Читать книгу Killer Classics - Kym Roberts - Страница 12

Chapter 3

The Tool Shed Tavern should have been packed. Instead it was uncharacteristically empty. Granted it was a Wednesday night, but what the heck else was there to do in Hazel Rock, especially when Joe and Leila held an extra-long happy hour for hump day? My daddy didn’t work most Wednesdays, so I usually opened and closed the bookstore. Today, however the store had closed so early, and I’d been stuck dealing with cleanup instead of customers all day. A little downtime with Scarlet was well deserved.

Sugar walked up with margaritas and put them on the table in front of us. “This day started out as a stink bomb and is going to end the same way.”

“It couldn’t be any worse than this morning,” I said.

“Oh yeah? Look who’s sitting at the bar…with her paws on Dean.”

Scarlet and I turned and looked at who had Sugar’s flowing blond tresses all knotted up.

The woman sitting next to Sugar’s boyfriend could have been Sugar’s twin, or older sister. She had the natural beauty of a California Barbie and the pleasant smile to match. Unlike Sugar, however, Maddie MacAlister had perfect teeth. But it was the imperfection in Sugar’s smile that made her beautiful. Plus, she had an angelic personality—that disappeared when Maddie rubbed her chest on Dean’s arm.

“That does it,” Sugar exclaimed. “I don’t care if she’s the mother of his child! I am tired of trying to help that woman. I’ve invited her to events, I’ve tried to be a friend to her, but she’s got no desire to be my friend. She wants Dean back. That’s her number one goal. That woman has pushed me too far, and I am not going to tolerate her moving in on my man like that.” Sugar stormed off with her tray under her arm and the angry swagger of a woman scorned.

Woman scorned.

I thought about Nathan Daniels’s book and the conversation in the Barn with the mystery moms that morning.

“Sugar is not Candy and Maddie is not a victim,” Scarlet assured me, as if reading my mind.

“The similarities are beginning to freak me out,” I said. I watched as Sugar and Maddie squared off, their expressions anything but friendly, while Dean hunkered down lower into his beer.

“He should put a stop to that,” Cade Calloway said as he walked up to our table. The mayor was one of the best-looking men in town—next to Mateo, of course—and at his height, he was hard to ignore. But I wasn’t taking my eyes off the trio who looked like they were in the middle of a love triangle.

Dean didn’t want any part of the argument brewing between the two women. Maddie was his ex-wife, and Sugar was his girlfriend. No matter what he did, he would lose.

I looked up at Cade. “You better go over there.”

Cade’s hazel eyes turned toward me, and he grimaced. “This day is just going to keep getting worse and worse, isn’t it?”

I nodded. There was no reason to argue a moot point. I got up and followed Cade just in case he needed my support.

“Sugar McWilliams, you got no right to interrupt my conversation with Dean. Do your job and bring me another drink.” Maddie turned and ran her hand up Dean’s arm. She was wearing a white sleeveless blouse with a tight, red, leather skirt that showed off her shapely legs. The hemline had creeped up to an almost indecent height, but Maddie didn’t seem to mind in the least. She wiggled her foot that was clad in red-and-black suede ankle boots against Dean’s thigh. The blatant suggestion wasn’t missed by many.

Dean winced, pulled his arm back, and scooted off his bar stool, but Sugar only saw the too familiar way in which Maddie was handling her man. She didn’t like it one bit. Sugar leaned between them and grabbed a set of keys from the bar then shoved them into the half apron she wore around her waist. “I’m cutting you off, Maddie. You’ve had too much to drink. I’m calling you a cab.”

Maddie whipped around, her blond hair flying like a model in a hair commercial—it was too bad Scarlet hadn’t recorded it to use for her salon.

“Don’t you—”

“Ladies, please.” Cade’s tone was gentle. Too gentle. Neither one of them heard him.

Maddie grabbed for Sugar’s arm, but I slid between them as Cade pulled Sugar away.

“We’ve got this, Sugar. Why don’t you call Maddie a cab?” I asked.

“I don’t need no stinking cab!” Maddie yelled. “You may have taken my man, but you ain’t taking my keys!” Maddie’s words slurred as she lunged toward Sugar and knocked me back into Cade.

“I’m not going to let you drive when you have a baby at home.” Sugar jutted her chin out in defiance.

Finally, Dean stood up and paid attention to what was really happening. “I’ll take you home,” he said. His forty-something face was pinched with worry. Worry that Sugar wouldn’t understand and worry that Maddie would read too much into his offer. But most of all, worry for his child who might end up being a victim to Maddie’s overindulgence and drinking and driving.

Maddie beamed while Sugar scowled.

