Jackrabbit Junction Jitters (50 page)

“That depends what you have in mind.”

Mac took the can of Coke from her hand and set it next to
the sink, then lifted her onto the counter. “Nothing too strenuous on your
part.” He ran his hands up her bare thighs. “I’ll do all of the work. You can
just lie back and watch.”

Her husky laugh rippled through him. “We need to rent a
motel room. This place is packed.”

“Ruby’s office will do.” He trailed his lips over the
purplish-yellow bruise on her jaw, his fingers exploring through her T-shirt. “Besides,
there’s something I’ve been wanting to try in that chair.”

Claire shivered as he nibbled on her earlobe.

“Oh, jeez, you two! Enough already.”

Mac pulled back at the sound of Kate’s voice.

Standing just inside the kitchen doorway, her arms crossed,
Kate smirked at them. “Can’t you find some closet to do the wild monkey dance
in? This is a public place, you know. And I eat off that countertop.”

“You’re one to talk.” Claire grabbed Mac’s hand and placed
it back on her thigh. “Remind me again who gave that porn-star exhibition in
The Shaft’s parking lot earlier today.”

Kate’s forehead reddened as she shushed Claire and glanced
into the rec room.

“I can’t believe you smashed Butch’s pickup again.” Mac
leaned against the counter next to Claire, shaking his head.

Kate shrugged. “A girl’s gotta do what a girl’s gotta do.”

“The poor guy has no idea what he’s getting into with this
family.”

Claire pinched Mac’s arm.

“How did Mom take the news?” Kate asked Claire just as
Deborah waltzed through the doorway.

“How did I take what news?”

Kate winced and turned, her smile extra wide. “Hi, Mom.”

“Don’t you ‘Hi, Mom’ me, Kathryn Lynette.” Deborah prodded
Kate further into the kitchen. “What were you thinking? That man is a
bartender, for God’s sake. What future can he offer you?”

Here they went again. The six-pack of Coors in the fridge screamed
Mac’s name.

Claire slid off the counter. “Mom, don’t—”

“No, Claire. This is my problem.” Kate held her mother’s
stare. “What Butch does for a living is none of your business. All you need to
be concerned with is my happiness, and he makes me happy,” she paused and
chuckled at what must have been a private joke, “very happy. So I’m staying
here.”

“Look on the bright side, Mom.” Claire crossed her arms over
her chest, apparently unable to keep quiet. “At least Butch isn’t a killer—unlike
your first choice.”

“Or a thief.” Mac couldn’t resist adding that tidbit,
referring to the office break-in that started this whole mess.

Deborah shot them both a scowl before continuing with her
scolding. “You’re not thinking straight, Kathryn.”

“No, you’re the one who’s confused. You were wrong about
Porter, and you’re wrong about Butch. For the first time in my life, I like a
guy who has his shit together, and I’m not going to let you screw this up for
me. That’s why you’re flying home without me tomorrow.”

Mac had been the second person to volunteer to drive Deborah
to the airport, right after Chester.

Deborah turned to Claire. “Look what you’ve done.”

“Don’t blame me. Kate’s a big girl. She hasn’t taken any of
my advice since I convinced her to moon our high school football team for good
luck.”

Kate’s pointed glare said Claire wasn’t making that up.

“All right, Kathryn.” Deborah gave in. “You stay and have
your fun. But I won’t be one bit surprised to have you knocking on my door by
Labor Day.”

“We’ll see,” Kate said with another little chuckle.

Pointing at Claire, Deborah said, “And you! Stop sticking
your nose in where it doesn’t belong. In case you haven’t noticed, the people
around here aren’t real friendly to strangers, and my heart can’t take another
near-miss on your life. I didn’t endure nine months of morning sickness and a
slew of stretch marks for you to just throw it away on some Angela Lansbury
fantasy of yours.”

A grin surfaced on Claire’s lips. “I love you too, Mother.”

“As for you.” Her manicured finger now pointed at Mac. He
braced himself for her stinger. “Take care of her. She says she doesn’t need a
keeper, but a bodyguard might serve her well.”

Mac blinked in surprise. “Uh …”

“Not that you’ve done the best job of keeping her out of
harm’s way so far.” Deborah walked toward the rec room.

That was more like it. Mac’s world tilted back into place.

“Oh, Kathryn.” Deborah paused in the doorway. “Be sure to
close the door when you come to bed. Ever since your grandfather returned with
his new wife, this place stinks like some cheap Vegas card room.”

