Dragon's Choice

by Juniper Hart

  “How can you have any worries in big sky country?” the caption read. A slow smiled formed on Gabriella’s generous mouth and she nodded agreeably.

  Perfect, she thought, exhaling slowly.

  “Hey! Aren’t you Gabriella Medina?” the homeless man demanded, jarring her from her reverie.

  Gabriella eyed him suspiciously. He was the last person she would have expected to recognize her, but within a second, she knew why he had. A newspaper lay open on the seat beside him, her picture in black and white accompanied by a full-length article.

  She shook her head quickly, covering her face again and backing away from the man, turning her head so her silken chestnut strands covered her partially.

  “No,” she muttered. “You’re confusing me with someone else.”

  The homeless man pointed, his voice raising an octave as he waved his finger in excitement.

  “Yeah! Yeah, you are! You’re the chick who’s having an affair with the mayor!”

  Color draining from her face, Gabriella watched as the entire car turned to stare at her, their mouths agape. The train began to slow at Cathedral Parkway, and a din erupted as people reached for their cell phones and iPads to document their encounter with the fallen woman in their midst. Without hesitation, Gabriella bolted onto the crowded platform as soon as the doors slid open.

  I have to get out of New York, she thought, hyperventilating as she rushed toward the surface of the city. She shoved the glasses back onto her face, willing herself not to cry.

  It was the same thought that had crossed her mind dozens of times since the scandal had emerged, but this time was different. This time she had a plan; she was going to the Treasure State.

  I will lay low and stay out of trouble, wait for everything to settle for a while. Then I will return to civilization. My only problem will be not dying of boredom in the middle of nowhere. After all, what the hell can happen in Montana?

  1

  Yes Mrs. Giberson, I understand your complaint. You have the same one every week.”

  The raised pitch of Mrs. Giberson’s voice could be heard through the police station, and the officers exchanged a bemused grin as Sheriff Cameron Lapin rolled his cerulean blue eyes skyward, his face pained as he jolted the phone from his ear to keep from being deafened by the irate neighbor.

  “Yes, ma’am,” the sheriff conceded. “I know what you think you saw, but—”

  He listened as the old woman continued to howl in his ear as the other men watched in amusement. It was always the same complaint from Mrs. Giberson: coyotes were on her property, scaring and eating her chickens.

  “I will have an officer investigate as soon as one becomes available,” Cameron promised, hanging up the phone with a sigh. He peered around the room at the five idle policemen, and they all promptly averted their eyes.

  “Who’s up?” Cameron demanded. A complete silence fell over in the room. “Come on, ladies, don’t be shy.”

  “I went last time,” one officer said quickly, and his words were met with a round of grunts.

  “Sure you did,” another officer murmured, knowing the deputy’s aptitude for dismissing what he considered to be worthless calls.

  “Fine. Brewer, you go. Take Collins with you. After you’re done with Mrs. Giberson, head up Vaughan Road and keep an eye out for the Potter’s renegade horse. Someone said they saw him heading toward Emerson Junction.”

  Officer Brewer stifled a sigh but did not object, gesturing for the rookie to follow. James Collins jumped eagerly from his chair, happy to make an impression with his superiors. He had only been on the force for three months and was still trying to prove himself.

  The novelty will wear off, the sheriff thought cynically. When he realizes that Great Falls is boring as sin, he’ll stop looking for excitement.

  Cameron could barely remember what it was like to be a rookie. Was I ever really excited about this job? Not likely, he thought. Even if he had been, it had obviously not lasted long.

  “Brewer!” Cameron called before the men disappeared from the building. The seasoned cop turned to look at the sheriff, barely shielding the displeasure from his eyes.

  “Yeah?” answered Brewer.

  “Do me a favor and swing by Angelstone Nurseries and see if they have any Monkshood. Maybe Mrs. Giberson would also like some for her farm.”

  The men stared at one another for a long while. Cameron noticed the other officers trying to read his non-verbal communication to Brewer. Of course they had never been able to understand the undercurrent flowing between them.

