Winsor, Linda

by Along Came Jones

  Deanna's neck grew hot as he shot a speculative glance at her. Ordinarily she'd have shot back that it was none of his business how she chose to spend her hard-earned money, but she needed to remain on the old coot's good side. "I didn't buy it new. It was a drug repo auction. I was just in the right place at the right time."

  "Till now," Charlie observed in a wry voice. "It just don't pay to buy outside the good old U.S. of A.; I don't care how new a model ya get or how good a buy it is. Why, I wouldn't take one if it was given to me," the mechanic snorted. "Foreign parts is foreign parts and sooner or later a body's goin' to pay to get 'em... when and if they find 'em, that is."

  Deanna nodded. How could she not agree? If she'd had an old American-made car, Charlie would undoubtedly have had a used part in the vast lot of rusting has-beens, or he could have found a new one right away But her blue baby was so pretty, so snazzy And she'd taken a leave of her senses with an atypical crush—in love with love, with life, and with a stylish Stetson. It was a far cry from the well-worn topper Shep tipped off his forehead in dismay

  "Just get it so it will run. I'll worry about the airbag expense later," she said with a sigh.

  "Check out the airbag anyway, Charlie," Shep contradicted.

  "Getting a price won't hurt," he explained to Deanna, "and if I'm going to fix something, I want it done right. Might have saved that knot on your noggin'."

  Charlie's spontaneous smile diffused any further objection she could muster. It was almost a fatherly one, a protective kind that spoke of genuine concern. She had to steel herself to keep from latching on to the sentiment like a lifeline. Her parents were gone and the last shoulder she'd leaned on vanished into thin air, allowing her to fall flat on her face in a heap of trouble.

  "I'll make more calls," Charlie offered. The eyes beneath the ample bushes of his brow narrowed as they shifted from Shep to Deanna then back to Shep.

  "Thanks, Charlie. I know you'll look out for me. Always have." Shep reseated his hat, as if the matter was settled.

  Strange. She had looked out for herself pretty well until recently. She prided herself on being able to stand and survive on her own. Talk about being an idiot. The past few days clearly had shown her how wrong she'd been. If Deanna wanted to rely on someone, she'd better look beyond her mirror like Gram always said.

  Like Shep did. She recalled how easily he'd given God credit for getting him through another day, how trusting it had sounded. Oh, she could ask quickly enough, but could she earnestly trust like that? It defied logic to sit back and wait for God to take over, like letting go of a steering wheel and allowing the car to steer itself into or out of a collision. How could she not try to stop or avoid it? Staring at the accordion-pleated hood of her blue baby, Deanna had proof positive that even with both hands on the wheel, she hadn't been able to control her own destiny

  Shep's voice invaded the cloud of revelation enveloping her mind. "Just radio me when you hear something."

  "Sure thing," Charlie replied. "I wanna get it out of here right quick. Invites vandals."

  Ushering Deanna to his Jeep, Shep halted in midstep.

  "Vandals?" He echoed her very thought.

  An icy stab of alarm cleared Deanna's mind, riveting her attention to what the mechanic had to say

  "Yep. I can't figure it." Charlie jerked his head toward the fence where a patch of new chain-link fence beamed bright against the weathered rust of the old. "Cut clean through my fence like one of them criminals on TV and made straight for that snazzy job. I only put up the fence to keep Buck from tomcattin' around at night. But come quarter to three this mornin', he commenced to raise thunder. By the time I got out here, whoever it was had left his cutters and a right smart-lookin' jacket hanging on the fence in his hurry to get out. Saw his taillights as he headed away from town, tires a squealin' and Buck a yappin' after him."

  Charlie glanced over at a bulldog with a drab fur coat at least two sizes too large at the collar. The face he turned toward them at the mention of his name reminded Deanna of an aged Winston Churchill sans the cigar.

  Shep scowled. "Did you call the sheriff?"

  "Naw, probably some drifter. I figured he saw this rig and helped himself to a closer look." Charlie grunted. "'Sides, if he came back for his jacket, me 'n' Buck would be ready for 'im."

  "Yeah, if he was local, he'd have known about Buck." Shep turned to Deanna. "Why don't you take a look and see if anything is missing. You'd think he'd have at least snagged those hubcaps."