“I’m staying at Butch’s place tonight, Mom.”

“Really?”

Mac nudged Claire and winked. They’d figured that would be
the case when they saw them in Butch’s parking lot.

Deborah’s sniff was full of disgust. “Where did I go wrong
with you two girls? Haven’t you heard of playing hard-to-get?”

When neither Claire nor Kate responded, Deborah shook her
head. “Fine. Have your little fling with Butch. But you tell him that before I
leave for the airport, I want to have a talk with him.”

With a flounce of her hair, Deborah exited the room.

“Shit.” Kate raced after her. “Mom, no. Not yet.”

“Poor Butch.” Mac chuckled. “First Kate, then your mother.
The guy should have fled the state while he had the chance.”

“Maybe he’s into masochism.” Claire grabbed his hand and
tugged him toward her. “Come here. If you’re going to be guarding my body, I should
give you a thorough tour so you don’t overlook anything.”

His pulse jump-started at the wicked gleam in her eyes. He
pinned her against the counter and tilted her chin up. “Are we talking clothes
or no clothes?”

“No clothes, definitely.” She rubbed against him, all soft skin
and curves. “What do you say, tough guy? You up to the task?”

“Maybe.”

He lowered his mouth to hers, breathing her in. She smelled
like chocolate and all things Claire.

“Where’s your tool belt?”

* * *

Thursday, August 26th

“Ruby found your tool belt in the office again,” Gramps told
Claire as he tore another chunk of sheetrock from the wall behind the faulty
toilet that had been giving Claire fits since she’d arrived at the R.V. park
two weeks ago.

“Sorry about that.” Claire fanned her sweaty T-shirt in the
sweltering, concrete block room.

The perfume of newly weed-whacked grass filtered in through
the open window, along with fat, black flies and a steady stream of humid air,
to add to the lovely aroma of ammonia-based disinfectant. A monsoon swelled on
the southern horizon, building another gully washer under the white-hot sun.

Henry sprawled nearby on the floor, snapping at any fly that
buzzed too close to his drooping ears. He hadn’t left Gramps’s side since Ruby
and he returned from Vegas, nor was he acknowledging Claire’s presence anymore.
The freaking mutt acted as if he’d spent the last week receiving daily canings instead
of slipping free of his collar each day to chase butterflies and grasshoppers,
eat handouts from campers, and shit and piss wherever he damn well pleased.

“Mac and you need to sell tickets to your tool belt shows.”
Manny grinned so wide his moustache curled at the corners. He sat on the sink
counter next to Claire, sharing her bag of barbecued pork rinds. “You could
advertise at The Double D strip joint, especially on Wednesday nights.”

“What’s so special about Wednesday nights?” Claire crunched
on a piece of fried barbecued pork fat.

He waggled his eyebrows at her. “Nude mud wrestling.”

Chester crushed his empty beer can and tossed it in the
trash. “That depends on whether she or Mac wears the tool belt.”

Gramps aimed the crowbar he was using to strip the drywall
at Manny and then Chester. “Stop talking about my granddaughter and sex.”

Manny chuckled and winked at Claire. “He’s so easy.”

“Hey, Gramps.” Claire remembered something that had been
bugging her for days now. “What was in that package you sent to Mac at work?”

Gramps snorted. “None of your damned business, girl.”

A belch rattled from Chester’s throat. “Who jammed a stick
up your ass today, Harley?”

“He’s just suffering from a case of penis envy.”

Claire shot Manny a
huh?
look.

“
Sì
. Ruby kicked his ass in the Euchre tournament. It’s
pretty obvious his new wife wears the pants in his casa.”

“Keep flappin’ your lips, Carrera,” Gramps said, tearing off
more sheetrock, “and I’ll be jamming this crowbar up your—”

“Hey, what’s that?” Claire hopped off the sink counter and
walked over to the stall where Gramps stood sweating.

A small piece of wood bridged the pair of two-by-fours Gramps
had just exposed that ran parallel up the wall on the right side of the sewer
vent pipe. On this makeshift shelf sat a small jewelry box, like the one Claire
had when she was seven, including the frilly pink scrolls.

Tossing the chunk of drywall he’d freed onto the pile in the
middle of the room, Gramps lifted the box from the shelf.

Chester peered into the stall over Claire’s shoulder. “It
looks like something of Jess’s.”

“Move your block head, Thomas.” Manny said.

