by Ann Charles
I clenched my fists, determined not to lean into him. “No, you informed me that your career was stagnant. That there was nothing left in Goldwash for you, so you were going to try your hand in Vegas.”
“Same thing.”
I planted both palms on his chest and pushed him back. “Your communication skills have never been your strong point.”
He allowed me the extra space, dropping his arms to his sides. “And your stubbornness will be the death of you.”
“That’s no longer your concern.”
“Bullshit, Shooter.” His eyes traveled down over my T-shirt. “You look thinner.”
Heartache made for a great dieting plan. Damn him for looking better than ever in his flannel shirt.
“I’ve been a little stressed.”
“How’s your dad doing on his own?” he asked.
“Coping. He helps out here some nights when the loneliness gets too much.” We made quite a pair—lonely and lonelier.
“Working with you can’t be easy.”
“I’m nicer to him than to you.” Dad didn’t choose a career over me.
His grin came quick. “I mean because you look so much like your mom when she was younger.” He reached out and fingered a strand of my hair. “Especially with your hair the same shade of auburn as hers. I like this longer, wavy cut. Makes you look more bohemian. She’d have approved.”
My eyes watered, damn it. I couldn’t let him use my momma to soften me up. I blinked away the tears. “What do you want from me, Joel?”
He released my hair. “I’ve chased you since you wore pigtails, Shooter. Just this once, couldn’t you have chased me?”
“I have a bar to run.”
“Buffalo could have filled in. Your sister and dad would have helped. Your brother, too.”
“It’s not their responsibility. Momma left the place to me.”
“She didn’t expect you to chain yourself to it.”
“It’s been in our family since this town was founded over a century ago. You don’t just walk away from that.”
“Excuses.”
I growled, pushing away from the desk, needing the room between us to hold my ground. “What was I supposed to do, Joel? Just drop everything in my life to follow you like a puppy, happy for any bits of attention you gave to me?”
“No.” His gaze bore into mine, all traces of humor and lust tempered. “You were supposed to ask me not to go.”
Huh? That stole the wind from my world, my tumbleweed of frustration rolling to a stop. “And if I had?”
He shrugged. “I would have stayed.”
My mouth fell open. “So this was all some big test?”
“No test. I was tired of running in place. It was change.”
I threw my hands up. “Well, you got your change, didn’t you? Was it as good for you as it was for me?”
He bridged the distance between us in three long strides, catching my hand, tugging me toward him. “A little birdie told me you’re going home alone every night.”
He had me so discombobulated that I let him pull me into his arms. “Tell your brother to mind his own goddamned business. He doesn’t know everything that happens in this town.”
“Are you sleeping with someone?”
“Maybe.”
“Your pants are on fire.”
He tended to have that effect on the lower half of my body. “Joel, you can’t just come back here and expect me to fall into your arms.”
“Don’t fall then.” He leaned in close, his lips even closer. “Walk.”
I almost danced to his snake charms again. “Stop it.” I nudged him aside and yanked open the door, escaping down the hall toward the bar.
“Montana,” he called. “Come back to me.”
“You need to leave,” I yelled back. If he didn’t, I might do something stupid and tell him how much I still loved him.
“I’m not leaving without you.”
I shoved out into the dark room and was halfway along the front of the bar toward the door before I fully registered that the lights were off—all of them, even the beer lights I usually left on in the windows.
“Buff?” My boot toe connected with what felt like a rolled up carpet on the floor. I stumbled to my knees, my hand coming down in something warm, wet, slippery. “What the hell?”
“Hi, Montana,” a scratchy voice said in the darkness. Fear spider-crawled up my spine. “Aren’t you going to welcome me home, baby?”
I gasped, my heart hurtling into a full-on panic. My ex was here, waiting for me in the darkness. I shouldn’t have left my shotgun at home.
“Sweetheart, I’m serious,” Joel said from the swinging doors. “I want you to come with—”
“Joel, watch out!” I yelled. Then a shot rang out over my head.
