A Good Day for Chardonnay

by Darynda Jones

  “No,” she said adamantly. She sat beside him and rubbed his back, planting her chin on his shoulder. “I like to call what you are suffering from Aurora Dawn Blindness.”

  Her mother shook her head haplessly.

  “It’s a nontransferable medical condition,” Sun continued. “I think it has something to do with her coloring. It’s so bright, it’s hard to see past it. Also, she has you both wrapped around her finger so tight, you’re lucky you can breathe.”

  “Apparently,” Elaine said.

  Sun hopped up and grabbed her bag.

  Cyrus followed her. “What if he doesn’t leave of his own accord?”

  She didn’t think of that. “In that case, a little encouragement might not hurt.”

  He chuckled to himself and Sun could only imagine what he had planned.

  * * *

  Auri breathed a sigh of relief as her mother left her grandparents’ house. Nothing got past that woman, and on any other day, Auri was certain the fact that she had a boy in her room would not have escaped her mother’s notice. But today, with Levi injured, her mom was frazzled.

  She rolled over to the other side of her bed and looked down at the boy lying faceup on the floor, ankles crossed, arms tucked under his head like he hadn’t a care in the world. Then again, he didn’t know her mother as well as she did.

  “Penises are stupid?” he asked.

  After stifling a giggle with her hand, she said, “They are. Boys do stupid things.”

  “Oh, yeah? Like what?”

  “Have you ever asked someone to hit you in the stomach as hard as they can?”

  “Guilty.”

  “There ya go.”

  His full mouth widened across his face. A face that had taken her breath away the first time she saw it. “I can’t argue with that.”

  Auri officially met Cruz the first day of school, but of course she’d noticed him sooner. Though she’d grown up in Albuquerque while her mom was in college, and Santa Fe when her mom was an officer then a detective for the Santa Fe Police Department, Auri had spent every summer since she was two with her grandparents. That meant getting to know many of the locals.

  She thought she’d first noticed him at the lake when they were about ten, but thinking back, she realized she’d had an encounter with him when she was younger. She doubted he remembered it, but she would never forget even though it took her a while to realize he was the boy who very likely saved her life. A man in a white van offered her a ride. He tried to coax her closer. Then a boy on a bike skidded to a stop between them and the guy took off.

  That would mark the second time she’d had her life saved. She’d wanted to ask him if he remembered the incident since she’d put two-and-two together last week, but she kind of didn’t want him to. She’d been stupid when the man said her grandmother was looking for her and he offered to take Auri to her. Cruz didn’t need to know the depths of her gullibility.

  But she would never forget that boy on the lime-green bike. Dark hair. Rich, brown eyes. Fearless. Absolutely, utterly fearless. If not, Auri might not be here today.

  “You good?” he asked, gazing up at her.

  “I’m better. Thank you for coming over. You didn’t have to.”

  He shrugged a shoulder. “’Course, I did.” He took a hand from behind his head, reached up, and captured one of hers.

  She let him. Let him entwine her fingers with his. Let him rub a thumb across her palm. Let him pull that very same hand down so he could place a soft kiss on the back of it.

  There was something so gracious about him. So gentlemanly. He completely respected her for who she was. Her ideas and opinions and dreams mattered to him. And when he kissed her, his affection carried that same hint of respect, but there was something else there, too. Like he wanted to do more but held himself back to let her take it further if she wished to.

  Every time they were together, everywhere they went, it was like he had to touch her. He put his hand on the small of her back when they went through a door. He tugged on a strand of hair when he sat behind her in class. He rubbed his shoulder to hers when they were talking to kids at school. Never suffocating. Never possessive. Just … there.

  If she didn’t know better, she’d swear he had ESP. His touches were warm and reassuring and perfect. Exactly what she needed at any given time, as though he could sense her every desire. Which was a distressing thought.

