Fool's Gold (A sexy funny mystery/romance, Cottonmouth Book 2) (15 page)

“Carl doesn’t clean latrines. And I haven’t
fallen for Brax. I only met him a couple of days ago.”

“Brax? What on earth kind of heathen name is
that?”

“It’s a nickname. A shortened version of his
last name.” Why was she trying to explain? The more she said, the
worse her mother would get. Ariana was magnificent at twisting
words, her own as well as others. Simone knew she meant well, but
her mother didn’t know when to let well enough alone.

“Does he clean latrines as well?”

“
Nobody
cleans latrines.” Irritation
slipped through her voice.

“Don’t use that tone with me, young
lady.”

Simone pinched the bridge of her nose.
“Sorry, MOTHER.”

“If this kind of insolence is any indication
of what that man is teaching my poor little girl...” Ariana let her
words trail off, expecting Simone’s apology.

Simone was well used to the maneuver, and
she’d long since given up engaging in battles she’d never win. The
best counter maneuver was to give her mother exactly what she
wanted. Then get the heck off the phone. “You’re right. He is a bad
influence. I didn’t realize until this moment, but you’re so right.
MOTHER, you are so wonderfully astute.”

There was a short pause as if Ariana
suspected sarcasm. If she did, she chose to ignore it. “I am,
aren’t I? I love you, and I worry about you. It’s a mother’s
instinct to protect her young.”

Some mammals
ate
their young. Ooh,
that was an awful thing to think. “It’s lucky Brax is only
visiting. But I won’t give him a by-your-leave from now on.” Brax
wouldn’t give
her
a by-your-leave if he caught her sneaking
up to Carl’s trailer, not after she’d refused to talk to Maggie. He
would
not
understand.

“You’re such a smart girl. And you always
listen to your mother.” A long-suffering sigh traveled across the
line. “But your sister. I don’t know what I’m going to do with
her.”

“Jackie?” Jackie had been
born
soaking
up their mother’s every word, and suddenly Simone knew why her
mother had let her off the hook so easily with Brax. “What’s wrong
with Jackie?”

Another sigh. “Oh, I don’t know. She’s acting
strangely. She hangs up the phone when I walk in her room.”

Her mother had barging-in-without-knocking
down to a science, all in the name of taking care of her daughters.
“I’m sure Jackie just wants to give you her undivided
attention.”

Ariana didn’t get the sarcasm. Or, more
likely, she was too wrapped up in the drama of the situation. “No,
no, it’s a quick, furtive sort of thing.”

“Oh my.”

“And I’ve caught her in little lies about
where she’s been and who she’s said she was with and what time she
got in. Simone, I think your sister has”—gasp—“a man friend.”

“Noo!”

“Yes!”

“That’s terrible.” Good for Jackie. She
deserved a little happiness. A lot of happiness.

“I don’t know what to do about it. She’s so
naive. I know she’ll get herself hurt in the end.”

“She’s a big girl, MOTHER.” Sometimes a
daughter had to make her own mistakes or she never learned. So
great was her desire to protect, Ariana didn’t understand that.

Her mother snorted, a very un-Ariana-like
sound. She was probably so distracted she hadn’t even heard herself
do it. “He must be after her money.”

At least it would give Jackie the chance to
get out of their mother’s smothering house. Simone loved her
mother, but all that caring stifled a person. “But maybe he’s not.
We should give her the benefit of the doubt, don’t you think?”

“Simone. Your sister has no sense of judgment
when it comes to men. Remember that horrible Wesley person?”

Jackie had been eighteen and the “horrible
Wesley person” a horrible twenty-five. Ariana had made sure
Jackie’s heart got broken before Wesley had a chance to do it
himself. Simone had always wondered if he’d really taken that
payoff money or if Ariana had him shanghaied to Europe. Ariana was
capable of a lot of not-so-nice things in the name of love.

Simone was suddenly tired of her mother’s
voice and her mother’s worries. No one, least of all Simone
herself, would ever convince Ariana to let Jackie have a life of
her own. “There’s the timer on that yummy pan of brownies I’m
making. I better get them out of the oven.”

