Surrender To Sultry

by Macy Beckett

  “Far as I know. She took over the hardware store when her daddy passed, so you can try her there too.”

  Leah told him to holler if he needed anything, then headed to the kitchen, where she stared at the old rotary phone affixed to the wall. She couldn’t put it off any longer—she had to call Rachel. Not only was it the right thing to do, but she needed a friend right now. Even a furious friend who’d demand answers Leah wasn’t at liberty to give.

  Taking a deep breath, she lifted the phone from its cradle and dialed the number she knew by heart.

  “Hello,” Rachel spat after the third ring. Her phone greeting had always sounded exactly like this—accusing, as if she’d been on the verge of curing cancer before you’d had the nerve to interrupt her.

  “It’s me,” was all Leah said.

  “Tinkerbell.” The smile was thick in Rachel’s voice. “It’s about damn time.”

  Chapter 4

  “Listen up, dipshits,” Colton hollered at his deputies during Friday morning roll call. Instantly, half a dozen men bolted upright and quit their jabbering. “Stop using an open pen to tap the LCD panel in your cruisers. You’re leavin’ ballpoint ink on the touch screens.”

  That equipment was expensive as hell, and he’d kissed a lot of ass to get it covered in the budget. “Next guy I catch marking up his laptop is gonna spend two months detailing the whole squad.” Pointing at his chief deputy, he added, “I’m lookin’ at you, Horace.”

  “Yeah, yeah.” Horace waved him off before scratching his potbelly with a Bic cap.

  “And speaking of equipment,” Colt said, “if y’all want new pistols next year, you’d better start writing tickets.” After court fees, the sheriff’s department only kept about twenty percent of the total fine, and Glocks weren’t cheap. “Folks are haulin’ ass on Route Fifty. It’ll be like shooting fish in a barrel.”

  His lower back muscles clenched, and he sucked a mouthful of black coffee from his Styrofoam cup, letting the flavor of roasted beans distract him from the pain.

  “Another thing,” he muttered. “When you’re serving warrants, see if you can get a snitch on whoever’s stealing the AC units on Front Street.” When the economy tanked, theft skyrocketed, and people were snatching anything that wasn’t nailed down. Crazy fools had even stolen the brass valves out of the new auto-flushing toilets at Shooters. “The perp’s probably selling the parts over in Hallover County.”

  Horace nodded a little too enthusiastically and checked his watch, no doubt eager for the free country platter Miss Stacy served him each morning at the diner. “We done?”

  “Not yet.” Colt cleared his throat and pretended to study the warrants tacked to his clipboard. “Y’all probably heard Leah McMahon’s back in town.”

  “Mmm-hmm,” came a few replies.

  “She in trouble?” Horace asked.

  “Unh-uh.” Not yet, anyway. But last night Colt dreamt she’d been kidnapped by Troy Aikman. The quick-fingered bastard had thrown Leah over one shoulder, huffed into the end zone, and then spiked her onto the Astroturf. While the logical side of Colt’s brain understood the absurdity of it, the echo of her screams still rang in his ears, and he hadn’t been able to think straight all morning. What if the nightmare was an omen? Yeah, he knew that sounded crazy too, but he didn’t care. He finally had Leah back in his life—more or less—and he wasn’t taking any chances with her safety.

  “I want you to keep a special watch on her,” he said. “Make sure she’s okay. Be there if she needs a hand.”

  Someone snickered from the other end of the table, and Colt fired a glare that would freeze the balls off a brass monkey. The laughter died real friggin’ fast, but to make sure his men knew he wasn’t dicking around, he threatened, “If she so much as stubs her toe while she’s here, I’ll have your asses.” After a stern glance all around, he added, “We clear?”

  “Yeah, Chief,” they muttered.

  He gave the boys a terse reminder about Saturday night’s spaghetti supper at the firehouse before dismissing them for patrol duty and returning to his office. When he hobbled down the hallway and shoved open his door, his already lousy morning took a hard left into Shitville.

  “Hey, jerkwad.” Homecoming queen turned manhater, Rachel Landry, occupied his chair, resting her fugly garden clogs on the corner of his desk. The eight-by-eight office seemed to shrink in her presence, probably because her bitterness took up all the room.