“No!” Scrambling, I tried to get to my feet and run to Joel, but I slipped on the wet floor.
A volley of gunshots blasted around me as I fell, my shoulder exploding in pain, my head connecting with a stool on the way down. The crack echoed through my skull…
Goldwash, Nevada
December 24th
On the first day of Christmas my true love gave to me…
“Would you turn off that Christmas crap and help me clean up all this beer?” I said, throwing a wet rag at my cousin Buffalo as he nursed his drink at the end of the bar.
Buffalo caught the rag mid-air. “Jeez, Montana, can’t you let a man enjoy a nostalgic moment? Where’s your holiday spirit?”
“I think your dog ate it.” I dragged a bucket of sudsy water over, pulling the stools out on each side of Buffalo, and mopped up the beer pooled there. The clinical, ammonia-heavy odor from the mop bucket blocked out any yeasty whiffs of beer.
“Leave Brunhilda out of this.” Buffalo reached down and scratched his bulldog between her fake reindeer antlers.
“I’d like to, but her fat butt is in my way.” I nudged her with the toe of my red cowboy boot. Brunhilda grunted, but didn’t budge. “I’m not even supposed to have dogs in here. If the state health inspector were to walk in, I’m screwed.”
“Nah. I’d just explain that she’s our Aunt Harriet. They kind of look alike. Besides, if it weren’t for me and Brunhilda, you’d be all alone on Christmas Eve.”
Sad, but true. I needed some new friends. “I’m closing the bar early tonight. You can either help me with this mess or drag both of your sorry asses home.”
“Just call me Cinderella,” Buffalo said, setting his glass to the side. “Whoever spilled all of this good beer should be thrown in the hoosegow.”
Something about my standing there with a mop in my hand spurred déjà vu. I tried to remember what had happened earlier in the night, but everything jumbled together in my memory—the two old drunks caroling on top of the bar like they were Vegas night club singers, the feisty retiree in the red velvet running suit bouncing around and dangling mistletoe over her head. It was a wonder someone hadn’t broken a hip.
“You have everything you need for New Year’s?” Buffalo asked.
“Everything but a date.”
“You can be mine—minus anything disgustingly sexual.”
I grinned. “The feeling is mutual, Buff. I still can’t believe you got in a fight with your girlfriend over your neighbor’s pig and ended up with a broken arm.”
“I can’t believe she came at me with that cast iron skillet.” He bent down and scratched Brunhilda’s back. “But we’re sure glad that crazy bitch left us, aren’t we old girl? She was just jealous because you’re prettier than she ever was.”
“You and that dog are spending way too much time together. Next you’ll be telling me she’s the ‘one’ for you.”
“You know I don’t believe in just having one woman for more than a couple of months. It’s unnatural.”
“You’re unnatural. Now help me clean up this beer or get the hell out of my bar.”
Buffalo wiped the bar down in silence for several seconds. “I wonder what Jo
el is up to. You’d think he’d come home for the holidays, pay his dad a visit, drop in and share a drink with the latest woman he’d kicked to the curb.”
I stopped mopping mid-swish, my hackles rising unbeknownst to Buffalo apparently, because he kept rambling. “The guy always hated staying in the big city too long, said it rotted his lungs.”
“Can we not talk about that son of a bitch tonight?” I asked. “I’m hoping to have a sober holiday.”
Buffalo shook his head. “I can’t believe you’re still not over him. I hate to say it after he left you like he did, but that means something, Monty. You should probably go see him, run some tests, and find out if it’s really love.”
“Or just chronic heartburn,” I said, glaring at Buffalo. “If only I had the power to turn men into dung beetles.”
He laughed. “You know, it’s not your fault. Joel always could charm the spines off a prickly pear cactus if he put his mind to it. I’m just surprised it took him so long to get you into bed.”
I’d resisted Joel’s wooing as long as humanly possible, but the bastard had convinced me I was special. Not to mention that his pheromones could be a superpower. “He certainly had a talented tongue.”
