Cowboy Justice (9 page)

She hugged herself tighter. “I live in Tucumcari.”

“Okay, well, don’t go shopping. And for the love of God, no more parties with Wallace Jr.’s crowd.”

“Fine.”

“And while we’re at it, how about you show a little respect for the people who raised you and hand over any pot you have in the house.”

Her eyes turned wide and innocent. “I don’t have any.”

“Give me a break, Gwen. Hand it over or I’ll search your room. Because I’d rather you be pissed at me than be storing drugs right under the noses of our parents.”

After a minute’s deliberation, she opened her closet and scrounged around in a drawer. Blank-faced, she handed a baggie to him.

He pocketed it, nodding. “Thank you. Anything else?”

“No.”

“Are we clear about things?”

She picked at a fingernail. “Yes.”

He put his hand on the doorknob, then stopped. “I know you don’t think you need me, but I can list a hundred different ways you might get into hot water fast, now that Wallace Meyer has it out for you. If you have a problem, you call me, okay? If you think you’re being tailed or harassed by the Tucumcari police in any way, you let me deal with it. Got it?”

“Yeah, I got it.”

“If you ever get to thinking about doing stupid shit again, drugs or shoplifting—whatever—think about Mom and Dad, will you? Think about what this is doing to them.”

She stalked up to him, indignation written all over her face. “You have no idea what I’m going through. No idea what it’s like to have a problem you can’t control.”

He opened the door, the itch for a smoke burning in his throat again. “Yeah, sis. You’re right. I have no idea what that kind of impulse control is like. You’re such a special snowflake.”

She threw something at him, a book or folder. He wasn’t sure which because he ducked, then scrambled out, shutting the door. A second something thunked against it.

“Were you two arguing?” It was Mom in the living room, her apron bunched in her hands, her face anxious.

Turning on his brightest smile, Vaughn swatted the air as he walked to her. “Sibling squabble. I suggested she work with Dad at the college to earn her keep around here. She told me to butt out of her life.” He slung an arm across her shoulders and guided her to the kitchen.

“She doesn’t want anybody’s advice, Vaughn. You know that. I’ve been praying for guidance, but that’s about all she’ll let me do to help her.”

Seems like Gwen was letting Mom do plenty, providing her with free boarding and food, and probably doing her laundry too, but he’d never call Mom out about it. “You get any answers from the Big Man on High yet?”

“Not yet.”

He rubbed her shoulders. “Whatever you do, keep trying.” He glanced at his watch. Five o’clock. “Any chance you’ve got some extra cookies to spare? I’m going to check in with Dad, then I’ve got to get on patrol.”

In a six-man department, the sheriff was on the hook for patrol as much as the most junior members of the team. There simply weren’t enough bodies to cover the shifts while the sheriff sat behind his desk. It was one of the many things Vaughn loved about being a sheriff of a rural county. He loved getting his hands dirty on the job, keeping his finger on the pulse of the community. He hadn’t gone into law enforcement to work a desk job.

“I already packaged them for you.” She presented him with a bag full of snickerdoodles.

“Thanks, Ma.” He took the bag and bussed her cheek. “I’ve been craving cookies since the last time you sent a batch home with me.”

She followed him to the door. “If you had a girl of your own, I’m sure she’d make you cookies whenever you wanted.”

He couldn’t help but smile at the singsongy nag, relieved her anxiety over his argument with Gwen had passed. And yet, he didn’t know how to break it to her that he wasn’t all that attracted to domestic types of women. He didn’t want a rancher’s wife—some cute little thing who stayed home to cook him dinner and wash his clothes. It was a certain truck-driving, ride-the-range sort of cowgirl who’d captured his interest.

He wondered what his mom would think of Rachel. He could almost reconcile it in his head, the two of them bonding. Not over cookies or knitting, but horseshoes and grain feed.

He opened the bag and popped a cookie into his mouth. “You’re not going to rest until I get hitched, are you?”

“I need grandchildren.”

Bam! There it was—Mom’s favorite topic. Uncanny, how she’d weaseled the conversation in that direction. Still, he had the good grace to look surprised by the suggestion. “Wait a gosh-darn minute. Stephanie gave you three grandchildren. Frankly, I thought I was off the hook years ago. I sent Steph a fruit basket to thank her.”

