The Love of a Lawman, The Callister Trilogy, Book 3 (22 page)

"I guess I hadn't noticed," Isabelle lied. "What're you mixing up?"

"Chocolate frosting. You're kidding, you haven't noticed, right? That cute butt in those tight Wranglers?"

Well, damn. One of the first things Isabelle had noticed about John was how his jeans fit him. "Hmm. Well, inspecting men's bottoms is not something I usually do."

"Oh, c'mon now. All women look at men's bottoms. Just like men look at women, don't you think? Misty Arnold, you remember her. She was in mine and Paul's class in school. She's a checker at Fielder's now. We joke all the time that the whole pattern of grocery buying has changed. Now all the women go shopping around noon so they can be in town to watch when John walks from the courthouse to Betty's Road Kill for lunch."

Isabelle let out a little gasp. "I can't believe that."

Nan measured ingredients into the mixer bowl. "Well, believe it, cousin. You've got every woman in town jealous."

"That's a switch. I don't think anyone's ever been jealous of me before."

"That new lady that opened the fancy coffee shop on Main Street? Can't think of her name now, but she takes phone orders for those crazy coffees and delivers them to the courthouse every day. Three dollars for a cup of coffee. Can you imagine?"

Nan switched on the mixer, then raised her voice to be heard above the whir of the motor. "She's got such a crush on him it's embarrassing. Somebody said she'd dated him or something. After hearing about you, she told Misty she wished she'd opened a stable instead of a coffee shop." Nan cackled again. "Take my word for it, there's a whole herd of women whose beds he could park his boots under if he wanted to."

Isabelle couldn't recall Misty Arnold, but she had seen the coffee shop, Java Junction. She had even intended to drop in. Now she would make it a point to do just that, perhaps buy some kind of specialty coffee to have for John when he came to her house. "Hmm. I'm wondering if
I
would've been better off opening a coffee shop. I'm losing confidence every day in my plans for a horse-training operation."

On that reflection, she downed the last of the coffee, set the mug on the counter and told Nan she had to go. "Thanks again," she said as her cousin brought her jacket from the coatrack. "As long as we're discussing the local gossips—you won't say anything about this to anyone, will you?"

"What, that you're writing a letter to that asshole Billy?"

Isabelle shrugged into the jacket and tugged her hair free of the collar. "Well, that, and the fact that you had to help me. I don't want to start talk all over again about how dumb I am. I remember how it used to be when I was a kid."

"Oh, Izzy, people are different now. These days nobody looks at dyslexia as dumb. I think one of my kids has a touch of it. And he's the smartest kid I've got. He can spell words as long as my leg, but he can't spell 'cat.'"

"Really? It's sort of like that, Nan, no kidding."

"Come over someday when you're not in a hurry and let's talk about it."

"Yeah, okay. You understand, though, don't you, why I don't want people gossiping? Ava might hear it. She's such a little fighter, she'd feel like she had to defend me, which could cause her problems."

"Hey, don't worry. I won't even tell Roger." Nan hooked an arm through hers. "I'm so glad you came back to Callister. It's nice to have a girl cousin my age. And you remind me of Aunt Helen." She touched Isabelle's hair. "You've got her hair. Remember how pretty it always was?"

A feeling of being disconnected flitted through Isabelle's mind. The only hairdo she could remember on her mother was a tight bun on the back of her head, a style necessitated by her occupation as a cafe cook. "Yeah, sure," Isabelle fibbed. "Who's the cook at Betty's now? I wondered who would take that job after Mom dropped dead."

The fun and laughter left Nan's face. "I know you left here with a lot of bitterness, Izzy. My mom's always said Helen was a decent woman. It's just that after she married a good-for-nothing she didn't know what to do about it. She had you two kids and no way to make much money if she left him. Nobody had any idea how bad it was with Frenchie until it was too late."

Isabelle smiled, masking the truth of what her cousin and she both knew. If life in the Rondeau home had been anything other than miserable, Paul might have gone beyond eighth grade and she might not have quit school at seventeen and left town with Billy Bledsoe. "I know. I'm not holding any grudges."

And she didn't. Her life outside Callister had been fun and exciting at times. She had met a host of interesting people and acquired a wealth of knowledge of horses. If she had stayed in Callister, in all likelihood she would have become Nan, having babies and pinching pennies.

At the front door her cousin threw a heavy arm around her and hugged her. It
was
nice to have a female relative, and encouraging. Perhaps a relationship eventually would grow between Ava and Nan's kids, even Paul's daughters if Sherry could ever be persuaded to bring them to visit.

All the way to town Isabelle's mind stayed on John Bradshaw as if he had stamped a brand on her brain that read s-e-x. She thought about Nan being pregnant and the disheveled bed in her and Roger's bedroom. Isabelle scarcely remembered sharing a bedroom with a man with whom sex was a regular occurrence, though once she and Billy had been that passionate. She could no longer picture Billy naked and aroused. When he popped into her head, the next visual was the bottle-blonde, diamond-covered horse owner from Oklahoma and at that image Isabelle's mind threw up barriers. Lately, the erotic picture that filled her imagination was the sheriff.

Now she had a new question to consider. Was she one of that herd of women who wanted his boots parked under her bed? He had made it plain he was available if she wanted him. "Don't be insane, Isabelle," she muttered.

At the post office, she took from her purse the three ownership-transfer forms obtained from the American Quarter Horse Association months ago. She added them to the envelope holding the letter and sealed it. She bought postage, then carried the letter to the outgoing slot. On a deep breath and a silent prayer, she slid the letter into oblivion.

