by Pamela Tracy
“Whatever we find, we’ll tell your father and he gets to decide. It doesn’t have to be announced.”
“There are no secrets in a small town,” Joe said.
“What made you think of this now?”
“I’ve always thought about it.” Not a chance did Joe want to tell her the real reason, that he was—in just a few short days, two to be exact—getting used to seeing her. Finding the coins meant she’d leave for good and he’d know for sure there was no Santa Claus, nothing under the tree for him.
She was good company, she was entertaining, and he enjoyed being with her.
“What made you think of this now?” Annie repeated. Apparently, she didn’t like his first answer.
“I’m just playing the devil’s advocate,” Joe went on. “What if we find out who really took them and it’s not Kyle, it’s someone else who was at the party?”
“Like Missy or Marlee? Could they be guilty?”
“No, I really don’t think so. Marlee married Dwayne right after high school. They were pretty much a couple from the time she was in eighth grade and he was in tenth. She and her husband own the restaurant. They’re two of the happiest people I know. Actually, three of the happiest people. Their daughter, Katie, is full of spit and vinegar. Good with animals, too. They have money because of the restaurant. No, she wouldn’t have taken them. Missy left after high school, but all I ever heard was how tough a time she was having. If she’d have taken the coins and sold them, she would’ve had some fun, don’t you think?”
“But there are two others, right? You told me about a father and son who were there. You said they left before the coins went missing.”
“That’s why I’m bringing this up now,” Joe answered. “There’s not a chance the dad who acted as a chaperone took the coins—not a chance, nor his son. They’re Billy and Cliff Whittaker, and you’re about to meet them.”
* * * * *
Blue Sunflower Farm was so much more than the rustic farm—like all the others they’d passed this morning—that Annie expected to see. It was a Norman Rockwell painting that somehow collaborated with a creative ten-year-old girl armed with a paintbrush. Annie rolled down the window and leaned out. The fresh air whipped her blond hair and rushed against her cheeks. Not quite as good as coffee, but close enough. She just might manage to stay awake long enough to help. “It looks more like something from a kid’s movie than a farm.”
“Clifford’s family is one of a kind.”
The fence was fairly close to the road. Someone had attached bright blue wooden sunflowers, complete with yellow centers, on every post.
“Mona, that’s Clifford’s wife, paints them every year. She sells them, too. I guarantee she has a booth at the farmer’s market our parents went to. The dirt you see behind the fence, that’s the acre she’s using for the real thing.”
“Sunflowers.”
“Yes, she probably planted a few weeks ago, and if we were a bit closer we could see some of the seedlings emerging.”
Annie sat up. “How cute is that!”
“What? The acre?”
“No, over there, the cows!” A line of cows—all standing at attention—obviously took guard duty seriously. If not for an occasional swish of a tail or a baby nudging at a mama, Annie would have thought they were sculptures.
“Haven’t you seen cows before?” Joe sounded amazed.
“Of course I’ve seen cows. I’ve just never seen them stand like that.”
“Here in Kansas, the cows care about and protect their owners.”
“Oh, hush.”
He was teasing, and had he been anyone else, she’d have hit him playfully or stuck out her tongue. As he turned into a long driveway leading to a white clapboard farmhouse, he said, “Cliff has a grazing herd of Ayrshires with a few Milking Shorthorns thrown in.”
“I have no idea which cows are Jimmy Choo caliber and which cows are Payless, so tossing out their brand names does nothing for me.”
Joe started to laugh but quickly stopped. The cows had been stationary. The hogs were not. He slammed on the brakes to avoid hitting one that ran right in front of the truck. “Cliff’s hogs break out of their pens on a regular basis. He’ll also tell you they’re docile, but when you’re chasing them, they’re anything but.”
“More trouble than they’re worth?” Annie asked.
“These are purebred Hereford Hogs, quite a few of them pregnant. They need a closed pasture, but outside of chasing them down every day or so, they aren’t much trouble. Actually, if you look closely, you’ll see that Cliff’s grandkids—the ones chasing them right now—don’t seem to mind too much.”
