton-size breasts.
“Hi,” she said, extending a limp hand. “I’m Dixie Darling, owner and creator of Bada Bling! shoes.” She burst into fresh tears. Loud, heaving, heart-wrenching sobs. “Poor Chickie!” she wailed.
Chickie?
“Criminy,” Andy complained.
“Would you please wait outside?” Kylie said, waving him away. He was a good cop, but the man had the sensitivity of a turnip.
The door clicked shut in his wake.
Kylie nabbed a handful of tissues from the box beside her bed and passed them to her blubbering visitor. “I don’t understand why you’re here, Dixie.”
“To see my shoes in your store and to bring you these.” She shoved the shoe box into Kylie’s hand. “Remember I said I was going to make you something special?”
“Yes, but I thought you’d mail them. Aren’t you from Philadelphia?”
The woman nodded, causing her teased hair to bob and sway. “I hope you like ’em.”
Dumbfounded, Kylie tore away the metallic pink wrapping paper and plucked off the lid. “I’m speechless.”
“Yeah. They kinda have that affect. Beautiful, ain’t they?” she said with a watery smile.
“Mmm.” Kylie inspected the glittering red stilettos, wondering where in the world she’d ever wear the whimsical, sexy FMPs. Except maybe in the bedroom.
“You kinda remind me of Dorothy what with you being so sweet and living in the cornfields. There’s no place like home, right?”
“Right.” Kylie didn’t point out that Dorothy was from Kansas and this was Indiana. Dixie didn’t seem too bright, but she sure had talent and heart. “Thank you, Dixie, but…I still don’t understand why you came all this way.”
The woman burst into a fresh wave of tears. “I wanted to see my shoes, I mean people wearing my shoes. I wanted to meet you, my first client, and Chickie wanted to talk to you about Tommy.”
“Who?”
“His brother. He was admiring the renovations and it made him sad. Thinking his brother was dead, thinking he couldn’t make amends. Between that and the coffee…” She sobbed into the handful of tissues. “Can’t see,” she said, fanning her dragon nails in front of her face. “Mascara in eyes.”
“There’s a bathroom,” Kylie said. “Right there behind you. Maybe if you splashed your face with cool water…”
Dixie bawled and turned in circles.
“Right. Can’t see.” Heart pounding, Kylie slid off the bed and guided the woman into the bathroom. “Take your time.” She shut the door, then palmed her spinning head. She wasn’t sure if she was dizzy because of the accident or because of the blond tornado that had just blown in.
Chickie? Tommy? Brother?
What was Dixie talking about?
“He was admiring the renovations and I think it made him sad.”
Oh, no. It couldn’t be.
Kylie stumbled back to the bed and sat down before she fell down. She mentally sorted through the information she’d gleaned from Travis, Jack, Skully and now Dixie. So, what? Dixie was married to Chickie, who wanted to talk to Kylie about his brother Tommy, who’d renovated McGraw’s, meaning Tommy was Travis?
“Thinking his brother was dead, thinking he couldn’t make amends.”
But the man in the trunk was Frank, not Travis. Travis was on his way to France, wasn’t he? Kylie rushed over and spoke through the bathroom door. “Dixie, are you sure Tommy’s dead?”
“No. He’s with the deputy,” she wailed, “and Chi…Chi…”
Chickie. Kylie massaged her throbbing temples and stumbled back to the bed. So Travis…or rather Tommy, was back in Eden? She needed to speak with Jack.
The door creaked open.
Shy jumped off the bed.
Kylie looked over, expecting Andy, hoping for Jack, and instead saw a doctor.
“Afternoon, Miss McGraw. I’m here to administer your sedative.”
“I don’t need a sedative.” Although maybe she did. She felt as if she was on the verge of hyperventilating.
“According to your chart.”
Shy growled, a menacing growl that caused Kylie’s skin to prickle.
The doctor looked down. “What the fuck?”
Kylie’s heart leaped to her throat. She peered over the edge of the bed. Shy skittered away, leaving a puddle of pee in her wake.
