Caught by Surprise

Millie Surprise had learned to enjoy chaos when she worked for Rucker McClure, the famous newspaper columnist, but that had been two years ago. She was used to serenity now, and the noisy mob of women in the small lobby of the Paradise Springs jail was getting on her nerves.

Hardly anything ever rattled her, so she chalked her restlessness up to the impending arrival of Brig McKay. They’d never had an out-of-state prisoner before, much less a celebrity prisoner. She was going to enjoy fingerprinting a VIP.

“I’m scared,” said a wispy voice.

Millie peered over the counter of the receiving desk into the wide eyes of a tiny, auburn-haired girl in a blue sunsuit. The room was packed and she looked as if she might be in danger of being flattened by the restless crowd. “Where’s your mom, sweetie?”

“By the door. She told me to wait here. I’m getting squashed.”

Millie swung a half-door open, stepped out, picked the little girl up, and sat her on the counter. “How’s that?”

“Good.” The child eyed Millie’s deputy uniform dubiously
but smiled after a moment. “You’re little,” she observed.

“I know,” Millie answered drolly, and smiled back. She understood that part of her rapport with children came from her nonthreatening size.

She went back behind the counter and studied the chaos in dismay. The lobby was sleekly modern and tastefully decorated—it hardly looked like the reception area for a jail. The mob hardly looked like a mob either—it was comprised of carefully tanned locals wearing designer sport clothes.

These women should be out playing golf, Millie thought, or shopping in Paradise Springs boutiques. From their style she would have guessed they were fans of artsy New Age music, not Brig McKay’s honky-tonk brand of country-western.

A door banged open behind the reception area and the sheriff stuck his head out, a telephone clasped in his hand. Millie smiled ruefully at him. Graying, lanky Raybo Rivers made every effort to be Andy Griffith, folksy and sweet, but his true nature kept getting the best of him. He glowered at the scene in the lobby.

“Millie, what’s going on out here? I can barely hear myself think!”

“You said it was okay to let McKay’s fans in, because he told his local fan club he’d sign autographs when he got here today.”

“I thought he meant four or five people, not half the town! The Nashville courts transferred McKay down here to get him away from publicity!”

She sighed. “I take it that you want me to arm wrestle the cream of Paradise Springs society? That’s the only way I’ll get these ladies out of here. I don’t know what McKay’s appeal is, but he sure inspires devotion.”

Raybo smiled grimly. “If anyone can whip this crowd into order, you can, Deputy. I’d put you up against a nest of alligators.”

“I’ll tell these ladies you made that comparison.”

“Don’t you dare! Get Charlie and Suds on the radio and make sure they’re on the way. We’ll need ’em.”

“Just talked to them, Raybo. Charlie’s tied up with another plant theft. Somebody stole four azaleas and a rosebush from a home on South Lakeside. Suds is hunting for two kids who went joyriding in a boat down at the marina.” She grinned. “Crime never stops in the big city.”

“Then it’s just you and me, Millie. Buzz me when McKay gets here. We’ll block a path for him.”

“Raybo? This guy’s not going to get special treatment the whole time he’s here, is he?”

“Nah. Just today.” Looking suspiciously sheepish, Raybo withdrew and shut his office door.

Millie thought she smelled a rat. Paradise Springs was a small, affluent resort town in Florida’s inland lake region. People called it a miniature Beverly Hills. There wasn’t much serious crime, and the town council had voted years ago to rent out extra jail space. Raybo obviously liked the idea of hosting this hell-raising entertainer. She made a mental note to ask Raybo’s wife if he had any of Brig McKay’s albums in his collection of country-western music.

Sighing, she turned toward her counter mate. “What’s your name, sweetie?” she asked the little girl.

“Ann.”

“Well, Ann, we’re the only two girls here who aren’t excited about meeting Brig McKay.”

Ten minutes later Millie was on the radio with her fellow deputy, Charlie McGown, when the lobby erupted in cheers. “Gotta run, Charlie. Our rebel without a cause will be here any minute.”

“Hot damn! I can’t wait to meet him.”

She was completely surrounded by Brig McKay fans, Millie realized with disgust. She called Raybo on the intercom, then patted Ann on the shoulder. “I don’t want you to fall off, hon. Let’s find your mom.

Brigand Howser McKay was going to jail. While he knew that he was hardly the first McKay to run amok of the law, he was the first
famous
McKay to do so, and
he felt sort of proud about it. He came from a long line of rowdy, independent men and women, and he wanted to uphold the family heritage. He pulled the brim of his battered khaki bush hat low on his forehead, tilted his head back on the seat of the rented Cadillac, and eyed the Florida landscape slipping past.

“Cripes, Chuckie, look at those billabongs over there,” he grumbled mildly to the heavyset man in the passenger’s seat. Brig took one hand off the steering wheel and pointed out the window. “If I was really keen on bein’ eaten by mozzies, this’d be a fantastic place.”

“Speak English,” his business manager demanded in a rich southern drawl. “Dammit, Brig, I ain’t ever gonna figure out your Aussie talk, and I give up tryin’ a long time ago.”

“I’ll translate,” Brig said patiently. “ ‘Look at those lakes over there. If I wanted to be a meal for mozzies—that’s
mosquitoes
—this’d be the perfect place.’ ”

“Florida ain’t bad. You’ll like it.”

“It’s bloody hot here in June.”

“The jail is air-conditioned. Brig.”

“Oughta be gold-plated too. Took a lot of money for the record company’s legal eagles to get me transferred here.”

“That’s the price you pay for privacy—and luxury. As jails go, it’s a palace.”

Brig chuckled. “I would’ve been happy with a spot at the big pokey in Nashville. Least I’d be near home. And I like givin’ the record company boys indigestion.”

“Go easy on ’em, Brig. The promotions people don’t get a kick out of seein’ one of their biggest names serve time for punchin’ a state senator.”

“No worries, mate. I’ll do my sixty days quietly. Maybe get time off for good behavior.”

Brig’s business manager grunted in disbelief. “Son, I’ve knowed you ever since you ambled off the plane from Australia. You wouldn’t recognize good behavior if it bit you on the behind.”

Brig grinned nonchalantly. “If it looks like a mosquito, I’ll just swat it, mate.”

•  •  •

Millie felt a quick draw of breath evaporating from her lungs. The man who climbed out of the Cadillac’s front seat wasn’t Brig McKay’s chauffeur, she knew immediately from the squeals of the crowd behind her.

Brig McKay was everything a man should be, and more.

So this was the womanizer, brawler, tabloid darling, and winner of every major award in country-western music. So this was Brig McKay, about six feet of brawny male perfection in cowboy boots, faded jeans, a white polo shirt, and a wide-brimmed khaki hat that looked as if kangaroos had bounced on it a few times.