“Waiting for you. I want to take you on a date tonight.” He snatched my hand, kissed my fingers, and then held our clasped hands to his heart. “Tally Decker Jones, will you go to the fair with me tonight?”
I ran the fingers of my free hand through the dark locks of hair that perpetually fell in his eyes. “I’ll wear something pretty,” I said with a smile.
“A
www
w,” Deena sighed. “If you two are gonna give me diabetes, I better have a big ol’ sundae now, while I still can.”
“I’ve got just the thing for you,” I said. “While I’m making Deena’s ice cream, take a look at this.” I handed the crumpled envelope to Finn. “What do you make of it?”
Deena settled her girth onto one of my wrought-iron café chairs, and Finn smoothed out the envelope, studying it with a frown, while I slipped behind the counter of the A-la-mode to work a little ice cream magic. I dished up two scoops of straight vanilla bean ice cream—a superior vanilla made by heat-steeping the cream with vanilla bean before making the custard base—in a long, narrow banana split bowl. Then I dipped into my well of brandied cherries. Finally, I drizzled a scant ladle of bittersweet fudge sauce over the top. The result, a frozen cherry cordial. Perfect for the flamboyant Deena Silver.
I set the dish in front of her, and she dug in with gusto . . . and a moan of pure carnal passion. I sipped the iced tea I’d poured for myself and smiled. I wanted to please all my customers, but pleasing the genuine foodies was a special thrill.
“So? What do you think, Finn?” I asked.
“Should I ask where you got this?”
“I didn’t steal it, if that’s what you’re implying. A gentleman dropped it, I retrieved it, and I haven’t yet returned it.”
“Mmm-hmm. I think you might be using the term ‘gentleman’ in a fairly loose sense. These names after the note to collect? E. Collins is surely Eddie Collins.”
I had met Eddie Collins the year before. He’d given me Sherbet, actually, just a kitten at the time. He was a slightly shady guy, but generally harmless.
“And J. Solis is probably Juan Solis. Scar’s a little tougher.” He tapped his forehead with his index finger. “Thankfully, your man has a big brain. See, the one thing Eddie Collins and Juan Solis have in common, besides a general lack of upward mobility, is a known proclivity for dealing drugs. Eddie sticks to dealing pot, thanks to his connections back in California. Juan Solis is a wannabe gangbanger, and he peddles coke and crack here in Dalliance on behalf of the Seventy-Fives.”
“The Seventy-Fives?”
“Latino gang based in Dallas. All the Dallas zip codes start with seventy-five,” he explained.
“So we’ve got a coke dealer and a pot dealer on this list. That would suggest that maybe, just maybe, Scar is actually Daniel Skarsgaard.”
“Why do I know that name?” Deena mused, a spoonful of cherry sundae halfway between the dish and her lips.
“Danny boy owns a piece of scrub property out in the county. Inherited it from an uncle. His neighbors aren’t too happy about his upkeep.”
“Oh, of course,” Deena said. “I thought Tom was going to lynch that boy himself.” Deena’s husband, Tom Silver, owned a horse ranch out in the county. He was sort of the unofficial spokesman for the ranchers and gentleman farmers who rounded out the Lantana County countryside.
“What am I missing?” I said.
“Daniel Skarsgaard cooks meth. Sells it in town here, but also exports a fair bit to Dallas, Fort Worth, and even Austin,” Finn explained.
“Why hasn’t he been arrested?”
“Oh, everyone knows what he’s doing, but he’s got a veritable compound out there. Razor wire, dogs, the works. Who knows what sort of file law enforcement has on him? But they haven’t made a move yet. I don’t know if they’re still gathering evidence or if he’s got some sort of deal in the works. But, for now, he’s out there with his Aryan buddies, trying not to blow himself up.”
“So, three drug dealers. Why would Neck have the names of three drug dealers on his to-do list?” Deena mused.
Finn groaned. “Neck DeWinter? You two were lurking around Neck DeWinter? Hand to God, Tally, you’re going to take years off my life.”
Deena and I ignored Finn’s melodramatic outburst.
“Doesn’t Neck do work for bail bondsmen? Maybe he was supposed to pick these guys up?” I said.