  Brewer nodded almost unperceivably and left without a word.

  “What else is on the books for today?” another officer asked.

  Cameron shook his dark head, his perfect crew cut not shifting by the move.

  “Well then,” the officer said, sitting back and taking a sip of his coffee. “Just another day at the office.”

  “Would it kill you to patrol the town?” the sheriff asked, scowling. “At least pretend to do some work around here?”

  The officer’s mouth became a fine line of defiance, but he slowly rose to his feet. Cameron Lapin’s temper was infamous, and the officer clearly wanted to stay on his good side.

  Cameron eyed the remaining officers as they sauntered out. No words were exchanged and he smirked slightly in his silent win.

  He had been the sheriff of the small town of Great Falls, Montana for ten years. It was more or less a desk job, but upper management had its perks. Telling people what to do was one of Cameron’s strongest qualities.

  It was not his fault that his six-foot four, two hundred-twenty-five-pound frame inspired awe and submission. He relished in the fact that people cowered in his presence.

  The phone on his desk rang again, eliciting a sigh from him. It was shaping up to be a busy day—two phone calls before nine o’clock in the morning.

  Damn, it’s almost like the big city in here, he thought sarcastically.

  “Great Falls Police Department,” Cameron answered the phone.

  “Uh, sheriff?” An uncertain man’s voice flittered into his ear, and Cameron tried to place it. It didn’t instantly register.

  “Yes, this is Sheriff Lapin,” he answered. “Who is this?”

  Suddenly, he could hear the shrill voice of a woman yelling in the background.

  “It’s Bob Jacobs,” the man said. Cameron recognized him now: he was the owner of a grocery store. The phone became muffled, but he could hear Bob telling the woman to calm down.

  “Bob?” he called. “Hello? Is everything all right?”

  A moment later, Bob returned on the line.

  “Yeah, listen, I just got into a car accident on Second Street, across from Gibson Park, with this broad. The woman is hysterical and turning purple.”

  “I am not turning purple, you idiot!” came the screeching response.

  I wonder if she’s related to Mrs. Giberson, Cameron thought. Same wretched pitch of voice.

  “Is anyone hurt, Bob?” he asked, reaching for his radio and speaking into it. “Car 112, come in.”

  “No,” Bob replied. “But our vehicles are damaged pretty bad and we’re blocking traffic.”

  “Get off the street and wait for help,” Cameron instructed. “We’ll be there soon.”

  He replaced the phone and waited for his officers in the field to respond.

  “Car 112,” an officer called back through the radio.

  “What is your location?” the sheriff asked.

  “Eighth and Willmont Road.”

  Cameron glanced at the clock in surprise. How fast was he driving? He didn’t have time to worry about the officer’s infractions. Cameron was much closer to the scene of the accident than anyone else. He jumped up from the table and called out to Jeannie at the front desk.

  “You’re on dispatch, Jeannie,” he told her, grabbing the keys to his car. “Call out a couple tow trucks to Second Street across from Gibson Park. There’s been an accident.”
>
  “You got it, boss,” the amiable redhead replied, winking flirtatiously at him.

  A few years back, they had shared a night or two of drunken passion, but it had fizzled as quickly as it had begun. The novelty of an inter-office romance caused more problems than it was worth. That was fine with Cameron; he had neither the time nor the interest in a relationship. He was a lone wolf. But that didn’t stop him and Jeannie from remaining friends and continuing with the sexual banter. Sometimes Cameron wondered if he was missing out on something by dismissing the women he briefly dated, but his common sense overrode his moments of weakness.

  As he hopped into the squad car, Cameron wondered who it was that Bob had hit.

  He didn’t identify her by name, the sheriff realized. He probably doesn’t know her.

  It was hard to believe. In a town the size of Great Falls, Bob Jacobs was apt to know everyone. He had a long-standing market in the heart of town where he inevitably came to know all the residents. He was as much a fixture in the community as anyone could be.

