Juliet's Law (11 page)

He shook his head, his mouth tight. “They wouldn't let me.”

Gesturing him inside, she asked, “What did you find out? When will they set bail?”

“Very earliest is Wednesday. The judge is out of town until then.”

Juliet narrowed her eyes. “Was that deliberate? The deputy who arrested her seemed to want it to be a very humiliating experience.”

“Probably.” He met her eyes. “It's a closed community in some ways. Desi has been accepted more than some because she is a great vet, but Claude made some enemies.” He sounded calm, but his anger made his back too straight, his face stiff.

She offered a plate of cookies and Josh helped himself to a handful. “Wednesday! I hate thinking of her in there for so long.”

“Me, too.” He took a bite, then said, “I don't think you should stay here. It's pretty isolated and you're not used to it.”

Relief moved through her like a wave of wind, cooling her fear. “I don't want to. But where will I go? I have to take care of the dogs, of the property, of—”

“You can come to my house. I have a big couch.”

A ripple moved on her skin. She thought of kissing him earlier, thought of the flare that had burst over her nerves at the taste of his lips, the thrust of his tongue. To her embarrassment, her nipples pearled and she crossed her arms, hoping he hadn't noticed. She hesitated, picking up a cookie, then putting it down.

“I'm not expecting you to sleep with me,” he said. “It's not like that.”

Juliet blushed. “I didn't think you were.”

“I just don't think you need to be up here by yourself.”

“What about the dogs?”

“We'll bring them with us. Alex, the kid Desi loves so much, will take care of the wolf sanctuary. He's very capable.”

Juliet really didn't have to weigh it out. Stay up here, terrified, or go to town with Josh? “I'll be right back,” she said, going to pack a bag.

S
now was really beginning to fall by the time they got to town. Juliet stood outside in it for a moment, the dogs leaping and dancing all around her as they heard Josh's dog, Jack, howling inside. In spite of everything, Juliet could not resist the delight of turning in a circle, looking around and up at the sky. It was enchantingly beautiful. “Snow is so magical,” she said.

He chuckled. “See if you feel the same way in April.”

There it was again, the assumption that she'd be hanging around. “I'm sure it loses some of its appeal.”

“Let's get inside. I'll make us some supper. Unless you already ate?”

“I'm pretty sure fourteen chocolate chip cookies don't count for dinner.”

The dogs tore inside and greeted Jack, and then Josh put them out in the backyard, which was fenced, to let them burn off some energy. “We'll have to take them out for a walk in the morning. Walk over and pick up Glory from my mom's house.”

“Walk?”

He grinned, shrugged a little as he pushed his sleeves up on dark, smooth forearms. “Snowshoe, maybe. Have you ever tried it?”

“Nope.”

“I need to give my mom a quick call,” he said. “Go on into the kitchen if you want.”

She followed him into the kitchen, a small room dominated by glass-fronted cabinets and a butcher block island in the center. Stools sat on one side, and the stove was in the middle of the island. The colors, peach and magenta and white, were a little weird, but in general, she liked it. In the hallway, Josh talked to his mother, explaining what had happened to Desi. He asked if Glory was still awake.

Then, “What?” he said. “I can't believe you let her go, Mom. That wasn't your decision to make.”

Silence, the faint sound of a voice on the other end. “All right. I guess you're right.” He paused. “Thanks, Ma. I don't know what I'd do without you.”

Juliet pulled the sleeves of her sweater down over her hands, an old habit from childhood, and wondered with a pang what it would be like to have the kind of relationship with her mother that Josh obviously had with his. Her mouth curled at the corners in a bitter smile. Carol, the brilliant physicist with her tweeds, and blue
blood, and trim waist, had better things to do than roll around in the emotional quagmire of children's needs.

Josh came into the kitchen. Juliet turned. “Everything okay?”

“I was hoping to go get Glory and bring her home before the snow, but my mom let her spend the night with a friend on the rez.”

“And that's a problem?”

He lifted one shoulder, quickly, as if he knew his feelings were unreasonable. “I don't like her to be with anyone else but me or my mom. I only started letting Desi keep her a little while ago.”

“Because of everything that happened with her mom?”

A terse nod. “It's all right. My mom has a point, too, that Glory needs to get to normal life. Part of that is spending the night with friends. My mom knows the family and trusts them.” He blew out a breath. “It's hard for me to trust anybody these days.”

“Yeah.” Juliet found her mouth twisting again. “Yeah. I know what you mean.”

“I noticed that.” He reached for a pan on the stove. “Can you talk about it?”

“Not right this minute, if you don't mind.” Like a curious dog, she rounded the perimeter of the kitchen, worrying her sleeves. “Is the color scheme your doing?”