  “I’m sorry about Mr. Ravinder,” he said softly, brushing a thumb over her knuckles. “And I get why you’re so upset seeing him like that, but who is he to you? I mean…” He groaned and covered his eyes, then started over. “That came out wrong. I just meant—”

  “It’s okay,” she said, letting him off the hook, though watching him squirm was fun. “He’s just really special. He … he helped me when I was a kid. And he’s always been there for me.”

  His brows slid together. “How did he help you?”

  She pulled back her hand and tucked it under her chin. She remembered it so clearly. The time she’d decided to take her own life. When she stood on the cliff over Del Sol Lake with that very intention.

  Just one step. One tiny step and the product of all her mother’s woes, the product of her mother’s rape, would be gone and her mom could get on with her life. She could live and be happy and fall in love without the burden of an unwanted child dragging her down. But Levi and his nephew Jimmy showed up and started talking to her about the most everyday things. They didn’t try to stop her so much as just listen.

  She’d only recently admitted the truth of that day to her mother. The conversation that followed healed years of misery and self-doubt, and she now knew that her mother wanted her no matter what. That her mother loved her. Had always loved her.

  Cruz had overheard a conversation about that day she’d had with Jimmy, so he knew that much. He did not know what Levi did for her though.

  She lifted a shoulder instead and whispered, “The time I considered jumping off the cliff at the lake.”

  He looked away. Based on past experience, the subject upset him. A lot. If she remembered correctly, the words fuck and you popped up during that conversation.

  “He stopped you?” he asked, snapping her out of her musings.

  She tilted her head, appreciating his profile. “Let’s just say he was the first person to ever save my life.”

  He refocused, training his powerful gaze on her. “The first person?”

  She nodded but didn’t elaborate.

  A lock of her hair fell over the side of the bed. He took it and let it slide through his fingers as though fascinated. Auri just liked watching his biceps bunch up with the movement. She wondered how much he worked out because, even as a freshman, he was more sculpted than most seniors. Including the athletes.

  “How many times has your life been saved?”

  She squinted in thought. “A few, most likely. But two to be certain.”

  “Ah. So I have Mr. Ravinder to thank for keeping the enigmatic Auri Vicram alive and kicking.”

  “Enigmatic?” She snorted softly. “Have you looked in the mirror?”

  “Me? Hardly. What you see is what you get.”

  And what a sight it was. “So, for real? You?”

  He frowned in confusion.

  “What I see is what I get? I see you.”

  He stilled, his eyes shimmering in the low light. “I’m all yours.”

  A soft knock sounded at the door. “Auri, sweetheart?”

  Auri rolled over sleepily and raised a hand to shield her eyes again like she had with her mom. Making sure to add a grogginess to her voice, she said, “Hey, Grandma. Hey, Grandpa.”

  They eased into the room. “Your mom said you were having trouble sleeping. We brought some hot chocolate.”

  “Laced with barbiturates?”

  Her grandma stopped and cast a hapless expression on her husband. “Everything I touch.”

  Auri scooted to the other side of her bed, leaned against the head
board, and took the piping hot cup. “Thanks, Grandpa.”

  “Are you feeling better, pigeon?”

  “A little. How is Levi’s friend?”

  “He’s still in surgery.”

  “I hope he makes it. Levi was really upset.”

  “Yes, he was. But he was glad to see you.”

  She lifted a shoulder. “I hope so.”

  Her grandma sat beside her on the bed while her grandfather sat on the end.

  “We were going to clean out the attic tomorrow if you’re up for it,” her grandma said. “It’s supposed to be cool. A perfect time to climb up there before summer sets in.”

  She took a sip and nodded from behind the cup. “I’m totally up for it.”

  “Good.”

  “Thanks for the hot chocolate.”

  “You’re welcome,” Grandma said. “I hope it’s helping.”

  “It is. I’m already getting sleepy.”

  She smiled, leaned in, and kissed her cheek. “Okay, well, sleep tight, peanut. We’ll come check on you again in, oh, say, thirty—”

  “Twenty,” Grandpa said.

  “—twenty minutes. Just to make sure the hot chocolate did the trick.”

