Page 32 of Barbed Wire and Burglary
“I’m in good shape now.” She gave him a squeeze hug and helped him hobble to the adjoining restroom. “I was already buckled inside the ambulance, so the EMTs took care of me. A.J. was right there, too. He’s the one who went into the house and rescued Bandit.”
“No kidding?” Aaron returned his attention to A.J., who was still lounging in the doorway. “How’d you avoid the gas leak?”
“With a gas mask,” Aurora chortled gleefully before A.J. could answer.
A.J.’s whole face softened as he watched her. The guy had it pretty bad for her. Aaron would give him that. What he wouldn’t give him was a free pass on the preposterous.
“You just happened to have a gas mask on you?” That wasn’t suspicious at all. So help him, if A.J. had anything to do with the leak!
The retired military policeman shrugged like he didn’t see what the big deal was. “A throwback to my Army days. Plenty more odds and ends where that came from in my truck storage bin.”
Aaron wasn’t sure what to believe as he barricaded himself in the restroom to change into his plaid shirt, jeans and boots. By the time he finished finger combing his hair and donning his Stetson, Maggie had returned with the wheelchair.
He had to swallow his pride to take a seat in it. “This is completely unnecessary,” he grumbled again, though nobody seemed to be listening. The only upside was that A.J. was no longer present to witness Aaron’s humiliation.
Aurora was too busy making friends with Maggie and setting up a coffee date for the two women. She was up to something that would undoubtedly involve interfering in his nonexistent love life.
To Aaron’s further dismay, A.J. was waiting for them at the curb outside the medical center. The doors of his shiny Dodge Ram were open, ready for the three of them to climb inside. Logic told Aaron that hitching a ride with his sister’s boyfriend would make it that much harder to negotiate adrop-off at a hotel. However, he doubted he would win the wrestling match with his sister that was sure to follow. He was too weak.
In the end, he saved himself the additional humiliation by not putting up a fight at all.
Maggie remained on the sidewalk, waving at them as they drove away.
“Your nurse was really nice,” Aurora noted in a laughing voice. “Pretty, too, the Betty Boop way you like.”
Whatever.Maggie Meyer was nowhere near that voluptuous. He knew his sister was only trying to get a rise out of him.
“Oh, yeah?” He stared out the window in the backseat of the dual cab, wishing she’d change the subject. “I didn’t notice.” He injected a note of boredom into his voice.
“Liar!” She swiveled around in her seat. “Different subject. The sheriff isn’t sure when they’ll release the lake house from its crime scene status. Until he does, A.J. has been kind enough to offer us a place to stay.”
Aaron started to protest, but she talked right over him. “His apartment has two bedrooms. You and A.J. will share the one with the kiddie bunk beds, while I take over the main bedroom with the queen-sized bed.”
He sent her a venomous look. “You do realize that he wants me in jail?”
She rolled her eyes and turned back around in her seat. “Maggie warned me that the meds making you loopy had worn off. Guess she was wrong.”
Chapter 6: Hits and Heists
Well, that backfired!
After presenting compelling evidence to his higher-ups at Lonestar Security that had taken A.J. months to compile, he’d expected Deputy Aaron Cannon to be taken in for questioning. Instead, the sheriff had defended the guy as if he were some sort of choirboy…and then gone to the same choirboy and told him everything!
I’ll probably die in my sleep tonight.
There was nothing quite like the prospect of being smothered with a pillow in one’s own bed to prove a point to one’s boss. But A.J. wasn’t one to back down just because things got tough, and having a crooked policeman sitting in his backseat surely qualified as tough.
He glanced in his rear-view mirror to give Aaron a hard look. “I’m not trying to get you fired.” Nope. He was trying to get the guy arrested. There was a difference. “How about we save this conversation for when we get to the apartment?”
Aaron glowered for a few seconds. “Throw in a coffee,and we might have a deal.” There was a resigned note in his voice. Did he realize the gig was about up?
A.J. mulled over their coming confrontation as he drove up to the behemoth old two-story that his landlords had recently renovated. No matter how hard he tried, he couldn’t imagine living in a place as big as a warehouse, much less getting his hands on enough furniture to fill the place. He was guessing that the owners were renting out the gorgeous loft apartment over their four-car garage to help pay for it all.
Aurora squinted through the sunlight at the enormous ranch home. “Wow! A real country mansion!”
A.J. sent her a sideways glance, hoping it didn’t mean she’d ever want to live in a place like that. “Yeah, big enough to get lost in.” A four-room cabin in the middle of the woods was more his style.
Her smile was wistful. “Maybe they have a lot of kids and grandkids. One of the bedrooms in your apartment seems to suggest that.”
