Instead of tending to the unconscious victim, all I can do is pick Tami up and hold her tight against me and kiss her. I can’t stop kissing her, even when Diana clears her throat behind me and says, “Uh, Sheriff. You’re getting blood all over her and contaminating the crime scene.”
“Oh, uh, Deputy,” I stammer. “Take the unconscious man up to the vehicle and call the ambulance.”
“What about the bodies on the porch?” she asks, pinching her nose.
“Call those in too. I cleared the rest of the house. Let’s wrap this mess up.” I check my watch. “Looks like we still have a minute of Halloween left.”
“Todd, is this trick or treat?” Tami asks, still shell-shocked from the blood and gore I smeared on her.
“Definitely treat.” I pick her up and carry her up the stairs. “I took care of all the tricks and threats. Happy Halloween.”
And this time, she kisses me back, locking her lips to mine. In the distance, a lone wolf howls, marking the end of a truly horrifying Halloween that will haunt me the rest of my life if it weren’t for the promise of a lifetime of love with my Tami Terrific.
Thirty-Nine
~ Tami ~
I strip myself naked, throwing my clothes and boots in a trash bag, before stepping inside Todd’s cabin. He ties the bag up and places it in the truck, saying the blood, the stench, the spilled tea, and all the dirt and mud I was dragged through are evidence.
Whatever.
I streak through the living room, past the old rocking chair with his grandmother’s afghan, and step into the shower. The water’s still cold, but I can’t get enough of the relief as it washes over my scrapes and bruises.
As the water warms, I soap up a real lather. Even though I assured Todd I was not sexually molested, only pulmonary assaulted, he still wanted me to go to the hospital.
No effing way.
I breathe in the pure, clean steam of the hot shower and lather Todd’s manly body wash all over me. I never appreciated how delightful he smells, always clean and well groomed, like sunshine and pine on a crisp autumn morning.
The bathroom door thumps open, and Todd’s manly voice booms, “Are you okay in there? Save some hot water for me.”
“Join me.” I lower the taps and fling aside the shower curtain. “Then we can save water together.”
His eyes widen at my squeaky-clean skin, and before he can back away, I’m out of the shower and undressing him.
“It’s been a tough time for you, Sheriff Colson,” I say as I unbutton his uniform. “Thank you for your service, keeping everyone safe and protecting all the happy haunters.”
“I well, are you sure?” His voice hitches hopefully, and a blush rises over his cheekbones.
I wiggle and jiggle my shoulders and everything below. “Yes, hit me with your best shot, big guy, or should I say, big foot?”
He grins as I lower his pants. “Big stick.”
“Oh, yeah.” Licking my lips, I take him by the thick nightstick, rubbing it, and lead him into the shower.
I should have known. An alpha dude like Todd doesn’t let me lead for long. As soon as he pulls the shower curtain, he has me pressed against the smooth tile wall.
“My turn first,” he says in between the kisses he lands on my mouth, over my ear, and sucking his way around the column of my neck. He palms are over my breasts, rolling and kneading, as water showers over his back and trickles through the hairs of his chest down the trail to wonderland.
“Close your eyes,” he says when he realizes I’m staring. “I want you to relax and enjoy my all of my protective services.”
“Promise me handcuffs?”
“Later, darling.” His lips and teeth are busy sucking and nipping. Strong hands and fingers stroke and walk down my back and hips, squeezing my buttocks and making my knees weak.
How often have I imagined this? The last time I was alone with my dreams, I only had my thin fingers. Now? I’m blessed beyond all braincells with Todd’s hands ministering pleasurable sensations over every inch of my body—except one. He hasn’t dared to go low and deep.
“Please Todd, all of me,” I barely mutter as I spread my thighs, sliding down the shower wall.
“Oh, I’ll get there. No hurry.”
“Yes, hurry.” I jut my hips at him, and he places my hands on his shoulders as he thankfully goes down to the thatch between my legs.
I’m not sure if I should have waxed or not, but Todd’s a mountain man, and I’m betting he won’t mind.
His fingers part my glistening lower lips, slipping and sliding into my folds. I gasp and moan, writhing with pleasure, releasing breathy groans. He pets and massages, and when I’m almost begging again, he inserts his fingers.