  Probably a drunk tourist, Cameron thought, gritting his teeth. He really could have done without the drama this morning. The freshwater springs at Giant Springs State Park sometimes brought along the type of people Great Falls could do without.

  In mere minutes, Cameron was at the site of the accident, and for a moment, his heart seemed to freeze.

  As Bob had stated, both cars were in dire condition: the grocery store owner’s Toyota Tacoma was sandwiched to the size of a compact car, and a shiny silver Mercedes was in smithereens.

  How the hell did they walk away from that unscathed? Cameron leapt from the cruiser to examine the scene.

  Bob was standing on the sidewalk, his arms folded firmly over his chest, bald head turned slightly away from a hauntingly beautiful brunette who was yelling directly in the shopkeeper’s ear.

  “Bob?” Cameron asked as he approached. “Are you all right?”

  Bob’s annoyance seemed to melt into relief as he saw the sheriff, and without speaking, he pointed at the irate girl.

  “I will be fine if you can get her out of my face,” he said pleadingly, his hazel eyes wide with exasperation. Cameron could see the mild-mannered man was on his last nerve.

  Imagine having to arrest Bob Jacobs for assault, he thought, swallowing a smile as he envisioned the community backlash. Still, he could tell that it was a real possibility by the way Bob was twitching.

  Cameron turned sternly to the woman.

  “Miss, I need you to stop screaming,” he told her flatly. The beauty’s face turned more furious as she stared at him.

  “You call this screaming?” she shrieked. “You will know when I am screaming!”

  Cameron gritted his teeth and studied her closely. He was sure she was not a Great Falls native, but there was something oddly familiar about her, something he could not place.

  Maybe she is a tourist, he thought, peering at the shredded Mercedes.

  “What happened here?” Cameron asked stoically, and the young woman threw up her hands in frustration.

  “This idiot hit my car!” she snapped before Bob could speak.

  Cameron found himself growing angry with the boisterous girl.

  “Do not speak again,” he ordered her and turned fully to the store owner. “Bob? Do you want to tell me what happened?”

  “I was going straight and this deranged woman decided to make a left turn in front of me!”

  “Deranged?” the woman cried. “Are you kidding me? You ran a red light!”

  Cameron glanced at her. “What did I tell you about speaking, miss?”

  “You can’t shut me up!” she yelled. “What is this? The good old boys club where women can’t say anything? Am I in Montana or in the fifties?”

  Cameron didn’t want to deal with her attitude. “I am going to place you under arrest now,” he told her monotonously. A part of him enjoyed watching her jaw drop as he pulled the handcuffs from his waistband.

  “You’re what?”

  Her voice was so high, he was shocked it did not shatter the nearby windows. Bob grimaced and put his fingers in his ears.

  “For what?” the girl demanded as Cameron slipped the bracelets on her skinny wrists.

  “For being a public nuisance and causing an accident, for starters. I am going to run a breathalyser on you in a minute, after I finish taking Bob’s statement.”

  “I am not drunk!” she bellowed as he led her to the rear of the squad car. “This is false arrest!”

  Cameron maintained his calm, slamming the door on her inane babbling before turning his attention back to Bob.

  “Has she been like this the entire time?” he asked, and the older man nodded, sighing.

  “Thank God you got here when you did or you would have walked onto a murder suicide scene.”

  “I’ll talk to some witnesses and then I guess I’ll deal with that one,” Cameron said as he pointed to the squad car. “Can I call someone to take you home?”

  Bob shook his head.

  “Betsy is on her way now. She just dropped Devon off at the sitter so we can go to the insurance company.” He turned his full attention to the sheriff. “This wasn’t my fault, Cameron. She made a left turn when the light was still green, I swear it.”

  The sheriff nodded.

  “I believe you,” he replied, glancing back at the nearly hysterical brunette. “The way she’s acting speaks volumes for her attention span. She was probably texting or putting on her mascara. I wonder what she’s doing in these parts, anyway.”

  “I guess you’re gonna find out,” Bob chuckled.

