Cheyenne McCray - Point Blank (Lawmen Book 4) (3 page)

“And she’s got him wrapped around one of her tiny little fingers.” Natasha flipped the dust rag over her shoulder. “Chocolate?”

“Oh, dear Lord, yes. I swear I feel as though Dementors have sucked the life out of me.” Christie straightened in her chair. “You are the Lupin to my Harry.”

“You’ve been reading Harry Potter out loud to Jessica again.” Natasha snorted back laughter. “Someday Mommy is going to teach our baby not only about Hogwarts, but the Tardis, the One Ring, the Death Star, and the Enterprise.”

“Mommy has already started.” Christie reached for the small packaged saddle-shaped piece of dark chocolate that Natasha handed her, then started to unwrap the plastic. “Jessica will grow up loving all the good stuff. Of course we’re starting out with the tamer stories. I think we’ll be on
The Sorcerer’s Stone
until she’s eight, toning down the slightly scary parts.”

“Auntie Natasha will be more than happy to help in her training.” Even though Natasha was Christie’s cousin and not her sister, they were as close as sisters and had decided that Trace and Christie’s children should call Natasha “Auntie”.

“This is so good.” Christie sighed and closed her eyes as she let a bite of the chocolate saddle melt in her mouth. She opened her eyes. “You don’t get the cheap stuff.”

“Never do.” Natasha frowned a little as she looked at a bronze-colored resin statuette of a cowboy that was eighteen inches high. “Except these things. I really hate them. They are so damned ugly.” Resin looked like stone but didn’t chip as easily as plaster.

Christie waved the partially wrapped remainder of the chocolate saddle, gesturing to the statuette. “Why do you sell the things if you don’t like them?”

Natasha shrugged and unwrapped a green lollipop shaped like a saguaro cactus and sucked on it. Lime-flavored pure sugar. Yum. She set the wrapper on the desk in front of the chairs.

She pulled the sucker out of her mouth and turned her gaze on a resin statuette of a Native American in full headdress. She shrugged. “My supplier told me they would sell like crazy at my trade shows. He pressured me and because I wanted his business, I made the concession.”

Christie licked chocolate off of one finger. “How well do they sell?”

“Like crazy.” Natasha waved her cactus lollipop in the air. “I’ve had different buyers come to all three trade shows I’ve worked and each buyer has purchased the entire lot of what I have on hand. Who’d have thought?”

Christie cocked her head and studied the cowboy and Native American statuettes. “You’re right. They are kind of ugly.”

“Your taste has always been good, like mine.” Natasha smirked. “These resin statuettes don’t sell well in Bisbee. Tourists buy them sometimes because they’re not too expensive compared to real art.”

Christie nodded “I’ll take quality any day.”

Natasha gestured to limited edition bronze sculptures by Ella McBride from Prescott. Ella’s work was similar to Remington’s. Natasha then pointed to fine hand carved wooden figurines, followed by original paintings. “All of this is
real
art.” Natasha nodded to framed, numbered prints. “Generally, these are purchased by private collectors.”

“What about those?” Christie gestured to the framed prints.

“Mark does give me some good prints along with the resin statuettes,” Natasha said. “He chooses great frames.”

Christie balled up the plastic that had once held the chocolate saddle. “How do those sell at the trade shows?”

“The prints sell very well, mostly to small gallery owners who snap them up.” Natasha took the plastic from Christie and also grabbed the cactus wrapper on the desk. She covered the remainder of her sucker before throwing it all away in a wastebasket next to the desk. “With the exception of the numbered prints, I don’t sell the good pieces nearly as often as I do the resin statuettes. The cost for the quality art is prohibitive for some, of course.”

“When do you leave for the next trade show?” Christie asked. “Denver, right? Something called WESA.”

“Yes, the Western/English Sales Association.” Natasha nodded. “I leave in three days, on Tuesday night. I need to set up my showroom on Wednesday and be ready for the show to start on Thursday.”

“You’re such the social butterfly.” Christie smiled. “You enjoy the trade shows.”

Natasha laughed. “I have to admit I have a lot of fun. The shows in Las Vegas, Nashville, and Phoenix were a blast.”

Christie grinned in response to Natasha’s laughter. “When you’re socializing, you are in your element.”

