Pineapple Puppies by Amy Vansant

Author:Amy Vansant [Vansant, Amy]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Published: 2019-05-23T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter Eighteen

Charlotte answered her door to find Sheriff Carter standing on her doorstep. She glanced at her fit watch. It had just turned ten.

“Sheriff Carter, what brings you to FrankLand?”

Carter took off his hat and held it at his waist. “Good morning, Miss Charlotte. I’m sorry to bother you but things are getting interesting over at the Miller Estate and I think you’re about to be involved.”

Charlotte took a step back, using one leg to push Abby farther away from Carter. “Come in. Ignore her, or pet her, she just wants attention. She won’t hurt you.”

Carter gave Abby a quick scratch behind her ears as he entered and Charlotte led him into the kitchen. She moved a mug on the counter into the sink.

“I wasn’t expecting visitors,” she mumbled before turning to face him. “Do you want coffee?”

He removed his hat. “If you have some.”

Charlotte nodded and opened a drawer to find a coffee pod. “Mariska got me one of those one-person pod thingies. I’ll run it through for you.”

“Mariska?”

“Oh, sorry. You don’t know her. I’m used to everyone knowing her. She’s like my adoptive mother. She lives across the street.”

He nodded. “Frank told me something about that. He said he sorta adopted you?”

Charlotte chuckled. “The whole neighborhood did, with Mariska in the lead. Long story short my parents died, and left me here with my grandmother, who also ended up dying. The neighborhood arranged it so I could stay and not be thrown into the system.”

“Lucky girl.”

“I was.”

A silence fell and Charlotte suddenly felt self-conscious. She scrambled for something to say.

“Milk?”

“Black.”

“Of course. Big bad sheriff would take it black, wouldn’t he?”

Charlotte smiled to keep from cringing. Why did I say that? That might be the dumbest thing I ever said.

If Carter thought she was a weirdo, he didn’t let on. He chuckled as she turned to hand him his coffee.

“So what’s this about the Miller Estate?”

She realized she’d given him the mug that said I got high on Pike’s Peak on its side, a gift from Mariska after a trip to Colorado. Sheriff Carter held up the mug and cocked an eyebrow at her.

“Do I need to arrest you?”

“Gift from Mariska. I’m not sure she got the joke.”

“Hm.” He took another sip and then put down the mug. “I’ll let it slide this time.”

He smiled and winked and Charlotte hastened to make herself busy throwing out the used coffee pod. She felt like he was flirting with her. It probably came naturally to him. He was a strapping, handsome sheriff in uniform. He probably had the ladies swooning everywhere he went. If she had to guess, he was close to forty, which would make him a good ten years her senior, give or take, but not so old it might not cross his mind to flirt a little.

“Single pods,” he said, as she dropped it in the trashcan. “You live here alone?”

She nodded, cognizant it was a stretch for him to leap from the pod to her living status. A coffee pod maker didn’t mean she was alone.

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