Miss Behave (The Anderson Family Series Book 1)

by Traci Highland

  Gary Lindquist. Why on earth would that Mansquatch assume that I knew him? I can’t get it out of my head, and I noticed Dad peeking through the curtains this morning, staring out at the street.

  It’s probably nothing, but what if this Gary guy is a friend of Dad’s? When he tells me that he and Bunny were going to go play some tennis, I decided to dig, just a little, around my father’s stuff.

  The problems with digging around Dad’s stuff in the guest room are more than just me worrying about whether or not he’s going to walk in the door.

  The biggest concern is that icky yuk feeling rolling around in my stomach.

  The whole, I-am-a-terrible-daughter icky yuk. My sisters don’t trust him. I know this, I’ve always felt the pity in their eyes when they watched me waiting at the window on the days Dad said he would show.

  The trust he had with them was broken. Whether it broke after missed visit ten or twenty, I don’t know, but trust isn’t something that you can just patch over.

  But Dad and I had a special bond, through the fantasy leagues and the emails and the negotiated trades. So even when he wouldn’t show up when he said that he would, we never lost that connection.

  And now, staring at his sad array of items, the one thing I notice is the picture he’s placed next to his bed. A picture of all of us, even Mom, right after I was born, smiling and happy, together.

  His clothes are faded and with each borrowed drawer I rummage through, the feeling of my betrayal grows like a living thing inside me.

  Hands shake as I pull open drawer after drawer. Just one more, let me check, let me see if there is something. Anything.

  The sound of a car driving by stops me. I freeze, hand hovering over the contents of the opened top drawer. Did the car sound like it pulled in? The guest room window faces the back of the house, so I can’t-

  A car door shuts and voices emerge. A conversation. Dad’s voice booms out across the neighborhood.

  My fingers work furiously in the top drawer. This is the last one, the last place-

  Shirts and shirts and wait. Something square and soft and a book! I skirt the clothes aside and listen as Dad’s voice keeps up the conversation outside. Opening the book, it’s filled with what looks like a series of addresses. Employers, maybe? I take out my phone and take picture after picture, flipping page after page and now a door shuts and I hear my father shout goodbye.

  Two more pages, click.

  The lock jiggles.

  One more, click.

  I race through the door and into the armchair, phone in hand, just as-

  “Babygirl! I didn’t see you there. You shouldn’t be looking at that phone in the dark, you’ll hurt your eyes.”

  Oh my gosh, I am burning in hell for being the worst daughter ever.

  “Oh, sorry. I just got carried away reading these autocorrect fails. I’ll turn the light on.”

  “Good.” His voice is soft as he kicks off his shoes and disappears into the bathroom.

  He couldn’t be the Gary Lindquist that guy was looking for, he just couldn’t.

  The first name in Dad’s address book is in the city, and a quick search of the New York City phone book shows that it’s a service that buys stock photography to then later re-sell to consumers. I mark it down and continue through the next few, searching and proving relationships to the photography market.

  Though I hate admitting it to myself, I’m relieved. I sit at my desk and sip at the full cup of coffee Gennifer just brought in from Dunkin. Great. I don’t think I have to go through the whole book in order to put my mind at ease. I can probably just go through a few more addresses. Easy peasy.

  Time to go check out the high country falconers’ club. Chugging the rest of the coffee, I send the address to the Mapquest app on my phone and grab my jacket. Gennifer calls, “Hey, are you going to fair Friday?”

  I grin. “Yup. Wouldn’t miss it. You?”

  “Haven’t decided yet. Last time I went I ate so much funnel cake that I threw up.”

  “Always a risk. Do you know anything about the falconers’ club? You know, like how they apparently have to be included in my sports section?”

  “Other than the fact that they play with birds? Nope. Have fun.” She stares at the screen. “But at least you get to be outside. I get to cover the planning and zoning board.”

  I push send on the last inquiry email about Dad and pull on my jacket, feeling sort of queasy. “See you later.”

