by Ann Charles
He didn’t have a clue what dark magic she’d worked, and he decided right then and there without consulting me that I needed a bodyguard for my visit to the cop shop. When I told him that I doubted they’d let him get past the front desk officer, he bet me otherwise.
Now, ten bucks later, here we sat together in a torture cage inside the Deadwood Police Station.
“Thanks for coming along,” I said, inspecting my cuticles.
“Ya didn’t exactly give me much choice.”
“What? I said you didn’t need to come.”
“You said one thing, but the quiverin’ in yer voice said somethin’ else.” He elbowed me playfully. “We both know you could use a bodyguard for this kind of meetin’. Or at least a witness to vouch for your sweet buns when they charge you with assaultin’ an officer.”
“Leave my buns out of it.” I frowned at him. “You think Hawke will try to get rough?”
“I’m more itchy about yer sharp teeth. Ya got a purty mean bite when you lock on. I should know.”
“When have I ever bitten you?”
“I’ve asked you to remove your teeth from my hide plenty o’ times.”
“Your memory is playing tricks on you.”
“My memory is fit as a fiddle. Just ask my poker-playin’ pals. That reminds me, yer Romeo called while I was waitin’ fer ya outside in the parkin’ lot.”
I’d phoned Doc before leaving Cooper’s house, telling him what was going on in case I needed him to make bail for me … again. Although the last time, Cooper let me go free of charge. I doubted Hawke would be as generous once he got me locked up in the clinker.
Doc had told me he’d try to hurry up and finish early in Hill City, so he could be back here in case I needed him. When I told him Harvey was going to join me for my duet with Johnny Law, he said he’d stop by the bank and make sure he had enough cash to spring two jailbirds.
“What did Doc want?” I asked Harvey.
“He told me not to leave you alone with any cops.”
“Was he worried I might bite one of them, too?”
“He reminded me there’s a troublemaker on the police force who wants somethin’ you have.”
My mind flashed to the piece of paper someone had stuffed in my purse months ago when Cooper had thrown me in jail for an hour or so, the butthead. The words WE WANT WHAT BELONGS TO US had been scrawled on the paper, and the only place my purse had been all day before then, besides at my side, was in the evidence cage.
“Oh, God. I hadn’t even thought about that.” I’d been too worried about facing off with Detective Hawke.
“That’s why you have Doc and me. We do yer thinkin’ for ya.”
That wasn’t the only reason, especially when it came to my Romeo.
We sat for a few more minutes, making faces at each other in the mirror while we played what I figured was part of Detective Hawke’s game of cat and mouse. He probably thought making us wait and wait and wait would make me more eager to talk, or at least more afraid of what he was going to do when he finally joined us. But he was wrong on both counts. I was just getting more pissed off.
“This is as ridiculous as pourin’ water on a rusty wheel bearin’,” Harvey said. “I’ll give ‘em two more shakes and then I’m gonna water the corner.”
Thankfully, the door opened before Harvey got around to reaching for his zipper. Detective Hawke entered, followed by Cooper. Both men looked like ten miles of bad road, but Cooper at least still had his tie on straight.
“You shouldn’t be here,” Detective Hawke said to Harvey. He turned to Cooper. “Your uncle needs to leave.”
“I already told him that.” Cooper leaned against the two-way glass, his arms crossed.
“Then why is he still here?”
“He’s part bull.”
“What’s the other part?” I asked.
“Mule.”
I nodded. Cooper was spot-on there.
Hawke snorted. “You mean you can’t control this old man?”
“Old man?” Harvey wrapped his thumbs around his rainbow suspenders, his chin jutting at Hawke. “Look at you, badge toter, puffed up like a pigeon in a bow tie and tux.”
More like a turkey, if he asked me. A turkey in a brown corduroy sports coat, striped shirt, baggy pants, and scuffed-up loafers. Sheesh, did he come straight from the set of Barney Miller?
“Yeah,” I said. “We don’t need no stinkin’ badges to be tough.”
Harvey grinned at me. “Been watching Blazing Saddles again?”
