Lassoing the Deputy Read online

  Hanging up, Alma told herself she would call back again later and keep trying until she reached Harry.

  In the meantime, she would just have to use the resources that were available to her. She decided to start with the sheriff.

  Getting up, she crossed over to his office. He was busy writing. By hand. Although there was a perfectly good computer on his desk and he used it when he absolutely had to, Rick still preferred the old-fashioned way: writing reports by hand. Nothing, he claimed, beat the personal touch.

  She was inclined to agree with him, albeit silently.

  Sensing someone was in the doorway, Rick looked up and saw her. “Something I can do for you, Alma?” he asked mildly.

  She tried to sound blasé, but she had a feeling that it was a useless attempt on her part. The sheriff was pretty good at reading people.

  “I was just wondering if you knew what was going on with Harry’s grandson.”

  Rick had always been one who called a spade a spade. He had no patience when it came to waltzing with words. He didn’t dance and he expected his deputies to refrain from wasting their time and his.

  “You mean Cash.”

  She nodded, giving up any and all attempts at sounding detached. “I mean Cash.”

  Rick laid down his pen and studied her face as he asked, “What’s your question exactly?”

  “There’s something bothering Cash. He’s different. Troubled, I guess, would be the best description in this case. There’s a terrible sadness in his eyes and I was just wondering if maybe you either knew or could take an educated guess as to why.”

  “Why would I know?” Rick asked. “You’re the one who’s closest to him. You’d know if anyone did.”

  But she didn’t, she thought. Alma shook her head. “I was close to him before he left for college. But my status changed pretty quickly. I haven’t heard a word from him in years. I didn’t even know he was coming back until Harry told me.”

  Alma took a chair without waiting for an invitation and sat down, facing the sheriff over his desk. “He’s different.”

  Rick shrugged. He hadn’t known Harry’s grandson very well. They’d moved in different circles while he still lived in Forever, and besides, he was older than Cash. So all he could do was offer the logical explanation. “People change.”

  Maybe, but not Cash—and definitely not to this extent. “Not this much,” she insisted stubbornly. “He’s been through something, endured something, seen something that’s taken the happiness right out of his eyes.”

  “Well, I can’t say I noticed his eyes one way or another,” Rick said. “And if you want to know what’s bothering him, my suggestion is to ask.”

  Very simple advice. Unfortunately, it didn’t work. “I did.”

  “And?”

  “He said that there was nothing bothering him.”

  “Maybe there isn’t,” Rick said. Sometimes moods came for no reason.

  She shook her head. “But I know it’s something. I can feel it when I talk to Cash.”

  “Maybe Cash just doesn’t want to burden you. Or he really doesn’t want to talk about it. Either way, you’re not going to know what it is until he’s ready to tell you.”

  “What if he’s never ready?” she pressed.

  “Then, unless you’re into mind reading, you don’t find out.”

  Alma shook her head. “That’s not acceptable,” she said adamantly.

  Rick laughed. “I had a feeling you’d say that.” He seemed to think for a moment, then made another suggestion. “You know any of his friends in Los Angeles? They might be able to give you a little insight.”

  It was a good idea, except for one problem. “I don’t know anything about his life in Los Angeles. Except for the name of the law firm where he works.” And that was thanks to Cash’s grandfather. Cash had stopped communicating with her long before he’d ever landed the internship with the prestigious law firm.

  “Well, that’s a start. Look them up and call them,” he suggested. “Maybe they can give you some insight into what’s bothering him—if there’s something actually bothering him,” he qualified.

  “Oh, there’s something bothering him. I’d bet my whole next year’s salary on it.” Hands braced against both armrests, she pushed herself up out of the chair. “Thanks,” she said, referring to his last suggestion. “I’ll do that. I’ll call his firm.” Although what she was going to say to them after they answered the phone, she had no idea.

  Alma flashed a smile at him before she left his office. The kind of smile he hadn’t seen on her lips for the past three days, he thought, ever since she’d found out that Cash was coming to the wedding.

  “Glad I could help,” Rick commented, although it was more to himself than to her. Alma had already left his office.

  A woman with a mission, Alma went straight to the computer that she, Joe and Larry used on occasion. It was supposedly a communal computer, but for the most part, she was the only one to use it. Larry usually wound up swearing at it and Joe had no use for it, preferring to either write his reports or, on occasion, type them on the old typewriter they still kept on the bottom shelf in the supply closet.

  On those rare times that something needed to be gotten out quickly, she was the one who was always recruited to get the job done. Of the three of them, she was the one equipped not so much with computer savvy as patience.

  Sitting down in front of it, she turned it on, intending to access the internet. Once awakened, the computer wheezed and groaned like an asthmatic octogenarian trying to get up enough oxygen in his lungs to blow out his birthday candles.

  Hearing the computer whine as it struggled to go through its paces, Joe looked in her direction, mildly curious. “What are you looking for?”

  She wished she knew. Then it would be easier to find. “A needle in the haystack,” she answered.

  Unfazed, Joe shrugged. “Good luck.”

