Thirty-Two and a Half Complications (2 page)

“Not just the bank money. They took my deposit bag. I want my money back.”

Officer Sprout scowled, as if to rebuke me for making his life more difficult. “Well…I don’t know how that works.”

“What
do
you know?” Mr. Murphy asked, his contempt obvious.

Officer Ernie burst through the door. “I don’t see anything.”

I shook my head in disgust. “That’s because they left already.” I started for the front door, but Ernie blocked my path.

“And where do you think you’re goin’?”

“I left my purse in the car, and I need to get my phone so I can call Mason.”

He shook his head, his face breaking out in splotchy red marks. “Nobody’s leaving this building until we get your statements and look for evidence.”

“Aren’t you going to go after them?” a man asked.

Everyone swiveled around to look behind the counter. I was surprised to see that Mr. Turner, the bank manager, was standing there with Samantha Jo. He’d been conspicuously absent during the robbery.

“When did you get here?” Mr. Murphy asked, pointing his cane at the middle-aged, balding banker.

He rested his folded hands on his paunch. “I was in the back…taking care of…something.”

“You yellow-bellied, snake-eyed coward,” Mr. Murphy growled. “You
hid
.”

The banker’s eyes widened. “I…”

“I need to call my husband,” the younger woman said, wiping tears from her cheeks.

The middle-aged man turned to Mr. Murphy. “Why didn’t you beat them off with that cane of yours?”

Pandemonium broke out, every one of us voicing our protests while Officer Sprout looked like he was about to take off running and Officer Ernie’s ears turned bright red.

I edged over to an empty desk and picked up the phone. “Mason,” I said when he answered his cell phone. “You’re never gonna guess what happened.”

“With you, there’s no telling. Are you okay?”

“I’m fine. Mostly.” I rubbed my bruised side. “But why are you asking? You don’t even know why I’m calling.”

“Rose, trouble finds you like a divining rod finds water.” I heard the smile in his voice, but then he turned serious. “Where are you and what happened?”

“Do you think you could get away for a little bit?” I asked. “And meet me at the Henryetta Bank?”

“Are you having some kind of trouble at the bank?”

I took in the chaos around me. “You could say that.”

Mr. Murphy’s voice rose above the others. “I got all my money in this damned place. I better not have lost a penny!”

“Do I hear
shouting
?” Mason asked before switching to his official voice. “What’s going on there, Rose?”

“I’ll explain when you get here.” I sighed as I hung up. Mason was right. This was just another day in the life of Rose Gardner.

***

Chapter Two

Mason walked through the bank’s door fifteen minutes later. I had no doubt he’d have been there sooner if the brace on his leg hadn’t slowed him down. He’d broken his leg a few weeks ago while we were evading Crocker and his men in the woods near Henryetta. The doctor had set it with pins and put him in a cast for two weeks, so the brace and the cane he was using with it were a graduation from crutches. Still, it slowed him down. And Mason Deveraux was a man who was always on the go.

His face was taut with worry until he saw me sitting on the metal desk, then it was replaced by relief. “Rose.”

I hopped off the desk and met him halfway. He pulled me into a tight hug. “I called Detective Taylor on the way to find out what happened.” He leaned back and examined me closely. “Are you really okay?”

Tilting my head to the side, I gave him a frustrated grimace. “I’m fine. Really. Just ticked off that the thieves took my deposit bag. I tried to report the theft to Officer Sprout, but he refused to listen to me…said he didn’t know how to take my report.”

He grinned. I loved how his smile was slightly lopsided, lifting up ever so slightly more on one side. Funny how I’d never noticed until we started seeing each other, right around the time Crocker broke out of jail. “Violet should have a record of all the checks, and the cash you take in at the shop is minimal. You can get customers to stop payment on the checks and issue you new ones.”

Something in my stomach rolled around and tried to dive to the floor. “What about the cash?”

He shrugged. “It might be a total loss unless you recorded the bills’ serial numbers. I doubt you’d hit your deductible anyway.”

Suddenly, I felt hot and was having a hard time breathing.

Mason’s eyes flew open in alarm. “Rose? What’s wrong?”