Dean held his hand out for Maddie’s car keys, and for a moment, it looked as though Sugar was going to smack his hand away. The pleading in his eyes, however, changed her mind, and she slammed the keys into his palm before stomping away.

“Do you want me to take her?” Cade asked.

I looked at him like he’d lost his mind. The last thing he needed was to get in the middle of this drama. Maddie had a well-earned reputation as a woman who always had a bank account within her sights, and Cade had the biggest bank account in town. Besides, we had enough drama of our own going on.

Dean shook his head and grabbed Maddie’s arm as she swayed toward him. “No. I got her. This is my mess to clean up.”

Maddie’s brows drew together, but despite the consternation in her words, her tone was frisky as all get-out. “Are you saying I’m a mess, Dean MacAlister?”

Dean gave his ex-wife a sad grin. “I’m saying I’m the mess darlin’. Not you, and certainly not Sugar.”

I didn’t hear Maddie’s response as they made their way to the door, but I saw the anger on Sugar’s face. She was one unhappy girlfriend.

When I’d first returned to Hazel Rock, Sugar threw a beer in my face because she thought I was making a move on her man. Tonight, I had to give her credit. If anyone deserved to wear the beer sitting on Sugar’s tray, it was Maddie Macalister. Yet, as they walked past Sugar, Dean tipped his ball cap in her direction, and Sugar held her tongue.

“Why haven’t you returned my calls?” Cade asked, interrupting my observations.

I turned and looked up at him. “Why didn’t you return my call?”

“Look at your phone. I’ve called you multiple times since six o’clock.”

“I’ve been in here since six. Why didn’t you call earlier?”

“I was catching a flight back home.”

“Oh. I didn’t know you were out of town. You should have told me.”

We worked our way back to Scarlet, who had already finished her margarita and was working her way through mine. “I ordered you a double. I figured you could use it.”

Scarlet was the best friend a woman could ever have.

Cade pulled out my stool for me and joined us. After Cade placed an order with another waitress for a beer he leaned over and asked, “How much damage did you sustain today?”

“Most of the books on the second floor are a total loss. Luckily, they’re all used books.”

“Was anything else damaged?” he asked.

I knew he was referring to his boxes we had stored in the loft and the tearoom. “The two boxes we put in the loft are a complete loss.”

Cade sighed. “I suppose the boxes were spilled open and were quite a mess to clean up, huh?”

Cade wasn’t necessarily concerned about the physical mess, he was worried about the fallout from his stuff being in the Barn. He was a politician through and through.

“Mateo knows…everything.”

“That’s it? No one else?” he asked.

“That’s it. Liza Twaine was too busy worrying about the smell of her clothes. And her hair. And skin.”

The Cade I knew and loved grinned and began laughing, until the politician in him took over and covered up his smile as he tried to wipe it off his face. The rumble of humor escaped between his fingers.

“What was in the boxes?” Scarlet asked.

“Nothing,” Cade and I said in unison.

Scarlet raised her eyebrows and looked as if she was about to call us out, but Cade steered the conversation in a different direction.

“You’re going to recycle those books, aren’t you?” Cade had run his campaign with the slogan: A greener Hazel Rock, a greener Texas. Considering our town was mostly brown, it was an appealing promise.

“Do you think I could?” I asked.

Cade nodded and took a drink of his beer that had just arrived. “Go see Dallas Dover at the recycling plant. He’s a little crude, but he knows how to get the job done. We gave him the city contract eight months ago. I’m sure he can help you out.”

Finally, a solution to my problem. I could get rid of the books that smelled worse than roadkill.

* * * *

The next morning, I borrowed my Daddy’s truck at the crack of dawn and made my way to the recycling plant located off County Road 57. A couple of trash trucks were in line to turn onto the dirt road that led to the facility on the other side of the hill. It was one of the reasons the people of Hazel Rock had approved the permit for the business. They didn’t particularly want a trash collection site in their neck of the woods—no one did—but Bin Dover Recycling was out of sight and out of mind. It didn’t get any better than that.

After a guy in a company shirt unhooked a chain from across the drive and waved us through, I followed the two trucks into the lot with a third one behind me. As I passed, I returned the friendly gesture and proceeded down the drive to where it opened up on the backside of the hill into a parking lot. I parked in front of a tan mobile trailer that had two small windows. The backside of the hill had been excavated sometime through the years and the office sat in front of the off-white cliffs. There was no grass around the office, nor were there any bushes. Just the sand rock cliff, the gravel driveway, the parking lot, and huge bins for customers to deposit their recyclables. Two pickup trucks were parked in the lot that I assumed belonged to employees.