Then she headed for the coffee shop.

* * *

"I can tell you what he likes," a female voice said.

Startled, Isabelle turned from studying a wall of dark coffee beans in fat, squatty jars. Standing just behind her was a willowy, extremely attractive woman in her twenties who had eyes so shockingly blue they looked artificial. "Excuse me?"

The woman raised her hand and with long, perfectly manicured, crimson acrylic nails, swept a long sheaf of raven-black hair behind her ear. "The sheriff. I can tell you which beans he likes."

Caught off guard at a perfect stranger appearing to know personal information about her, Isabelle was dumbfounded. Nan's words filtered back.
Somebody said she'd dated him or something.
In a million years, it wouldn't have occurred to Isabelle that the John Bradshaw she knew would have dated this woman who looked more out of place in Callister than a mule at a horse show. Nor would she have thought John was a custom-ground-coffee-beans kind of man.

She settled a look on the woman she estimated to be, at a minimum, five years younger than herself. "I'm really not interested in—"

"You're that horse woman, aren't you?"

Isabelle heard derision in the question. She drew herself up. "I don't think we've met."

"I'm Rita Mitchell. I own this shop." In a graceful gesture, she pointed to a jar of brown beans. "Traditional Roast. That's what the sheriff likes. I grind them for him every week. Sometimes, when I can persuade him to walk on the wild side, he'll buy French Roast. He's a big-time coffee drinker."

She's got such a crush on him it's embarrassing.

Any notion Isabelle had of buying gourmet coffee to please John's palate marched right out Java Junction's front door. "Oh. Well, good for him. And you, too, I suppose."

The woman turned her back and moved behind a counter anchored on one end by a cash register. She had on a form-fitting ankle-length black dress and black ankle-strap wedges. Silver hoops the diameter of beer cans looped through her earlobes. Her hair, shiny and straight as a string, hung past her waist and moved like black water when she turned her head. "Everyone over at the courthouse is wondering," she said, "is it just the horses?" The girl crossed her arms under her breasts. "Or is it something else?" Her red heart-shaped lips curved into such an evil smile that Isabelle thought of a cobra.

Isabelle was as naive at playing head games with women as with men. All she could think was John must have slept with this woman. Even if he hadn't slept with her, at the very least, he had commerce going on with her. "I guess I don't know what you're talking about."

"I'll pass on something you might find helpful," Rita Mitchell said. "You see, I have this sorting and classifying system for men. I'd file John under 'Type A Taker.' That's one of the most dangerous types. Gives away nothing of himself, but makes you think you're the one who can push his button. Gives you a false impression he has an interest in you." She ran a fingernail along the edge of the counter and Isabelle noticed a tiny white flower painted on it. Isabelle stuffed her hands with their short nails into her jacket pockets. "Then after he's got you tied up tighter than one of those poor calves he used to torture," Rita Mitchell said, "he forgets your phone number."

Panic that had been building since the beginning of this conversation filled Isabelle's chest and she tried to remember what had compelled her to come into this store in the first place. The blended aromas of two dozen flavors of coffee that filled her nostrils made her feel nauseated. "Look, it's nice meeting you, but I'm in a hurry. If you'll excuse me, I—"

"Sure you don't want a pound of Traditional Roast?"

Isabelle pasted on a smile, hoping her face didn't crack. "No, thanks. I can't afford it."

Feeling as if she had been ambushed, she tramped to the end of the block where she had parked the Sierra, her boot heels pounding a cadence on the sidewalk. What had she been thinking, allowing herself to be attracted to John? With everyone in town talking, speculating on what was going on between them on the mornings he came to her house, what if someone found out what had happened in the barn on Tuesday? What if Ava started hearing tales about her mother?

What could be more humiliating in a town of six hundred thirty-five than getting involved with a man who had also been involved with who knew how many other women in town? She imagined a pack of clamoring females sitting around a table comparing notes.

She hated to have to find someone else to help her with the horses, especially since John was so good with them, but she had no intention of succumbing to the charms of the town stud or a Type A Taker.

She imagined him with Rita Mitchell, his hand between her thighs, his lips pressed to those red lips as they had been pressed to hers yesterday in the barn. Why wouldn't he be attracted to Rita? She was beautiful in a Gothic way. She didn't have flyaway red hair and freckles. She was a businesswoman. Maybe she had been to college. In any event, she surely wouldn't have to ask a relative to write a letter for her.

Chapter 14

The prisoner handoff went without a hitch and by midafternoon the Idaho Falls deputies and their charge were on their way out of town. Though John hadn't slept well on the rollaway bed that stayed in the makeshift bedroom, he remained in the courthouse the rest of the day, catching up on paperwork.

All night and all day he had thought of Izzy and what almost occurred in her barn. The gun-shy man inside him warned him to back off. If he didn't, his good intentions of keeping his pants zipped in Callister would be out the window.

At home, TV movies provided no distraction from the ones going on in his head. At one point, he found himself pacing between his chair and the phone, role-playing phony conversations and offering excuses why he couldn't put in an appearance at Izzy's tomorrow. Christ, he had seen the anxiety in bulls and stallions when they had a female's scent. He didn't like thinking it, but his own behavior wasn't much different.

Thursday morning, having failed to make the decision to tell her he would continue with the horses only until she could find someone else, he put coffee on to brew and took a cup with him to the shower. He consumed another cup while he shaved, the horny part of him planning to bring to a conclusion what had begun in that big old bam.