“Be careful you don’t blow your cover. She’s got a knack for sticking her nose into everything around here.”
Nick stroked his chin. “Hell, all that gal’s interested in is having her hair dyed. I’ve been doing this FBI gig for twenty years, Jack. Dixie Carmichael’s a piece of cake.”
Jack laughed. “That’s what I thought about Maggie when I got here from Chicago. Hold on to your butt, city boy. You’re in for a rougher ride than you think.”
HOW COULD JAN just up and leave! Dixie grumbled as she tromped toward the Purple Sage, past Pretty in Pink and the hardware store. She tried to picture the woman who’d done her hair for ten years, but instead that Nick guy she’d run into came to mind.
She gave herself a shake. She had no time or desire to get involved with any man, even if he did have great black hair and eyes and one dynamite build, and was a whole lot more exciting to look at than Jan ever was. Dixie Carmichael had an agenda. She had dreams to fulfill, dreams too long put off.
She pushed open the purple door to the Sage and made her way around the partially filled tables with purple Formica tops, past the counter with the doughnuts and a cherry pie winking at her from under a glass dome.
She ignored them—no more junk food, she’d promised herself—went to the usual table by the window and plopped down. Maggie, best friend number one, flipped through a wedding magazine. “Don’t these editors think forty-year-olds get married? I need sleeves.”
“And I need the Curly Cactus. What the heck happened to the place? I can’t believe you let Jan go.”
Maggie took a sip of tea. “You know, it was the craziest thing. One day Jan was here. The next she up and flew the coop. Went to live with her sister, I heard. We’re trying to get Patti Jacobs to open a shop.”
Dixie snapped the magazine shut to get Maggie’s attention. “Patti grooms dogs. Sheers sheep. I’m not getting a good picture here.” She thumped her hat. “Under this Stetson I have roots—big fat ones. We should boycott that Nick guy, get Jan to come back. Do whatever it takes.”
Maggie opened the magazine again. “Well, the boycotting idea is not going to happen. See this guy?” She jabbed her finger at a gorgeous groom in the magazine. “He’s good-looking, but he doesn’t hold a candle to that Italian stallion down the street. He’s single, and every woman in a fifty-mile radius is salivating and no one intends to boycott him. More like beat a path to his door. They’re taking bets over at the Cut Loose on who’s going to date him first. Pot’s up to five hundred bucks.”
“Boy, could I really use five hundred bucks,” Dixie said as Dr. Barbara Jean Fairmont, who’d recently become MacIntire, drew up to the table.
She braced her arms, leaned over and glared at Dixie. “You told us you were going to Billings to see your accountant. I just got a fax from Billings Memorial. Billings Memorial’s a real strange name for an accounting firm. I’m listed as your primary-care physician so they sent me your latest medical information.” She parked in the chair beside Dixie and whispered, “They sent your biopsy results.”
Maggie dropped her cup of tea onto her saucer with a clatter that drew stares. She paled. “Oh, no.”
Dixie grinned. The best defense was a good offence, or something like that. “And I’m fine.” She took BJ’s hand. “The AMA frowns on doctors, especially pregnant ones, rendering bodily harm to their patients. I didn’t want to worry either of you. One’s on the nest. One’s planning a wedding. Besides—” she did the big smiley-face thing “—I’m okay. Better than okay. I’ve got a new job.”
“Don’t try to change the subject,” BJ huffed. “I’m still furious with you. I’m beyond furious. I’m pissed as hell!”
Maggie gasped. “You’re leaving the Sage?”
“I’m a reporter for the Whistle Stop,” Dixie said. “Isn’t that great? But I’m not leaving here. The Sage is where I’ll find out what to report on. More gossip is tossed across these tables than fried eggs and ham. I always wanted to go to the city and work on a big paper. My plan is to scoop some story here that’ll be great on my résumé.”
Maggie and BJ exchanged glances and Maggie finally managed in a weak voice, “You’re leaving us, as in going somewhere else? What will we do? We’ve met at this table for thirteen years, ever since I moved back from Chicago after divorcing Jack.”