Mom got that twinkle in her eye that only showed up when she found him charming. “You did not send your sister a fruit basket for having a baby.”

“Sure I did. When she popped the second one out and it was a girl. I figured my keister was covered because she’d had one of each, so I sent her another fruit basket. Actually, more like a fruit tower. Boxes of apples and pears and oranges—a whole tower of fruit.”

He’d reeled her in good now. Chuckling as she was, she’d forgotten all about the fact he hadn’t brought a girlfriend around in a long, long time, or that her middle child was a petty thief and all-around loser.

“I’ve always wanted one of those, like from the catalog,” she mused.

He gathered her in a bear hug. “That’s good to know.” He kissed her hair. “See you soon, Ma. Thanks again for the cookies.”

He found his dad alone in the workshop, sharpening a hoof knife. He afforded Vaughn a sideways glance. “Did I hear your mother hassling you about grandchildren again?”

He opened the cookie bag and popped one in his mouth. “Brings her great joy to nag me about it, so I’m hard-pressed to complain.”

“That a boy,” Dad said with a grin. “’Course, if you’re really interested in bringing her great joy, it wouldn’t kill you to bring a woman around for dinner every now and then.”

Vaughn rubbed his eyelid, grimacing. “That might kill me, actually.”

Dad grinned. “Aw, now, I’m teasing you. Don’t get your undies in a bunch.”

Vaughn grinned and nearly choked on the snickerdoodle he was swallowing. “
Undies?
What am I, eight?”

Dad chuckled and went back to sharpening his knife. “Does that mean you avoided upsetting her with Gwen’s trials, I hope?”

Vaughn settled on a bench. “Tried my best not to, even though Gwen makes that near impossible most days.”

Dad tested the knife edge with his thumb, then sheathed it in a worn leather scabbard. “I take it today was one of those days?”

“I don’t know where you and Mom find the patience to deal with her.”

“It’s called love, son. No use loving someone if you can’t be patient with their shortcomings.”

Snorting softly, Vaughn opened the nearest drawer. The divider tray of horseshoe nails was a mess, with no rhyme or reason to its organization. He set the tray on the counter and got busy sorting.

“Tell me what’s going on with Gwen,” Dad prompted.

Vaughn sighed, “I’ve got something going on at work. A case involving Wallace Meyer Junior. And Meyer told me out-and-out that if I arrest his son, he’ll be looking to repay the favor next time Gwen has a problem.” Out of the corner of his eye, he watched his dad perch on a stool, shaking his head. “Makes me want to treat her to a month-long cruise in the Caribbean so I can concentrate on the case without having to worry about her.”

“What kind of case are we talking about here?”

Vaughn swept a pile of No. 5 nails into the largest section of the tray. “Junior trespassed onto private property in Catcher Creek along with some buddies. They shot the homeowner and a horse.”

Dad whistled. “That boy never was worth his salt.”

“None of the Meyers are.”

“Watch your tone. The Meyers were our clients for a lot of years. They, along with the rest of our clients, put food on the table and put you through college.”

He laid the No. 4 nails in a line on the counter, checking for size inconsistencies. “Yet Wallace and Kathryn treated you and Mom like crap the entire time. Don’t even get me started on the way they treated their horses.”

“They weren’t the most pleasant people.”

He sifted the imperfectly sized nails from the line and set them aside, then gathered the rest by the handful and dropped them in the tray. “Aw, Dad. You can’t say an unkind word about anyone, can you? It’s like you’re physically incapable of verbalizing a person’s faults.”

“That’s not true. The other week I was grousing about Sal Dias forgetting to fill my weed whacker up with gas after borrowing it.”

Vaughn flashed him a bemused grimace. “You’re a real hard ass, all right.” They could joke all they wanted about Dad’s good-naturedness, but it irked Vaughn that he refused to speak the truth about Wallace Meyer. It was a disingenuous way of living, to sweep every unpleasant reality or thought under the rug. He took up a metal file and one of the too-long No. 4 nails. “Grousing about your neighbor is a start, but there’s a big difference between leaving a weed whacker on empty and beating a horse bloody because it threw your child, who didn’t have the handling skills to ride it in the first place.”

“We don’t need to dig that up—now or ever. It has no bearing on the trouble Wallace Jr.’s gotten himself into.” Vaughn registered the offense in his tone, the warning to back off.