  Chapter 14

  Aunties and Other Naughty Birds

  Dear Miss Behave,

  The circus came to town and my best friend decided to cross “sleep with a carnie” off of her bucket list and now she’s engaged to a falconer. He’s nice, despite the leotards, but I am an animal lover, and I can’t stand the idea of animals being trapped in cages and traipsed around the country for other people’s amusement. How do I tell her without hurting her feelings?

  Sincerely,

  Untamed

  Dear Untamed,

  Your friend seems to have a rather exciting bucket list. Do you have the rest of it? Miss Behave is most curious, darling. She may hate you for it, but you have to say something, sweetest. And if you storm the circus and free all the animals, let me know and I will bring the tequila and the crowbars.

  Love and Margaritas,

  -Miss Behave

  The thing about picturesque small towns is that sometimes roads and GPS tracking don’t always match. I’m sitting in the middle of an empty cul-de-sac in some densely wooded area and my app insists I’ve arrived at my destination.

  Nothing about this destination says, “High Ridge Park”, the supposed meeting place for the elusive falconers’ club. I hit another button on the phone and now the little blue arrow says that I’m in the middle of some lake.

  I rest my head against the steering wheel and call Gennifer. No answer. Great. Who would know this town well enough to determine the location of the apparently secretive park?

  My brain scan only turns up on one very hot native and I desperately try and think of someone else. Nope. No one.

  I look at the time, three-thirty. He’d still be at work, so if I call and get lucky, then maybe he could just text me the correct address. I text him:

  Mr. Brookes. I am looking for High Ridge Park and my GPS sent me to some dead-end. Do you have the correct address? The falconer’s meeting starts at four. Have to cover it for work.

  I add the last part in case his mother is looking over his shoulder.

  I wait.

  And wait. I pick at my nail polish -

  Hard to find. I am going to have to show you where it is. Meet me at my Bank Street office in ten.

  Ugh. Can’t he just text me?

  It won’t interfere w/ur work? You can just send me directions.

  Please, please, please let him just text me directions, I don’t want to have to-

  No. Come here. I will be waiting outside in five minutes. Start driving.

  So I guess I’m driving back into town.

  Hunter’s waiting in a suit, and honestly, I’d swear that he looks like he stepped out of the page of some Gucci ad, the open collar, the tailored seams, the strong chin with just the right amount of stubble, the perfectly mussed black hair-

  I sigh as I think about my fat-day jeans, baggy sweater and ponytail. Of course, how well will his Gucci suit fit in with what I imagine to be a leather and kilt-clad crowd at the falconry club?

  I hope some bird poops on him just so I don’t feel underdressed.

  Pulling up to the curb, I roll down the window. He says, “Park it around back, we’ll take my car.”

  Right. So I can feel even more out of place. I nod and pull around behind the charming brick building with high glass windows and antiqued signs reading Brookes and Son.

  I park in a small graveled lot. Opening my door, I do my best not to scratch the paint of the white van I’m parked next to. My heels crunch on the gravel and the smell of baking bread wafting do
wn from the nearby Mari’s Bakery makes my stomach rumble.

  He reaches his arms out for a hug. Oh, no. I grab his hand instead and shake it.

  No hugs. Hugs are dangerous. I don’t hug Abigail, after all, why should I hug him?

  The thought of his arms wrapping around me and his pectorals being all hard and lean and warm and-

  Neon lights, girlfriend: No hugs. Bad. Idea.

  He smiles. “Shall we?”

  The heat from his touch zings down my spine and the neon lights pop up again: Touch Bad.

  My God, I have an inner Neanderthal. Why can’t I even form full sentences in my head as a warning?

  He opens the door to his car for me and I slide in, only to have his smell and his heat and his ambience sizzle through me, making my girl parts tingle.

  I am doomed.

  That’s it.