“And now you’re marrying him again and BJ has Flynn and the kids. I need something, too. I want adventure, excitement, trouble. You know how I love trouble. I get all twitterpaited just thinking about trouble. You both went away—medical school, art school. I married Danny the dope right out community college. I now live with my sister and her two kids, in a house a block from where I grew up. My big vacation each year is visiting my folks in Tampa. I want a real life before it’s too late.”
Maggie leveled her a hard look. “Except I got a bad feeling about this story you’re going after. It’s that knockoff wallet situation, isn’t it? And the guys who came after Drew because he saw them. I’m right, aren’t I?”
Without giving Dixie a chance to contrive a good excuse, Maggie added, “Are you out of your flipping mind?”
BJ pursed her lips. “I’ve got a better idea, one that’s much more fun. Go after that Nick person who’s opening the restaurant, instead. That’s an adventure. Men are always an adventure.” She grinned and patted her still flat stomach, which wouldn’t be flat much longer. “I speak from experience. That guy’s handsome and very well-built. Much more interesting than a wallet, and a whole lot safer…maybe.”
“But I don’t want safe. And I definitely don’t want a man, especially a boring cook, no matter how attractive he is.” She smiled. “Except I sure could use the five hundred dollars.”
“Meaning you’re going to give him a tumble?” BJ asked.
“Meaning I’m going to get a date with him and collect the money, and then run like hell.”
THE NOON SUN blazed overhead as Nick pushed the dolly holding the last white salon swivel chair down the stone walk toward the shed behind the restaurant. Not that he had to accomplish all that much while here; he just had to give the impression of working to fix the place up. This was a front, after all. He had to look as though he was getting ready to open a restaurant, while really tracking down the smugglers.
Oh, he’d concoct some of his grandmother’s—Nonna Celest’s—recipes and let heavenly smells waft through town and drive everyone nuts. But as soon as this caper was over, he was out of here to start anew. He’d read, fish, be bored. Buy a house and mow grass. That was what ordinary people did and he just wanted to be ordinary.
Now was a good time to practice fitting in and being one of the townfolk. The more people accepted him as just a guy, the more they’d open up. Someone had to have seen the trucks or strangers showing up from time to time. Anything could lead him to nailing the smugglers. He’d learned long ago that the smallest detail could be the biggest clue.
He dragged the salon chair into the shed and parked it beside the other two chairs and wash basins he’d hauled in earlier. When he came out, Dixie Carmichael was strolling toward him, carrying a basket and waving as though she’d known him all her life. What had happened to make her so friendly today after she’d wanted him to drop off the earth yesterday? She was after something, no doubt.
She had a blue bandana on her head, little tufts of red frizz sticking out at the sides. “See you got curls without Jan around to help.”
“This?” She plucked a section of hair that resembled one of those copper-colored metal scouring pads. A spark of…was that murder?…showed in her eyes for a second. But then she smiled sweetly, a little too sweetly, and said, “Had to take matters into my own hands. Gave myself a dye-and-perm job. Except I mixed up the times. Doubled the time I left on the perm solution and halved the dye time. I figured it would all work out in the end. It didn’t. This is the fried Chia Pet look.”
He suppressed a laugh. Never, ever laugh at a woman’s hair, no matter what. Being over forty,
he was old enough and wise enough to know that. “Dye it back the way it was.”
“If I do anything else to my hair using chemicals there’s a good chance all the ends will break and I’ll have paintbrush stubs.” She swung her basket. “But I didn’t come here to talk hair. I came to welcome you to Whistlers Bend and the surrounding territory. What about taking a holiday from renovations-by-Nick and joining me on a picnic? It’s a beautiful day and I can show you the area, point out places of interest, be your own personal tour guide. What a deal, right?”
Ah, the small-town ways. This was the third picnic he’d been invited on since he’d gotten here. He’d begged off the others, needing a few days to get the feel of the place and the people, and he should do the same now. Still, he had to fit in. Turning down invitations was not fitting in. But why was Dixie asking him out now, when she’d wanted him gone before? “Does this mean you’ve forgiven me for taking over the Curly Cactus?”