“Yes, it does,” he countered quietly. He dropped the filed nail into the tray and started on the next one.

His dad appeared at his side, a file in hand. He chose an irregular nail and got to work. “The past only haunts us if we let it, son. I’ve chosen to let it go, and I suggest you do the same before the bitterness eats away at you.”

The only bitterness eating away at Vaughn was the fact that nobody’d ever succeeded in challenging Wallace Meyer’s unchecked power. He intended to be the one to change that statistic, but he respected his dad enough not to press the subject. He finished shortening the last of the No. 4 nails, and repeated the process with the No. 6 nails, laying them in a row on the counter.

He nudged Vaughn’s shoulder with the back of his hand. “Who is she?”

Vaughn sent him a sidelong glance. “Who’s who?”

“The homeowner Wallace Jr. shot. I’m right about it being a woman, aren’t I?”

“How’d you know?”

Dad tapped his file on the lip of the counter. The nails rattled. “Because you’re reorganizing the nail drawer. You only do that when you’ve got a person of the female persuasion on your mind.”

Vaughn huffed. Helluva poker face he’d crafted for himself. “Guess we’ve had our share of chats in the workroom over the years, haven’t we?”

“Yes, we have. So who is she this time?”

None of the No. 6 nails were irregular, so he swept them into the tray. “She is Kellan’s soon-to-be sister-in-law, Rachel.”

“Hold on—Wallace Meyer’s son shot Rachel Sorentino?”

“I don’t have proof it was him. Could’ve been one of his associates.” He ran his tongue over his teeth before asking, “What do you know of Rachel Sorentino?”

He held his breath, weirdly anxious about what his dad might say. What if he didn’t like her for some reason? That was baloney, though, because the man had never made a disparaging comment about anyone in his entire life.

“I farriered for the Sorentinos back when Gerald Sorentino’s father, Albert, ran the place. Rachel is Gerald’s firstborn, if memory serves. She was a quiet thing. Apple of her daddy’s eye. I hear she’s grown into a fine farmer.”

“That she has.” He reached into the tray, turning all the nail heads in the same direction.

“What kind of designs do you have on Rachel Sorentino?” Dad asked.

Vaughn’s hand stilled. He kept his head down, knowing better than to look Dad in the eye when he lied. “No designs.”

Dad held up a nail as though presenting the evidence to a judge. “The nail drawer doesn’t lie.”

Vaughn stuffed his hands in his pockets and pushed off the bench. He paced to the far end of the room. “Look, just because I’ve got Rachel Sorentino on my mind doesn’t mean I have designs on her.”

“Mm-hmm. If you say so.”

“Dad, you know I can’t have a relationship with someone involved in an investigation. It’s unethical and immoral, and, in this case, it would be illegal because there’s a decent chance she’s going to face charges for possessing an unregistered firearm. Hell, Wallace Meyer wants me to charge her with attempted murder because she shot Junior in the back.”

“Are you going to charge her with that?”

“Hell, no. She had a right to defend herself on her own property.”

“If that’s all there is to it, then why is my nail drawer the neatest it’s been in over a year, when you told me about some girl—who, I might add, you never saw fit to bring around for dinner—breaking it off with you? You had your head in a storm cloud for a good long while after that.”

Dad had a hell of a memory for a man who didn’t like to remember anything unpleasant. Vaughn dropped to the bench again and looked him in the eye, ready to stop skirting the truth. “Same girl.”

Dad rubbed his mustache. “Well, now, that complicates things.”

“Tell me about it.”

They both reached for the cookie bag at the same time. Vaughn let Dad choose first, then dipped his hand in for two.

“How does she feel about her ex working her case?” Dad asked.

Herex
implied they’d had more than a scorching four-week fling. It implied that they’d dated, when in reality he’d never so much as taken her to dinner. The realization hit him like a loss. What he wouldn’t give to go back in time and do things differently with her. “Hard to say. I think she’s as torn as I am. She seems relieved I’m looking out for her interests, but, like me, isn’t much enjoying the reminder of all the reasons why we didn’t work out.”

“What are you going to do?”

Vaughn released his breath in a long, slow stream. “Only thing I can. Use my badge and my position to protect her from Meyer. That’s all I’ve got left to offer her, and she needs it because Meyer could make her life a living hell if he got it in his mind to.”