Buffalo cringed. “Hey, come on. There are things about you two that I never want to know.”
“You started this.”
The phone behind the bar rang.
Looking over at the display screen, Buffalo frowned. “It says, ‘unlisted number’.”
“Don’t answer. It’s just going to be a bunch of heavy breathing.”
“Did you tell the sheriff about these calls?”
“No.”
“You’ve been getting them for a week now. It’s time to take this seriously, stat.”
“Did you just say stat?”
He continued, ignoring my interruption. “You need to let the sheriff know about them so you can get it put on file in case you end up shooting someone again.”
“That was an accident. How many times do I have to tell you I’m sorry?”
“Every time my scar throbs.” He leaned against the bar, watching the mop-head move back and forth. “I sure wish you had that damned shotgun of yours handy.”
I winked at him. “What makes you think I don’t?”
“That’s my girl.”
The bell over the door jingled.
“Bar’s closed,” I hollered.
“Hello, Montana.” The deep voice nearly stopped my heart. I turned slowly, squeezing the mop handle in a death grip. “Aren’t you going to welcome me home with open arms?”
“Well, well, well,” Buffalo said, his tone low. “Look what Santa left behind for you, Monty, some achy-breaky heartachey. You must have been extra naughty this year.” He slid me a grin. “I told you to stop talking bad about Aunt Harriet.”
I growled in the back of my throat as Joel walked closer, shucking his thick coat. With his ruffled midnight-black hair, stubble-covered square jaw, and emerald green eyes, he looked like sin in the skin, all cock of the walk.
But when he stopped in front of me, I noticed the crows’ feet bracketing his eyes, showing a tension that his big, easy grin couldn’t hide.
Don’t say it’s a fine morning or I’ll shoot ya, I heard John Wayne say in my head. “I said the bar’s closed.”
“I heard you, Shooter.” His use of my childhood nickname prickled my pucker. He patted Buffalo on the back. “Hey, Buff, you given any thought to my investment offer for the ol’ Goldwash Grand?”
Buffalo had recently “retired” after making a shitload of money in software development over in Silicon Valley and was blowing it all on fixing up the local historic hotel, which needed a lot of love and a wad of cash after sitting in the Nevada sun and wind for the last forty years.
“I don’t feel right taking money from friends or family.”
“Hey!” I gaped at Buffalo. “What about that fifty bucks you still owe me?”
“Well, your money feels just fine, Monty.”
Buffalo turned back to Joel. “How are those Vegas lights?”
“Too damned bright and crowded,” Joel answered Buffalo, but his green eyes held mine captive, fire burning in their depths like usual whenever he tried to sex my boots off. “Not enough big blue sky there.”
I curled my toes, holding on to my boots and my heart.
“What do you want, Joel?” I asked, not mincing words.
His gaze hovered on the front of my T-shirt. “I missed you, too, Montana.”
The asshole had a lot of nerve, strutting back into my world and throwing hungry looks in my direction.
I let the mop handle fall against the bar and walked around to the wall full of liquor bottles. Eenie-meenie-minie-moe. I grabbed a bottle of whiskey, sending him a stink-eyed glance. “Go back to the bright lights, Joel. It took me long enough to scrape you off the bottom of my boots last time you came around.”
Buffalo whistled between his teeth. “She ain’t pullin’ her punches tonight, Joel.”
“Come on, Shooter,” Joel said. “Is that any way to treat a guy just out of the cold on Christmas Eve? Where’s your holiday spirit?”
“Brunhilda ate it,” Buffalo said.
Brunhilda swiveled an ear in our direction.
I poured myself a shot, my trembling hand itching to pour the amber liquor over Joel’s head. How dare he show his mug in here after kicking me in the teeth the last time we talked?
The phone rang. I glanced at the caller ID—unlisted number again. Damn it!
Reaching over, I grabbed the phone base, tore it off the wall, threw it on the floor, and stomped down on it with my heel.
