A Little Town in Texas

by Bethany Campbell

  Nate Purdy said, “Cal? He’s worried that J.T.’s going to be upset by this blasted brochure. And he will be.” With one spotted knuckle he tapped the brochure on the tabletop. “This is pretty damn cheeky. It’s like that Fabian fella’s throwing down the gauntlet.”

  The others muttered in agreement, and the conversation swung back to what fresh evils Fabian might be brewing.

  Kitt rose from the counter and drifted toward the window. She saw Bubba backing his pickup truck out of the parking lot. She watched as he drove down Main Street, and her reporter’s instincts began to hum.

  If Bubba was going to Burnet County, as he claimed, he was heading in the wrong direction. Burnet County was due north. Bubba was driving west.

  She stood, brooding on this, letting the opinions and arguments in the room swirl around her. She wasn’t due to see Martin Avery, the former mayor, for another forty-five minutes. If needed, she could call him and push back the time.

  “We can handle Fabian and his fancy lawyer,” Nate said. “It doesn’t matter what they try. Just so long as we stick together.”

  A mumble of agreement went through the crowd.

  At that moment, Kitt saw Mel Belyle’s car come down the street, heading west, just as Bubba’s pickup had done. She felt an irresistible rush of curiosity.

  Where was Mel bound? Was it a mere coincidence he and Bubba were going in the same direction at the same time of day? She could not resist the temptation to find out. And she needed action. Only action could exorcise the ghosts of the past that Cal had awakened in her.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  AN AUSTIN RADIO STATION was playing the score of Smokey Joe’s Café. Mel drove, humming along with “Love Potion #9.” Stupid lyrics—about magic and instant love. But still a catchy melody, an irresistible beat.

  Casually, he glanced up into his rearview mirror. A mile or so behind him was a white compact car. It was familiar.

  He blinked hard, as if to clear his eyes of illusion. But when he looked in the mirror again, the car hadn’t vanished. He swore and smacked the steering wheel with the flat of his hand.

  Kitt Mitchell? The crazy little redhead was following him? She was truly insane. Nobody could follow someone on a back highway like this. The road was straight and empty—except for the two of them. She couldn’t stay hidden if she’d camouflaged her car with twigs and cactus plants.

  He speeded up. She sped up. He pushed the sedan up to a hundred. She fell back a little, but not much. This was stupid and dangerous, and he didn’t like handling a car this big. He wished he had his agile little Aston Martin. He’d hit warp speed and leave her behind in a slower universe.

  He changed his tack, slowing to a tortoise’s pace. She, too, slowed. He crept. She crept. He stopped. She stopped, still keeping a mile between them.

  He swore again. There was a junction ahead. He would dawdle up to it, then smash the gas pedal to the floor, fake an escape onto the other route, then as soon as she followed, cut a fast U-turn and flash past her.

  He might not be able to outrun her, but he could sure as hell outdrive her. If she ran off the road and crashed into a Brahma bull, it wouldn’t be his fault. But then, like an omen of warning, a sheriff’s department car appeared on the horizon, approaching them.

  Do no evil, the car seemed to warn. Or you will see the fateful lightning of my terrible swift ticket.

  Mel swore again. The cruiser had slowed; the deputy had noticed that two cars were crawling surreally down the highway like huge metal snails.

  Mel hit the accelerator and brought the sedan up to exactly the speed limit. Behind him, Kitt did the same. The cruiser passed them.

  When he’s out of sight, I levitate, Mel thought, setting his jaw in grim determination. But the cruiser did not continue toward Crystal Creek.

  It pulled over, turned and began to follow them. Great, thought Mel, now he’s suspicious. I’m leading a damn parade.

  This was not the way to go to a clandestine meeting. Mel picked up his cell phone and tapped out a number. A man answered.

  “This is Belyle,” Mel said. “Where are you?”

  “I’m on the outskirts of Fredericksburg. I’m almost to the museum.”

  Mel had planned the meeting to take place at the Nimitz Museum, a nice, roomy place, not too crowded on a Tuesday morning in autumn. Two men might seem to bump into each other, strike up a quiet conversation. That had been the scheme. Kitt Mitchell had tanked it.