He tried to nudge Chester aside with the cane he still used
after his quarrel with the flooded toilet last weekend. Unfortunately, his
plight had had no effect on Miss Rebecca, who’d motored out of the park
yesterday without an
adios
or backward glance.

“Hit me again with that cane, you old geezer, and I’m going
to wrap it around your testicles.”

Gramps opened the box’s hinged top. A blonde ballerina
circled on a pink satin ledge while mechanical-sounding music twanged and
dinged. Claire leaned closer, mesmerized by the glitter on the dancer’s tutu.
The steely scent of Gramps’s Aqua Velva merged with the smell of beer from
Chester’s warm breath as his chin brushed her shoulder.

Henry barked twice, breaking the spell, making Claire jump
back—right onto Chester’s toes.

“Yowch!” Chester limped out of the stall.

Crunching on more rinds, Manny laughed. “That’s what you get
for wearing argyle socks with open toed sandals.”

“Sorry, Chester.” Claire turned back to the music box as
Gramps pulled a chiseled arrowhead out of it.

“Looks like a piece of flint.” He held it up under the
sixty-watt light bulb overhead. “Why would Jess put a flint arrowhead in the
wall?”

Flint arrowhead. Claire stared at the chipped stone,
something sparking in her bruised brain.

Arrowhead.

“Gramps, what did Kate call arrowheads when we were kids?”

His brows wrinkled as he glanced at her. “Pointers, why?”

“That’s it!” She snatched the arrowhead from his hand and
cupped it in her palm. “This is Flint’s pointer! And all along I kept thinking
Joe was talking about that dead guy in the mine.”

Gears spun in her head as she stared at the vent pipe
running up the wall.

“And that explains what he meant with the ‘pipe up and let
me hear it’ quote.”

She pushed past Gramps and gripped the pipe, wiggling it.

“Of course!” she continued. “‘Shiver my timbers’—this pipe
always rattles against the wall when the toilet is flushed. But what about ‘pieces
of eight’? Where did that fit into this?”

She turned around and looked to the guys for help.

All three men stared at her like she’d morphed into the
one-eyed, one-horned, flying purple people eater.

“Have you been smoking doobies again, girl?” Gramps asked.

Chester grunted. “Maybe she has leftover water on her brain.”

“I bet that tire knocked some wires loose upstairs,” Manny
added. “Have you noticed her one eye keeps ticcing, especially when her mom is
around?”

“Gramps, remember what I told you yesterday about Porter flipping
through Joe’s first edition of
Treasure Island
?”

“Yeah. So?”

Claire waved all of them off, shoved the arrowhead in her
pocket, and focused on the vent pipe again.

“Would one of you smartasses hand me that saw?” She knocked
on the pipe next to where the music box had sat. It sounded hollow just like
the rest of the pipe.

“Move aside.” Gramps squeezed in next to her. “And show me
where you want me to cut.”

“Just give me the saw.”

“No way. If Mac finds out I let you do any work today, he’ll
have my hide. You’re supposed to be sitting on that sink and taking it easy,
remember?”

“Oh, yeah.” She’d forgotten about Mac’s threat to have
Deborah play nursemaid instead of him if Claire didn’t cooperate. “Mom’s
definitely flying out tomorrow, right?”

“Yep. Ruby and I need some time to settle in without your
mother’s big nose around. The two of them are barely speaking as is. A couple
of more days together and blood will spill. Now where am I cutting, Sherlock?”

Pointing out two places a couple feet apart on the pipe, she
backed out of the stall and joined Manny on the sink counter. Her fingers
drummed on her thighs as she watched Gramps saw through the black PVC pipe.
Sewer gas seeped from the open pipe and filled the small room, making her eyes
water.

“Woo wee!” Chester moved to the open doorway as Gramps
pulled the chunk of pipe free. “That smells like Carrera’s breath in the
morning.”

Gramps chuckled as he stuffed a grease-smeared rag from his
back pocket into the bottom part of the open vent pipe.

“All the better to kiss you with, lover.” Manny puckered his
lips and wiggled his index finger at Chester. “Come over here, big boy.”

“I have something you can plant those lips on, Carrera.”
Chester reached for his belt buckle.

“Never mind. I wouldn’t want to put Tilly or Milly out of a
job. Which one are you seeing tonight, anyway?”

“Tilly. Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturdays are her nights.
Milly gets me on Wednesday, Friday, and Sunday.”