“Hardly.” He snorted. “Real estate is stupidly expensive around here, but there are some rentals set aside for the workforce. Most of them are down the valley quite a ways, but this whole section of blocks is rentals owned by the town. We have a place on the rez, of course, but it's a long way out, pretty isolated, and I
need to be in town for Glory's sake.” He pointed with a knife he'd taken out of the drawer. “My mom lives a couple of blocks over. She's the librarian.”

“That's very convenient.”

“No kidding. We worked at it.” He sliced ham from a butt he'd taken out of the fridge, and dropped chunks of butter into a heavy cast-iron skillet. When the butter started to foam, he dropped the ham into it and sprinkled it lightly with brown sugar.

“That looks great,” Juliet commented. “Can I do anything?”

“There's some canned pineapple in that cupboard to the left of the sink, if you want to get it out and open it. Can opener in the drawer below it. No, one more over.”

He turned the heat down and let the butter and sugar caramelize with the ham. When Juliet opened the pineapple, he forked rings out and laid them on top of the ham slices, sprinkled them with a little more brown sugar and dots of butter, then turned the heat very low. “I'll let it just get good and hot. Do you like corn? Carrots?”

“Both.” She leaned on her elbow. “I have to admit I was expecting something like a sandwich or something, not this actual supper.”

He grinned. “Once upon a time, that's what it would have been. I had to learn to cook easy, healthy things so I could feed Glory.”

“Lucky for me.” She watched as he took frozen corn from the freezer and poured some into a bowl he put in the microwave, then filled a plump white teakettle with water and set it on another burner.

“Tea or milk or hot chocolate to drink?” he asked,
and opened a cupboard to reveal neat colorful boxes of tea in stacks.

“Oh, tea, definitely,” she said, and chose a spice blend.

When they were settled over the very satisfying meal, Juliet said, “So, what will we do about Desi? Who else could have killed Claude?”

“Let's start with the people we know didn't do it,” he said, buttering a chunk of hearty dark bread. “It wasn't Christie Lundgren, the girlfriend. She's got a rock-solid alibi. It wasn't you. It wasn't me.”

Juliet raised her eyebrows. “That leaves a few possibilities.”

“Right. I've done some poking around, and the trouble is—” He paused.

“The trouble is?”

“Claude made a lot of enemies the past couple of years.” One thick brow cocked. “Mostly women and a few disgruntled boyfriends.”

“I see.” Juliet cut a triangle of ham, carefully layered a triangle of pineapple on top of it. “Criminal law isn't my specialty, but usually a crime of passion kind of murder seems to happen in the heat of the moment, or at least in the heat of the affair.”

“That's true.”

She ate the bite of ham, perfectly balanced salt and sweet, caramelized sugar, rich butter, crisp pineapple. “This,” she said with deep appreciation, “is very good, Josh.”

“Like it, little girl?” He winked. “I have many special dishes up my sleeve.”

“Really.” The word was droll. “As exciting as the
Vienna sausages and saltine crackers we had the other night?”

He laughed. “Point taken.”

“So, anyway,” she continued. “Who are the most recent scorned lovers?”

“That will take some digging, but it seems to be the dentist's wife. Who, in my opinion, would have been more likely to shoot Christie.”

A little pause fell. “What about the developers who want the land? What if they've gone out of their way to frame Desi or something?”

Josh nodded, considering. “It's possible. There's a lot of money at stake, but we'll have to look into that some more. Might not be a bad idea to amble over to the Black Crown and see what the gossip around town has been.”

“Is it open tonight?”

He raised his head. “Sure. You want to go?”

“What else is there to do, really?”

The corner of his mouth lifted, very, very slightly. “Nothing at all.”

 

The Black Crown occupied a pub that had been serving libations to Mariposans as far back as the gold rush, though it had been called Molly's Tavern for most of that time. An ex-pro rugby player from New Zealand had purchased it two years ago and renovated it into a classic British-style pub that specialized in beers from around the world and old-fashioned pub food like hamburgers and shepherd's pie and even a ploughman's platter with cheeses and pickles that Glory loved.

Josh wasn't much of a drinker, but he liked Tamati Neville and his pub. Rugby jerseys lined the walls, and the jukebox had a great selection, and Tam kept order with a jovial smile backed up by muscle when necessary.

It was fairly busy tonight, especially for a night in the between times—between the summer tourists and hikers, before the winter ski crowds—and Josh glanced around, wondering why. A big group of skinny, tough runner types lounged in one corner, empty plates scattered on the table before them. One had an orange-and-white flag on his T-shirt: orienteering. Another group, mostly women, were dressed in athletic clothes, their leathery skin, sturdy thighs, and no-bullshit air giving away their adventure racer status.

