by Sandra Hill
“Schenectady? What in hell are you doing there?”
“I took a little detour. I wanted to stop and scope out the area a bit for a case I’m working after George’s wedding.”
“Yeah, spy guy? What kind of job?”
“Nothing earth-shattering, trust me. Some dress maker jumped on a subpoena and disappeared. She’s originally from this area and still has family here, so I thought I’d stop and look around, see if anyone’s caught sight of her.”
“Well, haul your ass out of there and get yourself to Maine.”
“The thing is, Slick, sometime between when I landed here and now, the trains north have stopped running altogether. Something about an obstruction up ahead.”
“Hmm, that sucks. So when will you hit Snowdon?”
“At this rate, next April.”
Sam swore softly. In the background, Kevin heard a hauntingly familiar voice. “Samuel Merrick, you watch your language.”
“Oh, Lord,” Kevin muttered, shuddering. “That’s not Mrs. Smith, is it?”
“I’m sorry, Mrs. Smith,” Sam said, in the same repentant tone Kevin remembered from eighth grade English class.
“You’re stuck on a bus with Pinch-face Smith?”
“She’s one of the traveling Santas,” Sam replied in a low growl. Despite his frustration over the transportation problem he was facing, Kevin laughed. “Lucky you, Slick.”
“She’s mellowed. She’s only corrected my grammar twice in the last few hours.”
“I heard that, young man,” Pinch-face admonished. “You’re not too old to get the ruler, you know.”
“She hasn’t mellowed much,” Kevin noted.
“Hasn’t aged much either. None of these folks have. There’s got to be something in the water at Winter Haven.”
“Well, with old man Anderson running the place, it’s probably bootleg whiskey.”
“Actually, he passed away.”
Kevin’s heart gave a lurch at the news. Although Reba Anderson’s dad pretty much disapproved of her friendship with the three of them, he hadn’t forbidden it, either, unlike most other folks in town. “I’m sorry for Reba,” he said quietly. “I wish I’d known. She was a fun kid.” And at one point Slick had been crazy about the girl. But Kevin didn’t mention that part. As cool and smooth-tongued as Slick had been back then, somehow he’d always been kind of goofy around Reba.
“Yeah, well . . . you ought to see her as an adult.”
Kevin frowned. “Say again?”
“She’s the tour director for this Santa thing.”
“Reba’s on the bus?” Kevin burst out laughing. “Well, that explains why you’re there, loverboy.”
Seeing Reba again was probably driving Sam crazy. So changing the subject seemed like a real good idea. “So, fly boy, got any suggestions for getting me to Maine?”
“Give me your exact location, JD.”
Kevin winced a little at the old nickname. He didn’t mind so much that his best buddies called him JD, but at the origins of the letters. They stood for “Juvenile Delinquent,” the assignation he’d been given by the disapproving adults in Snowdon within weeks of his arrival at White Mountain Home for Boys. He headed over to a porter. “Where am I?” he asked bluntly.
The guy looked at him like he was a few slices shy of a loaf, but finally gave him a precise enough directional location to relate to Slick, which he did. Slick said, “I’ll call you back,” and hung up before Kevin could respond.
Shaking his head, Kevin flung his backpack over his shoulder and headed back to the information desk. The teenybopper behind the counter swallowed audibly as Kevin approached. He ran a hand through his shaggy hair and plastered as engaging a smile as he could muster on his face. If he were Slick, the girl would have fainted dead away. As it was, she merely returned his smile. “Is there something else I can do for you?” she asked.
The only thing she could do for him was find him a way to get to Maine. He had the feeling that feat wasn’t in her repertoire. He opened his mouth, but she quickly interrupted. “Has anyone ever told you that you look exactly like Harrison Ford?”
That stopped him. “Harrison Ford?” The man had to be in his fifties.
“Oh, yes. Just like him. You know, Indiana Jones.”
Well, that wasn’t too bad, he supposed. Harrison had been a good bit younger in his Indie days. “Nope, never heard that one,” he mumbled. “Got any good news for me since last time we talked?”