  “Listen,” Mel said from between gritted teeth. “We’ve got to abort this mission. I’m being tailed.”

  “Tailed,” the other man said in disbelief. “Who?”

  “The reporter,” he said, glancing again at the mirror. “The redhead.”

  “Kitt Mitchell?” the other said in the same tone.

  “I can’t shake her. There’s a deputy behind us. We’re going to have to arrange another time, another place.”

  There was a pause. Mel could sense the man’s frustration. He could hear the resentment in his voice when he asked, “When? Where?”

  “I’ll call you tonight. After eleven.”

  “But—”

  “It’s the best I can do,” Mel retorted. “Be patient. There’s a lot of money at stake here.”

  “But—”

  “Tonight. After eleven.” Mel snapped the phone shut. He saw another junction, leading to the main highway. He took the turn as decorously as a preacher setting an example for others.

  Kitt followed, abiding just as strictly to the laws. The deputy followed Kitt. “I feel like a goddamn mother duck,” Mel grumbled.

  When he saw a rest stop, he signaled and turned into it. He parked and waited, tapping his fingers on the steering wheel. A few moments later, Kitt wheeled in. She stopped at the other end of the lot, her motor running. The deputy pulled in and parked between them.

  The deputy got out. He was a big man with a proud belly riding over his sheriff’s department belt. He had three chins, a Smokey the Bear hat, and the rolling gait perfected and patented by John Wayne.

  He strolled up to the driver’s side of Mel’s car. Mel sighed and rolled down the window.

  “Could I see your license?” the deputy said. It was more of a demand than a request. Mel took his wallet, extracted his license and handed it to the big man.

  “New York City,” the deputy said, in the tone one might say, I see that you’re a lower life form.

  “Yessir,” Mel nodded. “Would you mind telling me if I’ve broken a law? I wasn’t aware of it.”

  The man fixed him with a gaze of piercing intensity. “You were driving funny. When I first saw you, you were going about five miles an hour. You mind telling me why?”

  Mel shrugged, wondering if he should tell the truth or concoct the most cunning lie he could.

  Then Kitt appeared at the deputy’s side, her red hair tossed by the breeze. She barely came to the man’s shoulder, and she smiled up at him in seeming delight. “Hi, Hugo. I thought that was you behind me. Got a problem?”

  Mel could have sworn that the deputy blushed with pleasure. “Hey, Kitt. I heard you were in town.”

  She positively beamed up at him. “Is this character in trouble?” she asked with a nod toward Mel.

  Hugo struggled to regain his dignity. “I saw you two driving down the road slow as turtles. Now, I have to say my suspicion was excited. So I proceeded to question Mr. Belittle.”

  “Belyle,” growled Mel.

  “That was my fault,” Kitt said airily. “He thought I was following him.”

  “Yes,” Mel interjected. “And she was following me. I slowed down so she’d have to pass. She wouldn’t do it. Officer, can I file a complaint against this woman?”

  “Oh, grow up,” Kitt said with maddening playfulness. “It’s not like I was going to hurt you or anything. Do I scare you? Boo!”

  “I have certain business I have to conduct in confidentiality,” Mel complained. “She’s interfering with my appointed duties, and she’s infr
inging on my privacy.”

  Hugo shook his head so that chins waggled. “You shouldn’t ought to follow him, Kitt. Him driving slow like that, it could be a hazard.”

  “Going too slowly is a hazard?” Mel objected.

  “I’ve got a job to do, too,” Kitt said, looking up at Hugo. “After all, freedom of the press. Want to see my press card?”

  “No, Kitt. I know you.” He turned to Mel, leaning down to look him in the eye. “Now I think you should settle your differences with this lady—”

  “Me settle with her? She caused all this.”

  Hugo’s eyes became steelier. “You ought to settle your differences with this lady in private, not on the highway system of the state of Texas. Now I could give you a ticket—”

  “Me?” Mel said in affronted disbelief.

  Kitt put her hand on Hugo’s sleeve. She seemed incredibly tiny beside this mountain of a man. “Oh, Hugo, no,” she pleaded. “Give me the ticket. It really was my fault. And I was only trying to do my job.”

