Bootscootin' and Cozy Cash Mysteries Boxed Set (Books 1-6)

by Scott, D. D.

  Jules rubbed the corners of her eyes, moving her fingers in theatrical circles to disrupt the flight plan of the headache seeking clearance to land.

  Evidently finding what she was looking for, or out of cupboards to ransack, Tulip finally stopped the mayhem. Without running her mouth, she set mugs, saucers and dessert plates at two of the place settings edging the center island.

  Jules drummed her fingers on the edge of the sink while analyzing her aunt’s behavior.

  Tulip’s silence was a delay tactic. Nothing less. A significant nonverbal cue of her distress at not achieving her goal. She always stalled before changing methods on Jules, her favorite lab mouse.

  But Jules knew how the good doctor worked, both on her patients and while meddling in her niece’s life. Raised by the woman since she was five, she’d learned all her tricks and had developed unique survival skills.

  Pleased with her assessment, Jules leaned against the kitchen table, crossed her arms, and waited for her aunt’s next approach.

  “You know I’m thrilled to help you get Sweet Destiny going strong,” Tulip said, the same fudge brownie eyes the gene pool had passed to Jules begging for empathy. “But you can’t expect me to ignore my life’s calling when I notice signs of trouble.”

  “What signs?” Waves of dread crashed against Jules’ gut.

  As much as she’d like to bury herself in the sand to ride out the rising tide, she couldn’t escape Tulip’s persistence. Tulip wouldn’t quit digging until her problem pearl had produced an oyster.

  The woman was a mix of adoration and aggravation. Brilliance and bull-headedness. Loving kindness and lunacy. Kama Sutra positions and commit-me-know quirks.

  Tulip hoisted her petite frame onto a barstool, holding her head high as if she thought she was about to cash in yet again on her Yale doctorate.

  Jules pictured Tulip reaching for her canary yellow legal pad then perching her Swarovski crystal-studded bifocals on the bridge of her nose, looking over the lens making sure her patient was comfortably reclined on the white damask chaise lounge next to her matching club chair.

  “Let’s begin with the fact that the bedside box of love oils, intensifying gels, and pleasure balms I sent for your housewarming hasn’t been opened. If it had been, I’d keep my mouth shut.” Tulip went straight for the vagina monologue, never one for idle chit chat.

  “You would not keep your mouth shut — like it belongs. You’d be pumping me for details about which product I liked best,” Jules countered, proud of her perfect reprisal, wishing she were on the clock like the rest of Tulip’s patients instead of a never-ending family charity case.

  “Perhaps.” Tulip dropped her voice to near inaudible decibels, looking away from Jules rather than face that her psychobabble methods had been bested by a pastry chef.

  Jules should have known neither Tulip’s sex therapist ego nor her story-sniffing, Citizen Kane alter ego would neglect to follow up on The Love Box. Jules shook her head then looked to her vaulted ceilings for strength.

  She’d actually forgotten the contents of the hand-carved and painted chest on her nightstand, using it as an item of décor instead of an aphrodisiac-filled trinket chest.

  “Honestly, Aunt Tulip. I haven’t seen you for what feels like forever and all you’re worried about is if I’m making good use of erotic pleasure balms and feather duster applicators.”

  Jules got out soy milk and natural sugar for their coffee along with the butternut cream icing she’d whipped up for the cake, smacking the containers on top of her breakfast bar.

  “You’re incorrigible.”

  “Only because you’re faltering in one of my areas of expertise.” Tulip threaded a red napkin through a ruby-toned ring. “You know I’m the gal for anything involving parties, pastries or sex.

  “Which reminds me,” she said, handing Jules a gift bag. “Here’s a must-have gem.”

  Taking the bag, an expectant rush traveled through Jules’ hands then touched her heart, easing the cardiac arrest Tulip’s antics often initiated.

  Her aunt’s just-because treasures were fantastic adventures. From the presentation to the main event nestled inside the always exquisite packaging, she had a flair for giving gifts to remember.

  Lowering her hands between stashes of metallic red tissue paper, Jules burrowed deep into the sparkly silver bag, careful not to ruin the expensive ensemble. As she reached for the prize, her heart sprinted like a child digging into a Cracker Jack box.