  Cameron ran his tongue along his teeth. His gums were beginning to throb, and he steeled himself to be calm. He could not afford to lose control. While he had kept his composure, the woman had instilled annoyance in him, and he willed himself not to react to it. Reluctantly, he shuffled off to speak with the witnesses who had stuck around, already knowing what they would say; the unstable brunette had made an illegal turn and caused the crash.

  By the time he had returned to the squad car, he fully expected her to have tired herself out, but to his surprise, she was still fuming.

  “It’s about goddamn time!” she raged. “You didn’t even crack a window! I could have suffocated in here.”

  Cameron arched an eyebrow, amused.

  “It’s fifty-four degrees outside,” he told her matter-of-factly. “And you’re not an infant in a car seat.”

  He started the cruiser as the tow trucks appeared to clear away the wreckage.

  “Where are they taking my car?” she cried, watching the scene with her nose pressed to the window.

  Cameron stared at her in the rear view. “You know the car is destroyed, don’t you?” he asked. “You saw it, right?”

  “It’s the only transportation I have!”

  He bit on the insides of his cheeks. “What’s your name?”

  For the first time since encountering her, the woman fell deadly quiet, and Cameron turned his neck to stare at her.

  “You don’t want to tell me your name? Will I find you in the system?”

  “No!” she answered quickly. “My name is…” She hesitated. “Grace.”

  “Do you have a last name, Grace?”

  “Kelly.”

  Cameron snorted and she turned to stare back out the window.

  “Grace Kelly? Is that what you’re going with?” he demanded.

  She glanced at him through her peripheral vision, and he realized that she didn’t see anything wrong with her alias. He cleared his throat and decided to help her out.

  “Grace Kelly was an actress…” When this didn’t elicit a reaction from the woman, he continued. “She became Princess of Monaco… Is any of this ringing a bell?”

  He watched as she inhaled sharply.

  “Ah yes,” she murmured softly, her tan complexion turning waxen.

  Perhaps he needed a gentler approach to make her talk. “Want to tell me your real name, h
oney?”

  The woman’s lips pursed together and she refused to speak as they pulled into the stationhouse.

  “Well at least I got you to shut up,” Cameron commented, savoring the look of pure fury crossing over her face. He opened the backseat and ushered her into the building by the arm.

  She looked around, her face seeming to understand the gravity of the situation. She did not seem like a screaming shrew now, but a scared little girl under the harsh lights. For a split second, Cameron felt himself softening as he looked at her.

  She’s all bark and no bite, he thought with some amusement. He almost felt sorry for her.

  “Jeannie, I am processing this girl,” he told the receptionist. Jeannie glanced up from her bagel and did a double take.

  “Oh, my lord!” the redhead cried, pushing back her chair and leaning across the counter, her heavily made-up face registering shock. “Is that who I think it is?”

  “Grace Kelly? Probably not,” he replied, laughing as he glanced at his arrest.

  The girl seemed to shrink further against him, and suddenly Cameron was filled with a sense of alarm.

  “No, that’s Gabriella Medina, Cameron,” Jeannie gasped. “Aren’t you?”

  The name tickled the corners of Cameron’s mind, but he could not reconcile the woman at his side with whom Jeannie spoke.

  “Who?” he asked, his brow furrowing.

  The receptionist rolled her eyes, almost in exasperation. “Do you ever do anything but watch sports? She’s a supermodel, Cameron. She’s the supermodel!”

  “Is your name Gabriella Medina?” he demanded, turning to the woman he was still holding by the arm.

  She remained silent, shifting her eyes away and staring stonily at the door leading toward the offices.

  “Wow, what did she do, Cameron?” Jeannie asked as they continued through the threshold.

  Cameron found himself unwilling to speak. The door closed on Jeannie and he led the brunette toward the lockup.

  “I have already confiscated your purse,” the sheriff told her, but there was no longer a bite in his tone. He could sense a deep unease in the girl, and he did not want to push her too hard. “I will find out who you are in a minute. Are you sure you don’t want to tell me your name?”