Her hand fluttered to her neck. “You mean, since ten minutes ago?”
“Right.”
“Uh . . . no. The track north of us is still out, and probably will be for the next week.”
Damn. “Have any suggestions for alternative forms of transportation?”
“I’m afraid not,” she said, her brown eyes sympathetic. “All bus routes northbound have been suspended, and all of the airports within a hundred miles are closing down in anticipation of the storm.”
Double damn. He glanced around. “What are all of these stranded people going to do?”
She brightened considerably, and the Christmas ornament earrings she wore jangled as she nodded. “There’s a Motel 6 right next door. Why don’t you go on over and settle in until the storm passes?”
“I’m afraid I can’t do that,” Kevin replied, shaking his head. “I have to be in Maine in three days. He held up his hands. “I’m best man in a wedding.”
“I’m sorry.”
With a nod, Kevin moved to turn away, but just then his cell phone started belting out Jingle Bells. He rolled his eyes as he pulled it from the pocket of his bomber jacket. He really had to keep his secretary, Mrs. Boswell, away from his toys. He still hadn’t gotten over what happened the night she’d borrowed his hand cuffs.
“Wilder.”
“Hey, JD,” Slick growled.
“Tell me you’re flying up here to pick me up.”
“No can do, but I’ve got the next best thing.”
“What’s that?”
“If you can get to the truck stop on Route 8 within the next hour, Betty Morgan says we’ll be able to veer off course a little and pick you up.”
“We?” he asked suspiciously. “I hope you don’t mean the Santa Brigade.”
“That’s what I mean, buddy.”
“Let me see if I’ve got you here, Slick. You’re offering to stick me on a bus with Mrs. Smith, and a whole bunch of other Snowdon residents who probably still believe I’m the devil incarnate?”
“They were all real pleased to hear you’re not doing twenty to life in Attica.”
Kevin scowled. “And you cannot mean the Betty Morgan.”
“The one and only.”
“Betty Bad-ass is driving that bus?”
“In between trying to order me to drop and give her twenty, yes.”
“Only twenty? Then she’s definitely mellowed.”
“Uh . . . not really. She just can’t supervise more than that in the rearview mirror.”
Through the phone Kevin could hear a chorus of folks singing cheery Christmas carols. Everywhere he looked in the train station, people were greeting each other jovially, as if they didn’t have a stranded care in the world. He’d landed in the holiday Twilight Zone. “Not a chance I’m boarding that hell on wheels.”
“You have a better offer, do you?” Sam asked.
Kevin glanced around wildly, silently praying for Santa and his sleigh to appear. Anything but facing the elder statesmen and women of Snowdon. Although he was secretly proud of the fame his hometown folks had achieved with the yearly Santa Brigade trek, he also knew that many of those self-same philanthropists had written him off as hopeless a long time ago. Only George had had faith. Only George had refused to give up on him.
“I think I’d rather hitchhike and take my chances with a deranged trucker.”
“But see, we’ve got Betty! There’s no more deranged than that.”
“Merrick, you get KP at the next stop,” Kevin heard a v
oice bark in the background.
Sam swore.
“Samuel!” Pinch-face Smith said.
“Oh, God!” Kevin muttered. There was no way he was getting on that bus. “No way I’m getting on that bus.”
“Do you want to see George tie the noose or not, JD?”
“Yes, but—”
“Look, Maudeen went online and checked all options, JD.”
“Maudeen? Maudeen of Color Me Bad fame?”
“That’s the one.”
“This is getting scarier by the second.”
“You are not going to find a better offer,” Sam said, ignoring his complaints. “Most roads are closed or nearly impassible. This is about the only boat on the move.”
“How is that, anyway? How’s Betty getting around all the road blocks?”
“You wouldn’t believe the connections this broad has. Not to mention, this bus is so souped up, a blizzard couldn’t stop it. Much as I hate to admit it, JD, this is your best and safest chance at making it to George’s wedding.”