I drop down, but his other hand holds me up, propping me for a feast.
“You’re such a live wire, Tami Tornado,” he mumbles. “I’m so hungry, and I want to lick all your sweet juices. Yum, yum, yum.”
And sure enough, he sticks his face into my bush, slurping and licking. Jolts of passion shoot to the top of my head, and my toes tingle, gripping the pebbly tile shower floor.
My fingers clench over Todd’s strong muscles, and I’m coming too fast and hard. I don’t want to come around the mountain without him. I want to come around his big, thick cock instead.
I shout out, “Stop, stop in the name of the law.”
And he stops, licking his lips and gaping up at me. “Did I hurt you?”
“No, siree. I want to come around your big thick cock when I come. I’ll be coming around your big thick cock when I come,” I beg and yank his nightstick. “Choo, choo.”
“You’re mixing folk songs,” he grins, all cocky and cool.
And then, he lifts me. All whatever many pounds I am, pushes me up as my legs come around his hips.
I knock my head back underneath the showerhead. Cold water washes over my face, but I don’t care, because Todd’s hot, pulsing cock shoves through my folds and lodges right where it belongs. Inside me. Deep inside my mineshaft.
We moan in sweet unison, and then we both move. Chugga, chugga, chugga, chug, choo, choo, choo. Steam rises from the heat and friction, pumping molten lust and love. My fingertips grip Todd’s flesh tight, and his hips piston faster and harder, slamming stars behind my eyes, and a swelling wave of desire crests from my core to my heart.
“Todd, oh, Todd,” I moan and gasp, too overtaken by awe and wonder. The intense orgasm builds as fast as his thrusts.
And I’m coming, coming around Todd’s mountain, when I come. I’m coming around Todd’s mountain, when I come, wringing out every glorious spasm and riding the rapture of Todd’s mountain, when I come …
Forty
~ Todd ~
In the days and weeks that go by, I untangle the mess of lies and coverups on that fateful first Halloween at Tami’s Harrowing Haunts Hotel. By the time I finish, I, too, have become a dirty cop.
I destroyed evidence in the form of Tami’s naked pictures. I didn’t need them to convict Evan of Viola’s murder. His name was not Evan Graves, the world-famous ghost hunter. Yes, there was an Evan Graves, and he was the one who performed on Halloween night at the Tower of Reeds in San Francisco.
The man who showed up in Colson’s Corner to masquerade as Evan Graves was a fraud named Evan Sims. He’d victimized Tami when she was a sixteen-year-old college student, and when she advertised for a ghost hunter to help her renovate her hotel, he’d contacted her and told her his stage name was Evan Graves.
Evan Sims, whose mugshot was found by Viola Graham in her nosy diggings, was far more sinister—a con artist and child pornographer with a rap sheet a mile long.
During his trial, we discovered how wily he was. He’d hacked into Tami’s email and sent Molly a text message through email telling her the murder was a staged event. She’d dutifully programmed the announcement to go out into the hotel’s PA system. In the ensuing confusion with people taking pictures and touching the body, the crime scene was complete
ly contaminated. Evan managed to mix himself in the scene and picked up a souvenir, the Bigfoot mask, to pretend he was innocent and framed.
After all, if he were guilty, his lawyer argued, he would not have planted evidence in his own room. The case, of course, fell apart when Molly testified that Evan told her to go to San Francisco to substitute for him. When she got there, she found another Evan Graves doing the show.
I suspect Molly always knew Evan Sims wasn’t who he said he was, due to her internet research, but as long as he paid her—we discovered payments sent to her bank account—she kept his secret for him.
Once he was arrested, the payments stopped, and Molly, being Molly the grifter, had no more obligation to keep up the ruse, so she exposed him.
Furthermore, as Diana suggested, the blood found on Viola’s baseball bat matched Evan Sim’s DNA. Evan was hit by Viola with the bat, but failed to retrieve it because he didn’t want to be caught with it. Later, when people took pictures with it, he didn’t realize his blood was on it, and was perfectly happy when the town initially believed it was the murder weapon.