  She looked up at him, grateful that he was just letting the matter go. If Larry had been in today, she would have been subjected to an endless barrage of questions. Larry liked knowing everything about everything, never mind that it was none of his business. At times his curiosity proved to be handy, but most times, she thought, waiting for the noise coming from the computer to finally abate, it was just plain annoying.

  After roughly five minutes, the computer stopped making loud sounds and settled down to emit a steady, low hum. That was the signal for phase two: getting access to the internet and trying to get the search engine—any search engine—to work.

  Exercising an infinite amount of patience, Alma typed, and then retyped the name of Cash’s law firm in an attempt to locate it and get the phone number.

  She was up to eleven attempts when it finally began to cooperate.

  “I would have shot that thing by now,” Joe told her truthfully, although with absolutely no emotion.

  Alma couldn’t help but laugh. “That’s why I locked my gun in the drawer first,” she told him. “Finally,” she cried as the firm’s website address came up on the monitor.

  The next four minutes were spent trying to get that site to come up. When it finally did, she found the phone number on one of the first lines. She quickly began to write it down on the pad she’d brought over from her desk. She managed to copy down all but the last three numbers when the computer’s internet connection mysteriously went down and the window she had just opened disappeared without a trace.

  The words Not Signed On pulsed across the top of the screen.

  Alma gritted her teeth together, trying hard to hold on to her temper. “If I was given to swearing,” she said, tossing the words in Joe’s general direction, “the air would be blue right now.”

  “I could swear for you,” Joe offered, again without so much as cracking a smile.

  He might not be smiling, but she was. He’d made her see the absurdity of it all and she was grateful to him for that.

  “Not the same thing,” she told him.

 
; Blowing out a breath, she glanced down at what she’d managed to copy. She stared hard at the two empty spaces, trying to remember what had come next. This, she couldn’t help thinking, would be when having total recall would be a wonderful thing.

  “Okay, I think the next number was a three. That leaves only two unknown. I could start dialing, maybe I’ll get lucky.”

  “And maybe you’ll owe the sheriff your paycheck for the next three months,” Joe pointed out. “You have any idea how many different combinations of numbers you’d have to try?”

  Alma had always been fine when it came to ordinary math, the kind that a person needed when making change, or buying something that claimed to be discounted by twenty percent and figuring out what that came to.

  But what Joe had just put to her came under the heading of statistics and that was when she and math parted company for the most part.

  “Too many” was her answer.

  “More like a hundred,” he countered without any fanfare.

  She stared at him. She didn’t have to try to backtrack and check the figure to know that he was right. He always was when it came to math. What’s more, the more complex the problem, the more likely that he was right in his answer.

  “How do you know that?” she marveled.

  “It’s a gift,” he answered simply. “Most likely you’ll waste less time—and money—if you just reboot the computer and find the rest of the phone number that way.”

  Alma frowned deeply. “I hate it when you’re right,” she grumbled.

  Joe came close to laughing just then. “Mona says the same thing,” he told her.

  “Always knew I liked her,” Alma commented. Then, with a sigh, she began the process of getting the computer—and the internet—to come alive all over again.

  This time it didn’t take quite as long, predominately because she didn’t bother doing a search. She went as directly as possible, given the machine she was working with, to the firm’s website.

  When the particulars came up several minutes later, she copied the last two numbers quickly, anticipating another computer glitch or freeze.

  Because she’d anticipated it, it didn’t happen.

  Free to move the cursor about, Alma decided to look over the website.

  Testimonials, accolades enumerating the number of cases the firm had collectively won—it was an impressive number—and detailing the kinds of cases they took on. The website also included a section that gave a brief biography, along with a flattering photograph, of all the junior and senior partners attached to the firm.

  She had no interest in the others, but she was curious what Cash had written on his. She scrolled down to his name. He’d included the names of both his undergraduate and graduate schools. Also listed were the awards he’d received. But unlike in the other biographies, there was no mention made of where he hailed from.

  But there was something written at the very bottom of his bio. Reading it gave her pause. It said: “On extended leave.”

  Since when were two-week vacations considered extended leaves?

  Alma chewed on her lower lip. That didn’t make any sense to her.

  “Found what you were looking for?” Rick asked, coming up behind her from his office.

  “I’m not sure,” she murmured. All she knew was that she needed to get to the bottom of all this. Picking up the phone, she began dialing. “Let’s see what I come up with after I call the firm.”

  She glanced at her watch. Making an adjustment for the time difference, she realized that it was just before lunch in Los Angeles. She still should be able to get someone. Given the size of the firm and its reputation, she assumed that the phones would be covered no matter what the lunch schedule might be.

  Two rings were all it took before the line was picked up.

  The formal-sounding, prerecorded female voice on the other end gave her a series of choices and accompanying buttons to press, then told her if she knew her party’s extension, she could dial it at any time.

  Alma hated automated operators. Determined to speak to a live person, she kept pressing zero until one finally came on. The woman said the name of the law firm so mechanically, for a second Alma thought she’d been switched to another automated line. But then she thought she heard the woman breathing, so she decided to see if she was right.