“I can’t get Lili Von Shtupp singing ‘I’m Tired’ out of my head this morning.”
“Did ya have another nightmare?”
I nodded, glancing at Cooper. A stab of guilt poked me at the exhaustion lining his face.
“See, Coop?” Hawke turned to his partner. “This is why your uncle has to go. He’s distracting the suspect, especially with those god-awful suspenders.”
“Oh, you’re one to talk, Ralph Lauren,” I said. “Did you choose that outfit in the dark?”
Harvey glared up at Hawke. I had a feeling he was imagining where he’d like to aim Bessie. “Coop, this fool ain’t gonna last eight seconds on my back. Ya better round up the other rodeo clowns and get ‘em ready to drag him out of the ring.”
Hawke gave Harvey a beady-eyed glare. “That’s it. Either you leave now of your own free will, or I’ll have some of the boys drag you out of here.”
I latched onto Harvey’s arm. “Since this is an unofficial meeting that I agreed to attend, Harvey stays or I go.”
“You won’t be going anywhere if I handcuff you to the table,” Hawke threatened, pulling a pair of cuffs from inside his blazer.
“Back it down a notch, Detective,” Cooper said, his gaze bouncing between his partner and me. “It’s not going to hurt anyone to have Uncle Willis in here with Parker. He’ll be good.” Cooper stared at his uncle. “Won’t you?”
“As sure as a chicken has feathers.” Harvey’s gaze was still locked onto Hawke. “Now, we all know Violet didn’t put a spider in Ms. Wolff’s biscuit, so what’s this roundup about?”
“I’ll tell you what it’s about.” Hawke pointed his handcuffs at me. “Parker slipped her leash.”
There were several things about that statement that fried my hiney. “I’m not your damned pet, Detective.”
“You’re a prime suspect in a murder case.”
“I’m innocent until proven guilty.”
“That’s a formality we’ll overcome as soon as the DNA evidence comes back from the lab, mark my words.”
“Oh, no!” I overacted with a loud gasp. “Look how I shudder in fear at your words.” I held my hands in the air, shaking them.
Honestly, my heart did race a little at his threat. So much hinged on a single strand of hair.
“You should, you witch.”
I scoffed. “Are we going to resort to name-calling now? That’s real mature. What is this, auditions for Kindergarten Cop Two? Is there a casting director hiding behind that two-way mirror?”
“Actually,” Harvey said, scratching his beard. “I’m purdy sure there’s already a second movie in that franchise.”
I raised one eyebrow. Really? I didn’t remember seeing it. “Is Schwarzenegger in it?”
“No. Dolph Lundgren took his place.”
“Young Dolph or old Dolph?” I asked, remembering something about how intelligent Dolph was in real life. I could use a big strong genius like him to take on Mr. Black.
“The old one,” Cooper said, rubbing his eyes. I couldn’t tell if he was tired or frustrated. Probably both.
Harvey grunted. “But the big Swede still looks like a stack of bricks that’ll make yer knees wobble.”
“ ‘My name is Drago,’ “ I said in a fake Russian accent, stealing one of Lundgren’s lines from Rocky IV. “Soon, the whole world will know me.”
“Will know my name,” Cooper corrected my quote, skipping the Russian accent.
“Ya kn
ow,” Harvey said. “If we add a few inches to Coop, and about sixty pounds of bulk, we’d have us a Dolph Jr.”
“That’s enough!” Detective Hawke roared. A vein pulsed on his forehead. “This is a serious meeting. You two need to remember that or I’ll lock you both—”
“Parker,” Cooper interrupted Hawke. His voice had that hard, take-charge tone that usually made my neck bristle. “Where’s your phone?”
I pulled it out of my purse.
“May I see it?”
He was actually asking for once? What a concept. I almost asked what the magic word was, but decided not to push my luck. I unlocked it and held it out to him.
He punched some buttons. His forehead wrinkled. “Whose number is this?” He held the phone out to me, showing me a telephone number starting with a 702 area code. “That’s a Las Vegas area code,” he added.
Vegas? I took the phone back and checked my contacts. “It’s Cornelius’s.”
