Dakota Bride by Wendy Warren

Author:Wendy Warren
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Silhouette
Published: 2002-10-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eleven

Sara sat at her desk in the Kalamoose jail, tapping a pen rapidly against a stained blotter while Nettie balanced herself on a cot in one of the cells, measuring for curtains.

New curtains, for crying out dang loud! Just what they needed, more girly stuff to make a perfectly good jail look like a sorority house. As if the old ruffles weren’t torture enough.

Tossing the pen, Sara pulled a couple sticks of Juicy Fruit from the desk drawer, blew to remove excess dust, then unwrapped and crammed them both into her mouth. In four days, Nettie had scraped the paint off the entire lower half of their house, slip-covered Sara’s favorite TV chair and arranged the contents of the snack cabinet in alphabetical order, which meant Sara had to dig for the Pop Tarts, but the dried apples were right up front. Nothing was safe.

“Come on, let’s go,” she said, rising from the chair. “It’s almost seven, and my stomach’s going to cave in if I don’t put something in it soon.”

Nettie turned from the window. The same cheerful smile she’d worn for days—as if her cheek muscles had frozen solid—wreathed her face. “I didn’t realize the time,” she chirped, hopping down from the bed. “I’ve got an Irish stew in the Crock Pot. I made chicken Oscar, too. We can pop that into the oven, if you’d rather. Or I can freeze it for another time. Oh, and there’s soda bread, but I could whip up a batch of biscuits if you—”

“No!” Burying a choice swear word beneath her breath, Sara pleaded, “Don’t whip anything.” Heading for the door, she grabbed her hat, smashing it onto her head. All she wanted for dinner was a triple-decker peanut butter and jelly with a handful of the potato chips that were shelved somewhere between Oreos and Raisinettes. “Let’s just go.”

Since Nettie had walked to the jail, after Sara locked up, they both got into the squad car, neither of them speaking on the short drive home. Staring out the window with her arms and legs crossed, Nettie knew she had morphed into Heloise and was driving Sara half mad, but she couldn’t stop herself. She didn’t want to stop herself. Each desperate act of domesticity enabled her to cease thinking and to feel in control, at least for a while.

When they reached the house, she jumped out of the car and ran up the porch steps to busy herself with dinner preparations. With any luck she’d be tired enough to turn in before the last smear of grease was sponged off the last plate.

As soon as she opened the door, she realized something was odd. Lights were on all over the house, yet she didn’t remember turning on any lamps before she left. There was also a definite aroma of flowers in the air.

Nettie crossed the threshold, about to comment to Sara, when she noticed several things at once: a shawl tossed over the living-room lounger, chunky-heeled sandals kicked off

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