Acquiring Trouble (31 page)

“Move over! I got this!”
a
nother voice rang out down the quiet Main Street.

“Miles, who was that?” Morgan whispered, trying again to push her way to look out.

“
That would be your everyday gun-
to
ting granny
,
Edna.” Miles looked back around the corn
er and saw that the elderly women
had
Brady
confused. He kept looking where Miles and Morgan were
,
trying to decide if he should advance further
,
or take out the white
-
haired
,
pot
-
throwing mafia.

Brady
de
cided against the women in the c
afé and
walked toward Miles and Morgan as he
continued to
pull the tri
gger in steady succession
.
Miles stepped
fully
in front of Morgan and prepared for
hand-to-hand
combat.

As Miles tensed for attack
,
the sound of a second gun shook the earth. It sounded as if a cannon had gone off. He felt it in his f
eet
as the heavy noise reverberated up the street. Miles
looked around
the corner
to see little Edna with the long barrel of a 500 Smith and Wesson Magnum p
ropped up in the window of the c
afé. Miss Daisy and M
is
s Violet
were
each bracing Edna
against the power of the gun
as
Miss Lily was
in turn
bracing her sisters
.

Brady
looked shocked. He was frozen in place as he stared at
the
women.
Mi
les didn’t hesitate as he
sprang
from behind the wall and sprinted full speed into Brady. They crashe
d to the ground, Miles grappled
with Brady as they
both
tried to reach the dropped gun. They rolled and Miles
stood
up, dragging Brady with him by his collar.

Miles landed a solid punch and saw Brady’s head snap back. But Brady wasn’t
out yet. Miles was advancing on him when Brady lashed out with a kick to his midsection.
Miles
exhaled on the kick and felt a rib crack, but it wasn’t enough to bring him down. Not when he was protecting the woman he loved.

“That’s enough!” The time it took to recover from the kick was enough for Brady to grab his secondary weapon from behind his back. Miles growled as he studied the best angle for attack. “You try it and I shoot her.” Brady shifted his gun to point directly at Morgan
who
had come around the side of the wall.
Miles held up his hands and took some big steps backward trying to get in position to protect Morgan from a shot.

W
ith
tires squea
l
ing
from behind
,
Miles
jumped
back
to block Brady’s
shot
as he watched
Morgan
scrambl
e
behind the wall. Now that Morgan was safe,
he
ran
as fast as he could away from Brady
,
as
a silver
minivan sped toward them.
It
flew by
him
,
too fast for
Miles
to see
who was driving
. All he could see w
ere
four white
stick
-
figure
stickers and
a Dale Jr. sticker
as it
roared by him.

Miles turned back around
just
in time to see
the
driver
steer
toward
a shocked Brady
. With his mouth and eyes wide
open
,
the minivan hit him.
Brady
was launched
high
into the air. He landed
on top of the minivan
and bounced a couple of times
before t
he
vehicle
slid to a stop
.
Brady
was trying to anchor himself to the hood, but
the momentum was too much
.
He couldn’t hold onto anything and went sailing
through the air
, landing
on the ground with a grunt.
The door opened and Pam Gilbert stepped out of the minivan.

Morgan raced to Miles’
s
side
.
“Holy
crap
! Your sister just ran Brady
over,” Mi
les said in amazement as he wrapped Morgan in a fierce hug.

“Well
b
less her heart.”

William Brady opened his eyes slowly. The world was out of focus, but seemed very bright. The last thing he remembered was a minivan barreling toward him.
He blinked his eyes until t
he blurriness focused into four little white heads. It was those
damn
women! He must have died and gone to Hell. One was holding a wooden spoon, one a spatula,
another
a broom
,
and the last one held a very large Smith and Wesson Ma
gnum pointed right at his head.

“You just got r
u
n over by a socce
r mom
—b
et that hurts worse than
knowing you’re going to jail,”
the one with the broom laughed.

“Did you see him flying through the air?”
t
he
one with wooden spoon chuckled.

“
Real tough guy, that one,”
t
he
woman with the spatula laughed.

“You made my day, punk”
t
he
lady with the
gray
hair said as the
targeted
FBI agent
stepped into
his view wearing a huge smile
,
surrounded by sheriff deputies. 

“Mr. Brady, the FBI is requesting your presence at our office for a nice long chat. Let me introduce myself. I’m Special Agent in Charge
,
Cole Parker
,
and you’re under arrest.”

