Page 72 of Fast and Dirty

“And you just listened to her?” My voice goes up a few octaves.

“With Agnes, it’s easier to just go along with it,” he drones out, completely unruffled.

“Gramma!” Hattie scurries up the walkway, her russet hair piled on her head and a rumpled Blasters t-shirt over some black leggings. “What’s going on?” She looks between us. “Gramma, why are you doing this, and how do I get you out?” Hattie fawns over Agnes, sounding forlorn.

“Forget it, I swallowed the key,” she informs her, and I feel the breath leave my lungs.

“Are you crazy!?” Hattie shrieks at her grandmother.

“Duh.”

“Call Hunt, he’s got to have something to cut her free,” I instruct Hattie and she nods.

“Or maybe I’m a mastermind,” Agnes rambles on. “They can’t destroy an old building with a little old lady attatched to it. That would be murder.”

“Gramma, you’re not the first to think of this kind of thing,” Hattie says with her phone to her ear. “They have legal processes in place for this kind of thing. Let’s just hope no one calls the cops. Hunt?” She turns away, as he must’ve picked up. “We have a situation at the inn. It’s gramma, can you bring your tools?”

“Agnes,” I turn back to her, lowering my voice in an effort to stay calm. “The wrecking crew doesn’t even come until tomorrow,” I try to ignore the sharp pain that shoots through my heart at the reminder that it coincides with Kira’s wedding. “If we can’t get you out of this, you’re going to be here for at least an entire day, and if you really swallowed that key, you could be in danger.”

“I wasn’t giving Kira’s sperm donor a chance to pull a fast one on us,” she replies, still cool as a cucumber. “I know his type. He’d probably send in the bulldozer early. He’s probably banking on his daughter bailing in the next twenty-four hours. This way, if she does, I’ve bought us some time,” she says smugly before adding, “that is, if Officer SweetAss doesn’t come along and break up the party.”

Shit… she has a point. Mr. Lockwood probably does have his bases covered in case Kira backs out. He knows she doesn’t want toget married to that pencil dick. And he’s probably ready to give the order the minute she loses her resolve.

But not my girl, I think. There’s no way she’ll break under the pressure.

“Besides, I’ve doubled up on the Depends,” Agnes adds, snapping me harshly out of my thoughts.

I drag a hand down my face. Coffee and shock therapy are sounding appealing right now. Maybe even a lobotomy, if it would make me forget about everything that’s happening right now.

“Hunt’s on the way,” Hattie sighs, walking up to me, just as I hear the familiar rumble of a Harley coming around the corner. I know my engines, and I know them enough to know who the rider is before they even pull up.

Kaleb rolls up the small pathway before cutting the engine and dismounting. “People are talking at Donna’s” he reports. “Had to see it for myself.”

“Tell them to mind their business,” Agnes snaps. “I don’t need people talking. I’m trying to hold off the authorites until the last possible second. You head on home and give it to your pretty wife.”

Kaleb shakes his head at her, giving her a fond smile. “I mean it!” She sparks up. “You all are making a spectacle. Unless someone wants to go on a donut run, get out of here, and let an old lady protest in peace!”

I look around, as everyone gets quiet, but oddly, no one moves to leave. In fact, I see the corner of Kaleb’s mouth pull up in a smirk.

“Or we could just forget this whole thing,” Kaleb muses and I can tell he’s trying to do some magic on Agnes. His wife tends to rub off on him like that. “We could untie Agnes… go about life as usual, while that old building just sits there and continues to rot because no one wants to deal with it.”

An eerie silence falls over everyone before he continues. “And West, you’ll be perfectly fine. You’ll just go back to running my grandpa’s auto shop like no one else can and you’llfind someone else. Awkward misfits that shake up a man and his town blow through here all the time.”

Okay, he was working magic on me, it turns out. Not in that way, of course.

I don’t want someone else. I want a raven-haired misfit with a bubbly personality, trying to find her way in a little town while charming everyone in it.

The next car to pull up is a small blue Toyota which I know belongs to Dottie, the clerk down at the town hall. I’ve gotten to know everyone by their vehicles.

“Great,” I shake my head and let my arms flop against my sides. “It’s a municipal affair now,” I gripe as Dottie emerges from her car and ambles up the sidewalk, clutching a tissue between her hands. She’s sniffling. “I heard you all were here,” she says, almost bitterly. “Why are you all gathered here at a time like this?”

“What’s with the waterworks, Dot?” Agnes calls out.

“It’s Mayor Wineberger…” she sniffs. “He’s … dead,” she lets out a sob.

Her announcement is met with a few gasps, and a couple whens and hows.

“He won’t wake up… he’s gone.”

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