“Shit,” Kevin muttered, as he watched an Amish woman emerge from the station diner and head in his direction. Why she captured his attention, he couldn’t say. There were tons of Amish folks in this part of the state, and she was dressed just as drably from head-to-toe as the rest of them. But something in the way she moved was seriously graceful. And although her plain blue dress and white smock exposed not an ounce of flesh, there was something blatantly sexy about her.
He turned away, snorting in self-disgust. He was either deranged or sex-deprived. Or both. “This sucks.”
“Actually, I think you’d be wildly in awe here, JD. I know I am.”
Considering Slick was a member of the elite Blue Angels, who flew some of the most sophisticated military birds in the air, Kevin was somewhat impressed. “Really?”
“Not to mention, think how much fun we can have regaling these folks with all of our heroic accomplishments. You can lie about yours.”
“Kiss ass,” Kevin said, but he grinned.
“Come on, JD. This’ll give us more time to catch up,” Sam said in his best Slick voice. The one no one on the planet seemed able to resist. Including his sucker friends, apparently. “This could be some serious fun,” Sam added.
“Oh, yeah. About as much fun as getting ambushed by a FTA.”
“A what?”
“Failure to appear. Never mind, just bounty hunter lingo, Slick. Way above your IQ.”
“I’ll let that one slide, seeing as you’re probably real proud of yourself for finally learning what IQ stands for. But what’s this bounty hunter crap? Is the PI work not panning out?”
“Nah, I’ve got more work than I can handle. But this is gravy. And I could use the bucks for law school.”
“Law school? Holy shit, JD!”
“Samuel!”
“Sorry, Mrs. Smith.” Sam coughed. “Cop, private dick, bounty hunter, and now law school? You’re going downhill fast, pal.”
“This from a guy who gets his rocks off doing wheelies in mid-air. What can I say? I’m a work in progress.”
Sam chuckled. “Come on, JD, what do you say? Let Bad-ass Betty and the Santa gang rescue you?”
Kevin wanted to get on that Santa bus about as much as he wanted to . . . miss George’s wedding. No, the very last thing he wanted to do was miss George’s wedding. Wonder of wonders, George Garrison was getting married. And there wasn’t a chance in hell Kevin would miss that event, even if he had to walk to Maine to get there.
A scent invaded his nostrils. Or scents. It seemed like a combination of perfume and cinnamon. Then, as he wrestled with his choices – which seemed to have dwindled to one very unappealing choice – he heard the info babe behind him say, “Hey, Miz Zook. How are you?”
“Ah, good, thank you,” a petal soft female voice answered, in a somewhat foreign accent that sounded strangely . . .not quite right. “And a good holiday to you.”
“What kind of pies didja deliver to the diner today?” the young girl asked. Out of the corner of his eye, Kevin saw that the girl was addressing the Amish babe. The unfathomably sexy Amish babe.
“Pumpkin, rhubarb and pecan today,” the woman said.
That voice traveled straight through Kevin’s body, as if caressing his insides with velvet. Kevin ignored it. “Okay, I’ll bite,” he said. “What do I have to do to meet the bus?” He shuddered at the thought.
“Make it to a place called Truck You’ within the next two hours. We’re going out of our way to rescue you, so be grateful, JD.”
He felt as grateful as a five-year-old getting coal in his stocking, but he gritted his teeth. “Truck You?’ You’ve got to be kidding me.”
“Nope. These road folks have a real good sense of humor.”
“Where is that again?” he asked, then grimaced when he was bumped from behind.
“Route 8. Betty says it’s pretty close to where you are right now.”
“Hold on.” Kevin swung back to talk to the info babe, and came face-to-face and almost breast-to-chest with the Amish woman. He sucked in a breath.
She sucked in a breath.
He stared into pale green, startled eyes that literally made his heart kick into his ribs.
She stared back unblinkingly, and Kevin knew a fleeting moment of wondering if she liked what she saw.
The moment was fleeting, because he could tell right away she didn’t like what she saw at all. In fact, her startled expression gave way to growing horror, as her eyes swept over his face.