  Hugo sighed. “So am I.”

  “And so am I,” snapped Mel. “This woman is stalking me, dammit. Make her stop.”

  Hugo glared at him. “You’re the lawyer, aren’t you?”

  Mel was taken aback. The fabled grapevine had twined him in its tendrils again. “Yes, I am.”

  Hugo looked at him pityingly. “Then you ought to know that I can’t do nothing but warn her. You want her stopped? You need to go to court and get a restraining order. Or don’t they teach you that in New York City?”

  A red haze danced before Mel’s eyes. Hugo faced Kitt again. “Consider yourself warned, Kitt.”

  Her expression became fetchingly contrite. “I do, Hugo. Thanks for your concern. I’ll work it out with him. I promise.”

  “You do that,” Hugo said with a nod, and his chins nodded with him.

  “Sure thing,” she promised. She took his hand in hers. “Good to see you again. We’ll have to have coffee. Talk over old times.”

  “I’d like that,” he said.

  “Goodbye, Hugo,” she said.

  Hugo thrust Mel’s license back through the window. “Watch how you treat her,” he said. “She’s a good girl.” He smiled again at Kitt, then went back to his car in stately stride. He got inside, took up his microphone and held a conversation with someone.

  Kitt leaned against the sedan’s door, peering at Mel coolly. “Aren’t you even going to say thank you?”

  He glowered at her. “That was one of the most disgusting things I’ve ever seen. You had that poor shmuck wrapped around your little finger. There ought to be a law against women like you.”

  “You’re a lawyer,” she smirked. “Make one.”

  He wasn’t amused. “You give feminism a bad name. My God, what goo-goo eyes. I’m a victim of rank sexism.”

  “Oh, settle down,” she said. “And act nice. Or I’ll call him back.”

  “I can do it, I can get a court order,” he threatened.

  “Bull.” She laughed. “The best you could do would be to keep me fifty yards away. After all, you’re news. And the news is my job. Where were you going, by the way?”

  “No comment,” he snarled.

  “Your brochure made a big hit at the Longhorn this morning. Well, maybe ‘hit’ is the wrong word. It stirred up a lot of talk.”

  He said nothing. He wished Hugo would leave and go patrol elsewhere.

  “The big question is if Fabian’s going to buy land, whose land would he buy?” Kitt said. “I have a few ideas about that. Do you want to hear them?”

  “No,” he said. Lord, he thought irritably, but she was pretty. It was hateful of her to be so pretty. He decided not to look at her any longer. He stared at a mesquite tree instead.

  She said, “There are five major landowners in this county. J.T., Carolyn Trent, Brock Munroe, Dan Gibson and Bubba Gibson.”

  Mel glanced in exasperation at Hugo, still sitting in his cruiser talking on his two-way radio.

  “Are you listening to me?” asked Kitt.

  “No,” said Mel.

  “Now, by the process of elimination, I’d say the person who’d be most tempted to sell is Bubba. He’s getting on in years, and he has only one daughter. Her husband’s wealthy. She doesn’t want or need the ranch. Bubba could sell and retire in style. So I bet that you’re courting Bubba.”

  He’d been studying the animation in her face. Oh, clearly she loved it, analyzing, probing, second-guessing. Her blue eyes were lit with the liveliness of it all.

  “Was he in love with you?” he asked, gesturing at the cruiser. “Officer Oaf? Did he sit in study hall and pine for you in high school? Did he waste away to a mere three or four hundred pounds?”

  “Don’t be mean,” she said sternly. “He had a crush on me, that’s all.”

  “What made me guess that you reduced him to a pathetic puddle of schmaltz?”

  “I was nice to him, that was all,” she said, tossing her head. “Kids can be mean. People used to tease him. It made me mad—and sad for him. He’s a nice person.”

  “I felt that. I looked into his eyes, as friendly as razor blades, and said to myself, behind that hideously murderous stare is a nice person.”

  “Which is neither here nor there,” she answered. “The question is are you working to cut a deal with Bubba Gibson?”

  From the corner of his eye, Mel saw Hugo’s car finally backing out. The cruiser stopped by the sedan, and Hugo rolled down the window. His face appeared in it like a framed picture of the moon. “Everything okay, Kitt? Situation in hand?”

