“No, but I write for the Bugle.”
Shaking a finger at me, her smile turned sly. “Are you sure? I won’t tell anyone. Promise.”
I felt a flush of pride. “Well, I do cover violent crimes from time to time.”
Lightfoot pushed his cowboy hat back with a thumb. “That’s putting it mildly.” Once again, he led her towards her sedan.
I shot him a look. “Mrs. Gold, I need your expert opinion. Have you ever heard of anyone ever being electrocuted by an extension cord?”
“Oh, young lady, I have heard of far worse. Stories that would curl your hair.”
“How does it work? Is water usually involved?”
“Now, I’m not the CEO of General Electric, mind you. But in my humble opinion, any liquid helps.” She shrugged. “And, yes, water is a part of most incidents.” Lightfoot opened the door to her car and helped her into the front seat.
It was hard to determine if she was as wise as she made out. “If you plugged an electrical device into an extension cord, and the cord became wet somehow, wouldn’t that shock the snot out of you?” I asked.
“Yes, and no.” Her eyes widened with excitement. “It’s not like some story about some poor schmuck who grabs an electric fence while standing in a puddle of water. A person would have to grab onto a frayed cord with exposed live wires and not let go.” She wavered and drew a shaky breath.
“That’s enough, Nancy Drew,” Lightfoot said under his breath.
“I forgot.” Mrs. Gold put a hand to her throat. “I did hear a story years ago about an electrician who was electrocuted when he grabbed a metal doorknob.”
“Yes?” I stepped closer.
“He was holding a large reel of extension cord by the metal handle. The extension cord was plugged in at the other end. When he grabbed the door handle it completed the circuit.” Her laugh was deep and throaty. “The story goes, he was stuck to that doorknob for fifteen seconds.”
“Did he die?”
She shook her head and stuck her keys in the ignition. “Nope. Someone found him in a heap, but he recovered.” With a sigh, she reached for the door handle.
“Why don’t I drive you home, Mrs. Gold?” I asked.
“I don’t know.” She worried her bottom lip, her gaze flitting back and forth between Lightfoot’s face and my own.
“Detective Lightfoot will follow behind.”
She drew a deep breath and flung back her shoulders. “If you think it best.”
* * *
• • •
After seeing Mrs. Gold safely inside her sprawling ranch-style home, we headed toward Main Street. Traffic was such a fright on the way back, I strongly considered lighting my hair on fire so we could drive down the shoulder, sirens wailing, with good reason.
The problem was the tourists in front of us. They kept pulling onto the shoulder to take photos of the desert in bloom, dramatic claret cups and bright firewheel blanketflowers, with the rugged Chisos Mountains in the background.
“Can’t you turn your lights on, or something?”
“Nah. We’ll be there soon enough.” He waved out the window to a little cowboy riding in an extended-cab F250 in the next lane. “Thanks for helping Mrs. Gold.”
“I’m a real Girl Scout.” My mind was on the dance floor. Would Ryan still be there when we returned? And would I really care if had lost my chance to exercise my newfound confidence?
“Woolgathering, my mother used to call it.”
“Sorry. Thanks for letting me tag along.”
He checked his rearview mirror. “Extension cords. Spill it.”
“I tripped over a pile of them in Lucky’s tent. A pacemaker interruption, for whatever reason, and a surplus of extension cords, are connected by the fact they both are . . . electrical in some way. Excuse the pun.”
“That’s quite a stretch there, girl detective.” He pulled to a stop in front of Milagro. In the distance near the gazebo, couples still scooted and swayed. From our position, I couldn’t tell if Ryan was still around.
“Watch it or I might have to start calling you Shaggy. Or would you prefer Scooby?”
After my attempt at humor, there was a moment of silence. I could see him mentally preparing his response. “After I have that talk with Barnes, I can make time for a talk with you as well. Is that what’s needed, Miss Callahan?”
“No,” I answered without cracking a smile. Inside, I was chortling with surprise. For a split second, a person like me might think a person like him was flirting.