Directly opposite the office sat a large metal building with several large garage doors that led to the sorting area for the recycling. I waited for the trash trucks to park in front of the bins marked glass, paper, and plastic then made my way up the metal staircase of the trailer. A picture of white cliffs with a large green bin sitting in front them was painted on the front of the door of Bin Dover Recycling. It was the same logo they used on their trucks.

I tried the door, but it was locked, and then noticed the hours of operation sign down below the window.

Fuzz buckets. They didn’t open for another two hours, and I needed to get back to the Barn. Scarlet and I had a book art class scheduled and were going to teach seven women how to make book wreaths that I needed to reschedule for the next day. I could not be late. Yet I didn’t want to bring back the smelly books in the back of the truck either. The odor was overwhelming.

I approached one of the trash trucks and knocked on the driver’s door. He jumped and grabbed his chest before rolling down his window.

“Sorry, I didn’t mean to startle you.”

“No worries, darlin’. I was just waiting for the boss to show up.”

“Do you mean Dallas Dover?” I asked.

“That’s right. In fact, that’s him coming across the lot now.”

I turned around to see a lanky man wearing jeans, a plaid button-down shirt, and a black leather belt with a silver buckle that had two old Mexican coins adorning the front. The black cowboy hat he wore had feathers plastered across the front. The whole outfit showed off his long dishwater-blond hair and a goatee. A pair of dark wraparound sunglasses hid his eyes and reminded me of biker goggles, but he wore a wide, friendly smile as he pulled off his leather gloves.

He glanced at the trashman and shook his head. “I’ll be with you guys in a minute.” He turned to me and grinned even larger. “How can I help you ma’am?’

“Are you Dallas Dover?”

He nodded and led me toward the trailer. “Yes, ma’am. But we’re not open for business yet. Gary at the gate should have told you that.”

I thought about the man who’d let me in the driveway. Maybe he’d been trying to wave me back. “Sorry. I thought he was just being friendly.”

Dallas laughed. “I suppose I can’t fault him for that, now can I? Since you’re already here, what can I do for you?”

“Mayor Calloway sent me to see you.”

“The mayor’s a good man.”

I nodded in agreement. “Yes, he is.”

As we approached the back of my daddy’s truck, Dallas got a whiff of the books and began looking around for the culprit.

“That smell is my problem. I own the Book Barn Princess in Hazel Rock and a skunk got into the store and sprayed the books.”

Dallas chuckled. “I was afraid my breakfast burrito was coming back to haunt me in front of a customer.”

I smiled but thought I was going to die of embarrassment for him, but Dallas didn’t seem to mind talking about bodily functions with a complete stranger.

“I hope that’s all it sprayed,” he continued. When I shook my head, he grimaced.

“That couldn’t have been good.”

“You have no idea. Can I show you what I have?”

“Sure thing.”

As we reached the tailgate, Dallas lifted his shirt and covered his face. “Are you sure it wasn’t a whole herd of skunks?”

“No, it was just one very aromatic male. He wasn’t happy.”

“I’d say he sprayed more than once.”

I hadn’t thought about that, but remembering Mateo and Liza on the floor, I had no doubt the skunk probably had. I pulled a box toward the back of the bed, but Dallas stopped me.

“I’m sorry but I won’t be able to help you.”

“What?”

“We can’t take these in the center. My employees would quit.”

“But…but…what about the bins outside?” I pointed to the bins where the three drivers waited patiently inside their trash trucks for Dallas. “Or the trucks. They could go directly into the trucks.”

“I’m sorry, miss, but those are trash trucks. They take what we can’t recycle.”

I looked over at the trash trucks and saw the different logo on the side. They had two large letter Cs with Waste Services printed below them.

Fuzz buckets. I wasn’t sure how I’d missed the Coleman County logo. “But you can’t recycle these. Couldn’t they take my boxes?”

“I would be in violation of the contract I have with them. We aren’t supposed to accept trash here, it’s only the trash we inadvertently pick up. If I took this in front of the drivers…

I can’t break the contract, but you could put them in the trash or take them directly to the dump.”

I thanked Dallas for his time and got back in my daddy’s truck. I’d already thought of his suggestions and decided against them. They weren’t viable options. For one, my trash pickup was Wednesday morning. It was Thursday. Where in the world would I put these boxes for the next week? I’d also thought of taking them to the dump, but a “green” candidate couldn’t have his name associated with such a move, and Cade’s stuff couldn’t be handed off to dump personnel to go into a landfill. Nor could books stamped with the Book Barn’s trademark tiara stamp. We were located in his town. We were his friends. We, namely I, could be a blemish on his career. The last thing in the world I wanted credit for was being the boil that busted his career.

I backed up and drove past the trash trucks raising the recycle bins to empty into their beds, but all I could think about was what I had to do. It was the last thing any bookstore owner would even consider. Yet I had no choice.

I had to burn the books.