Optical Delusions in Deadwood (16 page)

      What was the exact date of the Carhart murders? Was it late January? “I’m not sure, honey.”

      “Slagton.” Doc’s voice jarred me.

      He stood in the doorway, filling the gap I’d left open. The sight of him in his olive green cargo shorts and faded yellow T-shirt spurred a tickly feeling in my stomach, as if I’d swallowed a handful of Pop Rocks.

      He looked me up and down, his dark eyes devouring as he added, “That’s the closest ghost town to his ranch that still has buildings, anyway. The others in the vicinity are mostly littered with nothing more than foundation scars.”

      It sounded like somebody had been busy scouting about. I smiled, wondering if I looked as starry-eyed as I felt, hoping I didn’t. “Hello, Doc.”

      “Good evening, Violet.”

      Yes, it was, even more so now that I had him to ogle.

      His gaze lingered on the v-neck of my strappy sundress before meeting back up with mine. “Nice necklace. Is that amethyst?”

      I fingered the smooth stone dangling at my cleavage and nodded all slow and sultry. Then a giggle slipped out, ruining my Marilyn Monroe moment. So much for playing it cool. What was it about Doc that turned me into a giddy schoolgirl with an even giddier crush?

      “Who are you?” Layne asked Doc. My son’s narrowed eyes were full of distrust, his jaw rigid, lips tight.

      I’d forgotten that Layne had never actually met Doc. I rose, twisting my hands together, wondering how Doc would deal with Layne’s protective man-of-the-house act. “Layne, this is Doc Nyce, a client of mine.”

      At the word “client,” Doc raised an eyebrow at me. I shrugged and continued, “Doc, this is Layne, my son.”

      Doc held Layne’s stare for a pent-up breath or two, then moved into the room, letting the door drift closed behind him. “So, you’re Layne Parker.” He pulled out the chair opposite Layne and sat down. Leaning back, he crossed his arms over his chest. “I’ve heard about you.”

      Layne lowered his pencil. “You have?”

      Doc nodded slowly. “Word on the street is that you like to dig up the past. Get real messy.”

      “You mean like dirty?”

      Doc nodded again.

      “I guess so. Who told you that?” Layne shot a small frown in my direction. “Mom?”

      “Nope. One of my sources.” Doc pointed at Layne’s book. “What do you have there?”

      “A book about ghost towns.” He showed Doc the cover.

      “I’ve read that one. What do you think of it?”

      “The pictures are pretty good.” Flipping through a couple of pages, Layne added, “I wish it had better maps.”

      Doc held up a finger. “I think I know a book you’ll like more.” He pushed out of his chair and crossed over to the bookshelf lining the wall next to me. Scanning with his fingertips, he pulled out a blue book with white lettering and handed it to Layne. “Try this one. The maps are top rate.”

      “
Ghostly Tailings. A Snapshot of the Past
,” Layne read the title aloud, then skimmed through the pages and said, “Awesome! Thanks.”

      “You’re welcome. Mind if I hang out in here for a bit and talk to your mom?”

      Layne’s nose was already buried in the text of his new treasure. “Nah. Go for it.”

      Thunderstruck, I scratched my head, awed by Doc’s slick and quick disarming of my knight in shining armor. It was no wonder my chastity belt clattered to the floor every time Doc came near.

      “What are you looking for?” Doc pointed at the microfilm reader. “More trouble?”

      I returned to the screen and my scrolling. “The Carhart incident.” No need to lie; all he had to do was walk over to catch me in the act.

      He did exactly that, standing over me, making me feel all prickly with awareness.

      “I’ve been meaning to give this to you.” He held out a folded piece of paper, his hand capturing mine as I reached for it, his fingers lingering before letting me go. If it weren’t for his wink, I’d have thought I imagined the whole touch.

      Unfolding the paper, I glanced over to make sure Layne still had his nose buried in the book. He did, and the rest of his face, too. We didn’t even seem to exist in his world, anymore.

      Doc’s present was a copy of the article on Karen Snarky’s murder. Her black and white picture—grainy, but clear enough—showed a pretty young girl, whose dark hair the paper described as auburn.

      “Thanks,” I said, folding it up and stuffing it in my purse to study more later. Maybe I could run it by Jane, figure out a sly way to ask her if this was the same woman with the bloodstained collar she’d seen in the old photos.

