Page 74 of Brewbies
“Um. Sorry. What?” He dragged his notice back to her.
“I found the statute.” She wriggled her phone in his face. “What the hell, Ethan?”
It seemed less lame before he was forced to explain it to a perfectly reasonable woman who lived outside the wonky boundaries of Townsend Harbor. “I know that law is a bit obscure—”
“Obscure?” She regarded him as if he’d just whispered the wordmoist. “What it is, is bullshit. I mean, most small towns have shitty, bigoted laws on the books—I think even my town has something against sodomy or whatever, but when has that stopped people from taking it up the ass whenever they want? Only a back-asswards dumb fuck would even bother to enforce such an archaic and awful law.”
Ethan always appreciated Kiki’s directness, especially when relying on her experience and wisdom to help with his own job. But when she crossed her arms and gave him aWhat now, you bigoted, dumb fuck?glare, he didn’t feel like less of a man taking a step in retreat.
“Means to an end, Kiki,” was all he felt like explaining, seeing as how everything else made him feel about as likable as the sharp end of a catheter.
“I’ve heard women looooooove being a means to an end,” she said as she turned to stand shoulder to shoulder with him to see what was happening. “If you want to get them really hot, you should use your authority to harass them and make their lives difficult because you’re pissed they bought the land your mother sold out from under you.”
That brought his head around sharply, and Kiki lifted her hands in a placating gesture, “Not common knowledge, but Cy has been working closely with Myrtle to fertilize the back pasture and fruit orchards.”
Of course. Her younger brother, Cypress Forrester, was the premier arborist in town. Not known as a gossip, but there was no accounting for what you said to family.
“It’s…” He had to swallow his heart when it appeared that Darby was falling from her silk, only to have her catch at the bottom like a yo-yo and strike a stunning pose.
Yeesh.He wasn’t going to survive this.
“It’s complicated.”
Kiki slid him the side-eye and shook her head. “Christ, sheriff, when life hands you lemonade, you’re not supposed to turn itbackinto lemons.” She chucked him on the shoulder with the strength of a man before setting her ginormous raven totem head back on her crown.
“Family trait, I think,” he muttered. His dad had left him a fucking lemon orchard.
“Yeah, well, don’t be too hard on yourself. You Townsends are okay…you know…for colonizers.” She winked good-naturedly. “Well, good luck with your pink lemonade. I’ll contact your office next week for a parley?”
“Sure thing.” He nodded, setting off toward the net beneath the arial and trapeze displays, mostly because it seemed like the thing to do. It stretched like a helpful spider’s web behind the now-closed Airstream to catch any plummeting acrobats. If they missed the net, they could just dive into Gemma, Myrtle, Vee, and Cady’s open mouths.
As he stepped closer, his feet muffled by mossy earth, he heard his name just in time to duck around the Airstream out of their line of sight.
“Ethan’s going to shit an entire brick house when he sees this,” Cady marveled before giving a littlewooo!at their next trick, clapping happily. “That Gabe sure isfoinefor a felon, isn’t he?”
A cold dread coiled through Ethan’s gut.
Felon?
Casting her best friend a somewhat salty look, Gemma adjusted the ties on her knitted bikini halter and lifted her heavy, dark hair to allow the breeze to kiss her back. “Should you be looking? I don’t see Fox anywhere…” She made a show of searching in a 360-degree range that Ethan almost didn’t move fast enough to evade.
Cady’s mischievous grin shone in her reply. “I’m engaged, not dead.” She laughed. “Besides, Fox doesn’t care where I get my naughty inspiration, so long as I bring it home to try on him.”
Ethan highly suspected that even retired marine Captain Roman Fawkes would remain ambivalent to his lady’s salivary glands activated by an ex-con/aerial ass-nugget with too many show-off muscles and not enough body hair.
Kid barely looked old enough to have graduated from juvie, and walked with a don’t-fuck-with-me gait learned very specifically by the incarcerated. Not so much the Imight have drugs or razorblades hidden up my buttholelook, more theI’ve killed a man but that’s not what they arrested me forlook.
Ethan didn’t like it. Didn’t like any single part of it.
Didn’t like his fucking hands on Darby.
Nope. Not there.
Or there.
Or like that…or—
The kid moved beneath Darby so her ass fit into the arch of his motherfucking foot…and she sat there…leaning back to kick out her lovely legs.