  “Everything’s fine,” she beamed at him. “Thanks for your help, Hugo.”

  “That’s what I’m here for,” he said. He gave her a mock salute and drove off.

  “Now,” Kitt said, leaning her crossed arms on the window, “back to business. Bubba’s sworn up and down he won’t sell his land. But what if you make him an offer he can’t refuse?”

  Hugo’s car reached the intersection that led back to the county road. He took the turn and the car disappeared.

  Mel grasped the door handle and opened the door. Kitt, startled, moved back. “What are you doing?”

  “Your protector is gone.”

  He got out and stepped toward her. She held her ground. He towered over her, and it was a pleasant reversal, this position of power.

  “You don’t dare do anything to me,” she said defiantly. “If you try to hurt me, damage my car—the entire country will read about it.”

  He stared down at her, his emotions in a turmoil he barely controlled. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

  “You’d better not,” she warned. “Now. Here’s my theory about Bubba. I’ve heard he’s never really liked ostrich farming. That was his wife’s brainchild. So the biggest pressures for him to keep his land are her and peer pressure. What will the people of Claro Country think—”

  Mel stepped closer still. “You know what?” he asked.

  A sudden wariness came into her eyes. The breeze stirred her hair.

  “Somebody ought to stop your smart little mouth,” he said. “And I’m just the guy to do it.”

  Then, before he quite realized it, his arms were around her, and he was kissing her the way he’d wanted to kiss her from the first.

  AT FIRST HIS LIPS CLAIMED HERS with something like fury. Kitt was shocked. It was as if he was not only angry with her, but angry with himself for wanting her.

  If he had used the kiss only to punish and dominate her, she would have broken away. She wouldn’t stand for it, and she knew how to protect herself. She might be small, but she was a fierce and cunning fighter.

  But she didn’t have to fight him. Something in his touch changed almost instantly. For a fraction of a second his mouth went still against hers, he gasped, and his body tensed.

  His hands moved to her shoulders, gripping her so that his body remained tight against hers. His face raised slightly from hers, and he stared down at her. Regret and hunger warre
d in his eyes.

  Kitt stared up at him, more than a little dazed. Her heart pummeled her breastbone, making it hard to breathe.

  “I didn’t mean to do that,” he said in a low voice. His breath was warm and caressing against her parted lips. “I meant to do this.”

  His hands moved up to frame her face. He bent and brought his lips against hers just as hungrily, but without the edge of aggression. He kissed her with a thoroughness that dazed her.

  His mouth lingered and teased. Her lips parted. He trailed one hand down the side of her throat and clasped her shoulder. His other arm went round her waist, his hand splaying just above the curve of her hips.

  Ooh! Kitt thought in confusion. I shouldn’t like this. But I do. I do. His arms were strong, and he knew how to hold a woman.

  His tongue flirted and teased. She found her own doing the same. She fought the urge to put her arms around his neck, to arch against him.

  But then he broke the kiss, gazed down at her, one eyebrow lifted. “Well,” he said. “Now we know what that’s like. So where does it go from here? Do we go back to my room? Check into a motel? Or do I keep flirting and do you keep teasing?”

  The question brought her back to her senses with a painful jolt. She should have drawn away from his first touch. But she hadn’t, and that was foolish.

  Now she stepped back, and he let his hands fall away from her. She felt oddly incomplete and alone. And she also felt ashamed of herself.

  “It goes nowhere,” she said. “It can’t.” She moved farther away. She turned and stared out at the hills and smoothed her tousled hair back from her forehead.

  “Then don’t let me do that again,” he said quietly.

  She tossed him a glare. “Don’t let you? As if it’s my fault it happened? From now on keep your hands to yourself.”

  “From now on don’t follow me.”

  She turned to face him and put her hands on her hips. “It’s so like you to make this a sexual issue.”

  He stepped back to his car, opened the door. “Is that so?”

  “Yes, it is.”

  He gave her an ironic smile. “But you’re irresistible. ‘Some girls break records. Some girls break hearts. Kitt Mitchell does both.’”