“That fuckin’ dog pissed on my fuckin’ shoe!”
As he shook his leg, the long hem of the man’s urine-soaked scrub pants shifted, giving Kylie a glimpse of a shiny black oxford.
Guccis.
She gaped at the rabid man, who kicked at the snarling dog and missed.
“It was you!” she rasped. “You shot a man just for spitting on your shoe. And now… If you touch that dog—”
He lunged.
Kylie rolled off the bed, onto her feet. She screamed for help. “Andy!”
Dixie burst out of the bathroom. “Turk! You…you murdering bastard! First you went after Tommy, then Chickie. Your own blood! And for what? So you could take over as fucking boss?”
“Carmine was weak, you stupid bitch. In mind and body. I just helped him along.”
“I knew it. You put something in his coffee, something that messed with his bad heart.”
“The man was a fucking time bomb. He was going to let Tommy live. Do you know how that would have made the Mancini Family look? Tommy broke omertà. He got what he fuckin’ deserved.”
But he didn’t kill Travis, Kylie rationalized. He killed Frank. How could he confuse the two? And where the hell were Andy and Jack?
Dixie curled her dragon nails into her palms. “What did you put in Chickie’s coffee?”
“Don’t worry your fluffy head about it, Dix. Shut your trap, play your cards right and maybe you can be my goomah.”
Kylie didn’t know what that was, but it made Dixie’s face burn.
Someone knocked on the door. “What’s going on in there?”
Kylie saw the door handle jiggle. Oh, God. He’d locked it from the inside.
Turk eyed the open window next to Kylie. An escape route.
“Over my dead body,” Kylie said.
“Exactly what I had in mind.” Turk lunged, and wrapped both hands around Kylie’s neck.
Don’t panic.
Hands cupped, she swung out and in, smacking her attacker’s ears simultaneously.
“Imagine clapping two cymbals together,” she heard her martial arts instructor say.
Turk screamed and backed away, blood trickling from his ears.
Shy attacked his leg.
Kylie launched a roundhouse kick, connecting with his bloody ear and knocking the dazed goon to the floor.
Dixie grabbed a ruby stiletto and started whacking away. “You bastard! You fucking bastard!”
Someone pounded on the door.
Kylie lunged for the lock, but Turk grabbed her ankle.
She was pretty sure she screamed Jack’s name before her head smacked the floor.
CHAPTER FORTY-FIVE
BREAKING THE NEWS to his sister about the death of her husband had been tough. It got worse when, in obvious shock, Jessica sank onto a pew and asked Jack to leave. He preferred to stay, to offer comfort, but then she whispered, “Please.”
T
hat one word tore at his heart, rang in his ears as he stepped outside the small chapel. But then it got worse. Ziffel showed up with Travis, aka Tommy Mancini, in tow. The man was devastated by his brother’s death and needed a place to grieve.
Travis took one look at Jessie and backed out. “I can’t invade her space. Not knowing what I know about Frank. Not after what we…” He shook off his words, then locked gazes with Jack. “Can I see Kylie?”
“No.”
“I just want know she’s okay.”
“No thanks to you,” Jack said. “You brought the fucking mob into this town.”
“I know. I’m sorry. Turk’s the only one left and I’ll do whatever I can to help you catch him. He threatened Kylie and killed my brother. I want—”
“Revenge?” Jack raised a brow. “After what your brother did to you?”
“Carmine apologized. I accepted.”
“All’s forgiven just like that?” Jack asked.
Travis didn’t flinch. “In my heart, he’ll always be the big brother who allowed me to decorate our tree house.”
Jack studied the man in his designer suit and shoes, thought about the time and imagination he’d poured in McGraw’s, and the dream trip he’d tried to bestow upon Kylie. He thought about the respect he’d just afforded his sister. Maybe Kylie was right. Maybe Travis Martin/Tony Mancini wasn’t all bad.
Just then his cell rang. “Yeah?”