“You have more dancing planned for this afternoon?” He cast a quick glance at my dress before studying the crowd at the gazebo.
I shrugged and checked the time. Three thirty. “Maybe. Though I should go home and work on my stories for tomorrow’s deadline.”
“Sounds like a practical idea. How long will that take?”
“Let’s see.” I began to count off on my fingers. “Pinyon Pawn burglary, break-in at Gold Rush Lighting, and, oh yeah, a murdered chili cook.”
He studied my expression. “Seems to me, you could fit in a dance or two and still make it home to write at least one story before Milagro’s doors open for dinner.”
I hopped out and waltzed around the SUV to his window. “Thanks for letting me tag along.”
With a touch of his hat and a nod of his chin his only good-bye, he began to drive slowly down the street until I could no longer see him for the vendor booths, tourists, and other vehicles.
I smiled in spite of myself, enjoying the afterglow of his acceptance, wondering how many people he trusted with that surprisingly playful side of his personality.
A few staff members from Milagro were clearing the warmers, tablecloths, plates, and cutlery from the folding tables we’d set up on the sidewalk. During the day’s festivities we’d sold tamales, tacos, pecan praline candies, sodas, and Jarritos, a popular Mexican soda, to the passing foot traffic. Anthony and another waiter folded the tables and started carrying them around to the parking lot, where Uncle Eddie’s truck waited with the tailgate open.
“You need any help?” I called to Anthony.
“No, Miss Josie. We’re almost finished here.”
I waved and turned toward the gazebo and possibly a dance or two with a familiar partner.
“Don’t stay late,” Anthony called. “We still have dinner service to prep.”
“Don’t worry. I have a feeling my date may have hit the road for greener pastures.”
With a shake of his head, Anthony drew closer. “You’re too hard on yourself, just like my Lucinda. And she is muy beautiful.”
“Watch it.” I laughed and turned toward the gazebo and a dance. “I’m not giving you my tables, bucko.” Behind me in the distance, I heard him laugh.
Though it was May, the cool night air from the mountains would make for good sleeping weather as it blew through the screen in my open bedroom window.
“Muy beautiful, my Aunt Fanny,” I muttered. Anthony had a huge heart, so he probably meant it. It didn’t hurt that I had helped get the sheriff off his case when Dixie Honeycutt was killed.
I thought of Lightfoot and smiled. Who would have thought a serious-minded Native American detective from New Mexico would appreciate the sophisticated investigative skills of Nancy Drew? But the real question was this: Was he attracted to Nancy’s intelligence and simple girl-next-door beauty?
Chapter 15
Ryan Dances with Another Woman
I had left the dance floor and town square with a flight of butterflies in my stomach, but the Gold Rush break-in had driven them away. Something about the crime was off. Why would someone want to steal a computer charger? And, more importantly, who? This who might know something that would lead us to Lucky’s killer. This someone might be Lucky’s killer.
I sighed as I approached the center of Main Street and the ma
keshift stage. The butterflies came back with their cousins. Ryan hadn’t done more than ask me to dance. I needed to get a serious grip because I’d known him for all of my adult life. We’d been much more than friends in college, but now we got on each other’s nerves like siblings.
Thing was, this adult Ryan might have forgotten that I only act tough. He might have forgotten how lonely I could get—so lonely, in fact, that I might take his casual invitation to twirl on a crowded dance floor in front of God, Mayor Cogburn, and the entire town of Broken Boot the wrong way.
I ran my fingers through my hair, and wiped under my eyes just in case mascara had smeared underneath. I bit my lips and pinched my cheeks. Wait. Since when was I so Scarlett O’Hara? I’d obviously lost my mind.
I gave myself a mental slap.
Flashback to the skating rink in sixth grade. The in-house DJ was playing “Sugar, Sugar” by the Archies—an oldie, but always appropriate to the skating rink vibe. Girls were on one side and the boys were on the other. “Boys pick.”