“They chase them down every day or so?”
Joe paused a moment before answering, “Pretty much.”
Jacko suddenly sat up, barked, and scrambled across Annie’s lap so he could see out the window better. The jiggled kitten let out a tiny sound, and tiny paws stretched and curled, kneading for comfort that wasn’t there.
Jacko barked again. Annie wasn’t sure if he was saying, “Dad, let me out of the truck now!” or if he simply wanted to remind his owner “I’m awake and on the job!”
Joe parked by a barn, got his brown bag from the backseat, and headed inside the blue structure dotted with sunflowers. Jacko, without a backward look or bark of farewell, ran to join the pig chase.
Annie followed Joe, carrying the kitten box and wrinkling her nose at the strong odors while trying to keep an eye on where she stepped. If she stayed longer than a week, she was buying boots. Oz was no place for the sandals both she and her mother preferred.
“Thought you’d never get here,” said a voice from inside a stall.
Annie jumped, but Joe merely turned to his left and entered an enclosed area. When Annie started to follow, he said, “Wait out there.”
“I’ve already cleaned the wound with a saline solution,” a large man wearing blue cambric said. “I still have no idea how this happened. We don’t have any barbed wire in the pasture. I had Billy look to see if anything glass or metal somehow got into the field. He walked around for an hour but didn’t find anything. Of course, he’s not nearly as good at finding trouble as our horses.”
Joe took a small computer out of the bag he’d retrieved from his truck. After a moment, he said, “Dot had her tetanus shot two months ago.” He rubbed his hand over a big, dark brown horse’s head and the beast closed her eyes. “Yes, little girl, that’s right. This isn’t the first time I’ve stitched you up.”
Annie found a spot where she could see better, put the box with the kitten on a shelf, and leaned against the pen. The horse, one leg bent so it wasn’t touching the ground, stood trembling. A makeshift bandage bound the wound. Joe carefully unwrapped the binding.
“It looks awful,” the man observed. “Her skin’s just hanging there.”
Annie agreed.
Joe had something in his hand and was guiding it ever so slowly into the wound. Annie thought about looking away, but she was fascinated.
“Judging by how Dot’s taking this all in stride and the wound isn’t as deep as it looks, I think she’s going to be just fine. I’ll flush the wound, stitch her up, and bandage it. You remember what to do?”
“I own stock in petroleum jelly,” the man said. Now that his horse was no longer in danger, Cliff turned his attention to Annie. “Who’s this?”
“Annie Jamison,” Joe introduced, “meet Cliff Whittaker.”
“Ah, Willa’s girl. You find them coins yet? I’ve always wondered where they got off to.” He didn’t wait for an answer; instead, he turned back to Joe. “I hear your latest receptionist headed on up to Denver, Omaha, or some such place. Why would she want to do that?”
“Makes no sense to me,” Joe said.
Cliff turned again to Annie, looked her over, and then looked back at Joe. “You both fall in a mud puddle?”
“You could say that.” Joe filled Cliff in on what had happened the night before.
“Sorry to hear that. I’ll put your dad in my prayers.” Cliff went from serious to curious, looking from Joe to Annie. “I’m amazed that your daddy’s got one working for him and now you seem to be carting around the other.”
Joe took a moment to consider, then finally said, “She’s helping with the search, too. It’s temporary and unexpected.”
Cliff looked like he understood perfectly.
“By the way,” Joe said, “I missed you at church Sunday night. Everything okay?”
“We had some things to take care of in Kansas City,” Cliff said. “We stayed and attended services there.” About that time, he noticed the box Annie had put on the shelf. “What’s in the box?”
“A kitten I’m taking care of.”
At that, Cliff chuckled. “Oh, Dr. Joe, she’s going to work out just fine.”
Annie felt like she’d passed a test she’d not been aware she was taking.
“Can I come in now?” She didn’t wait for an answer but took one step through the half-open gate and into the stall. Then she stopped. The horse was bigger than she expected.