Tam was behind the bar as always, a tall, athletic man with thick curly hair and bright, wolflike green eyes. “Hello, my friend Joshua,” he said in his clipped Kiwi accent. “What can I get for you two?”

“Gossip is what I'm here for,” Josh said, “but I'll have a bottle of whatever is on special tonight.”

“And you, miss?” Tam asked. “We have beer from everywhere, but other things, too. What would you like?”

“What do you like best?”

“Well, I must admit to a soft spot for my native Tui.”

“Okay. I'll have that.” Juliet settled on the bar stool and glanced up at Josh, at which point he realized he'd been staring at her. The low light of the pub washed her blond hair with shimmery gloss, and he wanted to stroke the length of it, bury his hands in the softness. “What?” she asked.

He shook his head slowly, and lifted one hand to her hair, touching it very lightly with his palm. “Your hair is beautiful.”

A flicker moved on her face. “Thanks.”

Tam came back with their beers, and Josh raised his to toast Juliet. “Cheers,” he said. She tapped his bottle with her own and they both drank.

“This is Juliet Rousseau,” Josh said. “Her sister is the vet in town, and she runs the wolf center.”

Tam said, “The one who was arrested today.”

“Yep.”

“I am sorry,” Tam said, his accent slightly formal. “How can I help?”

“Claude drank in here, didn't he?”

Tam rolled his eyes. “Yeah. There was a bloody bastard, if there ever was one.” He glanced at Juliet. “Sorry.”

She smiled. “No problem. I agree with you.”

Josh felt a sudden wish to puff out his chest and strut, or fling his arm out and claim her. Irritated with himself, he said, “So, did he bring his women in here?”

“Sure. Different bird every week.”

“Anyone recently?”

“The skier. Before that, nobody in particular. All summer, he was feeding on the hikers with the tours.”

Josh nodded. A local tour group brought hikers from all over the world to walk the Mariposa Falls Trail, part of a 238-mile loop that wandered through the Sangre de Cristos and the San Juan mountains. “Have you heard anything else?”

Tam leaned on the bar and his arms rippled. “I'll
keep my ears to the ground, mate, but not at the moment.”

“Right. Thanks.”

“Tam!” a tall, lovely blond woman cried from the other end of the bar. “A refill, love.”

The big man grinned. “Duty calls.” He started to head down the bar, then turned around. In a low voice, he said, “There was a woman with him a bit, off and on all summer. I dunno who she was, but she had money.”

Josh took a notebook from his pocket. “Description?”

“Dark hair, green eyes. An accent from Europe. Maybe Germany or Poland or one of those, you know. That kind of accent.”

“All right.” Josh scribbled notes. “Age?”

He lifted a shoulder. “Maybe early thirties.” With a swipe at the bar, he leaned in toward Juliet. “Ye ain't with this guy, are you?”

“Hey, man,” Josh began.

But Juliet grinned. “Well, he's not as gorgeous as you are, but he's got great eyes.”

“I reckon.” He spotted the bar. “Come back under better circumstances.”

Juliet shot a look up toward Josh, her eyes as blue as turquoises. A fine glitter danced there, a tease and a challenge. He let his gaze drop to her mouth and thought again of her kissing him, of the cool feel of her fingertips against his cheek, the plushness of her breasts against his chest.

“You're gonna have to quit looking at me like that,” Josh said, and even he could hear the rumbling sound of his voice.

“Will I?” she asked, and put her small hand over the back of his big one. Beneath the bar, their thighs bumped. “Why?”

In other circumstances, he would have leaned over and accepted the invitation of that mouth. He would have thrust his tongue between her lips and laced his tongue with hers and inquired, in the most physical way possible, if she wanted to invite him in elsewhere. He was aching to touch her, undress her and look at her breasts and taste her pearling nipples. She had beautiful hair and beautiful eyes and a luscious mouth, and he wanted with a burning sort of energy, to explore her skin, see if it was as smooth as it looked. He loved blond hair. He loved pretty lips. He loved natural breasts, the squishy feel of them, the juicy jiggle. He imagined her nipples would be as pink as her tongue. Or perhaps dark and—

“You're looking at my breasts,” Juliet said. “In American culture, that's considered rude.”

“It's not rude in other cultures?”

She shook her head. “Not at all.”

“Can we pretend we're in those other places?” He grinned. “I like looking at your breasts.”

Juliet shifted, leaning back a little. “Better?”

He inhaled slowly, trying to calm his arousal. Leaning forward, he put his lips close to her ear and said quietly, “I could spend a whole evening on just your breasts.”

“Could you?” she said, just as quietly. “Doing what?”