  Removing a small, hardback book, she discovered a large pickle on the back cover.

  She laughed, an instinctual release offsetting her confusion, a diversion while her mind swirled with possible explanations to justify the bizarre image.

  “I’m a pastry chef not a vegetable connoisseur,” she said, looking at Tulip who looked right back with pursed lips signifying she knew exactly what she was doing.

  Though Tulip said nothing, the devilish gleam in her eyes eliminated innocence.

  Turning over the book, Jules read the title — “Tickle His Pickle.”

  Noting the cover blurbs on becoming a penis genius, Jules sucked in way too much air and choked. The wind blew out of her lungs, forcing her to gulp as if she were robbed of all the air in her kitchen.

  “You gotta hand it to me, Sweet Girl, I have a sixth sense when it comes to choosing the perfect gift,” Tulip rambled, apparently oblivious to her niece’s flustered frenzy.

  “You mean sick sense,” Jules squeaked, blinking back reality, hoping if she looked long enough the cover art would morph into a cook book graphic.

  She tossed the book onto her kitchen table. “What am I supposed to do with this?”

  “Well use it. Improve your techniques. I’ve marked the exercises that produce the best results.”

  Her heart still beating faster than normal but not at Cardio bar levels, Jules poured their coffee, her hands trembling with a dash of amusement tempered by bewilderment.

  Looking across the island at the woman who was her only immediate family, she didn’t have the heart to stay angry.

  Perplexed and annoyed?

  Yes.

  Amazed at her aunt’s tenacity?

  Hell no.

  Good thing the woman worked with balls ‘cause she sure had plenty to spare.

  “Aunt Tulip, I love you. But get it through your libidinal heavy brain that sex, or the lack there of, is not my predominant hang up.”

  “Perhaps if you’d tell me what is, I’d refocus my energy.”

  “What does Jacques Marentino do for your energy level?”

  “Jacques?!” Tulip’s mouth contorted as if she’d bitten into something she’d expected to be sweet only to discover tart and awful. “Okay. My energy level’s sufficiently engaged. Talk to me, Sweet Girl. Now.”

  After telling Tulip about Jacques Ass’ involvement in the Cruz wedding and his probable designs on Fan Fest, Jules licked her lips, moving her tongue to dislodge it from the roof of her mouth. Why did Jacques always have this unsettling affect on her? How could the mere mention of his name assault her entire nervous system?

  Tulip was right to speak to her like she would a patient she was coaxing toward a cathartic moment. The world may be full of fools but Jules now ruled their kingdom. And she’d re-established her monarchy in Nashville by keeping this gig despite Jacques’s role.

  “Okay. Let’s try to approach your dilemma from a different perspective.” Tulip rubbed her hands together like she did while conjuring her patient’s issues into plausible chunks of positive reinforcements.

  “I’ve been reading that Country Weekly rag to adapt to your new environment. Sienna’s marrying that country music hunk Evan Granger, right? The Cruz gigs could be a smart move, Jules. For Sweet Destiny, anyway. Forget about your personal sanity.”

  “Oh, I’ve given up on maintaining my mind, trust me,” Jules said, not surprised Tulip chose to focus on the lighter sides of the deep black-licorice hole Jules had dug.

  Tulip w
alked to the liquor cabinet and retrieved a bottle of brandy and a snifter. “I need something stronger than coffee.”

  She sashayed around the kitchen preparing cocktails, her tunic-style blouse billowing behind her leaving a dramatic void in its wake.

  Breathing in the air stirred by her lily-infused perfume, a tremor of childhood memories jolted Jules’ mind.

  Tulip, holding her hand, while people dressed in black filed past them at St. Patrick’s Cathedral saying how sorry they were for their loss.

  Tulip, holding her hand, thirteen years later while they listened to her parents’ attorneys explain her astounding inheritance.

  Tulip, holding her hand, six plus months ago while they said their goodbyes before Jules left their Park Avenue penthouse for Nashville.

  She and Tulip had forged a good life after her parents’ death, finding strength in each other’s wit, whimsy, and yoga sensibilities.

  Seeing her flitter about with contagiously happy delirium in the midst of chaos, Jules realized she’d missed her aunt’s lovable madness since moving to Nashville.