“No,” Finn chimed in. “I just saw Eddie at the fair yesterday. He was riding the merry-go-round and eating cotton candy. I think he was stoned. But he was definitely walking around free. And I’d have heard something down at the paper if the authorities were scooping up three drug dealers in one fell swoop. That’s front-page stuff in Dalliance.”
“So if he wasn’t collecting the people on the list, what was he collecting?” Deena asked.
“Look, this is all real interesting,” I said. “But what about the other half of the list? Neck served court papers on Bree—B. Michaels. And on Tucker Gentry. Who’s suing Tucker? And for what?”
“I’ve got a friend in the clerk’s office at the county court,” Finn said. “I’ll give her a call. If someone filed a lawsuit, there will be a file.”
Finn flipped open his cell to make his call.
“These cherries are delicious,” Deena whispered. “What do you do to them?”
“Trade secret,” I replied with a smile.
Just then the little bell over the shop door tinkled. A guy in a yellow-and-orange courier uniform stepped in, a Tyvek envelope crisscrossed with preprinted green tape clutched in his hand. Sweat dripped from beneath the band of his billed cap, and the heat had turned the acne on his cheeks to a raging, painful crimson.
“Can I help you?” I said, crossing to greet him.
“I’ve got a package for Bree Michaels,” the young courier said.
“I can sign for it.” I reached to take the envelope, but he pulled it back.
“No, ma’am. This has to be signed for by the addressee. No exceptions.” He sniffed and hitched up his belt. This was as much power as a courier got to wield, so I let him enjoy his moment.
“Well, Bree’s on the schedule for this evening. She’ll be in at five thirty. Do you deliver that late?”
“Yes, ma’am. Until six.”
He was talking to me, but his eyes were on my display freezer.
“Would you like a cone to go?” I asked. “On the house.”
“Really?” He frowned. “I still can’t give you the package.”
I struggled to keep a straight face. “I wouldn’t dream of asking you to compromise your integrity.” He blushed, his poor acne-marked cheeks turning an even angrier shade, almost the color of ripe mulberries. “Just a scoop of chocolate, to say thank you for braving the weather.”
“Strawberry?”
I did laugh then. “Sure, strawberry.”
By the time I’d dipped up the kid’s strawberry cone and sent him on his way, Finn was off the phone.
“So?” I said. “Who’s suing Tucker?”
Finn frowned. “Not sure. There’s a lawsuit, and Jackson and Ver Steeg is listed as the counsel of record who filed the complaint. Specifically, Kristen Ver Steeg. But the file itself is sealed.”
“So there’s no way to find out what it’s about?”
“Not really. But I asked my friend why a civil suit might be sealed, and she said the only two reasons she knew about were if there were big-time trade secrets involved or if the case involved a juvenile. I can’t imagine a youth pastor having access to important trade secrets. But access to youth? You bet.”
Holy crap. Maybe Eloise was right about Tucker having a thing for teenage girls. And maybe one of those girls’ families had hired Kristen to take Tucker down.
Which meant Tucker had at least as big a motive to kill Kristen as Bree did.
chapter 16
T
he Ferris wheel climbed its halting circuit until our car hung high in the sky, just short of the summit. Distance obscured the grime and general disrepair of the midway, so the carnival rides looked like glittering toys beneath us.
Lifted far above the blanket of asphalt that held the sun’s heat throughout the night, I felt a breeze against my face for the first time in weeks. Cool, it was, with the faint electric scent of ozone.
“Feels like a storm,” Finn said.
On the horizon, a band of darker night sky hinted at gathering clouds.
“That would be nice,” I said. “Been so dry.”
Beneath us, the safety bars clattered and the car gates squeaked as attendants ushered off the last group of riders to make way for the new.
We shared the car with the giant stuffed green elephant Finn had won for me by hurling rings over the necks of old milk bottles with a delicate flick of his wrist. As a result, I didn’t have to slide my hand far before I found Finn’s fingers. I caressed him softly, and he turned his hand to clasp mine tight, our fingers entwined like teenagers’. The view was magical, but not as wondrous as that moment of closeness. We’d spent the whole evening acting as if we didn’t have a care in the world, eating hot dogs and funnel cakes, riding the rides, listening to the bluegrass band playing in the amphitheater.
Now sated, exhausted, and holding my man’s hand in my own, I closed my eyes and sighed softly, content if only for an instant.