“Jack. It’s Skully. Turk’s in the building.”
In a heartbeat, Jack slapped a pair of cuffs on Travis. The last thing he needed was for the former mob lawyer to go postal on the man who’d killed his brother. “Take him to the station house and lock him up,” he said to Ziffel. “Now. And take Jessie with you.”
Seconds later Jack hit Kylie’s floor. He saw Skully coming from the opposite direction.
Kylie screamed Jack’s name and they both broke into a run.
Jack had ordered Anderson to stay with Kylie, but now the young officer was slumped in a chair in the hall.
“Drugged,” said a nurse, while a doctor continued to pound on the door.
An attendant rounded the corner in a red-faced frenzy, stabbed a key in the lock.
Skully flashed his badge. “Stand clear. And stay out until we say it’s safe.” He turned the key a split second before Jack kicked open the door.
They entered, guns drawn, and assessed the situation.
Skully pulled the shoe-wielding banshee off of the groaning doctor. “Let me guess,” he said. “Mario ‘Turk’ Mancini.”
The man took a wild swipe at the dog gnawing at his shoe, then fell back with a groan. “What about Wolverine?”
Jack called off Shy—when had she gotten so brave?—and knelt beside Kylie, who was sprawled flat on her back.
She blinked up at him. “We’ve got to stop meeting like this.”
A reference to that first night at Boone’s. Her birthday spill. Jack didn’t see the humor. He couldn’t. Kylie was covered in blood.
They were all smeared with blood.
Jack looked down. He smoothed his hands over Kylie’s trembling body. “Where do you hurt, baby?”
“I think…I’m just a little stunned. When he yanked me to the floor, I hit my head. It’s okay. I’m okay.”
“Your neck is bruised.”
“He tried to strangle me.”
“Your hands are bloody.”
“I broke his ear drums.”
Jesus.
Jack tried to take it all in. Tried to be objective. His gun burned against his hip. The urge to shoot the bastard who’d hurt Kylie was fierce.
“She smacked Turk hard, then kicked him in the head,” said the other woman. “I wish I could fight like that. I just beat him with my shoes.”
“You did some damage,” Skully said, eyeing the five-inch spiked heel, then the man’s bloody chest.
“I was trying to pierce his heart,” she said. “Heel for a heel. He killed Chickie.”
“Carmine Mancini,” Jack clarified while helping Kylie to sit up. “Boss of the Mancini crime family. Travis’s brother,” he whispered in her ear.
“Is Travis dead?” she whispered back.
He shook his head.
Kylie sagged against Jack while Skully flipped Turk and cuffed his wrists. “Clipped your uncle,” the marshal said to the mobster. “Don’t imagine that’ll go over well with the Administration.”
“Buddah will smooth things over,” said Turk
“Buddah smashed his car into a tree,” said Skully. “Dead.”
“Good,” said the blond woman.
“Turk’s the goon who killed a man for spitting on his shoe,” Kylie said. “He tried to inject me with something, but Shy peed on his shoe and he freaked.”
Jack ruffled the dog’s head. “Good girl.”
“I’ve been mauled, stabbed and beaten,” Turk complained. “Can I get some fuckin’ medical attention?”
The lawmen answered as one. “No.”
“What about you, miss?” Skully asked. “Are you okay?”
The buxom blonde burst into tears.
“Her name’s Dixie,” said Kylie.
Skully squeezed the sobbing woman’s shoulder. “Dixie, what’s wrong?”
She spilled her guts.
Kylie chimed in, squeezing Jack’s hand as she repeated some of the things Mario had said in between trying to drug and choke her.
Jack absorbed the women’s words. In the back of his mind he calculated ways to shield Kylie from having to testify.
“You and your friend should think twice before repeating any of that, Dix,” Turk said. “You know what happens to rats.”
The threat burned through Jack’s body and ignited images. Suddenly he was back in Manhattan, seeing Connie Valachi’s tortured body. All the disgust and fury he should have felt then, he felt now. He pinned Mario “Turk” Mancini against the wall, one hand around the bastard’s throat, the other on the trigger of his Glock.