“You afraid of horses?” Cliff asked.
“Not sure. I’ve never really been near any.”
“City girl,” Joe explained.
“I’m from Tucson, Arizona,” Annie protested. “We’re more the Wild West than a metropolis.”
“You look like your mama,” Cliff observed. “I can see why Joe’s carting you around with him, and if you represent the Wild West, maybe you can keep him in line. None of our local girls seem able to.”
Behind him, the horse let out a snort. Cliff grinned. “Dot here’s not feeling too good, so maybe we need to give her some space. You want me to introduce you to some of the other horses?”
“No, I’m good,” Annie said.
Cliff didn’t appear to be a man who took no for an answer—a trait most of the men she’d met in Kansas shared. Next thing Annie knew, Cliff had handed off the kitten to Joe, and while Joe cleaned up, she was being shown both land and livestock and hearing about the benefits of green grass, fresh air, and sunshine.
An hour later, after at least two miles of walking and one twisted ankle thanks to her stupid sandals, Annie joined the Whittakers for breakfast. She’d not managed to get a word in edgewise so hadn’t brought up the missing coins even once. She hoped to do it when they rejoined Joe at the main house, but before she knew it, she was standing in a kitchen bigger than her entire apartment.
Cliff’s two sons were at the table and introductions were made. Billy looked a lot like his dad and merely nodded his head while shaking Annie’s hand. He was a gentle giant. No wonder no one accused him. He was painfully shy. Nothing at all like his dad when it came to conversation. No way would he do anything to bring attention to himself. He and Joe talked animals and family and then fell silent.
Joe leaned over and whispered, “Billy’s always been the quietest of my friends, but he’s great fun. He’s always trying to figure out how something works, why something doesn’t work, and he’s always looking in corners expecting to find a surprise.”
“Has he ever found anything?”
“He has a collection of old bullets, a pair of spectacles, and lots of antique bottles, all found because he saw something unusual and had to investigate.”
Both the Whittaker sons had adjacent homes and worked for their dad. This added two wives, both friendly, to the already crowded table. In order to fit Annie and Joe, Cliff’s wife, Mona, set up a child-sized folding table for the five grandkids. Nobody asked if Annie wanted breakfast, they just assumed.
“So, Annie,” Cliff said after the prayer, “what did you enjoy the most? I’m thinking it wasn’t the cows.”
Joe, sitting next to her, laughed. “She liked them when we drove up. Thought they were cute.”
“They aren’t so cute up close,” Annie said. “One of them got me with her tail.”
And to think she’d been worried that Jacko would drool. “Eww” came squeals and snickers from the kids’ table. “We know what’s on a cow’s tail.”
“I know what I like best,” a little girl piped up. “It’s the kitten you brought. It’s bootiful.”
“We have a litter in the barn,” Mrs. Whittaker added. “We always seem to have a newborn or two in the vicinity.”
“So what did you like?” Joe encouraged, steering the conversation back to Annie.
“I liked the chickens.”
Cliff took over. “We have almost a hundred hatchlings and more eggs than we know what to do with. Annie helped me rearrange a few eggs so they’d be under a brooder.”
“It was interesting,” Annie said. “He has what he called a chicken condo. It’s divided in half and there’s a door in-between, and on…” Her voice tapered off. “You know this already?”
Joe nodded. “I know of at least a hundred chicken condos around here.”
“Tell them what you did next,” Cliff suggested.
Annie really didn’t want to tell them, didn’t want to admit how out of her element she was. Most of her animal knowledge came from books and was obviously wrong.
“Go ahead,” Cliff urged.
“A few years ago, I read that with baby chicks, the way you tell their gender is to hold them upside down by one leg. If it’s a boy, he’ll twist his head and peck at you with his beak.”
“I’ve never heard that,” said a daughter-in-law.
Both sons looked perplexed.
“It gets funnier,” Cliff said. “I about fell over when she shared it with me.”