Her eyes crossed and her face reddened, but she recovered and then managed a cheery tone and said, “Forgiven? Why, of course I’ve forgiven you. That’s the reason I’m here. And to make you feel welcome.”
Something was up, and it wasn’t her love of picnics or of him. “Mary Lou Armstrong, a teller at the bank, said she’d stop by later on.”
Not that he wanted to see Mary Lou, but she probably knew the workings at the bank, if someone was suddenly getting rich, could be a snitch for the smugglers. Besides, he wanted to see Dixie’s reaction. What was she after?
“Mary Lou?” Dixie’s smile froze. “How nice.” She yanked back the cover of her basket. “Fried chicken and blueberry pie. Surely anything Mary Lou has in mind can wait. Bet you’re hungry. Thought we’d head up to the old depot and abandoned silver mine. It would give you some history of the place and you could look around. We could mix business and pleasure. One of the kids found a knockoff wallet there. That’s a wallet that’s supposed to be by a designer but is really a fake. There might be some illegal activity in the area, and I thought I’d poke around for a story. I’m working part-time as a reporter for the Whistle Stop.”
The hair on his arms stood straight up. What the hell did she think she was doing, poking around in something so dangerous? Any story she got might well end up as her obituary. The smugglers were out there and knew what she looked like, and they’d put a stop to some cub reporter on a two-bit newspaper getting into their business.
Dixie Carmichael was beautiful, tenacious and feisty as hell, and she was walking into one giant mess.
Chapter Two
But Nick couldn’t say any of that to Dixie or he’d blow his cover sky-high. He slipped into good-old-boy mode. “Poking around in something like this sounds dangerous. Don’t know if I’d be doing that if I were you. Leave it to the sheriff. He seemed like a pretty competent guy.”
She gave him a devilish grin. “But I have a plan. If I can break this story it’ll be huge and I can nail a job on a city newspaper, something I’ve always wanted to do. You’re from Denver. Know anyone at the Denver Post? Maybe you can put in a word for me.”
“Maybe you should report on something else.” Like what? What happened in small towns? “Quilting,” he offered. “It’s really coming into its own these days. And baking. Bet you do great pies.”
“No big-city newspaper is going to pick me up because I write a story on baking a pie. I need something juicy. Something people can relate to. Everyone’s heard about knockoffs, been tempted to buy one at some time. This story will drive home where those bogus items come from and how buying them supports activities people hate most.”
“If you don’t get killed first!” Damn, how’d that slipped out? Because she was putting herself right in harm’s way.
She gave him a patronizing smile. “I’m not trying to be a one-woman vigilante committee. I know the territory. I’ll be fine. Besides, I have an advantage. No one thinks a forty-year-old full-figured woman like me would snoop into smuggling. My appearance puts people at ease. That’s the trouble with those Alias women on TV. They look like badasses and get themselves into trouble every time. I look like a…soccer mom.” She patted the bandana. “I have a built-in cover.”
Well, she definitely had the built part down! Focus, Nick, focus, and not on Dixie’s breasts. He should stay away from her and keep his mind on the job. Except, Dixie was the job. With or without him, she’d trot off to search for evidence or clues on the smuggling case. He couldn’t let her go off alone and if he got Jack to go with her, she’d know Nick had informed the sheriff and she might start wondering why Jack and the new chef in town were so close. He had to keep his cover. He had to go.
“You know, I should check out some of the streams and lakes for trout. I have a fresh-trout recipe that’ll knock your socks off.”
“Great.” She smiled, and this time as though she meant it. For a second he couldn’t move. Her smile was…intoxicating. Mesmerizing.
She added, “Write Mary Lou a little note that you’ll see her later.”
“Mary Lou?”
Her brow furrowed. “Uh, the gal you’re supposed to meet. You can see her at the Cut Loose tonight.” Dixie gave a slight sway of her nicely rounded hips. “Since I’m taking you up to the caves and showing you the streams, you can buy me a beer later. It’ll be fun. I’ll teach you the Montana two-step.”
“Sure.” He had no idea what the hell he’d just agreed to; all he could think about was her hips. Great hips. Womanly hips. “You bet.”