“Tally?”
“Hmm?”
“These last few months have been . . . incredible.”
I felt a smile creep across my face, and I gave his hand a gentle squeeze.
“I don’t want this to end,” he said.
I cocked one eye open. “Why would it end?”
“It won’t.” He turned his face forward, not looking squarely at me, and I saw a ripple of uncertainty pass over his features: a slight furrowing of the brow, and thinning of the lips. Finn, usually so glib and carefree, seemed positively tongue-tied. “I mean, that’s what I’m trying to say. I want to make sure it won’t end.”
A curious lightness invaded my limbs as I tried to puzzle out what he was saying.
Out of the corner of my eye, I caught a flicker of lightning in the distance. And then my stupid phone rang, the William Tell Overture tinkling into the silence between us.
I fumbled in my purse until I found it, glanced at the screen: Bree. I rejected the call. Indictment be damned. Bree could wait.
When I looked up, Finn was watching me, a smoldering heat in his shadowy green eyes. Whatever uncertainty he’d been feeling must have melted away, because even in the half-light I could see a rock-solid resolve in his face. My breath caught.
“I was so angry when I left Dalliance all those years ago. I drove all night, blaring Nine Inch Nails on my cassette player. But then I stopped the next morning in Memphis, got a cup of coffee and watched the sun come up, and I thought, ‘Oh, hell, what have I done?’” He smiled his crooked smile, and a gust of wind—redolent of rain—ruffled the swoosh of hair that fell across his forehead. “I spent two days in Memphis, touring Graceland and eating barbecue and trying to decide whether I should come back.”
My phone rang again. “Dang it,” I muttered.
This time I flipped open the phone.
“Tal—”
“Not now, Bree. Seriously.”
“But, Tal—” I flipped the phone shut.
“Sorry.”
He waved off my apology. “What I’m trying to say is that I always wondered if leaving that night was the biggest mistake of my life.”
I felt a bubble of joy welling up in my chest.
“But now I know it was exactly the right thing to do.”
The bubble burst.
“Oh,” I said. I mean, what else can you say when your boyfriend tells you he’s glad he dumped you? Or, worse, glad that you dumped him. I pulled my hand back into my own lap.
“Tally.” Finn’s fingers stroked the soft skin beneath my jaw, forcing me to tip my head up to look at him.
“Tally, I had to leave you, be away all those years, so I could grow up. And I had to miss you like crazy so I could appreciate having you back in my life. I loved you then, but what I feel for you now is so much more. So much better.”
Beneath us, the Ferris wheel stuttered to life, shifting us slowly up and over the apogee of the arc. Another blast of wind, cool and wet, set the car swinging gently. As we moved through space, I gripped Finn’s hand again, held it tighter.
It felt as if something had shaken loose in my chest. As if maybe I’d been holding my breath since the minute I saw Finn Harper sitting on my front porch the year before, and now I could finally exhale. As if the dam of emotion I’d built was going to break with the weather.
“This thing between us,” he said, “it’s the real deal. I love you.”
“I love you, too,” I said. But my words came out on a breathy sigh, and I couldn’t be sure he heard me over the calliope chaos of the fair below, the grinding of the wheel’s gears, and a distant rumble of thunder.
The Ferris wheel cleared the top of its cycle and then stopped again to allow another group of passengers to board.
“Tally, maybe this is crazy, and maybe we should wait. But I’m through with waiting. Life’s so short, and when you know what you want . . .” His voice trailed off, and I saw his throat move as he swallowed hard. “I know what I want. I want you.”
He raised our clasped hands to his lips and kissed my fingertips, one by one. Then he looked me square in the eye, a question in his gaze. He opened his mouth—
—and my phone, still resting on my knee, rang again. Without thinking, I glanced down to turn it off. This time, the screen told me it was Alice calling.
A million ugly possibilities flitted through my mind at once. The A-la-mode had burned down. Sonny had killed Bree. Bree had killed Sonny. Bree had been arrested . . . again.
“Oh, sugar,” I cussed. I glanced at Finn, an apology in my eyes. “Alice. It might be an emergency.”
A rueful smile tipped one corner of his mouth. “It’s all right. You and your family are a package deal. That’s one of the things I love about you.”
I flipped open the phone. “This better be good, Alice.”