“According to our tracking software, he’s in Goldwash, Nevada, right now.”
“You’re kidding. He was just at Doc’s office with me yesterday.” I hit the Call button.
Detective Hawke paced back and forth between us, periodically huffing in my direction.
Cornelius answered before it even rang on my end. “Who is this?” he asked.
“You know who it is, Cornelius.” I’d recently made sure my name appeared on his phone’s screen when I called so we’d stop having this stupid who’s-who conversation. “Are you in Nevada?”
“Violet, your paranormal skills are growing at an incredible rate. Did you dream about me being here?”
Before I could answer, he added, “Or did you use remote viewing to see me?”
I opened my mouth, but he interrupted with, “Or was it mental projection?”
I gave him a second to add another option. When he didn’t, I spoke up. “None of the above. Did you fly down to visit your friend who owns the haunted hotel again without telling anyone?”
Cornelius had called me before from Goldwash. Apparently, he had a friend who also ran a ghost-happy hotel down there.
“You’re amazing!” he shouted loud enough for all four of us in the room to hear him.
Cooper rolled his eyes. Harvey snickered. I chose to ignore Hawke’s derogatory remark about my character.
“Did you use telepathy to tap into my thoughts?” Cornelius asked. “Wait! Don’t answer that. Tell me what I’m thinking right now.”
“You’re thinking that the next time you leave the state, you’re going to let me know.”
“Because your littermate believes I’m your boyfriend?” he asked in a whisper.
“Sure.”
“Ah-ha! I knew it. Ever since the séance on Thanksgiving, our minds have been tethered.”
Tethered to Cornelius? He’d sprain my brain within a day or two. “If you say so.”
“Yes, it all makes sense now. This explains why I keep thinking about women’s underwear.”
Uh, no, it didn’t.
“I have to go, Cornelius. I’ll talk to you later.” I hung up and set my phone on the table, wrinkling my nose at it. Sometimes I wondered about that man. “Cornelius has taken a trip south,” I told both detectives, adding, “For some reason,” probably having to do with Natalie’s skilled fingers, I thought, “your fancy app is tracking him, not me.”
“Way to go, Coop.” Hawke jammed his hands on his hips. “You programmed in the wrong damned number.”
Cooper’s steely eyes nailed me to my chair. “Yeah. I guess I did. We’ll have to fix that, won’t we, Parker?”
“Or we could just rely on me checking in,” I offered.
“She’s not reliable.” Hawke squished that notion flat. “She’s a witch. She’ll trick you.”
I groaned. “Detective Hawke, how can you not see how absurd the whole idea of me being a witch is? This is not Salem, Massachusetts, in the 1690s.”
“Then explain what happened up at that house.”
“You mean the Carhart place?”
“Of course I mean the Carhart house! You did something to me up there.”
“I didn’t touch you.”
“You messed with my head.”
No, that was Prudence’s doing. “Be reasonable, Detective. Do you really believe people have the power to get inside others’ heads and dabble with their thoughts?”
I hadn’t before Deadwood. Then I met Prudence and Wilda and Harvey’s grandpappy, to name a few.
“Then explain why I’m having a recurring dream about getting my throat sliced open by men wearing burlap masks.”
Harvey and I exchanged wide-eyed looks.
“I saw that!” Hawke said, rushing us. He leaned across the table, shoving his nose in my space. “What did you plant in my head, Parker? Did you use some kind of hypnosis?”
“I swear, Detective. I did nothing to you in that house.” In fact, he was the one who’d slapped me … with Prudence’s help, of course.
“I don’t believe you.”
I doubt there was any way I’d ever convince him otherwise.
I focused on Cooper. “One has to wonder if the stress of this job is getting to your partner. Maybe the chief needs to put Detective Hawke on a mental health leave for a while.”
“Oh, you wish I’d go away, don’t you?” Hawke bit out. “But I’m not going anywhere. I’m your worst nightmare.”