  Colt glanced over his shoulder toward the reception desk and kneaded his lower back with one fist. “How’d you get in here?”

  “Darla.” She flashed a faux-sweet smile, shaking back her shiny chestnut hair. Rachel was girl-next-door pretty, but she sucked the fun out of the air like a possessed leech. “We were co-captains on the varsity cheer squad, remember?”

  “Must’ve slipped my mind.” He stalked behind her and jerked back the rolling chair, forcing her to hop to her feet. And because he knew it would put a burr in her britches, he said, “I arrested your idiot husband on Monday. He make bail?”

  Rachel’s eyes turned to slits, exactly as he’d hoped. “He’s not my husband, and you damn well know it.”

  “I’m pretty sure you’re still married in God’s eyes.” Colt didn’t believe that one bit, but it was too much fun watching Rachel’s mouth prune up like elephant ass.

  “Go to hell, Colton.”

  “Sure thing.” He lowered to his chair and groaned with relief. “I’ll say hello to your mama while I’m there.”

  “My mama’s still alive, moron.”

  “Exactly.” He pointed one finger at her. “And living with you. If that’s not some serious hell on earth, I don’t know what is.” Before she had a chance to strike back, he added, “Do us both a favor and take a hike, Landry.”

  “Believe me, I can’t stand sharing oxygen with you either.” To prove her point, she curled her upper lip and raked a glare over him from Stetson to Laredos. “I think your chair just gave me herpes. But I’m here for my girl, Tink. You want me gone?” She held out one hand and waggled her fingers. “Give me her license and papers.”

  Tink. He’d always hated that Leah’s friends had nicknamed her after some dumb fairy, just because she was tiny and blond. Anyone with two brain cells to rub together knew she was an angel. “No dice. I can’t release official documents to you—it’s a privacy violation. Leah’s a big girl. She can come and get ’em herself.”

  “Turns out I’m not the only one who hates sharing oxygen with you.”

  The words hurt as real as any buckshot, but he didn’t let it show. He couldn’t believe Leah despised him that much. Sure, she’d hung up on him the last three times he’d called, but her reaction during his visits—the way her ivory throat pulsed like she’d just sprinted the twenty-yard dash—said she liked sharing his airspace a little too much.

  Instead of dwelling on that, he asked, “She mention why she ran away?”

  Rachel lifted a shoulder as she moved to the opposite side of the desk. “Just the same bullshit excuse she’s shoveling all over town. But if you ask me, it’s your fault.”

  “Me?” Colt couldn’t hide his reaction this time. He drew back, feeling his brows skyrocket into his scalp. His fault? He’d nearly lost his mind when Leah disappeared, and nobody had worked harder to track her down. Nobody. Not even her own daddy. “I think some of Tommy’s stupid rubbed off on you.”

  “Oh, please. Don’t play innocent. You completely trashed her reputation.”

  Colton opened his mouth to defend himself, but bit back his retort. There was no point in denying he’d blackened Leah’s name. He felt guilty just thinking about it. “True,” he said. “Maybe that’s part of the reason she left, but not why she stayed gone ten years without a word for her own daddy.”

  The shrew didn’t have an answer for that. For several beats
, Rachel sucked on her top teeth and stared him down, clearly searching for a way to blame it on him but coming up empty.

  “Yeah, I guess not,” she finally admitted.

  “You think maybe he hit her?” Colt asked. “I’ve heard those hardcore preacher types can be—”

  “No way,” she interrupted. “Pastor Mac couldn’t punch a clock, let alone his little girl. You didn’t grow up around here—you never saw the way he doted on her.”

  Colt wasn’t convinced. He didn’t need a Texas birth certificate to see that things between Leah and her father didn’t add up. “Well, something happened between them—something bigger than a fight about me. You don’t turn your back on family for that long without a good reason.”

  With that, the ceasefire they’d wordlessly negotiated seemed to end as Rachel’s tone shifted from mean to bitchtastic. “Whatever happened, it’s none of your business. You did enough damage last time.” She jabbed an index finger at him. “Leave her alone and call one of your floozies if you want a score. You’ve got a whole army of them.”