Natasha brushed her hands down her skirt. “You could say that.”

Christie stretched her arms and sighed. “I feel decidedly better.” She straightened in her chair, looking a little more refreshed. “Chocolate is a cure-all, you know.”

“Of course.” Natasha grinned as her cousin got to her feet. “Missing little Jess?”

Christie smiled like the proud mama she was. “Since she was born, I haven’t been away from her for more than a couple of hours on two occasions.” She put her hand on her abdomen. “Now I need to work on getting rid of baby-belly.”

Natasha hugged her cousin. “You’ll get back in shape in no time.”

“If I ever get the energy to start working out, that is.” Christie shook her head. “I think that women who have flat bellies and can fit into their normal pre-pregnancy clothes after giving birth should be shot.”

“But you have something they don’t have.” Natasha grinned. “You have one of the hottest lawmen ever, and he loves you exactly the way you are.”

“I’m a pretty lucky girl to get an amazing man like Trace.” Christie looked like a schoolgirl whenever she talked about her husband.

“And he’s darn lucky to have you.” Natasha took a step back, her flowing skirts brushing her ankles. “I told you lawmen are hot.”

“I am going to have to figure out how to get you together with Brooks Allen.” A mischievous look crossed Christie’s face. “He’s almost as sexy as Trace.”

“He’s not bad looking.” Natasha cocked her head to the side. “At least from what I remember of him. I wish I could have made it to your and Trace’s reception.”

“I’m just glad all you did was break your leg in that accident.” Christie’s features always looked a little more serious when she talked about Natasha’s accident. Or rather, any of her
accidents.

Both bones in her lower leg had been broken in the crash—she was lucky it hadn’t been worse. Her leg ached just thinking about the accident.

“I’m just sorry I missed all the fun.” She shook her finger at Christie. “You did not need to cut the reception short and come to the hospital when you heard what happened. I only broke my leg, for goodness sake.”

Christie shook her head. “As if I wouldn’t want to see for myself you were okay. You would have done the same thing.”

Natasha couldn’t argue with that.

“Oh, I almost forgot.” Christie picked up her purse, dug in it, and pulled out a colorful butterfly pendant. “I saw this at a boutique in Sierra Vista, and it reminded me of you. It will go well with all of your other butterflies.”

Natasha smiled as she took the pendant, feeling its contours and ridges in her palm. “It’s beautiful. Thank you.”

Christie got to her feet. “I’d better get home to Jessica.”

“Thanks for stopping by, Chrissy.” Natasha hugged her cousin.

Normally, she didn’t like being called Chrissy because it made her feel like a child again, but she let Natasha and Trace get away with it. She returned Natasha’s hug. “Have a good time in Denver. And don’t do anything I wouldn’t do.”

Natasha laughed as they parted. “Considering that you wouldn’t participate in half the crazy things I often do, that wouldn’t be any fun.”

“Well, behave.” Christie slipped her purse strap onto her shoulder. “And don’t get into any trouble.”

“Ha.” Natasha made a shooing motion. “Get back to the baby and your hunk of a man.”

“I will do just that.” Christie gave a little wave before heading out the door.

The moment the door shut with another jangle of bells, Natasha’s phone rang. Her ring tone was Imagine Dragon’s
On Top of the World,
a song that never ceased to put additional pep in her already bubbly personality.

She pulled the phone out of her skirt pocket. She wasn’t much of a seamstress, but she had managed to put pockets into every one of her flowy skirts. When she checked the screen, she saw that it was Mark Okle, her biggest supplier. She pressed the answer icon and raised the phone to her ear. “Hi, Mark.”

“How’s my favorite distributor?” Mark’s voice was booming and on the jovial side.

She’d met him a few times in person and he wasn’t remarkable looking—slightly balding and always wearing a suit, no matter what the weather.

Natasha shifted the phone to her other ear. “Everything is going well, and I’m ready for Denver.”

“Good, good.” Mark sneezed then coughed before he spoke again, and she wondered if he was getting a cold. “Your shipment of numbered prints and resin statuettes will arrive in Denver on Tuesday.” Mark supplied her with the items in her store that were not originals, including the numbered prints.