Another gasp. “Simone, you can’t eat a whole
pan of—”

“Oops, I can smell them burning. Gotta
run.”

Now that was a dirty trick to play on her
mother, but all was fair in war and daughterhood, especially when
your mother was Ariana Chandler.

Besides, she had Carl and Maggie to worry
about, and time was wasting.

* * * * *

Carl didn’t come home. In the end, Brax had
to go searching for him.

His own hands had done their fair share of
trembling in the kitchen, and his breath had wheezed from his chest
as he’d watched his sister literally fall apart before his eyes.
Then they’d sat in the living room for two hours—the longest two
hours of his life—while she alternately talked and cried.

He hadn’t been able to say a damn useful
thing. But he’d listened.

Finally, he’d pulled her to her feet. “You
get some rest, honey. You’re exhausted.”

“Only if you go out and find Carl for
me.”

He didn’t see that he’d have any more luck
than she had. He was used to hunting criminals, not his sister’s
husband. “I don’t like leaving you alone.”

“I’m used to it.” She gripped his hand hard.
“I need you to do this for me.”

How could he say no, even if his instinct was
to stay and protect her, if only from her own dismal mood? “I’ll do
whatever you need.”

“Go see Elwood.”

He quirked an eyebrow.

“Sheriff Teesdale.” She dipped her head, and
her voice dropped. “Maybe Carl’s in the holding cell sleeping it
off.”

“Does he do that often?”

“Only when he’s trying to get away from me.
And if he isn’t there, maybe Elwood’s seen him.”

Maybe Elwood knew at whose house he’d parked
his truck so Maggie couldn’t find it.

Damn. She looked so forlorn, she might have
read the thought. He stroked the straggly hair back from her face.
“I’ll check there first. Take a nice bath. You always did love a
long, hot bath.”

She grimaced. “Yeah, with you yelling at me
through the door and telling me to get out so you could take a
leak.”

“The trials and tribulations of being a
one-bathroom household.”

“You always were a brat.” Maggie sniffled,
but a hint of a smile curved her lips.

“Yeah.” More like a model brother, putting up
with her the way he had. “At least you’re old enough to have wine
with your bath.” Women liked wine in the tub, though he could never
understand the fascination with lying for hours while the water
went cold. “I’ll pour you a glass.”

She sniffled. Her brow puckered and her mouth
trembled. “I broke the last wineglass.”

Shit. “I’ll buy you a new set, I
promise.”

“I have others. But that was my first set
after we got married. And Woolworth’s is out of business.”

Ah God. He was an ass, forgetting, or clearly
not having understood the correlation between a bath, a glass of
wine, and the shards he’d mopped up and thrown in the trash. “You
got any chocolate?”

She stopped crying long enough to question
him with a look.

“Chocolate and wine in the tub.” Maybe that
would take her mind off things. His ex had kept a special tin of
chocolates on the bathroom counter. Upon pain of death, he was
never allowed to touch them, and as far as he knew, she only ate
them when she took a bath. Three had been her limit.

Fifteen minutes later, Maggie was in the tub,
the sweet scent of bubbles wafting under the closed door and
filling the trailer. Brax pulled his keys from his jeans pocket and
let himself out the front door. Crickets chirped, and somewhere an
owl hooted. Below, the lights of Goldstone trailers gleamed across
the highway, but Maggie’s plateau lay in the complete darkness of a
moonless night. Distant music wafted on a gentle breeze.

First stop, the county jail and Sheriff
Elwood Teesdale.

Something rustled the weeds at the edge of
the driveway. A dark shape scuttled to the top of the incline
toward Carl’s office trailer.

“Carl?” If it was, where had he parked his
truck? His usual spot sat empty.

The shadow, too small for the bulky Carl,
stopped, crouched, then sucked in an audible breath and held
it.

Brax crossed the drive and caught the
unmistakable feminine scent. The sweet tang of citrus. A fragrance
that had driven him crazy most of last night when he’d tried to
fall asleep. Now she wore a tight T-shirt and black leggings that
outlined every curve of her body.

Simone.

Chapter Nine

“What the hell are you doing sneaking around
in the dark?”