  Auri felt herself deflate. She groaned aloud, and said, “Mom knew, didn’t she?”

  Grandpa practically cackled. “How do you think we found out?” He leaned over the other side of the bed. “Hey, Cruz.”

  She heard a sheepish, “Hey, Mr. Freyr.”

  “Twenty minutes.”

  “I’ll be gone in ten, sir.”

  “I knew you were a good kid.”

  Auri had put a hand over her eyes as humiliation burned through her. She looked through her fingers and watched as a hand rose from the horizon of her mattress and gave her grandpa a thumbs-up.

  The couple chuckled and headed for the door, but not before her grandpa turned back with a final warning. “I’m going to hold you to that ten minutes.”

  Cruz climbed to his feet and waved sheepishly before they padded down the hall. “Well, that was a disaster.”

  Auri looked up the length of him, straight and tall and startlingly handsome, and said, “Not really. My mom could’ve arrested you. She’s apparently really into that sort of thing.”

  He rested an endearing expression on her. “It’s good she’s the sheriff, then. If she just went around randomly arresting people without the badge to back it up, she’d have to be committed. I had an uncle who used to do that.”

  He started for the window, and Auri practically jumped out of bed. “You still have nine minutes.”

  “Yeah, I don’t want to push my luck.”

  “You can go out the front door.”

  “And ruin the vibe? No way.”

  He lifted the window and vaulted out easily. She loved watching him do that, his lithe body like an athlete’s. Or a panther’s.

  She went to the window as he got on his bike. “You could come back tomorrow. My grandparents could probably use the help.”

  He played with a pedal, bouncing a foot on it. “I have to help my dad tomorrow.”

  “Oh. Okay, well I’ll see you at school Monday, then.” When he didn’t answer, she said, “Cruz?”

  He turned away from her, looking into the darkness when he spoke again. “I’m kind of in love with you, Auri.”

  Her lips parted in surprise. He started to take off when she blurted, “I’m kind of in love with you, too, Cruz.”

  He nodded and took off into the darkness, but all Auri saw was a sparkling luminous soul. He kind of loved her. She was good with that.

  5

  Caller reported a man wearing a

  T-shirt that read, Who needs drugs?

  Underneath that in a smaller font it read,

  No seriously. I have drugs.

  Man arrested on charges of drug possession.

  Deputy Salazar was grateful for the heads-up.

  —DEL SOL POLICE BLOTTER

  “Seabright got to Pres safely,” Rojas said when Sun entered the station, referring to Presbyterian Hospital in Albuquerque. She needed to tie up a couple of things before they headed out, but Pres was on the way. They could stop and check in on him.

  Quincy was en route. Hopefully. That guy took longer showers than she did, and she had to shave her legs.

  She’d also texted Levi Ravinder about a thousand times. She was going to kill him. If he didn’t die from internal bleeding first.

  “Good,” she said, dropping her bag on Quincy’s desk. “Any word on his condition?”

  He spun his chair around to her. “Other than he’s alive? Not yet. There’s some lady waiting in your office, though.”

  She checked her watch. “At midnight on a Saturday night?”

  “I told her you were stopping by here before heading to Arizona. She seems upset.”

  “She is upset.” The female voice of Mayor Donna Lomas echoed across the station, sounding alarmingly similar to the mating call of a barn owl.

  “Oh, sorry, ma’am,” Rojas said. He spun back to his desk and pretended to be working diligently instead of updating his status.

  Sun ignored her and asked Rojas, “The forensics team?”

  “They just got there. Zee and Salazar cleared everyone out.”

  “Perfect. Thank you.”

  He frowned in thought. “It’s odd that we never found any of the knives.”

  Yep. He was going to be a great addition. “I agree.” She couldn’t help but wonder if Levi still had the knife he’d used on one of the assailants. Maybe hidden in that cap. She should have frisked him when she had the chance.

  The mayor strolled out of Sun’s office just as she was texting Levi for the tenth time. She wouldn’t hesitate to arrest him for obstruction if he took that knife with him. The mere thought twisted her gut. Removing evidence from a crime scene could rack up some serious charges.