  "He was more curious than greedy," Charlie informed them. "Had the trunk popped. Left the glove compartment open. I just stuffed everything back in there."

  "You going to look?" Shep prompted when she made no move toward the car.

  Deanna felt as if she physically pulled herself from the icy pool of panic that formed in her mind. He. Was he the one—or one of the ones—who'd trashed her apartment? Had someone found her? And if so, what was he looking for? It should have been obvious by now that she wasn't floating in cash, or she wouldn't be stranded out here.

  Canada wasn't so far away Deanna had seen enough crime television to know that with the kind of money she'd been accused of taking, she could have had false IDs made and caught a plane to anywhere. She walked over to the sports car with leaden feet and slipped into the driver's seat. Her hand shook as she opened the glove box. The owner's manual, along with all her maintenance receipts, were stuffed into the organizer in haphazard manner. She pulled them out and put them in order, wishing her life could be put to rights so easily.

  The contents of her vinyl cosmetic bag that had contained a brush, spare lipstick, and a few personal products had been emptied and scattered into the far recesses of the glove box. Leaving them where they were, rather than call attention to the contents, she put the organizer over them and closed the compartment door. As far as she could tell everything was there.

  What good would anything she had in the car be to anyone anyway, much less a vandal or a thief? The answer to that nearly paralyzed her.

  They didn't want her car. They wanted her.

  Shep leaned on the open door of the vehicle, peering in. "Anything missing?"

  "N...no. I don't think so. Must have been a nosy vandal." Her attempt to laugh was shallow at best.

  He stepped back. "Hey, Charlie, is that the jacket in the back?" At his nod, Shep reached behind Deanna and retrieved a crumpled and soiled silk-linen blend sport coat. "You're right; he must have been a well-dressed drifter," he said, checking out the label.

  "Like as not that was either stolen or handed out at a shelter."

  Deanna couldn't comment with her heart wedged in her throat. She'd seen the jacket before—on C. R. Majors. Except it couldn't have been C. R. because he was dead. Even expensive men's wear stores carried more than one of a particular design or color. Besides, C. R. wouldn't be caught dead—

  She winced as Shep tossed the jacket in the back and helped her out of the car.

  "Did I hurt you?" He released his hold on her arm.

  "No, I'm just a little stiff from yesterday's accident, I guess." Somehow her rubberlike legs supported her. Part of her insisted the jacket was just a fluke. She was overreacting with nerves that were frayed to the point of snapping. Yet another more latent voice cried out, God? as if some heavenly voice was going to reassure her.

  "The jack and spare are still there," Shep observed from behind her. He rifled through the contents of the trunk.

  Unless C. R.'s jacket had been taken by his murderer. Unadulterated fear chilled the very marrow of her bones, oblivious to her desperate reasoning. But how had the man found her car when she didn't even know where she was?

  "It's a real tire, too," Charlie observed in approval as Shep pulled out an old map that must have belonged to the previous owner from under the spare.

  No, the one who searched her place couldn't have found her, she concluded, grateful that both men seemed oblivious to her dismay. It was simply impossible.

&nbs
p; "Don't see much of that anymore," the mechanic went on. "Them flimsy little emergency jobs come standard now."

  Shep grinned. "Not in these cars, Charlie." He handed Deanna her leather-encased portfolio. "Anything missing in this?"

  As though expecting something to fly out at her, she peeked inside. Nothing inside was worth stealing, just plain paper and her drafting supplies. She had no real work in progress, having been on the job just long enough to acquaint herself with the current procedures and marketing personnel. At least her search gave her a chance to find her voice, if not any answers to the questions bombarding her.

  "Nothing is missing that I can tell. Like Mr. Long said—"

  "Make that Charlie," the older man interrupted. "I don't hold with much formality around here."

  "Like Charlie said," Deanna flashed an appreciative glance at her host, "whoever went through the car must have just been curious." And he was likely some vagrant who lucked out at a shelter with wealthy contributors. C. R. didn't have the only expensive jacket in the world. She took a deep breath to override the sense of helplessness her lingering doubt instilled.