      “Mom.” Layne pushed back his chair. “I’ll be right back.” He held up the book Doc had found for him. “I want to make a copy of something in here.”

      “Do you need some change?” I asked.

      “No, I have it.” He looked at Doc, but said nothing, then left us.

      Alone.

      After a glance up at Doc, who was peering over my head at the view screen, I focused back on the task at hand—finding out more about the Carhart men. But I could feel Doc behind me, smell his woodsy cologne, hear his rapid heartbeat—no wait, that was mine. I felt like a masochistic lamb, anticipating the wolf’s pounce, eager for the bite. I needed to get a grip, but I couldn’t decide which part of Doc to grip first.

      “How was your evening, Violet?” Doc asked, his voice low and close.

      I slowly twirled the knob, scrolling inch-by-inch through the past. I decided honesty was the policy I’d start with and see where it took us. “Frustrating.”

      He bent closer and covered my hand with his, making me turn faster both inside and out. “Same here.” His warm breath teased the shell of my ear, soliciting shivers. “Did you go home and go to bed?”

      “Yes.” No need to mention the spoonfuls of cookie-dough ice cream I consoled myself with first. “Did you?”

      “More or less.”

      I looked at him, his cheek just a sway away. “Alone?”

      He turned his head and held my stare, the intensity in his eyes practically crackling. “I don’t want your friend, Violet.”

      He said what I needed to hear, but that didn’t solve my problem of Natalie claiming him first. “She’s a nice girl.”

      “Great. She’ll make some guy happy some day. But not me.”

      “Are you going out for a
business
dinner again, soon?”

      “No. I learned my lesson. You?”

      I shrugged, grinning, teasing, ready to play. “I’m a slow learner.”

      “Teaching you would be fun. I bet you’re a hands-on type of student.”

      “What gave that away?”

      “I’ve witnessed it firsthand.”

      “What else have you witnessed?”

      “You play well with others.”

      That made me chuckle. “Anything else?”

      “You don’t quit until you finish the job.”

      “Well,” I deliberately and slowly licked my upper lip. “I do like to be thorough.”

      He stared at my mouth and then his Adam’s apple bobbed. “Wow.” He groaned. “I need a time out.”

      “Oh, come on. That was too easy.”

      “What can I say?” His gaze dipped down to my amethyst again. “You do things to me.”

      Not enough things lately.

      “Are you going out with Ben again?” he asked, lifting his gaze north of my chin.

      Not if I could help it. “That depends.”

      “On what?”

      “How full my dance card is.”

      “It looks full from here.”

      I raised an eyebrow. “I thought you didn’t like being distracted.”

      “I don’t, but abstaining isn’t working.”

      “What are you going to do about that?”

      He let go of my hand and ran his fingers all the way up my arm, chills and goosebumps trailing. “Stop abstaining,” he whispered, then bent down and nipped my bare shoulder. It was the soft kiss he gave me to make it all better that nearly fried my control panel.

      It was my turn to groan. “Okay, we’re even.”

      Chuckling, Doc tapped the screen. “There’s your article.”

      Sure enough, the headline read,
Two Dead in Lead Murder-Suicide
.

      And that’s why Doc was the master and I was his puppet, still all aquiver, my mind stuck on the subject of bare flesh. Doc had not only toyed with my libido, he’d multi-tasked as he pulled my strings, locating what I’d been searching for while making me sing and dance to his tune. Three slices of humble pie for me, please, and don’t forget the whipped cream dollops.

      But something had me feeling a little confused. “Why are you helping me with this?”

      A couple of days ago, he was trying to wrangle a promise from me to walk away from the Carharts.

      “If I ask you to stop, will you?”

      “Probably not.”

      “That’s what I figured.”

      “Does that mean you’re going to help me?”

      His lazy grin resurfaced. “That depends.”

      “On what?”

      “How full your dance card is.”

      My gaze narrowed. Was Doc saying what I think he was? More of him on a regular basis? Just the thought made me feel sucker-punched, all winded and warm. I must be reading him wrong. 

      “I think I have some room on it.” Which was a way more cool-cat answer than jumping into his arms and screaming, “Take me! I’m yours!” Which was my first instinct.