“Breathe all over that, jerkoff,” I said and tossed back the shot of whiskey. It burned a path all the way down, slamming into my toes.
With a tight smile for Buffalo, then Joel, I said, “You both need to get out of my bar before I fill you full of holes.”
“She ain’t bluffing,” Buffalo said. “She’s got her shotgun with her.”
“What’s up with the phone, Montana?” Joel asked, leaning his elbows on the bar. His eyes tried to read my face like the wrinkles and sunspots had tall tales to tell.
“None of your business. Lock the door on your way out.”
Without another word, I grabbed the bottle of whiskey and shoved through the swinging half-doors that led back to my office.
Change of plans this Christmas Eve—chuck the old Westerns marathon and cuddle up with a bottle of firewater until Joel went back to Vegas and took his heartbreaking grin with him.
The bastard didn’t let me make it that far.
“Montana,” Joel called from behind me. “I need to talk to you.”
“Go to hell.” I stepped through my office doorway. “You’re killing my holiday buzz.”
He followed on my boot heels, shutting the door behind him. “This can’t wait.”
“Really?” I whirled on him, whiskey sloshing in my hand. “What’s so damned important that you had to break the four months of beautiful silence we had going?”
He took the bottle from me and put it on my desk. “Your ex-husband escaped from prison a week ago.”
What! “Are you serious?” At his nod, I stumbled backwards, falling onto the silver couch I used to sleep on in the old days when my parents ran the bar. “Oh, fuck.”
Joel kneeled in front of me, holding my clammy hands in his. He smelled fresh from the desert, all spicy and earthy, like the tumbleweed he was. Just last week I was daydreaming about using a nail gun to pin him to a fence once and for all.
“We’ve had an APB out for him since he disappeared. Yesterday, a convenience store owner down in Beatty recognized him and called the cops, but he slipped by them.”
“You’re sure it was him?”
“He bought unfiltered cigarettes, black licorice, and orange soda pop.”
I grimaced. Yep, that was him all right. “How did he escape from prison in this day and age?”
“His girlfri
end seduced a guard.”
“It’s that simple, huh?”
“There’s a bit more to it, but you get the gist.”
“So, is that why you’re here, Detective Andersen? The Las Vegas Police Department has you working overtime on Christmas Eve looking for my ex?”
In other words, I was just part of his job—the source of our breakup.
“Yes.”
I had never quite gotten used to his brutal honesty, no matter how many times he lashed me with it. I twisted my hands together to keep from giving him a shiner. “Well, I haven’t seen him.”
“Tell me why you broke the phone.”
“Some asthmatic keeps calling me.”
“How long has this been going on?”
“About a week now.” My eyes widened as a light bulb went on. “It’s him, isn’t it?”
Joel shrugged. “It’s a good bet you’re on his list of must-sees this holiday season, and I doubt he plans on doing the dance of the sugar plum fairy with you.”
“Does your brother know about this?”
He nodded. “Rick has had one of his deputies sitting outside your bar tonight.”
“Nothing like having to babysit the local bar owner on Christmas Eve.”
“Why didn’t you close like Rick asked?”
“The holiday party is a Goldwash tradition and the only get-together for most of the locals living alone out here. You know that.”
“Montana, he’s going to try to kill you again.” Joel’s fingers brushed along my jaw.
I pushed his hand away and stood. “Try being the operative word.”
“Don’t be going off half-cocked.” Joel rose to his feet. “Look where that left you last time.”
“In bed with you?”
He shot me a crooked grin. “I was talking about jail.”
Oh, yeah. I hadn’t thought about that in a long time. “Well, maybe I’ll kill him first. Have you considered that, Detective?” I paced in front of my desk. “I have several boxes of ammo in my garage. I’ll just hole up at home for a few days. Buff will cover for me here.”
“Shooter,” Joel said, reaching for my arm.
I dodged him. “No, I don’t want to take any chances of getting someone hurt. I’ll just have to shut the bar down.” Which pissed me off after all I’d spent in preparation for the New Year’s party.