  "Or thought there might be some money tucked away," Charlie speculated. "This model all but shouts big bucks."

  "Well, it lies," Deanna said. "Just because it looks expensive doesn't mean it was." And just because the jacket looked like C. R.'s didn't mean it was. Appearances could be misleading. "I'm just glad they didn't damage anything when they found nothing worth stealing."

  It had to be vandals... a fluke. Since she was certain that she couldn't find where she was on a map, the police or the people who'd ransacked her apartment couldn't either. End of story.

  "Buck didn't give him much time to think beyond saving his hide." Charlie pointed to the bulldog watching them through the folds of his brow.

  Buck didn't look like Deanna's idea of a junkyard dog, despite Charlie's talking as if the animal did more than sleep, eat, and cast a lazy eye over visitors. Somehow she pictured a Doberman or a rottweiler, not a pudgy pooch that hardly looked as if it could catch a burglar any more than its stub of a tail. Talk about appearances being deceiving.

  "Nonetheless, you ought to report it, Charlie." As if his word settled the matter, Shep started toward the Jeep. "Never can tell about these things."

  Deanna cast a quizzical look at Shep as she got in on the passenger side. His expression was fathomless, suggesting neither suspicion nor dismissal. From what she'd seen to date of her rescuer, if he were to err, it would be on the side of caution.

  "Aw, I hate to bother Sheriff Barrett. And that deputy of his is more interested in listenin' to the scanner than doin' anything productive." Charlie followed Shep to the vehicle. "I been tellin' you, Shep, you ought to consider takin' the sheriff's place when he retires this fall. Lots of folks think that's right up your alley"

  "It's not gonna happen, so save your breath. Hopewell needs all my time." Shep started the Jeep, giving it gas when it threatened to die.

  "Don't hurt to think about it, does it?"

  The Jeep jerked backward as Shep shifted into reverse. "I've got all I can think about right now without adding something else."

  Lips twitching, the mechanic stepped back to give them space. With a keen glance at Deanna, he gave in to a lopsided grin. "Yep, I reckon you do at that."

  Shepard Jones wasn't the only one with a lot to think about. Deanna fastened her seat belt as they accelerated out onto the highway toward Buffalo Butte proper. He couldn't possibly be any happier than she about her being stuck here without a vehicle for a minimum of six weeks. She'd thought for certain that Charlie could hammer out the dents, replace the flat tire, and she'd be on her way. Who knew her radiator and some special order thingamabob was trashed as well? Without adding auto theft to her rap sheet, she was stuck in the boonies where people left the g off of half the words that ended in -ing, dogs and guns were man's best friends, and dressed up for women meant clean jeans.

  "Well, that settles that, I guess," Shep drawled. "I might as well take you back to Great Falls."

  Deanna's breath caught, but it didn't stop the feel of the blood racing from her face to feed the panicked staccato of her heart. The only thing worse than being stuck here for six weeks was being stuck in Great Falls without a getaway car. She couldn't go back there. She just couldn't. She needed to lay low until she figured out what she could do.

  "We'll hash it out over lunch," he suggested when she didn't reply.

  After a short stop by the Farm and Ranch General, Shep took her to a vintage fifties railcar diner. The sign in front advertised a hot turkey sandwich and "fixins" for $2.99 as the special of the day. A shiny glassed-in entrance appeared to have been a recent addition, no doubt for climate control to the streamlined structure of time-dulled stainless steel.

  As they entered, almost every head turned toward them, save those people who stared at the new arrivals via the reflection in the mirrors lining the diner walls. As she'd done since leaving Charlie's garage, Deanna warily searched each face, although she tried not to be as obvious as the curious townspeople. To her relief, none looked threatening—just the everyday rural sort.

  Undaunted by the blatant attention, Shep ushered her to an empty booth around the end of the lunch counter by the restroom entrances, affording them some semblance of privacy.

  Even though Deanna had just eaten her egg sandwich, the sight of the oversized pies in the glass display case on the counter and the smells emanating from the grill made her mouth water. The last time she'd eaten in a place like this had been with her grandmother when Deanna was a schoolgirl. The old diner at the corner of Maynard and Vandam had long since been replaced by a parking garage for a new medical facility Somehow the similarity of Buffalo Butte's Town Diner to the one from her past was reassuring.