Oops. “Well...umm...” Darn it, she should
have had an excuse prepared. With Brax looming over her, she
couldn’t think straight. So she told him the truth. “I was looking
for Carl.”

“Why?”

“I decided that Carl was the one who needed a
talking-to.”

He was probably glaring at her, but beneath
the cover of darkness, she couldn’t tell for sure. He widened his
stance as if he were hunkering down for battle. “I’ve already
talked to him. You think you can do better?”

She shuddered in her white tennies. Maybe
that’s how he’d seen her when she’d thought she was sneaky and
stealthy. White against black. “I thought he might listen, you
know, coming from a woman and everything.”

He glanced at the trailer. “Carl’s not
here.”

His answer said he didn’t believe her reason
for being here, nor did he think it worth countering her argument.
“Oh.”

“In fact, I don’t know where he is. And
Maggie hasn’t seen him since this morning. So why did
you
think he might be here?”

She backed down the driveway a step. Then
two. “An unlucky guess. Since he’s not here...I should be going.”
Three steps.

He moved in a flash to her other side. Now
she was two steps above him instead of below. “Tell me why you
really came.”

She pivoted on one foot. “I just did.”

“I asked you before if you were having an
affair with Carl. You said no.” His tone indicated he needed to ask
the question again.

This
was what she’d been afraid of.
Brax finding her. She’d told herself the worrisome thing was Maggie
seeing her. Not. At least not as much. “I did say no. And the
answer is still no.”

“What was in the email you sent him?”

“Nothing important.”

“Was it cybersex?”

She almost laughed, but knew
that
would be a big fat mistake. “Don’t be silly.”

He crumbled the distance between them as if
it were paper in his fist, and suddenly, he was right in her face,
all six-foot-something, fire-breathing, two-hundred-twenty-odd
finely honed pounds of him. “My sister is in there crying herself
silly
because she thinks her husband is having an affair
with some
floozy
, and I want to know if that
floozy
is you.”

His finger stabbed within an inch of her
eyeball. Or so it seemed. She should have been pissed; most normal
women would be when accused of adultery for the second time—or was
it third? But darn, she was a sucker for a guy who didn’t even try
to hide his worry over his sister’s problems.

“No. No, it’s not me,” she whispered, as if
the smaller her voice, the calmer he might get.

“Then tell me what was in that goddamn
email.”

His shout boomed against her eardrums, and
she struggled not to put her hands over her ears. Would Maggie hear
and come running? Please, God, no. Tense white lips and stark lines
etched Brax’s face as if it were made of marble.

“I don’t think he’s having an affair at all.”
Though she wasn’t so sure of that anymore. Could it be Carl had her
write that story for someone other than Maggie?

His jaw worked, and his hand fell to his
side, bunching into a fist. “Tell me.”

“I can’t.”

“You won’t.”

“It’s Carl’s business.”

“Carl is fucking my sister over. I don’t give
a goddamn about his privacy or his business.”

* * * * *

Brax turned, stalked three paces, turned
again. He scraped a hand down his face. His fingers trembled. His
whole body quaked.

This was how Maggie had felt, he knew.
Helpless. Angry and impotent. It made a man want to lash out. It
made a woman want to Bobbitize.

“I’m sorry. That was uncalled for.” At least
the level of anger with which he’d shouted at Simone.

He wasn’t normally a bully. Still, he
couldn’t come right out and say he believed her. Something was off.
Obviously, she wasn’t the floozy with Carl at this very moment.
Equally obvious was that she didn’t know where Carl was. But Simone
was hiding something, and innocent people had nothing to hide.

What was in that email? He knew. Dammit, he
knew there was sex. That’s what she did, write sex. But was it
something she’d written for
both
Carl and Maggie?

This damn trip had been a bad idea all
around. He’d have been better off facing his failures back in
Cottonmouth. Though the same sense of helplessness had consumed
him, he’d had purpose, a killer to subdue, justice to mete out, and
a gun to back him up.

With Maggie, he hadn’t a clue how to help. He
closed his eyes, tipped his head back to let warm night air skim
his face.

Simone’s touch on his cheek brought him
back.

She smoothed her thumb across his lips. “As
much as we want to fix things for other people, most of the time
they have to do it on their own.”