I started to fan myself with my hand. “There was more than the usual amount of cash in the deposit bag, Mason. A lot more.”

His voice hardened. “How much?”

“Nine thousand dollars.” Feeling lightheaded, I stumbled backward.

Mason grabbed my arm and helped me sit down in the office chair in front of the desk I’d just hopped down from, taking the seat next to me. “What were you doing with that much cash?”

Tears welled in my eyes, but I refused to let them drop. “The big landscaping job Bruce Wayne and I just finished—”

“The retaining wall, trees, and shrubs for Mr. O’Leary?”

I nodded, feeling like I was gonna hyperventilate. “He paid me in cash.”

He grabbed my face between his hands, his fingers gently rubbing my cheekbones. “Take a deep breath. It’s going to be okay.”

I nodded again. But nine thousand dollars was an awful lot of money. Money we needed. Violet had already allocated all the grant money we’d received from the Arkansas Small Business Administration and then some for our expansion into the empty lot next to our existing building. Unexpected expenses had popped up along the way, and we needed every penny we could get. We couldn’t afford to lose nine thousand dollars.

“You have a copy of the receipt, right?”

“Yeah.”

“Then you’re fine.”

“Except for the deductible. And our insurance rates will raise.”

He frowned, then leaned in and gave me a gentle kiss. “You’re forgetting that your bag was taken during a bank robbery. The bank’s insurance should cover you one hundred percent. I know my own insurance predicament must have you worried, but I’ll eventually get reimbursed, and
so will you
. Stop worrying.”

I blinked in relief. Mason was right. He’d been fighting to get a settlement ever since Crocker burned his condo down weeks ago, and he was living with me until it was all sorted out. “Thank you. It’s at times like these that I’m particularly glad I have you around.”

He laughed. “Because of my legal expertise?”

I shook my head and grinned at him. “That comes in handy, but no.” I leaned over the arm of my chair and looped my arms around his neck. “Because you’re so calm, it makes me calm too.”

His smile turned wicked. “You make me sound boring, but that wasn’t the impression I got last night.”

A blush rose to my cheeks.

He leaned closer, until his lips were practically brushing my ear. “There’s a time for calm, and a time for…”

I lifted my eyebrows. “Not so calm?”

“I had a few other word choices in mind,” he teased. “But you’re right. I’m supposed to care about my reputation, and someone could hear us.”

“I should say,” said Miss Mildred, my old across-the-street neighbor, who seemed to have appeared out of thin air and was standing next to us. “I thought you were supposed to be a good example for the citizens of Fenton County, Mr. Deveraux. Not an example of lewd behavior. I can see that Rose’s debauched nature has rubbed off on you.”

Mason leaned back in his seat and smiled good-naturedly up at the elderly woman. Miss Mildred was eighty-three years old, but nothing slipped passed her. Which made her the perfect president of the neighborhood watch committee, also known as the Busybody Club. She was probably bored to tears since I was no longer in the neighborhood. Who was she spying on now?

“What are you doing here, Miss Mildred?” Mason asked. “How’d you get past the crime scene tape?”

“I’m here to see to it that my money’s safe. The fool loan officer Mr. Sullivan’s damn near given half the money in the bank away to the riffraff in this town.” She shot me a glare, making sure I knew she included me in that category, before turning her annoyance on Mason. “And Officer Ernie wouldn’t dare turn me away. I expected to find a crime scene, not your seedy display.”

Who was she fooling? She was here to snoop.

“Not to worry, Miss Mildred. Your money’s federally insured, so I can assure you that you haven’t lost a penny.” He chuckled. “And my girlfriend just had a brush with death. You can’t fault a man for wanting to confirm she’s okay…and that she knows he can’t live without her.”

Her frown froze, as if she couldn’t think of any negative way to spin his statement…a first for her.

“What about your husband?” Mason asked. “I bet you two were inseparable when he came back from the war.”

The elderly woman’s cheeks turned pink.

Miss Mildred was actually blushing.

I almost gasped in surprise.

“He was a sailor, wasn’t he? At the end of the Second World War?” Mason asked, wrapping an arm around my shoulder and pulling me closer as he spoke. The arm of the chair hit the spot on my ribs where I’d been kicked, so I shifted slightly. “I hear it’s hard for a young girl to resist a man in those Navy whites.” He grinned at me. “Maybe I should join the Navy.”