  “Why didn’t you call me?” she asked.

  Sun glanced up surprised. “Because you told me to stop.”

  Only a couple years older than Sun, the beauty known as Donna Lomas wore a bouncy blond bob, square wire-framed glasses, and a tailored navy pantsuit that accentuated her curves and made her look like a businesswoman from New York.

  Her bob swished when she shook her head in frustration. How could the woman look like she’d just stepped out of a salon at this hour? “I told you to stop calling me for every little non-catastrophic event. This was a stabbing. In my town. And no one called me.”

  After propping a fist on her hip, Sun said, “First you tell me to call you any time there is an incident. Then you tell me not to call you. Now you’re telling me to call you?” When the mayor only glared, Sun added, “I just want to get this right.”

  “You were calling every time someone got a paper cut.”

  Sun frowned and looked at her finger. “It was really deep.”

  Admittedly, Sun may have taken it a tad far, especially with the 3:00 a.m. paper-cut emergency, but she found a bizarre sense of pleasure in razzing the woman. If she didn’t want to be called for everything, she shouldn’t have told Sun to do that very thing. She needed to learn to choose her words more carefully.

  The mayor did a one-eighty and stood staring into Sun’s office, supposedly to get a grip on her anger, but Sun figured it had more to do with her own decorating prowess and the mayor’s inherent need to imitate her. If she saw a single Sheriff Hopper Christmas ornament the next time she went into the mayor’s office, Sun was crying foul.

  After a few moments, the woman asked, “Why do you have an empty dog crate on your desk?”

  Alarm shot through her. She hurried past the prickly mayor and stopped just before entering the small room. Sure enough, the furball had escaped. The crate sat askew on top of a stack of papers, the gate hanging open on its hinges.

  “I’m using it as a paperweight,” she said, her gaze darting around like the ball in a pinball machine.

  Rojas came up behind her and put a hand on her arm, send
ing her skyrocketing toward the ceiling in an embarrassing display of unprofessionalism. She put a hand over her heart and glared at him.

  “Sorry, boss,” he said, easing past her.

  Since he was going in first, she forgave him instantly. She just did not need another face-crotch experience. “No, no, it’s okay.” She leaned inside, scanning every inch before tiptoeing past the threshold. No idea why. “Do you see him?”

  He’d bent to check under her desk. “Nope.”

  “See who?” the mayor asked, growing wary.

  “The ghost haunting my office. He’s tried to kill me twice.”

  “You are not taking care of business,” the mayor said, giving up with a huff of air and brushing past her.

  Sun thought about warning her, but why be amicable now?

  Rojas shrugged. “I don’t see him, boss.”

  “Okay.” She cleared her throat and straightened her spine, both physically and metaphorically. “Thank you, Deputy. You might, you know, look around.”

  He nodded and left just as the mayor whirled on Sun. “You have to fill that position.”

  She set the cage on the floor beside her desk. “You came here at midnight on a Saturday night to tell me that I need to fill the lieutenant’s position?” Her former lieutenant, Bo Britton, had passed away before she’d taken up her post, and she had yet to fill the revered man’s spot.

  “No,” she said, gazing at Sun’s autographed poster of Sheriff Hopper. “That’s not the only reason I came.”

  Sun fought a desire to rip the poster off the wall and cradle Hopper’s face to her breast. Hopper was hers.

  “I just figured, while I’m here, we could examine the status quo.”

  “I have to go to Arizona.”

  “See, that’s what I mean.” She whirled back to her. “You aren’t taking care of business here.”

  Sun bit down. She’d been meaning to talk to Quincy about the position, rifle through his thoughts on the subject, but it just hadn’t come up yet. However, that didn’t mean she couldn’t throw the man under the bus. “I’m waiting for my chief deputy’s recommendation. He has yet to give me one.”

  “Then insist on one,” the mayor said. “Give him a deadline, then move on. We need to fill the spot.”