  "So what'll it be today, Shep darlin?" A waitress—the only one as far as she could see—spoke to Shep, but her eye was on Deanna. She even looked like the Maynard Diner's Miss Fanny— heavy on the eyeliner and in a faded pink uniform with a spotless white apron. All that was missing was the little pleated frill in her tightly permed hair.

  Shep grabbed a laminated menu from behind a miniature jukebox listing golden oldies and, glancing up, answered the inevitable question in her eyes. "Maisy let me introduce you to Deanna Manetti. Deanna, this is Maisy O'Donnall. She and her husband run the best diner in town."

  "That's because it's the only diner in town," Maisy shot back, not quite appeased by Shep's brief introduction. "Manetti? That's not a local name is it?"

  "I'm from New York." Deanna extended a manicured hand. "Pleased to meet you, Mrs. O'Donnall."

  "Lord 'a mercy, just call me Maisy. Last time I heard Mrs. Anything was right after I said 'I do.'"

  "Miss Manetti is just checking out the place before she decides to take a job in Great Falls and relocate permanently from the East," Shep said. "Or she was until that blamed stallion ran her off the road and wrecked her car. She's been stranded out at Hopewell."

  "Now I could think of worse folks to be stranded with." The wink Maisy gave him was outrageous.

  "It's just till my car is fixed," Deanna mumbled, shooting an uncertain look at Shep. Where had that come from? Was it the answer to her shaky prayer or her desperation to stay at Hopewell until she had wheels again?

  "Honey, if I was you, I'd take some irreplaceable thingamajig out of that vehicle and hide it, if you get my drift."

  And Miss Fanny had also flashed that same flirtatious twinkle Maisy directed at Shep.

  "Don't pay any attention to her," he said. "She runs on that way to all the men. And if they're single, her sole purpose in life is to herd them to an altar to alter their status."

  "It's a scientific fact that married men live longer than single ones," Maisy rallied, her ample bosom swelling beneath the bib of her apron like that of a ruffled hen.

  "Hey, Mais, where's that coffee?" one of the patrons at the counter called out.

  "Now, Homer darlin', y
ou know full well where it is," the waitress hollered over her shoulder. She turned back to Deanna with a woman-to-woman wink. "I'm making Shep's New York girlfriend here welcome. It wouldn't do for her to think we were antisocial."

  It was almost like going back to the safety and security of another era... except instead of Gram, a tall, dark, and handsome cowboy sat across from her, a flush climbing up from his collar. Maybe Shep wasn't as impervious to his surroundings as he'd have others think. Or instead of being embarrassed, he was quietly fuming over her presumption that she was staying at Hopewell for the next six weeks.

  "I'll have a burger and fries," he said quickly in an obvious effort to bring Maisy back to the point of their visit. "What'll you have, Miss Manetti?"

  The earlier tease in his voice had hardened as well. She shouldn't have mentioned it in front of someone. Why couldn't she just let things develop without taking over the controls? This mess with C. R. scrambled her brain and undermined the faith she sought to dust off.

  Deanna skimmed over the menu, unable to focus on the specials. Finally she seized upon a picture of a soup and sandwich meal. "A cup of the chicken soup looks good. Oh, and a diet cola." Her mouth had gone dry as the dirt on Hopewell's main street.

  "Landsakes, gal, no wonder you got so many sharp corners. Men 'round these parts like their women more rounded, if you get my drift."

  She squirmed under Maisy's disapproval. "I had a late breakfast." No doubt, the waitress would make her eat every drop of soup, just as Miss Fanny always had. After Deanna's loved ones had passed on, she thought people had stopped caring. Maybe that was why she'd been such a dupe when it came to C. R. and his seeming solicitous attentions.

  Maisy shifted her attention back to Shep. "You want coffee as usual?" At his nod, she leaned over and said in a sawmill whisper, "Take care of this one and she'll round out nice as me."

  "Well, you've done it now," he remarked, watching the waitress retreat behind the counter.

  "Done what?" Deanna gave him a startled look. This was it. He would insist on taking her back to Great Falls.