Page 58 of Whiskey Chase
“Well, if it isn’t Miss Scarlett Bodine,” Cassidy said, coming out of Yee Haw Yarn & Coffee with her shift-starting latte. She blocked the door, her hip cocked, and looked at me over her sunglasses. “You’ve been avoiding me.”
“I have not!” I resented the implication. “I’ve been busy.”
“Busy beddin’ down with that sexy next-door neighbor.”
“And other things.”
“Walk with me,” Cassidy said.
I hesitated for a moment.
She wiggled her coffee cup at me. “I’ll share my caffeine with you.”
“All right. But only for a couple of minutes. I’ve got some sandwiches in the truck that I don’t want to get mushy.”
“When are you gonna learn to cook?” Cassidy teased.
“Only when absolutely necessary.”
We wandered south on Lake Drive, Bootleg’s main street, past the Rusty Tool’s window display of deck umbrellas and a yard décor outhouse. I waved at Clarabell through the front window of Moonshine.
“So, what’s been goin’ on? We haven’t hung out. You haven’t sent me any blow-by-blows of your sex life—pun intended. You didn’t even complain to me when your brothers threw him in the lake.”
“Those idiots,” I shook my head. Devlin had returned to bed soaking wet from head to toe, and we’d started the fun all over again as kind of a ‘fuck you’ to my brothers. “Thankfully they seem to like Dev.”
“So do you,” she pointed out.
“What’s with the interrogation? Are you accusing me of something, Deputy Tucker?”
“I’m just trying to get to the bottom of why my friend suddenly drops off the face of the earth in a town as small as Bootleg. You’ve made yourself so scarce, I’m starting to think of you as Callie Kendall.”
“That’s not fair, Cass, and you know it.”
“Look, I’ve just never seen you so into a guy before. And you’re not showing him off or running around town with him. You’ve never done that.”
It was true. I’d been hoarding Devlin, keeping him all to myself. He made it easy with his natural reluctance to socialize. He was still feeling rough around the edges about his divorce and his violent, yet totally awesome, exit from the legislature. And he was just as eager as I was to get and stay naked. It wasn’t really a prime socializing situation.
“I took him to Chicken Shit Bingo,” I argued for the sake of arguing.
“Alls I’m sayin’ is I miss my friend,” Cassidy said, giving the eyeball to Rocky Tobias who had parked his shiny monster truck across two parking spaces in front of the bank.
Rocky gave a guilty wave and jogged to his precious hemi before the good deputy could cite him for assholery.
“Do you like him?” Cassidy asked.
“Who? Rocky? He’s a great dancer.”
“Devlin, you jackass. Do you like Devlin McCallister?”
“Of course, I do. I wouldn’t be sleeping with him otherwise!”
“Not true. Wade Zirkel.”
“That was different. I was... bored.”
Cassidy gave me the “I don’t believe you but keep talking so you get deeper in trouble” look that she’d gotten from her father.
“Ugh. Fine. I like him. Like a lot. And I know he’s only here for a few weeks, and I know it’s all temporary. But orgasms, Cassidy. Oh, the orgasms!”