And someone had picked me. In the half dark of the concrete-block skating rink, the disco lights, and the sonorous music, I held that boy’s sweaty palm and felt those butterflies come a-calling. Of course, he had a wart on the back of his hand, and of course I never spoke to him. Or skated with him again. But that feeling. That feeling was always welcome.
Not all the serious stuff that could follow, but those butterflies were welcome.
I stepped into the square and slowly picked my way through the crowd that stood along the dance floor, gabbing about their day and a few about Lucky’s untimely death.
The band played “Desperados Waiting for a Train,” couples slow-danced, Anthony and Lily’s younger brother and sister slow-danced hand in hand, half skipping, half lunging, adding the occasional twirl for dramatic flair. And I tried to look cool.
“Hey, Josie, who you looking for?” The mayor and his wife danced closer. So much for avoiding the unavoidable.
“Want to cut in?” Mr. Mayor asked as the two of them continued to move in perfect rhythm.
“Hah.” I laughed just in case he was serious.
“Eat your heart out, youngster.” They whirled into the flow of a circle of dancers two-stepping around the edge of the dance floor, twirling every eight counts.
Convinced that meeting up with Ryan was beyond stupid, I glanced around for a final time. Then I saw Ryan’s cowboy hat in the very center of the dance floor. I couldn’t see whom he was talking to because of the press all around him. I took a deep breath. Here goes nothing.
The song changed to “Whisper,” the music more sultry and heartbroken.
Mr. and Mrs. Cho from the dry cleaners danced with her head upon his shoulder. As I passed, she raised her head and gave me a nod. P.J. Pratt, who had tried to bully Uncle Eddie from the town council over a few head of Herefords, and his artist wife, Melanie, passed me in a boot-scootin’ promenade. Who knew so many prominent citizens of Broken Boot could cut a decent rug?
It was then that I saw him. With his back to me, I had no trouble picking him out by his height, his brown wavy hair, his faded denim jeans, the length of his torso, and the cut of his tight Western shirt.
Why was I worried? This was going to be fun. I tapped him on the shoulder. “Hey, handsome, want to dance?”
He swung toward me, and with him a familiar blonde. Now I saw what I’d missed in the crush of dancers: Ryan was partnering his ex, and my nemesis, Hillary Sloan-Rawlings. And he didn’t appear to consider it a hardship. Her hands were clasped around his neck, drawing the two of them close together and leaving no room for the Holy Spirit between them, as they used to tell us at First Baptist.
The butterflies evaporated and in their place appeared green-eyed devils. Which made me feel all kinds of ridiculous. I’d never been a beauty queen like Hillary, and she’d never been as gutsy and courageous as me.
“Hey, Jos.” Ryan made as if to remove Hillary’s hand from around his neck, but the beauty queen kept swaying back and forth. I couldn’t help but notice she’d forgotten to button one of her shirt buttons—the one right over her cleavage. “What happened? I thought I’d lost you.” He kept dancing though he was talking to me, mindlessly following where she was leading. They looked so good together, swaying as one, completely in sync with each other.
“Did you catch the bad guys?” Hillary asked. She’d added just the right inflection at the end of her question so I had no doubt that she was being sarcastic and witchy.
“Do I look like the sheriff?” I met Ryan’s questioning gaze, but I refused to soften. Tough. I wasn’t about to share my investigative secrets with this Miss America wannabe. Okay, I had to admit she wasn’t a wannabe. She had placed third in the final round of the big beauty bonanza, in front of a television audience and everything. She just got my goat, without even trying.
“Hey, come on, Ryan. Let’s finish the dance, then you two can catch up.”
He gave her an irritated look and disentangled himself from her grasp. “We’ve danced a few dances, Hillary. Ending in the middle of this one won’t kill us.”
She leaned against his chest and tousled his hair and then smoothed it down slowly, snaring him with her gimlet eyes.
And he wasn’t complaining. They’d dated on and off about a year ago. But on again was in their immediate future if she had her way.
“Let’s talk later,” I said.
