“I suspect so.” And then the guy she’d Tased would sue the hell out of her. He wouldn’t get anything. She could sell her collection of shoes and handbags, but everything else was gone. And he would pry her coffeemaker out of her cold, dead hands. She looked out and the deputy was currently using his overly large paws to go through her Chanel bag.
“So I have a Taser, pepper spray, what looks like a rape whistle, an EpiPen, more pepper spray.” The deputy shook his head as he pulled out a small air horn. “Why?”
She sighed. She didn’t particularly want to answer a ton of questions, but the deputy was almost too hot to resist. Deputy Cameron Briggs looked like he ought to be playing linebacker for a pro team. “I’m allergic to strawberries, hence the emergency dose of epinephrine I carry around in case of random strawberry attacks, and one of the pepper sprays is my backup. The air horn is for bears.”
What could she say? She liked to be prepared for anything.
Deputy Briggs shook his head at his boss. “She’s got just about everything in here except a gun.”
“Keep looking.” They would find it eventually.
Briggs frowned, his hand digging further until he came up with her little .38. “Yep. Here it is.”
The sheriff’s head shook. “All right, then. I guess I should just be happy you didn’t shoot Max.”
“Was he the asshole with the salmonella phobia?” That cowboy had been hot, too, but slightly insane.
“Oh, yes. His name is Max Harper. He’s the man you tried to kill.”
“Don’t be a drama queen, Sheriff. I wasn’t trying to kill him. I was trying to prove a point. He was yelling at Stella. Stella is a nice lady. She shouldn’t have to put up with some jerk harassing her. And that burger was done. It was barely pink.” The Harper fellow had been loud and obnoxious and a bit of a bully. She couldn’t stand that. She’d stood there and listened to him harangue Stella, and she just couldn’t take another minute of it. She’d walked right over to her purse, grabbed her Taser, and knocked the obnoxious hottie out. And then the strangest thing had happened. “You know the whole diner cheered, right?”
The sheriff’s lips curved up in a faint smile. “I can imagine. But that doesn’t make it any less of an assault.”
Fuck. She was in trouble. Again. For the last six months, she’d been utterly adrift. When her mom insisted on moving back to her hometown, Gemma had followed. It wasn’t like she had anything else to do. She couldn’t get on at another firm. Giles and Knoxbury was blackballing her. Hell, they didn’t need to blackball her. Her face had been all over the papers. She’d even made the national morning shows. “Midtown Meltdown.” That was going to be the sum of her career.
What was she going to tell her mom? She was thirty freaking years old, and she was worried about her mom thinking she was a loser. She’d lost two jobs due to her taciturn personality, and now she had the added threat of actual jail time.
“What can I do to make this right?” She was tired of screwing up. If apologizing to the paranoid jerk would keep her out of jail, then she would do it. She didn’t have to mean it. She was a lawyer. She was used to putting on a good show.
She used to be a lawyer. Damn it. Her money was running out. She didn’t want to add to her mother’s burden. Her mother had burdens enough. This was supposed to be a lovely time for her, but Gemma was doing nothing but making life hard. For the first time, she had to wonder if she was here for her mom or herself.
The glint in the sheriff’s eyes put Gemma on high alert. “Well, there might be a way we could work this out. I happen to be very good friends with the Harpers.”
She bet he was. God, were they going to try to con the city slicker? She sat in stony silence, waiting for the shoe to drop.
“When you first came to town, you were given the choice of three jobs. Why did you turn me down?”
Gemma had settled her mother into her cabin and immediately started looking for work. Three places had been hiring: The Trading Post, Stella’s Diner, and the Sheriff’s Department. It had been a hard decision between the first two. She’d utterly ignored the third. “I turned you down because the last two office managers you hired were both involved in bloody killings. And at least three people have died like right here. It doesn’t bode well for assistant number three.”
“She’s got a point, boss. This job is hours of pure boredom broken up by surprisingly frequent multiple murders.” Deputy Briggs winked her way. “And I’ve made sure to kill away from the station house so the office manager doesn’t have to clean up.”
The sheriff gave his deputy a thumbs-up. “See. We would be very respectful. And the first manager was my wife. She killed a son of a bitch who was attempting to kill me. And then Hope’s son of a bitch was her psycho ex-husband. You won’t ever have to save me. So all we have to worry about are psychotic exes. You got one of those?”
“Nope. Just an asshole, but he wouldn’t screw up his suit to kill someone, least of all me.”
“Then you’re in the clear.” He let the keys to the jail cell dangle. “What about it? You take the job, and we’ll call this time served.”
“I used to be a lawyer, you know. This is complete bullshit. I went to Harvard Law.”
The keys disappeared, and Wright winced. “Wow. No one told me that. Maybe I should rethink this. I didn’t realize you were a lawyer.”
“Come on, Nate.” Briggs practically begged. “Ever since Hope quit, nothing’s getting done. Make an exception. It’s obvious she’s insane, but she’s also our only choice. And you have to admit, she can handle some of the rougher parts of the job.”
“Yeah, but can she handle anything else? Fine. Damn it. I hate lawyers.” He opened up the cell, a frown on his face. “You can keep the Taser and pepper spray. You’re going to have to prove to me that piece of crap gun works and you know how to use it. And lose the air horn. It just pisses the bears off. And they make my head hurt.”
She stood up, a little wary. “Just like that? You hire me, and I don’t get hauled in front of a judge?”
He shrugged. “Things work differently here, counselor.”
She looked at the big desk in the center of the room. There was a radio, a mess of electronic equipment, and a sad-looking laptop. “I want a new computer. That thing is ancient.”
Nate frowned. “I didn’t realize this was a negotiation.”
She really looked around the office. It could definitely use a makeover. “Life is a negotiation, Sheriff. I want a new laptop with a high-speed modem. I’m willing to work ridiculously long hours because I won’t have a life outside this job. You’ll discover that I’m excellent at deflecting unwanted attention from you so you’ll have more time to do whatever it is you do. And I make the best coffee in the whole world. I’ll bring my own coffeemaker. I need my afternoon latte.”
“Please hire her.” The deputy’s eyes had lit up at the mention of coffee.
Wright nodded. “But we’re going to need a new speed trap. Laptops aren’t cheap.” He held out his hand. “Deal?”
She took it. At least she’d be off her feet, and this place actually looked like it might need something she could give. It was a dead end, but it was good to be needed for a change. Stella’s Diner really required only a warm body with a minimum of brains and a whole lot of patience. She wasn’t patient. And apparently she scared children, which was why the very sweet Teeny Green had shown her the door with the Trading Post’s customary layoff package—a pound of fudge and a T-shirt.
She took the sheriff’s hand. “Deal.”
The doors to the station house opened, and Stella blasted through followed by none other than Gemma’s victim, Max Harper, a second Max Harper, and a woman carrying a wide-eyed baby.