“And if it’s a girl chick?” Joe encouraged.
“Then she just hangs there, doesn’t do anything.”
“All my chicks are girls,” Cliff complained.
“Impossible,” his wife said, slapping him playfully on the arm. “The word ‘henpecked’ proves that we women know when and where to strike.”
“My books are wrong,” Annie said woefully.
“How many did you let her test before you stopped her?” Joe asked.
“Oh, about a dozen or so. I was having a good time watching.”
She felt it then, bubbling in her chest and rising to escape. Laughter, the good kind, the kind she hadn’t experienced since Burt had called her almost two weeks ago and said, “Something’s going on with your mother. You might want to come home.”
Home.
Annie couldn’t stop the laughter; it spilled out. Sitting next to her, Joe laughed, too. And she suddenly noticed, again, how big he was, how strong, and how much she liked the hint of a beard at his chin. The man needed to get home and shave.
Home.
She needed to get home where all her jewelry supplies were and she could spread out. She needed to get home and help with the business. Rachel wasn’t up to the task. She needed to get home and figure out what was going wrong with Beth and Charles. And then there was Cathy. She always acted like she was on top of things, but although it seemed that the youngest Jamison sister always landed on her feet, she needed encouragement, and not the kind that came over the phone. The kind that came with a girls’ night out and some serious cheerleading.
Home wasn’t Bonner Springs, Kansas, but Casa Grande, Arizona. And, for that matter, the sooner she and Joe headed back to Bonner Springs, the sooner she could really get to work. Not just for Joe, either. She could tear Max’s house apart, find the coins, and leave Kansas before whatever it was calling her—green grass, fresh air, sunshine, laughter, handsome vet—needed some serious thought and an answer straight from the heart.
Chapter Eleven
When they left the Whittakers, Annie was the proud owner of not one but two wooden blue sunflowers. After a bit of back-and-forth with Mrs. Whittaker and the grandchildren, Annie had also found herself the proud owner of a dozen funny-colored eggs in various sizes.
“She should have let me pay.”
“I’m surprised Cliff’s wife didn’t ask for payment or at least barter,” Joe said. “She’s usually quite a
businesswoman. What were you talking about over by the sink?”
“My mother mentioned that I clean houses for a living. Mona said she’d been using a pumice stone, but it wasn’t working on the old bathtub in their bathroom.”
“What did you tell her?”
“To use a carburetor cleaner.”
“You’re kidding. Hmmm, how much would you charge me to clean my apartment?”
She thought maybe he was joking, but so far, in their brief partnership, he’d not shown much of a sense of humor, unless it involved sarcasm. “How dirty is it?”
“I’m a bachelor, not home much, and have lots of animals to take care of.”
This made Annie’s answer easy. “You can’t afford me. Besides, you’re the enemy. I’ll probably clean your dad’s place, but that’s because I can clean and look for the coins at the same time. It’s easier.”
“I’m not the enemy.”
But he was, in more ways than one, just not the typical enemy who threatened a person’s well-being. Joe was more a threat to Annie’s way of life. First, he was the son of the man who’d hired her mother for a job but instead seemed to be wooing her. Second, he was very much like his father, and for the first time in a long time, Annie felt in the mood to be wooed.
That was the third reason why Oz wasn’t working out so well. The son of the enemy was turning out to be the nicest guy Annie had met in a long time.
“I’m just glad they were safe,” Annie said.
“Who?”
“Our parents.”
“Oh, funny. For a moment I’d almost forgotten what started this adventure.”
“I can’t forget. I’m still amazed that my mother came all this way just to look for coins.”
“She’s really not doing much looking,” Joe pointed out.
“No, but I’m going to look some today. But first, you need to take me to Margaret’s. You’re right. I’ve got to get some sleep.” She took out her cell phone and checked the time. “One o’clock. Wow, I can’t believe I’m still functioning. I can’t remember the last all-nighter I pulled.”
“I can. It was the night you arrived. I was at the Hickses’ place.”