He grabbed my arm. “Let’s talk now.” He led me to a cluster of tables, seating us at one near the back. Hillary followed close behind, taking the seat on his other side.
“I’m not saying a word with her here,” I whispered under my breath.
“You don’t mean that, Josie.” Hillary smiled a toothy smile. She had obviously been listening “We’re old friends. Let bygones float away.” In college, we’d started out as friends in the journalism department, but she always received the accolades while I stayed in the background doing the grunt work—no matter that I often stayed up late to help her write her late assignments.
I tried. “Where did you come from? I thought you left after the parade.”
“Oh, the town council—that’s whose car I rode in—took all the local beauties out to lunch.”
“I didn’t see you.”
She laughed and then paused. “Oh, you thought we’d go to Milagro. Oh no. We went to Riata in Alpine. Fillet, salad, baked potato, and blackened salmon.”
I loved fillet, salmon, and Riata’s expensive vibe, but I didn’t need her rubbing them in my face.
“What do you know about the burglary at Gold Rush Lighting, or did Majors send someone else?” Hillary asked matter-of-factly.
“That’s all there is to tell.” I didn’t trust her motives. She had a way of convincing our editor to give her the juicier stories, though technically her job was writing the occasional celebrity feature.
She smirked. “You know who did it, don’t you?” She batted her eyelashes like a lovesick calf. “You can tell me. Majors is going to be thrilled you got the inside scoop from that overbearing Lightfoot character, no matter who turns in the story.”
“It’s my story, Hillary.”
She raised her hands in mock surrender. “No argument here, but just so you know, he did ask me to cover the story as well.” She adopted a sad expression. “In case you couldn’t deliver the goods.”
“What? He wouldn’t do that, not after—”
“Please. No need to have a panic attack over it.” She smiled a cat-with-the-cream smile. “As it is, he’ll want to fire me when I tell him that Ryan and I are going to Austin next weekend.”
The bottom of my stomach turned into a block of cement. Back in September, Ryan had invited me to join him for a trip to Austin to visit our old college hangouts, like The White Horse honky tonk. That answered any nagging doubts I had about making the trip. If he invited her, the
n he didn’t understand me very well or the deep-seated dislike, not to mention, disrespect, she held for me. Why couldn’t he have left it at two old friends revisiting their college days? Getting out of town for a much-needed break?
He saw Hillary and me in the same light. What the heck?
“Jos—”
I ignored the appeal in his eyes. “No big deal.” I even managed to smile, with teeth and everything. “It’s a free country.”
Ryan frowned. “Give me a sec—”
With a shake of my head, I placed a hand on his arm. “We’re good.” I included Hillary in my largesse. “No worries.”
He leaned toward me and whispered in my ear, “We’ll talk later.”
I kept my focus on Hillary. She wasn’t going to find any trace of disappointment on my face. “So, you’ve finished your stories for the Bugle?”
Delicately she shook her wrists until her diamond tennis bracelet and matching watch floated down her toned arms and onto her slender wrists. “I was supposed to interview the celebrities this weekend.” She wiped the corner of her mouth with one finger and rubbed at her lipstick. “Too bad no celebrities bothered to show up.”
I could feel the blood rush to my cheeks. In all the hubbub of helping Uncle Eddie follow the ICA rules for the chili cook-off, attending the dance rehearsals for our parade performance, and writing Lenny’s blog, I’d completely forgotten to reach out to my friends in Austin—friends who knew popular musicians and actors who might be willing to make the drive down for the weekend. “Uh, yeah, about that . . .”
With his long arm, Ryan reached over and gave my shoulders a squeeze. “Celebrities don’t always follow through. You should know that.”
A deep furrow marred Hillary’s perfect forehead, and her eyes narrowed.
Ryan added his million-dollar smile. “Not you, Porcupine. The people you rub noses with. You’re acquainted with celebrities, aren’t you?” He shrugged. “Or at least I thought you were.”
She tossed her head. “Of course I am.”
Cinco De Murder Page 18