Anything original, she sold on consignment from the artists themselves, or purchased from a gallery in Tucson. She also had a different supplier for the chocolate mini saddles and suckers in a variety of western shapes, including saguaros, western hats, boots, and horse heads. Those sold well and were something her customers could purchase for their kids.

“Thanks.” She tucked hair behind her ear. “Another two crates of twenty-five statuettes each?”

“Four crates for a total of a hundred.” Mark chuckled. “They’ve been selling so well, I know you can move them.”

“Let’s stick with fifty.” She really hated those things and didn’t want to worry about shipping those that didn’t sell back to Arizona. “I think that’s more than enough.”

She wasn’t sure she imagined it, but she thought he had a hard edge to his voice. “They will sell, Natasha, and your commission will be exceptional.”

The commission was what had sold her on the idea in the first place. She was accumulating a good savings and a “mad money” account.

He sneezed again, and she was glad they were talking over the phone and not in person. The last thing she wanted to do was catch a cold. “Uncle Mark knows best, Nat.”

She rolled her eyes to the store’s open ceiling. She did not like being called Nat by anyone outside her family, much like Christy hated to be called Chrissy.

Natasha let out a sigh. “All right. But since I didn’t order them, you
will
take them back if they don’t sell. They don’t move in my shop.” But he did seem to have a “Spidey sense” when it came to moving product at the tradeshows.

“Of course.” Mark still sounded jovial despite his sniffing. “However, I have complete faith in you.”

“We’ll see what happens.” She glanced at the clock, surprised it had grown so late. Being around her cousin made time fly, and stores closed relatively early in a small town like Bisbee. “I’ll call you when I get back from Denver. I may get a hold of you sooner if all four crates sell.”

“Good girl.” Mark sniffled. “Have a great trip and a prosperous show.”

After Natasha disconnected the call with Mark, she turned the OPEN sign to CLOSED. She slipped into her coat, grabbed her bright yellow cloth purse with its fringe along the bottom, and left the store.

A stroll down Main Street sounded nice, and she locked the door behind her before heading down the sloping street in the fading light. She could have gone out the back door, but she enjoyed looking into other shop owners’ windows and seeing what new things might be for sale.

She liked to support her fellow business owners and operators, and had purchased handmade dinnerware from The Potter, furniture from Chic Antiques, and crafts from various shops. Her favorite boutique, Soul Made, carried the style of bohemian clothing Natasha loved. She fit in well with the artists’ colony that had made Old Bisbee a tourist destination and a thriving section of the town.

Chill air bit at her cheeks and nose, but considering she was from Indiana, this was nothing compared to the winter cold of her home state. She stopped by the post office at the bottom of the sloping street, grabbed her mail from the old-fashioned brass box with its small window, and stuffed the mail into her purse.

After waving to a few people she knew, she went to the parking lot up the hill, where she had left her
new
yellow VW Beetle. Bisbee was situated in, around, and on the surrounding mountains, so most streets were sloped and steep. The one time she had crashed her old car into the second floor of a two-story home had been one time too many, hence the new car.

It wasn’t long before she reached her VW, climbed into the chilly vehicle, and drove home. Her house was on a canyon road above a big white fire station on Main Street. Homes peppered the side of the canyon, but she had become accustomed to driving along the narrow road to the parking area above her home—even if she still had the occasional nightmare about her brakes giving out and her car flying off the parking area and onto the houses below.

She parked in front of the old railroad ties in the parking area designated for her and her neighbor, with a little room left over for any guests they might have. After she set the parking brake and turned off the car, she grabbed her purse, locked the Beetle, and jogged down the set of concrete stairs to her home’s kitchen door.

The house had been built on the mountainside over seventy years ago, and strangely enough, it didn’t have a front entrance. One door led into her kitchen, and the second door was off of one of the bedrooms. It was a bit of an odd house on a weird-shaped lot, but she loved it.

It was much warmer inside her home, and she shed her jacket. She retrieved the mail from her purse and hung the yellow cloth bag on the back of a chair.

One of her least favorite things to do was cook, so she threw together a salad. She’d been a vegetarian since high school, much to the distress of her meat-loving family. She’d considered going vegan, but didn’t have a problem with cheese, milk, and eggs. However, they had to come from organic farms.