And surprise, my good mood had fled at the same moment I’d crashed my freaking car.
“Good evening, Kramer speaking.”
“Is this Dare?”
“No, this is his brother, Gage. Whatcha need?”
“Are all of you named like romance heroes?” Shockingly, he didn’t respond. I cleared my throat. “I need a tow. I was referred by—”
I glanced at the window. The man and his ridiculous hat had disappeared. However, a cop was doing a U-turn to pull up beside me.
Fabulous.
“Anyway, can you come tow me?”
“Where are you?” His voice was appreciably cooler than when he’d answered the phone.
No one would accuse me of being wise, that was for sure. Made total sense to piss off the cavalry when I was well and truly stuck.
And I didn’t know where I was.
I squinted through the snowy windshield. There was a street sign at the end of the block, but it was snowing too hard for me to make it out. Luckily, I could ask Officer Friendly.
He knocked on the window with his bare knuckles. “Had some trouble, I see.”
“So everyone sees.” When he frowned beneath the brim of his standard issue hat, I forced my shoulders to relax. “I’m on the phone with the tow place right now.”
“Tell Dare Sheriff Brooks is on scene.”
“Dare, Sheriff Brooks is on scene,” I repeated into the phone, knowing I’d aggravate the guy on the end even more. I’d probably annoyed the sheriff too.
“Gage,” the guy on the phone said testily. “Since you sound like an out-of-towner, ask Brooks where you are, and I’ll send the truck out.”
What had happened to that old adage that people in small towns were so easygoing? Probably required me not being a dick to them, but in my defense, my unscratched two-month-old car was now a mess.
My younger brother, Lennox, had warned me not to buy something that would depreciate so quickly.
Cars aren’t an investment, Cal. Especially ones with a tawdry finish like yours.
Yeah, well, I’d clearly not listened. I’d loved my “tawdry” paint job that now would need to be retouched. And hey, bright side, with this accident, I’d done all the depreciating at once.
At least it had been minor. Shouldn’t take long to fix.
“”You still there, tourist?”
I frowned. Charming guy. “Why don’t you just talk to the sheriff, rather than me playing telephone?” I attempted to hand the phone to the cop, but he shook his head and made a gimme gesture with his fingers.
I unclicked my belt and wrenched open the door, thankful that it seemed to be working correctly. The car was tilted at an angle, but with some finagling and shifting, I placed my boot on the cracked upper edge of the ditch and stepped out with assistance from the sheriff. I shut my door as the sheriff gave me my next orders.
“Tell Dare you’re near the corner of East Lake Road and Grange.”
I repeated the information into the phone and managed a “thank you” before Gage hung up on me.
Wasn’t hospitality supposed to be a thing in small towns? I was beginning to think I’d been lied to.
First, Santa Claus was real. Then, small towns are wonderful, cozy places filled with lovely people.
The sheriff stepped back and eyed me up and down as he dipped his thumbs into the pockets of his trousers. “You’re not from here.”
Before I could reply to that incriminating statement—why it was incriminating, I wasn’t sure, but there was no mistaking his tone—a float on the back of a flatbed truck rolled by, complete with a inflated bouncy house-style Santa’s Workshop festooned with twinkling Christmas lights and little animated elves climbing up and down ladders. The truck’s driver blew the horn at the sheriff, and he waved, calling out a “Hey, Red, looking good,” as the vehicle continued down the street at a speed approaching my own pre-crash.
Falling snow wasn’t much of a deterrent around here. He’d better hope he didn’t encounter Buffalo Plaid Hat Guy.
I looked around. Said guy and his truck were long gone.
“So?”
I pocketed my phone. “So what?”
“You’re not from here,” he repeated. “What’s your business in Crescent Cove?”
“What, am I not allowed to drive through without a laminated pass? You should’ve asked the guy who pulled out in front of me why he couldn’t watch where he was going.”
The sheriff glanced at my awkwardly angled car, already gathering a healthy coating of snow. “Looks like you can’t either.”
I balled up my fists in the pockets of my long tweed coat. I shouldn’t flip off the sheriff in a town I wasn’t familiar with.
Problem was, I really, really wanted to.
“I was just out for a drive,” I said defensively.
“Did you have a drink before you got behind the wheel?”
“No, but I wish I had.” Okay, that definitely wasn’t the right thing to say. It wasn’t even what I’d meant. Exactly. “I mean, I should’ve had a drink and stayed home, rather than venturing out in this weather.”
The sheriff crossed his arms over his quilted vest, pinned with some badge-looking thing he probably could’ve gotten at any dollar store. “Let’s see some ID.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake. How about ticketing the guy who caused me to slide?”
“Do you see him?” He made a show of looking around. “I don’t.”
“He stopped to talk to me, and then he left. How is that my fault?”
“Plate number?”
“I didn’t see his plate.”
“Description of the vehicle?”
“A big brown truck.”
“UPS?”
“No, a SUV.”
“Make and model?”
“I didn’t have time to see all that. Big and boxy.”
“Oh, well, now I can find him, no problem.” He stared at me. “ID? Take it out, nice and slow.”
“It’s like I’m in an episode of Law and Order, if it was set in not-quite Mayberry.” Shaking my head, I withdrew my wallet, took out my college ID, and handed it over.
He tipped back his hat. “Professor?”
“Yes.”
“What do you teach?”
“Mythology and Applied Lessons in—”
“Good enough.” Clearly disinterested, he returned my ID and nodded at my car. “Explains the bright yellow.”
I tucked my ID away. “It does, does it?”
“License?”
“Are you kidding me? If I was out joyriding, I wouldn’t have come here.”
“I’ll have you know Crescent Cove is known the state over. At this rate, we’ll be known throughout the world.”
I pulled out my license and gave it to him. “For what? Obnoxious floats?”
His jaw clicked as he studied my license. “Small-town charm and…”
“And what?”
“Procreation,” he said in such a low voice I almost didn’t hear him.
I didn’t have time to ponder that inexplicable statement because a tow truck pulled up beside my car. A tall, bearded man in a baseball cap hopped down and flashed me a friendly smile that indicated he was not Gage Kramer and possible not even from this “quaint” Cove at all. “Hey there, I’m Dare Kramer. You are?”