She grinned. “Then we have a date for tonight. You and me, right?”
AND THE five hundred dollars will be all mine, Dixie thought. She nodded toward the restaurant. “Tape a note for Mary Lou to the front door. She’ll get the message.”
The message being, Dixie Carmichael landed the new fish on the block and you didn’t. “We’ll take my car. I know the roads. I’ll wait out front. I’m parked on the street.”
He gave her a quick nod, then made for the back door. He seemed a little off balance. Probably working too hard. She retraced her steps around the old redbrick building. Nick Romero was a strange guy. He looked rugged enough, as Maggie had said, but he wasn’t at all. Yesterday he’d been a little rough around the edges, probably from the fatigue of moving in and setting things up, but he wasn’t that way today.
He didn’t think much of snooping or taking chances of any sort. He liked articles about baking and quilting. Then again, he was a chef, and they weren’t known for daring and risk-taking unless they had a pan and stove in front of them.
She smiled to herself as she put the picnic basket in the Camaro. She liked his being more laid-back and not one of those testosterone-driven kind of guys. Maggie had Jack, her Chicago cop, now local sheriff and soon-to-be husband. BJ had Colonel Flynn MacIntire, local war hero and U.S. Army poster man, a true hero on all fronts. Danny boy, her own rat-fink ex, was a Donald Trump clone who always had a business deal going on. A mild-mannered chef was a nice change of pace, even for an afternoon picnic and one-time trip to the Cut Loose to win a bet.
A warm summer breeze stirred down the main drag of Whistlers Bend, gusting through the pines and oaks that lined the street, flapping the purple awning on the Sage. She watched the Montana-blue sky, stretching on forever except for the hint of clouds in the distance. Nick might need a jacket. Storms blew up in the mountains without much warning.
She skipped up the few steps to the Curly Cactus. The front door was slightly ajar. Jan had always had a hard time getting it to latch. Dixie walked in, intending to yell for Nick, but she stopped dead. He was talking to someone in the hallway, a phone conversation. He told the caller he had to go because he was going on a picnic to fit in around here, and that the caller should stop over later so they could figure out what to do about their current situation.
Was Nick speaking to Mary Lou? It wasn’t an airhead Mary Lou kind of chat, more a guy-to-guy exchange. Did Nick know anyone that well in town? It had to be in town or nearby if the caller was stop
ping over. The polite thing for Dixie to do was to make her presence known, except…except something felt off and good manners got outdone by basic curiosity.
Her left eye twitched, and it hadn’t done that in three years, since Danny had gone away on that Cancún business trip, then asked for a divorce.
Quietly, Dixie backed out of the room, leaving the door as she’d found it. She sprinted for the Camaro, jumped inside and slapped a smile on her face, hoping for the innocent look—as if minding her own business, twiddling her thumbs, just waiting for her date.
Nick strolled out the front door, smiled, waved, taped the note to the door, then came her way. As he climbed into the car, she asked in a sweet little voice, “Everything all right?”
“Sorry I was so long. Didn’t know what to say to Mary Lou in the note and I got a call from Mother.”
That was so not a mother conversation. Why would Nick lie? What was going on with the handsome, laid-back and very mysterious man from Denver? Only one way to find out: pump him for info and hope he’d let something slip.
“Did you happen to see anyone come in while you were out here? Thought I heard someone in the house.”
She gulped, then grinned. She wasn’t as good at this snooping thing as she’d thought. “Not a soul. Must have been the wind blowing through the place.” She nodded at the horizon. “We’ll probably have some rain blowing in tonight. Good thing you brought a jacket.”
She fired the engine and quickly added so that he couldn’t ask her more questions, “So, how’d you get to be such a great cook and want to open your own place? Culinary school? Prestigious internships at five-star restaurants? And what brings you to Whistlers Bend? Kind of far from Denver. Does your mother live there?”
He gave her a sideways glance.
Uh-oh! Too many questions at one time. Pumping for info was not drilling for it! She needed to recoup, offer something of her own so he’d feel comfortable and give something in return. She smiled, then he smiled, and she nearly swerved into Pretty and Pink.
A Fabulous Wedding Page 2