Bella was sandwiched between Ford and Linc—her two guardians—when a slim brunette woman in a dowdy brown frock slipped up to our little family group. Bella stiffened.
“Hello there, Mona Lou,” Granny said, leaning on her cane as the wind ruffled the lace around the collar of her new pink dress. “How are the boys?”
“Oh, just fine,” Mona Lou replied before glancing over her shoulder and back to Bella. “Miss Bella, I just wanted to tell you it wasn’t me who put the blue dress on the scarecrow. I know for sure you seen it when you come to town and…well, I just felt terrible. My husband, see, he asked me where I bought it, and when I told him at your boutique, he…well, he said things that expressed his dislike of my shopping there. But I do love the dress! I wanted to wear it today. I swear to the Lord I did.”
“I believe you. Thank you for letting me know.” Bella was polite but distant. Granny’s face was drawn into a sour expression, but she remained silent.
“I’ll be by on Monday to buy a new dress. This time I’ll tell him I got it online,” Mona Lou whispered and hared off before her husband spied her talking to the freaks, or so I supposed.
“Poor Mona Lou, she never did fit in right with them Learys. Course that bunch is right in tight with Manfred Owens and his passel of chest-thumping numbskull sons. She’s too kind-hearted for that lot of wild bandicoots, but she come up pregnant at sixteen and had to marry into that pride of apes. Rip and her ended up finishing high school, barely, while Mona Lou’s folks watched the baby during the day. I think she did a fine thingcoming to let you know, darling. I seen that frock in the field coming past and nearly wept, but I knew you would be a lady about it.” Granny patted Bella’s hand and led her to the old American elm tree where they began to whisper about who knew what. My attention was pulled from the ladies when I spied Ollie and an older gent who had to be related exiting the church.
My heart sped up as he made his way over to the Bastian gang wearing a tight-fitting polo with a small blue wind logo and khaki pants. He looked amazing. The gent with him was also in a polo and khaki pants, but his hair was long and braided while Ollie wore his hair military style.
“Sheriff,” I said as he ambled over to join our little familial group. Granny and the rest welcomed him and his uncle—it turned out to be—as if they were just part of this crazy clan I called family. “I didn’t see you when we entered, or I would have said hello.”
“You didn’t see me because I wasn’t here then,” Ollie informed me. “We were working out some things at the rez. Looks like we’re trying to set up some bilingual services for the elderly of the tribe to listen to when they’re homebound.”
“Very cool,” I replied.
“We think so. My uncle and father speak our language well and would be willing to translate, so it’s a work in progress.”
“Ollie, Gordon, you’re both welcome to come out to the ranch for Sunday dinner,” Granny spoke up.
“That’s kind of you, Mrs. B, but we have to head to the casino,” Gordon explained as my son darted past with a foursome of boys hot on his heels. They were all giggling madly. “A few of my employees called in sick so looks like me and this chucklehead are working security.” He crooked a thumb at his nephew.
Everyone started chatting about the weather and the slow-moving mess blowing into Texas in a day or so. I edged closer to Ollie.
“Can I have a moment of your time?” I asked quietly and got a nod.
I ambled off after making some lame excuse to the family. Baker cocked an eyebrow as Ollie fell in beside me. The urge to flip him off was huge, but we were on church grounds, so I ignored the ass and led Ollie to my car.
Turning to face him, I rested my ass on the warm front fender. “On the way to church, we passed a cornfield with a scarecrow in one of Bella’s dresses.” The soft expression of interest he’d been wearing faded from a possible flirtation to a serious policeman in the blink of an eye. “That’s got to be some kind of hate crime, right?”
“Were there any slurs or personal attacks pinned, written, or painted on the dress?” he asked, folding his arms over his chest. His cotton tee stretched over his massive biceps. If I weren’t so agitated, I would have been drooling.
“Well…no, but she worked incredibly hard on that dress. It was pretty.” Ugh, I knew that sounded pathetic. “Obviously, it was done to make her feel badly, which it did.”
He drew in a breath. Again, the cotton stretched. Good God, this man was a mountain of muscle that I wanted to scale like Kilimanjaro.
“Dodge, I get it, I do, and Iwilldrive out toward the ranch to see this scarecrow myself, but there’s no law against dressing a scarecrow.”
“But in a new dress? Who would do that?” I spat out and sighed. “Okay, well, we know who did it. One of those Leary men. His wife apologized to Bella, but I’m not sure a weak apology is enough for the hurt suffered by that poor woman. She was really upset.”
“That doesn’t surprise me.” He sighed as a robin landed nearby. “They’re a pack of roaming assholes. I’ll drive out to see what I can see, but it doesn’t sound like any crime has beencommitted other than wasting his own money on a handsewn dress.” I started to bicker. He held up a large hand. “Dodge, I feel your pain. Truly, I do. My niece is Two Spirit. I get that trans and non-binary people are under incredible pressure all the time, and if this were a case of harassment or a threat that I could progress legally with, I would do so in a fucking heartbeat. But it sounds like a case of one of the town assholes being an asshole.”
I huffed then shoved my hands into my front pockets. “I was afraid you’d say that.”
He reached out to give my tight shoulder a squeeze and a little massage with strong fingers. Damn, that masculine touch felt fine.
“I am sorry. I like Bella a lot. If anything else happens that I can sink my teeth into, let me know, and I will ride out and give Kenny Leary a sound bite on his skinny ass.” His fingertips bit into my shoulder, and the muscle loosened. “Promise me you and your brothers will not do something stupid.” I looked from the fat robin to his face. Lord, those eyes were spellbinding. Such thick black lashes…
“Stupid?”
“I’ve known Baker for twenty years.” That was said with a smile that I had to reflect back at him. “Stupid is his middle name at times.”
“Right.” I chuckled, giving my head a bob. “Nothing stupid, I promise.”
“Good, now, onto more pleasurable things. When are you in town for rec center classes next?”