  I’m going to crush on my boss until I move to Chicago. And if I don’t move to Chicago, I am going to have to move somewhere else, because if I stay here with him it is going to be seven circles of torture and I don’t need-

  “So, I have to admit, I was excited when you texted. I’ve always wanted to check out the falconry club,” He grins and pulls onto the main drag through the tree-lined gingerbread-like downtown. “It’s one of the things that make this town so amazing. My friends at Yale couldn’t understand why I’d want to come back home, but it’s hard to explain the appeal of a small town to people that never really get to experience it.”

  “I think there are plenty of people that get to live in small towns,” I say as I think of my own home town, a suburban nightmare of strip malls and Walmarts. “‘Small’ isn’t what makes this place special, it’s the fact that the people who live here treat it like it’s someplace special, so it becomes something precious. I’ve never seen anyplace like it, really.”

  I look out the window and see the line of bikers clad in leather waiting for Mari’s fresh-baked madeleines and maybe a loaf of her amazing ciabatta.

  Hunter gives me a look I can’t quite read, but he says nothing as we turn off the main drag and head off in search of the elusive park.

  We wind our way up a two-lane road that overlooks the lake. After an ancient, lopsided colonial farmhouse, we take a right onto a dirt road and continue to make our way up the hillside.

  “The park is up here on the left. There should be a sign, but sometimes it falls over and people forget to prop it up again.”

  I look out past his window, straining to find the peek-a-boo signpost.

  He slows down and the car rocks in the gullies of the road. “I think it’s there.” He points to a space where there is a gap between the trees.

  “No way. The grass is like knee-deep over there, how is that a park?”

  “That’s it. It’s at the forked oak.”

  I stare out the window at the trees that look like, well, trees. “Are you being serious right now?”

  “See it?” He puts the car into park and indicates the tree on the far side of the gap. “That oak, right there, it forks down low and then branches up. A good climbing tree.”

  “And you know this from personal experience?”

  He grins. “Much to my father’s dismay, yes. I broke my arm falling out of that tree when I was ten.”

  “Oh wow.”

  “I only fell because he started yelling. He came up here and was pretending to be interested in hiking to impress some buyer. He spooked me and I lost my grip.” He puts the car back into gear and pulls into the gap. “It’s here. See? There’s the post.”

  “I don’t see, but I’ll trust you.” I stare through the grasses and milkweed trying to distinguish some sort of post. “There’s no way I would’ve been able to find this place on my own.”

  “I know. I’m surprised no one warned you.”

  We drive between the trees, and there is sort of the impression of other tire marks in the grasses, so we make our way forward and down into the woods. The trees close in on all sides, the path narrow and overgrown and full of huge potholes and mud pits. Hunter chats happily, unperturbed at the fact that his low-riding luxury car is being given the business by the mountain path.

  He chats about the different kinds of trees with their limbs that dip precariously low over the car, the red oaks and the black walnuts and the native chestnut. Eventually we reach a clearing and a smattering of other cars.

  His car plows its way through the grass and we park beside a pick-up filled with crates and cages and things.

  The minute I open the door I’m barraged by the smell of fresh pine and the sound of barking dogs. Lots of dogs.

  I take a deep breath.

  It’s okay.

  Dogs are great. Really they are. Most people love dogs. Just because-

  “Are you feeling alright? You’re pale.” Hunter locks the doors and walks over by my side.

  “Yeah, fine.” I rub my hands up and down my arms and fight off the rising sense of nausea.

  He places a hand at the small of my back as a dog, a mass of white and brown fur and sloppy ears bounds through the parking area towards us, barking.

  I scream.

  “Piper!” Hunter wraps his arm more firmly around my back and I shove my head into his shoulder, gripping his shirt, hoping I can somehow disappear.

  “I can’t! It’s not on a leash! I was bitten, I was three and wandered away from the house and into this other yard and a dog broke off his tether and attacked me. I know I shouldn’t be scared and that most dogs are good, great even but I can’t-“

  “It’s okay, everything is okay.” Hunter bends down and holds out his hand, talking in even tones. The dog comes up to where we’re standing and lets Hunter rub his ears. “See, the best thing to do is stay calm and assertive. Walk around like you own the place and the dog will believe it.”