  Heat crept into Colton’s face, building like steam inside a pressure cooker until he feared the top of his skull might blow through the ceiling. “I’m not that man anymore,” he ground out between clenched teeth.

  Rachel didn’t know him—never really had—and it infuriated him to think she might drip that poison in Leah’s ear, filling her mind with tales of Colt’s drinking and whoring without bothering to mention he’d changed.

  His fury must’ve shown, because Rachel quit tapping her nails on his desk and took a step back. “You know what they say about leopards and spots.”

  “Get out,” he ordered in an eerie calm that alarmed even himself. “Before I find a reason to throw you in the tank with Tommy.”

  Rachel cocked her head to the side. He could practically see her wheels turning—calculating the risk of slipping in one more insult. She wanted the last word so badly her mouth twitched. But she must have thought better of it, because she turned with a huff, flinging her hair over one shoulder like a country diva as she charged into the hall.

  Colt stared after her a minute to make sure she’d really left before turning his attention to the stack of citizens’ complaints on his desk. But after mindlessly scanning the same page three times, he accepted the fact that Rachel had screwed with his focus, and he shoved the paperwork aside.

  Damn it, his goal to win Leah’s trust was hard enough without her friends meddling in his business. Leah already knew about his crazy teenage years, but she had no idea how he’d self-destructed after she left. He’d hoped to keep it that way.

  He’d done a thorough job of wrecking himself back then. Moonshine, honkytonks, titty bars—he’d used them all to forget Leah. Or to try. He never could put her sweet face out of his mind for long, so he’d doubled his efforts, hurtling through life with his pants around his ankles and a perpetual buzz fogging his brain.

  It had never occurred to him before, but what if Leah couldn’t forgive him for all the women he’d slept with? Because the idea of her making love to another man sent bile clawing a trail through his esophagus.

  He needed to apologize to Leah before Rachel turned her against him for good. Of course, there was the minor complication of getting Leah to speak to him first.

  He pulled her driver’s license from his shirt pocket and gazed into those sad, blue eyes. “Stubborn girl,” he told her. “Hide all you want, but I’m not gonna quit on you.”

  The direct method had failed, so maybe he needed to change strategies. To get sneaky. The more he thought about it, the more it made sense. He was mighty good at sneaky—an expert, if he did say so himself. While it seemed backward to trick Leah into forgiving him, he didn’t have much time before her dad got better and she’d leave again. Already, he’d wasted a week in a misguided attempt to do the right thing.

  So now that he’d resolved to trust his more wicked inclinations, how was he going to get Leah alone? She hardly left her daddy’s house, and there was no way she’d invite him inside.

  He bounced one booted heel against the floor, considering his options. He’d heard she planned on coming to Trey Lewis’s homecoming potluck tonight. Maybe he should confront her there. Not the ideal situation, as half the town would turn out, including Leah’s sisterhood of cockblockers, but Colt would have to make it work. The only question was how.

  Thirty minutes and two broken pencils later, he’d just hatched the beginnings of a plan when his sister knocked on the door and peeped inside.

  “Hey.” Avery bit her bottom lip, apologizing with her eyes. “Sorry to bug you.”

  “Don’t be.” Smiling for the first time that day, Colt pushed back from his desk and waved her inside. “I hardly get to see you now that you’ve taken up with that accountant.”

  “Consultant,” she corrected.

  “Whatever.” He didn’t give a rip what her boyfriend did for a living. The guy didn’t make Avery cry, and that’s all that mattered. Colt and his sister weren’t as close as most fraternal twins, but he still wanted to tear the nads off any bastard who screwed with her head. And since her “baby daddy” had split for Reno, there’d been a lot of candidates for Colt’s neutering services.

  “Come on in,” he said. “I could use a distraction.”

  “Oh, yeah?” Her face brightened. “I’m glad you mentioned that, because,” she tugged his niece into view, “I need a favor.”