Morgan stood with her mouth shaped into a perfect O as her sister jump
ed
out of the minivan
, now
with a considerable dent on the roof
,
and walk
ed
over to William with her hands on her hips.
It was over, it was all over and everyone was okay! Relief flooded her as
she realized
the end was finally in sight.

She felt Miles close the space between them as he wrapped his
strong
arms around her and pulled her to his chest. “I love you,” he whispered before
bringing his lips to hers. She forgot about Pam, the herd of elderly women, and the flock of law enforce
rs
. All she could think
about
was the feel of Miles’
s
hard body against hers. The taste of his mouth on hers was much more interesting than what
would happen to William Brady.

“Hmm. I love you too,” Morgan whispered as she pulled away from him. His eyes were
burning
with a
vibrancy that told her exactly what he was thinking.

“Morgan! Oh, thank
G
od!” Pam screeched as she rushed toward her. The passenger door to the minivan opened and a very wide-eyed man got out. She recognized Pa
m’s husband, Jeffery, from the c
afé. The poor man looked
like he was going to pass out.

Pam hit her
at full speed, p
ushing Miles out of the way
as
she crushed Morgan in a fierce hug. “I had just picked up Jeffery when I heard some loud noise. I thought it was an explosion. I hurried downtown to see that man standing in the middle of the street with a gun!” Pam rushed
on
, hardly taking a breath. “And then he was firing the gun and I saw Miles covering you and I didn’t know what to do!” Pam started to sob,
causing
her perfectly done makeup to
smear
and run down her face. “I just fo
und you and I wasn’t going to l
ose you. I just floored it! Oh and then he actually hit the car! Did you see him bounce? He got some good
air
as my kids would say. And poor Jeffery, he hasn’t said a word since and now my minivan’s roof is caved in, although I had really been hoping for a new one for my birthday
—y
ou know, the ones with the built in DVD players and the storage space beneath the seat
—b
ut I don’t know if insurance will
cover this. What do you think?”

“
Pammy
Cakes, I’ll buy you the top
-
of
-
the
-
line model with leather seats and all if you promise me that you’ll never run
over
another person. I don’t think I could take that again
!” Average Jeffery exhaled and s
ome color returned to his cheeks.

“Oh,
Jeffy
! I’m so sorry I scared you. I love you baby!” Pam
ran
into her husband’s arm and planted a huge kiss on him right there in the middle of Main Street. Morgan was willing to bet that was the
least average
thing Pam had ever done. Well, that and
bouncing a guy off her minivan.

Morgan smiled. At least she had expanded her sister’s horizons. And a sister who would send a guy sailing off her car was one she wanted to get to know better. Miles saw her smile and slipped his arm around her. Morgan snuggled her head against his chest and knew her life was never going to be the same again.

“Oh! Morgan!” Pam broke from her kiss and introduced her very dazed husband to her. “Jeffery, this is my sister. She’ll be joining us tonight for dinner with the kids.
Miles, you know where we live. See you at six. We have
to go buy
a new minivan!” Pam gave her a win
k and dragged her husband away.

“There’s something else I
’d
rather do tonight, but I guess it can wait until afte
r dinner,” Miles whispered as his
lips tickled the soft skin behind her ear. “It’ll have to wait, though
—i
ncoming.”

Morgan opened her eyes to see that the town had lost interest in William and was now heading straight for her. She tried to back up, but Miles held her in place with a wicked grin on his face. “Time to pay the piper, sweetheart.”

Morgan was lost in a sea
of white hair, brown uniforms, and enough
people
talking
to make her
head spin
. People hugged her, asked questions, and decided if she was to be forgiven or not.
Finally, Miss Lily thumped her broom against the paveme
nt to get everyone’s attention.

“I just have one question.
Is there anything else you did that we need to know about?”

“I was the one who painted the water tower, not Miles
.”

“You painted the
water tower?” Miss Lily gasped.

“I told you,” Mr. Wolfe said from the safety
of the other side of the group.

“I did. And I tipped the cows at
Mr. Johnson’s farm, I broke your mai
l
box Miss Edna, and I stole gum from the market
all to get my daddy’s attention. It was wrong and I apologize to all of you
,
” Morgan said with great sincerity.

“What about turning the cheerleaders blue?”
s
omeone asked from the crowd.

“Y
ea
h
, not so sorry about that one,” Morgan laughed and at her apology
the tow
n seemed to begin to thaw toward her
. She knew it was just the beginning, though. She’d need to earn their trust and respect
over time.