      Doc ran his finger along my jaw, cupping my chin, gently forcing me to lock eyes. “Make more room, Boots. Lots more.”

      The door flew open. Doc stepped back just in time. Layne entered the room and, after a brief scrutiny of us, dropped back into his seat. Doc returned to the table, joining him.

      I blew out a breath, clearing ribbon-carrying bluebirds from my vision, and tried to focus on the article. A quick scan later, I noted Wanda and Millie’s names, and Lila’s, too. The story was plain and simple—an unhappy, violent end to a pair of unhappy, violent men. But while Lila appeared in the picture of the mournful leftovers, I wasn’t buying her crocodile tears. Maybe it was the sultry pout or her outlined lips; something just wasn’t right.

      I leaned forward, staring at a mark visible above the low-cut neckline of her dress, just above her left breast—a tattoo. Of what, though? It looked like a pair of curled horns on the head of a pig melting into a goat. What the hell? Not exactly the cute little heart or rose most women prefer. I zoomed in until the picture blurred, but I still couldn’t figure out exactly what it was.

      The door pushed open and Addy bebopped into the room, giggling, carrying a book on frogs. Kelly followed. Addy stopped short when she saw Doc, then smiled wide. “Oh, hi, Doc.”

      Addy and Doc had a history involving chicken feathers and spilled secrets—namely mine, dumped from her lips into Doc’s ear. Addy hadn’t seen Doc in a couple of weeks, but based on her toothy smile for him, she didn’t seem to hold his temporary withdrawal from her life against him. Unlike her mother.

      “Hello, Addy.” Doc nodded at Kelly, then turned back to Addy. “How’s the arm?”

      Addy rubbed her cast-covered arm, her dimples showing. “Itchy. Do you want to sign it? I have to wear it for one more week.”

      “Of course. You have a marker?”

      “Mom does, don’t you?”

      I fished for one in my bag and held it out to her. She bounced from me to him, holding her dirty purple cast out toward him.

      He scribbled something and handed me back my marker. “You two staying out of trouble these days?”

      “Yeah. Mom has us in lockdown. She says she’s rebuked our right to freedom and liberty for all.”

     
Revoked
, actually, but I didn’t want to correct her in front of Doc. I hit the Print button so I could study the Carhart article and picture more later. Maybe I could find something on the Internet that matched the tattoo.

      “She sounds like a real dictator,” Doc said, his grin taunting me. 

      “Totally. She needs a man.”

      I rolled my eyes. Addy was channeling Natalie again.

      “No, she doesn’t,” Layne piped up. “She has me.”

      “You don’t even have a job, Layne.”

      Time to play referee. “Adelynn, that’s enough.”

      “I can take care of Mom.” Layne wasn’t done.

      “You’re just a kid,” Addy said. “Mom needs a real man. Someone who will take care of her when she’s hurt.”

      And so it began, the same argument we went through every night. Having Doc witness it, though, made me squirm in my chair. “Knock it off, you two.”

      Kelly cleared her throat. “My dad told Uncle Joe he’d like to take care of your mom.”

      Somehow, I didn’t think Addy and Jeff Wymonds were talking about giving me the same type of “care.”

      “Really?” Addy asked, smiling innocently at me as if she hadn’t been trying to shove Jeff down my throat for the last couple of weeks. “How cool would that be, Mom?”

      Not cool. I avoided Doc’s gaze and squirmed some more. Very not cool. I had to step carefully here, not wanting to hurt Kelly’s feelings about her father.

      “Kelly and I would be sisters,” Addy continued as I searched for a polite way to yell,
Hell, no!

      “I think it’s a bad idea.” Layne came to my rescue. “He’ll just want her to have more babies.”

      I coughed. I couldn’t help it. Just the thought of getting pregnant cinched up my esophagus in a tight little corset and made breathing painful.

      “Come on, guys. Let’s talk about this some other time,” I said, wheezing slightly. A time when Doc wasn’t sitting in on the conversation, laughing into his fist. I nailed him with a glare, damning him for enjoying my predicament.

      “Babies are cute,” Addy said. “I think you should go out on a date with Kelly’s dad.”

      Layne crossed his arms. “I don’t.”

      “Me, either,” Doc spoke up, silencing the crowd. “Her dance card is already full.”

      “What’s a dance card?” Addy asked, watching Doc closely.