The real murder weapon, a rusted pickaxe, was thrown into the same mineshaft Tami’s friends landed in. Evan must have been in glee when Diana stole a different pickaxe, confusing the townsfolk, although not the police.
At the end, the bat and pickaxe, as well as Molly’s betrayal nailed his coffin, or prison cell, shut.
Tami’s secret is safe. I burned the photos I found in my fireplace and let all the particles go up my chimney flue. I’ll never let her know I saw them, and I let her know Evan was lying and flinging mud, hoping to discredit her to distract from his own crimes. Once or twice, she asked if I’d found any of the mud, and I always acted innocent. When she quizzed me about the contents of Evan’s hotel room, I dutifully listed everything that was in my evidence bag and told her the room was combed over by investigators and forensics without finding anything pertaining to her—not even a hatpin.
I may be a dirty cop, but I’m one in secret and a piss-poor one. I’m not blackmailing or bribing anyone, but at the same time, I didn’t look too hard for the missing police reports that Diana claimed she lost.
If she’s making a separate deal with the Kings, the family whose founder, King Henry, murdered and stole a gold nugget from her ancestor, Wing Van Dirk, it’s none of my business.
All I know is that Tami’s father paid blackmail and child support all these years to Mooma Wolfe through Sheriff Bill Weaver who turned out to be Justin Jameson’s unacknowledged biological father.
I truly feel sorry for the guy. They named him after a whiskey they drank when he was conceived.
As for the accusations against Tami, they were moot.
Maybe Mooma was accidentally sickened by the horse chestnut powder mixed into the tea or maybe she was poisoned by the traces of the “medicinal” extract found in the teakettle. But her staying “dead” and abandoning Justin to foster homes was inexcusable in my book.
I recommended the maximum sentence for her for blackmail, insurance fraud, extortion, and conspiracy. Justin also got jail time for kidnapping Larissa and Tami and assaulting Rosalie and Suzette. Rosalie broke an arm, and Suzette had a concussion, so he was a one-man terror that Halloween night.
Tami’s parents have some work to do with their marriage, but I’m sure they’ll sail through the stormy seas. George has a lot of groveling to do, and Gracie is keeping herself busy with her bed and breakfast, as well as getting to know Cara, Tami’s half-sister, who is now living with them.
As for me and Tami? We’re good. Really good. We moved in together into Madame Goldilocks’s Boudoir and use my cabin as a weekend love nest. I still visit Miss Laverne and see that she’s safe and warm, and Tami’s still angling to get new businesses started in Colson’s Corner—although she’s nixed the big shopping center, preferring to keep the character of our small mining community.
I knew she’d see things my way.
I have a woman worth fighting for, but I’m too much of a man to talk about lovey-dovey stuff.
I am, after all, the upstanding and tough lawman of Colson’s Corner, and nothing gets by me—not even a bright-red speeding Datsun 280ZX with a flashy blonde behind the wheel doing sixty in a thirty-mile-per-hour zone.
~ Tami ~
It’s Thanksgiving Day, and I’m busy putting the finishing touches on my inn with cornucopia horns full of harvest gourds and Indian corn. My black cat, Spook, prances throughout the lobby, rubbing herself on the butter churns and broom decorations and looking completely out of place for my big Thanksgiving event.
The entire town, from the city council to the homeless shelter, is invited to our traditional Thanksgiving turkey dinner with recipes dating back to colonial times. Waiters and waitresses are dressed like our Pilgrim forefathers, and the guests are wearing the national outfits of their own immigrant families, including the Van Dirks who are dressed in Imperial Chinese gowns.
It might seem strange to some to have blond Chinese, but Diana’s forefather is Wing Van Dirk, the man my forefather, Hank King, is said to have murdered deep inside a mine.
Hank and Wing were best buddies, according to the written notes Viola found between the pages of a library book. Chinese names have the family name first, so Wing was his surname, and his nickname Van Dirk was actually One Dirk, which described the short dagger the man tucked in the thick braided queue that fell halfway down his back.