  “May I speak to CJ Taylor, please,” she requested, doing her best to harness her Texas accent.

  “I’m sorry,” the woman on the other end said, “but Mr. Taylor is on an extended leave of absence. May I connect you to another one of our associates?”

  She didn’t bother saying no but went right to the heart of her call. “You mean he’s on vacation?” Alma pressed.

  “No,” the somewhat lofty voice on the other end contradicted. She repeated, “Mr. Taylor’s on an extended leave of absence.”

  Okay, let’s approach this from another direction. “When will he be back?”

  She wasn’t expecting the answer she got. “I’m afraid I’m not privy to that information. I can have you speak to Mr. Wells if you like,” the woman offered, mentioning one of the senior partners. “I’m sure he’ll be able to help you.”

  With my question, or in general? “Is he taking over Mr. Taylor’s cases?” Alma asked, hoping that would lead to an answer she would find satisfactory.

  “For now, yes, he is. Mr. Wells is handling some of Mr. Taylor’s cases. Please hold,” she instructed crisply. “I’ll put you through.”

  Two minutes’ worth of annoyingly soothing elevator music was followed by the return of the operator. “I’m sorry, Mr. Wells is on another line. I can either take down your phone number and have him call you back or let you speak to another associate.”

  I don’t want to talk to another associate, I want someone to answer my very simple question.

  She tried again. “And you don’t know when Mr. Taylor is coming back?”

  “We have already established that,” the woman on the other end said, her voice tight. “No, I do not. Now do you want—”

  What I want, you don’t seem to want to give me.

  That was when Alma hung up.

  Chapter Six

  Alma pressed her lips together as she stared down at the telephone receiver she had just replaced in its cradle.

  Okay, she had a mystery on her hands. Not a mystery in the same vein as when Clarence Whitaker, a decidedly unathletic, overweight fifty-six-year-old grocery store clerk had woken up to find himself stranded eight feet off the ground in a tree after an evening of binge drinking because his wife had left him, but a mystery nonetheless.

  Why had Cash taken a leave of absence from his firm instead of just a vacation? Why hadn’t he told anyone at the firm when he was coming back, since he knew when the wedding was taking place?

  And why hadn’t he said anything, if not to her, then to his grandfather? She was certain he hadn’t said anything to Harry because if he’d told his grandfather that he was here indefinitely, she knew that Harry would have passed the information on to Miss Joan and the woman would have in turn told her.

  Why the secrecy? Or for that matter, why did Cash think he needed to keep all this a secret?

  Something wasn’t adding up. The Cash Taylor she remembered had always been as open and honest a person as could be found in the county, never mind the town.

  Just what had the big city done to him?

  She sensed that confronting him with questions outright wasn’t the way to go. What she needed was to get Cash to relax, to unwind. To feel comfortable about being Cash again. Maybe then she could get him to really start talking. But she wasn’t going to accomplish that alone. She needed help.

  As she picked up the phone again, her fingers automatically tapped out the numbers on the keypad.

  “Hello, Gabe?” she said when she heard the receiver on the other end being picked up.

  Rather than a “yes” or “no” response, the voice on the other end asked, “Alma?”

  “
Yes.”

  Before she could say anything further, the voice on the other end said, “No, this is Eli. You want me to get Gabe? I just saw him out back. I can—”

  She’d had five names to choose from and had guessed wrong, but in this case, one brother was as good as another. “No, that’s okay, stay. I can talk to you.”

  “I’m honored,” her brother cracked.

  She could envision him placing his hand solemnly over his heart and playing this to the hilt. “Shut up and listen,” she instructed. Eli had the ability to take a straight line and write an entire short story around it and she didn’t have time for that right now. “Didn’t you mention something about building an arch for Miss Joan and Harry’s wedding? Something special for them to stand under when they exchange their vows?”

  “Yeah—” It was obvious by his tone that he was waiting for a shoe—or an ax—to drop.

  “Well, I got you an extra set of hands.”

  “Yours?” He barely stifled a laugh. “No offense, Alma, but we’ll pass on that, thanks. You’re pretty accident-prone. We’ll spend half our time rushing you off to the hospital in the next town. And I’m pretty sure that Miss Joan and Harry won’t want to exchange their vows under an arch that’s got blood splattered along its perimeter, in between the flowers.”

  “Very funny,” she commented drily. “Not me, you dummy. I’m talking about Cash. After all, he is Harry’s grandson. I thought maybe getting him involved in doing things for the wedding would be good for him, get him to loosen up a bit. And from the way you were complaining the other day, I figured that you could use the extra help.”

  There was a pause on the other end, as if her brother was thinking it over. What was there to think over? They needed hands, Cash had hands. End of story.

  As if, a voice in her head whispered, making her exceedingly uncomfortable. The story, she had a feeling, was just beginning.

  “Sure,” Eli finally answered with a careless air. “The more the better. I’ll ask him the next time I run into him—if I run into him,” he underscored.