No. Last night’s Fear-Fest starring Addy was currently my worst nightmare. Rather than correct Hawke on where he stood in my nightmare lineup, I tried to diffuse the tension swirling in the room with more trivia. “Who said that ‘worst nightmare’ line?” I asked Harvey. “Was it in a Batman movie?”
Harvey cocked his head to the side. “I think it was Rambo.”
“This is all fun and games for you, Parker, but it’s going to get very real very soon. When that DNA evidence comes back, I’ll be knocking on your door with handcuffs ready to slap on you. You’ve managed to slip the law for the last time.”
“I haven’t been trying to slip the law, you dipshit.” I knew provoking him was foolish, but a scrappy, hot-blooded woman could only take so much.
“You’re a disease,” he said, “and I’m the cure.”
Harvey raised his hand. “I know that one! It was Sylvester Stallone in Cobra.”
“Dang it!” I smiled through the anger making my cheeks warm. “You beat me to it. How about this one?” I focused on Hawke, squinting. “Go ahead, Detective Hawke, make my day.” I might have been imitating Dirty Harry, scratchy voice and all, but I meant what I said.
A loud snort came from Harvey. “Ya have to at least make it a challenge, girlie.”
Hawke slammed his fist on the steel table. The boom made Harvey and me both jump. “Stop fooling around!” His eye twitched as he scowled at me. “According to the lab, we’ll have the DNA results within a week. If I were you, Parker, I’d get my papers in order, because you’re going to go away for a long time after I’m through with you.” A smug grin crept onto his face. “Your conviction is going to earn me one hell of a promotion.”
What?! Was all of this shit about pinning the murder on me and locking me up so that he could climb a step on the career ladder? What a fucking egotistical prick. Prudence was right when she called him a … what was the word she’d used? Oh, yeah.
I stood to leave and delivered my exit line: “Whatever you say, snollyguster!”
Detective Hawke barked at me.
He actually barked—twice—with bared teeth, wrinkled lips, and all. German shepherds could have taken a lesson from him.
I blinked in surprise, leaning away from him. The back of my knees hit my chair, and I fell into it.
“What the planets?” Harvey’s jaw hung low. “Is that line from Rin Tin Tin?”
Cooper came off the wall, exchanging raised brows with me.
“What?” Hawke looked from me to Harvey and back. “Why are you two staring at me like that?”
Son of
a dog biscuit! He didn’t realize he’d barked at me. I leaned forward and repeated, “Snollyguster.”
He barked again, loud, spit flying in my direction.
I flinched, feeling like my hair had been blown back that time.
“Boy, howdy!” Harvey smacked his thigh. “You’re a real law dog now.”
“Detective Hawke.” Cooper grabbed him by the shoulder. “Can I have a moment alone with Parker and my uncle?”
“Why?” Hawke’s face turned beet red. “What’s going on here? Why are you all looking at me like I’m some sort of mutant? She’s the freak!” He pointed at me.
“Snollyguster,” I shot back.
Hawke barked at Cooper, flinging spit in his face.
Cooper wiped away the spit with the back of his wrist and then glared at me. “Cool it, Parker.”
“Tell him to quit calling me names.”
“Hawke,” Cooper said in a calming voice. “Remember what the chief said. Let’s keep it professional here.”
“Why do you need a minute alone with her?”
“Because you’re being too aggressive with the suspect. I would like to soften her up about another idea for keeping tabs on her.”
“I’m being aggressive? She’s the one who—”
“Snollyguster!” Harvey cut him off this time.
Hawke barked again, spit sprinkling Cooper’s tie.
“Goddammit, Uncle Willis!” He whirled on both of us. “You two sit there and keep your lips closed.”
“What is going on?” Hawke’s eyes darted all around. His right cheek twitched several times. “I feel weird.” He rubbed his throat. “Why is my throat sore all of a sudden?” His beady gaze settled on me. “It’s you! You’re making me think I’m sick.” He clung to Cooper’s arm. “I told you she’s a witch. She’s put a hex on me.”
I opened my mouth to use the magic word but Cooper nailed me with a laser glare. “Don’t!” He turned back to Hawke. “Go get a drink of water. I’ll finish this and see them both out.”