Hank King started the Royal King Bank after walking out of Wing’s Hanging Glory Mine with a fifty-pound nugget of gold and cut marks on his face, arms, and torso. He claimed that Wing One Dirk attacked him for the gold, and that a mineshaft collapse crushed his friend and saved his life.
Wing’s family believed the gold belonged to them because it was taken from their mine. After they dragged Wing’s body out of the mine, they discovered he’d been stabbed through the heart with his own dirk, and they accused Hank of killing Wing and piling rocks on his body.
Since the winners wrote history, and the losers were forgotten, Hank got to keep the gold nugget while destroying Wing’s claim to the mine. Wing’s children said Hank burned up the English deeds but didn’t understand the document written in Chinese. Unfortunately for them, they lost the mine when a boarding house was built on top of it, and Diana’s grandmother, who was Madam Goldilocks, lost the property due to tax liens.
All of this history was validated by Viola who saved old papers and the secrets that went along with them. Miss Laverne Pine collected the old stories of miners, madams, and merchants. She listened to gossip and believed in the tall tales. But while Miss Laverne loved an old yarn, writing poetry and songs about the rollicking days of the miners’ lives, Miss Viola, unfortunately, tried to profit off the secrets she found.
After Diana had the Chinese deed validated, I settled with the Van Dirks to become partners in the Bee Sting Bordello, and that’s why they are a part of the Turkey Trot Thanksgiving Grand Opening.
I bustle about the kitchen, tasting gravies and inspecting the pies. Multiple turkeys are roasting, and the scent throughout the inn is heaven sent. Diana insisted on installing a giant wok, and she’s busily stir-frying chestnuts from China, which are edible, with bits of Virginia ham, scallions, and wild rice for the stuffing.
My big sheriff, Todd Colson, is wearing a traditional black Pilgrim hat with black jacket and pants and wide white cuffs.
He kisses me in a decidedly non-Pilgrim fashion. “How’s my Puritanical sweetheart doing?”
“Want a taste of my O King Corral Barbecue beef?” I ladle the hearty stew and blow it in front of his nose.
“I’m saving all my appetite for dessert.” He nevertheless slurps the hot saucy beef and blows out the heat. “Yikes, I burned my tongue. Guess I can’t use it tonight teasing between the turkey thighs.”
“You’re so bad, you’re good.” I slap the lid onto the stewpot and take his arm, leading him to the dining room where our friends and family gather to give
thanks and celebrate.
My father is showing Shane his antique blunderbuss while he’s twirling his pirate flintlock. My mother, bless her heart, is rolling out pie crusts with Cara, who’s become her little shadow.
Todd’s large family takes up an entire table. Since they are part Miwok Indian, they’re providing the acorn cakes, pine nuts, and cedar plank salmon. They’re wearing Western pioneer clothes instead of Pilgrim garb.
Across from them, Al, Dillon, and Randy are playing finger football by flicking paper triangles across the tabletop. They’re wearing coonskin hats and buckskin shirts and pants.
“Sheriff Naughty-Ham,” a sweet little voice pipes up from behind a giant pumpkin. It’s Jessie, Linx’s daughter, wearing a cowgirl vest and a square-dance skirt with a six-shooter on her belt. Her boots have spurs, and she has a bandolier of plastic bullets slung across her chest. “Look who’s here.”
My bestie, Linx, holds Jessie with one hand, and has her other hand clasped with her lover boy, Grady Hart.
“Oh, my stars,” I exclaim. “You didn’t tell me Grady’s back from Australia.”
“I wouldn’t miss Thanksgiving here in the States for anything,” Grady says. “They needed the help, but I need my family more.”
“Welcome back,” Todd says. “Our town needs a fire chief. Hint, hint.”
He gives Grady a bear hug, clapping and slapping his back, while I squeeze Linx and Jessie tight. I love them so much.
“I’m so glad your man’s back,” I tell Linx, knowing how worried she was. “He’s safe, and my prayers are answered.”
“And you, my goodness, you and Todd, when I told Grady, he said I was lying.” She punches Grady lightly on the butt. “See? Told you.”
“Man, I never would have guessed,” Grady says, saving face for Todd. “She’s not whipping you too hard, is she?”
All You Want Page 30
