Page 10 of Whiskey Chase
“I apologize for my brother being a crabby bastard, Dev. I interrupted him while he was workin’. He likes that about as much as when I interrupt him sleepin’.”
Gibson sighed. “It’s fine. I was done staining anyway.”
“Gibson here makes the finest cabinets this side of the state,” I told Devlin. “I’ve been after your granny to let him have a crack at her kitchen. I think I’m wearin’ her down.”
“You need anything else?” Gibson asked.
“You’re free to go,” I said grandly, dismissing him.
He started to walk away, grumbling about what an epic pain in his ass I was, but only made it a few paces. “Here.” He pulled a candy bar out of his back pocket and tossed it to me.
Say what you want about Gibson Bodine, but my brother has a heart of gold. It’s just under a whole bunch of thorns. And maybe some gargoyles and fire-breathing dragons. But it’s there, and it’s a whole lot bigger than anyone else knows.
“Thanks, Gibs,” I said, unwrapping the chocolate. Without another word, he jumped in his truck and left. At least he didn’t do a burnout in Granny Louisa’s driveway. He wasn’t a total Neanderthal.
“Let’s go get some lunch,” I said to Dev.
“Lunch?” he repeated.
“You know, the meal between breakfast and supper?”
“I know what lunch is.”
“I’m thinking Moonshine if you want to go.”
“You drink your lunch?”
“It’s adiner, smarty pants. Best open-face turkey sandwich I’ve ever had.” He still looked a little pale for my liking. I wasn’t about to leave a man in the midst of a crisis alone. And there was nothing Whit’s food couldn’t fix.
He didn’t look convinced.
“How many visitors you had today?” I asked, playing the ace up my sleeve.
“Counting you and your brother? Four.”
I nodded. “They’re curious about you. If you show your face in town, you won’t be the broody stranger. They won’t feel the need to come ringin’ your doorbell and handin’ you baked goods if you leave the house every once in a while.”
He didn’t look convinced. “You’re saying if I go into town, they’ll leave me alone?”
“Not entirely. But you won’t be getting near as many strangers on your doorstep.”
“I don’t know, Scarlett. I’ve got a lot on my mind.”
“Man’s gotta eat. C’mon. I’ll buy.” I hooked my arm through his and gave him no choice.
The poor guy didn’t put up a fuss when I shoved him into the passenger seat of my pick-up. I’d seen that look before. That shell-shocked panic. Once, when we were younger and much, much dumber, the four of us were messing around on the ice. Jameson had fallen through. His eyes had the same stunned look as the ice gave way under his feet. We’d pulled him out as a sopping wet human chain. And then lay there on the ice shivering and laughing and half-crying. It’s what we did when one of us was in trouble. From the looks of it, Devlin didn’t have much of a human chain behind him.
I gave him the twenty-cent tour through town. “And those are the hot springs. They keep the lake nice and toasty and draw tourists like crazy. We’ve got a couple of spas on this end of town. And that’s The Lookout.” I pointed to the bar on the hill. “Did your gran tell you anything about the history of Bootleg?”
“She did not,” Devlin said. He scrubbed his palms over his jeans. His nerves were still evident, but at least he was progressing to full sentences.
“Well, Bootleg Springs was the most prosperous town in West Virginia during Prohibition.”
“Ah, hence the name,” Devlin said, catching my drift.
“My great-granddad Jedidiah Bodine was the first to set up a still, and his moonshine became infamous. Soon, the rest of the town was brewing, and every Thursday night, they’d load up boats with liquor. A watch was always stationed up at The Lookout. They’d cross the lake into Maryland where they’d hand off the hooch, and it was distributed to D.C. and Baltimore.”
Devlin made a non-committal noise, but I kept up my incessant chatter as I cruised down Main Street and pointed out more places of interest. The spot where Jedediah led the police on a merry car chase that resulted in the blowing up of his still. That event was still celebrated annually with an enthusiastic reenactment complete with pyrotechnics.