  Maybe Tulip’s comedic conundrums, although potentially disruptive to Jules’ work flow, would be good for her soul. Maybe, Tulip was right and they could devise a plan to handle Jacques.

  Maybe.

  Maybe not.

  But the journey would prove entertaining with Tulip joining the party.

  Hearing her door bell ring, Jules forced her mind into the now, as deliciously screwed up as it was, and got up to answer.

  “I’ll get that,” Tulip volunteered, her voice rising to the uncomfortable, over-joyous pitch of being saved by the bell. “You stay here and take solace in frosting that gorgeous cake and downing my cognac.”

  Several minutes passed and still no Tulip.

  Thinking the person at the door was probably the mailman with a package she was expecting from a baking supply company, Jules ventured into the foyer, afraid her aunt had given her mailman’s prosthetic ears a stress test.

  So much for her mailman’s pain.

  And yes, he really did have prosthetic ears. Well — one totally fake, plus, one real ear that didn’t work without assistance. He’d been born without one and was damn near completely deaf in the ear he had. Something, Jules decided, he would have never thought was a gift until he’d met Tulip.

  But her mailman wasn’t at the door, frantically turning his volume control to mute.

  Seeing several catalogues already sticking out of her mailbox, he’d been saved until tomorrow’s delivery.

  But Cody wasn’t as fortunate. Seeing the ‘help me, please, who is this nutcase’ furrow of his brow, Jules’ heart took a nosedive.

  Stalling to think of some way to save her cowboy, she licked frosting off her fingers, not sure what, if anything, could ward off the orneriness brewing in her aunt’s eyes.

  Tulip leaned in toward Cody’s ear, the grand shadow from his hat appearing to swallow her misguided meddling.

  “My Jules has never found the sweet comfort in a man that she gets from her sugary confections,” Tulip whispered loud enough for her intended audience to include both Cody and Jules.

  Jules’ stomach muscles clenched.

  “But don’t you worry, I’ll be helping her deal with that hang-up. I’m a Sex Therapist,” Tulip said then tipped Cody’s hat as if to say ‘aw shucks.’

  Jules had a choice to make.

  She could pummel Tulip with her rolling pin and take her chances with karma. Or, she could get rid of the stupefied grin plastering Cody’s face above the devilish dimple in his chin.

  With his sexy-as-all-hell hat and powder blue eyes, her stomach turned delightful flip-flops.

  But she’d have to deal with her hunky diner boy later. Her aunt was the more immediate fear factor.

  Air travelled out of her lungs and through her vocal chords with a fervent gush of expediency.

  “Aunt Tulip, in an effort to shut you the hell up, allow me to introduce you to my friend Cody Weiss.

  “Although I’m sure he now knows more about both of us than he ever wanted to.”

  Once having been momentarily silenced by Tulip’s saucy brevity, now Jules couldn’t stop the onslaught of excuses pouring from her blushing pride.

  “Contraire, JuJu Bee.” Cody tipped his hat. “I’m kind of getting into this Hell’s Kitchen meets Meet the Fockers thing you got goin’ on.”

  Actually removing his hat, he turned back to Aunt Tulip. “Pleased to meet you, Ma’am.”

  This was the first time he’d ever removed that hat per Jules’ recollection. And she liked what she saw underneath.

  The shaggy chic cut of his black diamond hair gave one hot frame for his muscular, field-tanned face and rigid jaw line. And his ears. Cute. A tad large for his face, but a juxtaposition Jules found endearing. Imperfect in a perfect way.

  As if he read her mind, Cody placed his Stetson on his head, his cheeks warming with color.

  Hmm. Maybe his ears bothered him. She’d have to work on that.

  “I think you and I are going to hit it off real well,” Cody continued goading Tulip then winked at Jules.

  “Remember who you’re working for, Cowboy,” Jules warned then flipped Cody’s solid, jean-clad ass with her towel.

  “Don’t worry, I’m all yours.”

  Cody grabbed the towel out of her hands and swatted her behind, evening the score.

  Chapter Four

  Fried chicken. Fried asparagus. Turnip greens and mac-n-cheese. With cornbread and sweet tea too, Cody’s menu epitomized southern comfort, and that’s exactly what he wanted.