  “Hi, Uncle Colt.” Apropos of nothing, Emma stretched both arms above her head and told him, “This is how ballerinas dance.” She demonstrated by rising to her tiptoes and staggering into his office like a drunken mule in high heels. Before he had a chance to open his mouth, she pinched a handful of her bedazzled jeans and said, “These are really tight, but they’re fashionable. Don’t you think they’re fashionable?”

  “Sure, honey,” he told her, giving Avery a questioning look.

  “Can she hang out here for a couple of hours?” Avery asked. “I have a doctor’s appointment, and my sitter canceled.”

  Colt glanced at his niece, who’d begun whipping her head back and forth, smacking herself in the face with her own ponytail. Emma wasn’t a bad kid, but Colt suspected she was powered by nukes instead of cornflakes.

  “Why can’t she go to school?” he asked Avery.

  Emma hopped on one foot and interjected, “I’m in kindergarten!”

  “Teacher work day,” Avery explained.

  “What about Granddaddy?”

  “He’s in court.”

  Without warning, Emma pitched forward into Colt’s lap, knocking his rolling chair back a few inches and filling his space with the smell of peanut butter. “What’s that?” she asked, making a grab for his pistol.

  He pushed her little hand aside and told Avery, “Just take her with you. I see kids at the doctor all the time.”

  “I can’t.” Avery backed out of the room and hovered in the doorway, tensing as if to make a run for it. “It’s the lady doctor.” Then she felt the need to gross him out with details like, “I’m getting fitted for a new diaphragm. I’ll be naked from the waist down, spread-eagled with my feet in stirrups, all my business wide open for everyone to—”

  “Christ, Avery!” Colt held up one hand to block the image. He didn’t want to think about his sister that way. He liked to pretend she didn’t have girly parts or a sex life—that Emma was conceived immaculately. “Just go.”

  “Thanks. I owe you.” She blew a kiss at her daughter and told Colt, “Don’t give her any candy.”

  He scoffed, shaking his head. Of course he wouldn’t give the kid any friggin’ candy—it was nine o’clock in the morning. What kind of moron did Avery take him for?

  “How about a doobie from the evidence room?” he asked. “Can I give her one of those?”

  “Love y
ou too, Colton,” she sang in an unnaturally high-pitched voice, her child-friendly way of saying Fuck you, and the Harley you rode in on. “Be a good girl, Em,” she added before rushing off to her appointment.

  Emma didn’t miss a beat. “Look, Uncle Colt.” She thrust out her belly to display a sticker, pointing to a cartoon character dressed in a harem girl costume. “She’s my favorite princess.”

  “Oh, yeah?” He scanned the cartoon’s heavy-lidded bedroom eyes and the cleavage spilling from her off-the-shoulder halter top. Jeez, whatever happened to Strawberry Shortcake and Rainbow Brite? He shook his head. “She’s not my favorite.”

  Emma’s tiny pink lips parted with a pop. “She’s not?”

  “Unh-uh.”

  “Then which princess is your favorite?”

  Colt scrambled for a name, coming up empty. “Uh,” he made a wide circle with his hands and guessed, “the one with the poofy dress.”

  “Belle or Cinderella?”

  “Cinderella.” He recognized that one. Nodding at Emma’s sticker, he said, “I don’t like the way this girl is showing off her tummy and her—” ginormous tits “—uh, her bosoms.”

  “Oh.” Emma nodded in understanding. “Her bubbies.” She craned her neck to inspect said bubbies. “She’s sexy. One day I’ll have big bubbies too, then I’ll be sexy.”

  Good God. As if kids these days didn’t have enough to worry about. “You’re only six, hon. I don’t want you thinking about what’s sexy.”

  “But my friend Shayla said boys like big bubbies. She has three brothers, and they told her so.”

  “Well, first of all, that’s not true.” In all the years since Leah left town, he’d never seen a pair of breasts that compared to her flawless, pink-tipped B-cups. But he wasn’t about to share that tidbit with Emma. He thought for a moment, then warned, “And besides, you wanna stay away from boys. They’re gross.”

  “Really?”

  “Yep. They pick their noses and don’t wash their hands.” Then he hastily added, “Except for me.”