“Don’t you dare,” I whispered.

Miss Mildred tugged at her sleeve, avoiding eye contact. “He had been gone a long time.” Then, as though remembering who she was talking to, she stiffened. “Shouldn’t you be investigating the robbery, Mr. Deveraux?”

He grinned and relaxed his grip on my shoulder. “Nope. The fine officers of the Henryetta PD have it under control. I’m here to make sure my girl’s okay. I’ll take over when they’re done.”

She gave her head a little shake, then pulled back her shoulders. “Fine officers, my foot.” She cast a scowl at me. “They never did a blessed thing when I called them about
her
.”

“I can assure you that they’d arrest her if they could find the evidence to warrant it,” Mason said, grinning.

I pulled away from him. “Hey!”

Miss Mildred walked away, muttering under her breath about my wicked ways.

I turned sideways and glared at Mason. “The police would arrest me if they
could
? And why would you sound happy about that?”

His grin turned wicked again. “I like thinking about you in handcuffs.”

My eyes flew open. “Mason!”

He laughed. “She’s harmless, Rose. I don’t know why you let her get you so worked up.”

“You try living across the street from her for twenty-four years, and then we’ll revisit the topic of how harmless she is.”

“I’d rather spend every minute with you.” He kissed me again, then pulled back with a sigh. “But the duties that accompany the never-ending job of an underpaid, underappreciated county attorney tend to interfere with that.”

I smoothed out a wrinkle on his shirt with my thumb, wishing we could go back to the farm so I could take it off of him. “You love every minute of your job and you know it.”

“Almost every minute.” He gave me another peck on the lips and stood. “Except for the minutes it takes me away from you. I cleared my schedule for the next hour. Let’s get out of here. I want to spend time with you, but not in this mess.”

I looked around, taking in the sight of the still-chaotic bank lobby. “Don’t I have to give my statement? I’ve got details about the robbers that I need to share.”

“Not until Detective Taylor shows up. When I called him, he told me that there was something he needed to wrap up on another case before heading over here. I’ll tell Ernie that I’m taking you into my personal custody in the meantime,” he smirked. “And maybe we can borrow a pair of handcuffs for good measure. I’ll be doing a public service by protecting the innocent citizens of Fenton County from a whirlwind of trouble.”

“Very funny,” I said sarcastically, but I couldn’t hold back my laughter. I cast a glance at my second least favorite police officer—Detective Taylor being the winner in that category. Officer Ernie was trying to break up an argument between Mr. Murphy and the bank manager, reaching for the cane the older man was beating the younger one with. “Officer Ernie isn’t going to like it.”

Mason straightened his back, instantly looking more official. “Officer Ernie will have to deal with it.”

As I’d expected, the Henryetta police officer frowned his disapproval, especially after an errant cane swing from Mr. Murphy hit his arm, but he didn’t try to stop Mason. Most intelligent people with even half a brain wouldn’t. After Mason took over the assistant DA position last spring, he quickly convinced most of the town he was someone to fear. Which is why I received applause when I told him off in front of a group of courthouse employees while I was serving on a jury. I was one of the few people with the gumption to stand up to him, and by the time the case I’d been a juror on was settled, Mason and I were friends.

Which had been a huge sore spot for my old boyfriend Joe. For more reasons than I’d understood at the time.

But just as we were slipping out the front doors of the bank, a black sedan pulled into the parking lot. Mason stopped in his tracks when Detective Taylor got out and started walking toward us.

My toast from breakfast turned into concrete in my stomach. “So much for escaping.” A brisk November breeze lifted the hem of my jacket, and I reached down to flatten it against my jeans.

“I’m going to ask him to take your statement first. I want to be there when you give it.”

I slipped my hand in his and squeezed in gratitude. He knew how nervous I got whenever the police questioned me. Especially after Henryetta’s finest made me their number-one suspect after my mother was murdered months ago. They’d spent a good amount of time trying to find enough incriminating evidence to arrest me instead of looking for the real killer. But I also suspected he was impatient for more details about what had happened in the bank that morning.