  A Sunday meal at The Lunchbox had become an institution for his extended family, and welcoming Tulip into the fold was gonna be fun.

  Setting a third heaping bucket of chicken on the table, pride warmed him like the down-home cooking his family’s café had dished out for fifty-eight years.

  A mainstay in Nashvillian diets, any local could name his or her favorite Meat n’ Three diner. But out of the hundred or so in existence, the Weiss’ Lunchbox Cafe continued its reign as queen.

  ‘Course it wasn’t just the food that kept their customers coming back. Something about The Lunchbox’s tin shack-like home made eating there a social occasion as well as a gut buster.

  As Cody’s Grandma Lucy told reporters when the café was featured as a must-stop Music City destination, her customers came in hungry strangers but left full of friends.

  “Well, I think that should do it.” Grams wiped up a glob of mac-n-cheese that had escaped its bowl. “If this doesn’t fill ‘em up, your friends should see their family doctors.”

  “You’ve got that backwards.” Cody removed his grease-stained apron. “They should see their doctors because they’ve eaten here.”

  “What’s a clogged artery or two? I’ve lived on this food for seventy-four years, and there ain’t nothin’ wrong with me.”

  “That’s what you think,” Cody said, enjoying teasing her and anticipating her reprisal.

  She’d never let him leave the ring with the last word.

  “Watch it, boy. I can still put a hurtin’ on you.” Grams pulled to attention her five feet frame of lean mean cooking machine.

  “Yeah, I’m scared.” Cody paid lip service to her threat while backing toward the door in case she wasn’t kidding.

  Grams packed a deadly wallop with a dish towel.

  Forgetting Petunia, the gigantic, hand-painted porcelain pig greeting the diner’s customers, Cody damn near took a tumble. Grams had paid a fortune for the sassy-striped swine to help last year’s United Way campaign. Why she had to set the thing in such a high traffic area was a notion Cody would never understand, although he’d long since given up changing her mind. She was mighty proud of that pig and the people she’d helped by buying the way overdone beast.

  “Walk much?” Grams cackled then disappeared into her kitchen.

  The bells attached to the café’s door flew into a frenetic free-for-all before Cod
y could think of a good comeback.

  He didn’t have to turn around to know the culprit was his buddy Damian. Damian made a habit of clanking the blasted ringers as if he were calling in farmhands from across the globe.

  Cody took a seat on Petunia and watched his friends file into the diner.

  Along with Damian and Cody’s other best bud Zayne, the clan now included Jules and fellow Manhattan-raised hottees Roxy and Audrey. With Zayne and Roxy a major item, both on and off their saloon’s dance floor, and Damian and Audrey acting as if there could be more going on when no one was looking, Cody considered it his duty to take care of Jules. And for that, he was the luckiest man in boot country.

  Although she was a handful, Jules was one fine dish.

  With her dark chocolate hair falling in bombshell waves around her gorgeous face, she looked like Catherine Zeta-Jones, complete with the killer lashes, perfect pout, and stunning curves.

  Seeing Aunt Tulip step into the diner behind her, Cody recognized the fascinating gene pool Jules had been blessed with.

  Age had no hold over the Lichtenstiens.

  And Aunt Tulip, accompanied by The Moms, gave new meaning to feminine power. Cody never thought Nashville could handle another woman like Zayne’s mom Kat and Roxy’s mom Lily — who they all affectionately referred to as The Moms, a duo making ‘dynamic’ an understatement.

  Although, by the looks of things, the duo could become a trio.

  What a force to be reckoned with.

  Cody felt sorry for the poor sons of bitches that crossed any of the three.

  “Hey, Sweet Man. The food smells and looks delicious.”

  Jules’ low, husky voice and her tight, toned body pressed against Cody’s side, tearing his mind away from The Moms new addition.

  “If you’re impressed, it’s all good,” Cody said, leaving Petunia to guard the door and wrapping his arm around Jules’ tiny waist.

  Planting a kiss on her cheek shivers shot straight to his boots.

  He inhaled, letting her sweet scent surround him.

  She smelled like cake frosting, probably because she was wearing some. He couldn’t count the number of times he’d seen remnants of some bright-colored butter cream delight smeared across her clothing, usually stuck to her shirt in the vicinity of her Playmate-worthy cleavage.