  A man stomps into the clearing wearing camouflage from his toes up to his eye-black and shouts, “Hey, you the folks from the paper?”

  The dog sniffs my feet and I whimper like a sorry sap and do my best to nod. Hunter, for his part, is now on his knees in front of the dog and it licks his face as he pets its head. “We are,” Hunter yells over to the bearded and camouflaged gentleman who is fast approaching. “I’m Hunter and this is Piper, she’s the one who’ll be writing the story on the club. Who is this friendly little guy?”

  “Oh, that’s Gump.” The man approaches. He’s about six feet a billion inches and a wall of green and brown and sports a large black and grey beard that would make ZZ Top stand up and give salute.

  Hunter reaches up with one arm and pulls me down beside him. No, no I don’t want to meet Gump. Not my thing. “I think Gump might be happier over with his owner.” I whisper, hoping our bearded friend can’t hear-

  “Oh, Gump is a big ol’puddle of love. He’d be happy just about anywhere.” His owner states and reaches his hand out towards Hunter. “I’m Bill O’Malley. President of the Connecticut Falconers club.”

  Hunter shakes his hand, leaving me kneeling in front of Gump.

  Gump doesn’t look terribly ferocious, I have to admit. He wags his tail and licks my open palm.

  Ok. This isn’t bad. Slimy, sure, but not bad. I tentatively wrap my palm around Gump’s ear and he comes closer.

  I tumble backwards and fall on my butt into the dirt. Totally professional. Sitting in the dirt, covered in dog slobber. I am making one heck of a first impression, I’m sure.

  “Sit, Cujo.” Bill jests as Gump licks my face.

  Yuck. “Too much, Gump, that’s too much love. A little less on the slobber, alright?”

  Gump looks particularly evil as he rolls over on his back and exposes his stomach to me, his tongue hanging out of the side of his mouth and his tail swishing the leaves on the ground back and forth.

  “He likes you.” Hunter bends down beside me and we both reach out and rub Gump’s white belly.

  “Nah, haven’t you noticed?” I look up at Hunter’s face. “Most men I meet tend to lay at my feet, t
ongue all agog.”

  “Can a tongue be agog?” He asks.

  “Absolutely. Agog is totally a thing.”

  He extends a hand to help me up and I take it, leaving my new furry buddy to run over to Bill. Hunter continues, “It’s a perfectly understandable reaction. I, myself, occasionally have trouble standing upright when you’re around.”

  Heat rushes from my head down into the pit of my belly and I drop his hand. The image of Hunter on his knees before me, his soft hair tracing lines down the flesh of my stomach…

  “So, you going to come meet the rest of the club?” Bill asks.

  I shake Bill’s hand and indicate the thick leather glove on his other hand. “Where’s your falcon?”

  “Oh, you mean Bobby? He’s over on his perch in the field.” Bill strides off and we make our way down a narrow trail at the end of the parking lot, marked ominously by a tin sign nailed to a tree reading “trail” that hangs upside down and looks like it was made during the Harding administration.

  Bobby. Of course the falcon’s name is Bobby. Here I was expecting it to be named Killer or Hawkeye or something, but Bobby makes a strange kind of sense for a guy who names his dog Gump. “So” –I hold back a switch so it doesn’t hit Hunter as he passes me on the narrow path- “what kind of bird is Bobby?”

  “He’s a red-tailed hawk. Oh, it’s the not the meanest kind of bird out there, to be sure, you’ve got your peregrines and larger gyrfalcons and such, but a red-tailed is a damn fine bird to start with. Just big enough to take out small grouse or pheasant. Not an ugly bird, either, their flight really is something special to watch.” Billy chatters happily as he stomps over the sleeping saplings and dead leaves that litter the trail.