Turk wheezed. “Yo. Cocksucker, I—”
“Shut up.” Jack pressed the nose of his revolver against the man’s forehead.
The door swung open and Jessie pushed in. “What’s going on? Oh, my God. Kylie, you’re bleeding.”
“I’m fine,” Kylie called.
Jack didn’t take his eyes off Mancini. He didn’t ease up on the pressure. “Get out of here, Jess.”
“Jack.” Jessie’s voice was fragile, almost childlike. “Who is this man? Is he the one—”
“Goddammit, Skully,” Jack said. “Get the women out.”
“And miss Turk getting his due?” Dixie shrieked. “Forgettaboutit.”
“Time to go, Sunshine.” Skully hustled Dixie from the room. Jessie wouldn’t budge, so he physically removed her, then returned.
Jack tightened his hold on Mancini. “You, too, Kylie.”
“No.”
“That’s right, sweetheart,” wheezed Turk. “Stay right where you are.” He smiled at Jack. “You’re not gonna pop me. It would traumatize your girlfriend. Besides, that would be murder. Got murder in your soul, Chief Reynolds?”
When he thought about how this man had tried to kill Kylie? And what he’d try to do to her if she testified against him? “I’m thinking of it as a preemptive strike.”
“Crank it down a notch, Reynolds.” Skully said close to his ear.
Jack’s temples throbbed. Skully knew his history. He knew about Connie Valachi.
“Let it go,” the marshal added.
Jack knew he was right. He couldn’t save a dead woman. Or the world. And he couldn’t protect Kylie, or anyone else, if his ass was in prison. Still, Mario “Turk” Mancini represented what Jack hated most. Corruption. Immorality.
The mob.
“Don’t do it, Jack.” Kylie moved in and wrapped her arms around him, her front flush to his back. “I need you. Jessie and Maddie need you.”
He heard Shy whimper, felt the wonder-dog leaning against his leg.
“Rem
ember the water tower? You asked me to trust you. You told me to let go.” Kylie tightened her hold. “Whatever this man represents, whatever ghosts he conjured, we’ll conquer those demons together. Trust me, Jack.”
He’d come back to Eden to reconnect with his soul. He thought about his family. He absorbed the strength and love emanating from Kylie.
Jack holstered his gun and passed Mancini off to Skully.
He let go, and when he and Kylie were alone, he turned around and held on.
To Kylie. To life. To love.
Kylie melded into him, sighed.
“What are you thinking, Tiger?”
“I’m thinking I’ve had enough excitement for a lifetime.”
“It’s not over yet, hon. There’ll be an investigation. A trial. A shitload of gossip.”
She looked up at him with a watery smile. “That’s nothing compared to the thought of losing you.”
He thought about her nosedive into the lake. “Funny. I had a similar thought today.” Jack cradled Kylie’s sweet face and poured his heart into the kiss.
When he eased away, she smiled. “What are you thinking, Jack?”
“I’m thinking there’s no maybe about it. I love you, Kylie. With an intensity and depth I can’t describe. It’s…”
“Scary?”
He smiled. “Wonderful.”
“That does it,” she said, her eyes shining with tears. “You’re stuck with me for life.”
He moved in for another kiss. “Paradise.”
CHAPTER FORTY-SIX
“GRANDMA, HOW ARE WE going to make a profit if you keep hoarding the stock?”
“But I love these.”
Kylie watched the seventy-year-old woman lace up a pair of high-top sneakers. Part of Dixie’s new animal line—cheetah print with metallic black laces. “But don’t you think they’re a little young for you?”
“Young schmung.”
Kylie’s mom, who’d been restocking the gum ball machine, chimed in. “Consider it an investment in advertising, Kylie. Every time your grandma leaves the store in a new pair of shoes, at least two people come in asking for something similar. Must be the spring in her step.”