Obviously she didn’t share info-babe’s Harrison Ford observation. But the alarm in her eyes was pretty damn insulting. He knew he wasn’t anything that special, even when he cleaned up, but he also wasn’t the hunchback of Notre Dame. Unless he’d just broken out in a horrid disease, he couldn’t find a good reason for her reaction.
Even horrified, she was gorgeous. Her heart-shaped face and pink lips begged for a man’s touch. Which was utterly ridiculous because her outfit and bonnet said loud and clear, “Back off, bucko.”
Amish babe’s amazing eyes dropped instantly, and she murmured, “This is for you,” to the info chick, giving the girl a small, gaily wrapped package. “And now I must go,” she added, before beginning to hustle out of there like a world class sprinter.
“Wait!” info babe said. “I have something for you, too!”
The Amish honey stopped abruptly and reluctantly, then turned back to the desk, her head hanging way low. “You needn’t have done such a thing,” she protested in that soft, smooth voice and strange accent.
Kevin realized that the delicious smell he’d just encountered actually emanated from her. The bakery scent he could understand. But he could swear there was perfume mixed in there. Chanel No. 5 if he wasn’t mistaken. And he was pretty sure Amish people wouldn’t be allowed to wear Chanel No. 5, although he didn’t know that for sure.
As he stared at her profile, his gaze once again landed on her lips. They were full and lush and he could swear covered in a pastel lip gloss. He was almost positive lipstick would be a no-no in Amish country. Vanity being one of their seven deadliest sins.
His eyes happily drank in her profile and the rest of her features.
If she wasn’t wearing blush, then she was a natural blusher. And if she wasn’t wearing mascara, she had some awesome eyelashes. Her nose needed no help. It was just plain cute.
A tingling sensation tickled his gut. It was a reaction he’d come to learn over the years that told him something wasn’t quite right. He took a closer look at the Amish chick and the tingling intensified. He’d never known any Amish folks personally, but somehow she seemed eerily familiar. Did she resemble some woman he’d dated in the past?
He really mourned that ugly cap on her head. He’d love to know what color and length her hair was. Just out of a PI’s natural curiosity, of course.
“JD?” he heard shouted from the speaker of his phone, which had somehow lowered from his ear.
He
shook his head and lifted the receiver. “What?”
Slick cussed, and again Kevin vaguely heard Mrs. Smith in the background, chastising.
“If we’re picking you up,” Slick said, after apologizing once again, “we have to know in about one-point-five minutes. It means a different turn-off.”
Kevin dragged his gaze from the Amish babe back to the info kid. “Do you know where a place called Truck You’ is?” he asked. He thought he heard a low gurgle from Amish beauty, but couldn’t be sure, with all the noise around them.
Info babe smiled, apparently happy to have good news this time. “Sure! It’s right up the road, just a couple of blocks.”
“Can I catch a cab?”
The girl’s happy smile faded. “Yes, sure, I think so. As long as they’re still running when your number comes up on the waiting list.”
“Waiting list? How long is the waiting list?”
She checked a clipboard. “You’ll be number thirty-nine if I add you right now.”
Kevin started to curse, but remembered the Amish babe just in time. “And what’s the ETA of that cab thirty-eight passengers from now?”
“This is just a guess, but about three hours?”
He bit back more cussing. “There’s a hundred dollars in it to somehow slip my name up in the top five.”
“Oh, I don’t know if I’m allowed to do that!” the young girl said, looking distressed and greedy all at once.
Kevin decided to help her enjoy the morality of it by letting her get a peek at the green herself. He reached into his jacket pocket for his wallet, and found the space aggravatingly empty. That couldn’t be. He always kept his wallet in his left hand pocket. But just in case, he patted himself down, then growled, “Hold on,” as he dug through his backpack, tossing the tools of his trade aside, digging through his skivvies and toiletries, and practically chewing off his tongue to keep a string of epithets that would singe the hair off a bear from passing through his lips.
This time he did swear. He just did it silently. “Appears with all the other fun adventures this trip is promising,” he told Sam, “I’ve been robbed.”
Out of the corner of his eye he watched the Amish woman try to tug back her freedom from the info girl who seemed hell-bent on holding onto her for dear life.
