“He’s not fully licensed yet,” Adrian punctuated.
“There is that too.” Mike grimaced. “Apparently the OGs bought their tickets from some shady website. Either the instructor thought of making some money under the table, or the OGs convinced him to. Not clear yet who’s at fault.”
“Those ladies are going to be the death of me,” Adrian growled.
She really didn’t want to, but her mouth had a mind of its own. “Where did you leave Jade? If you’re both tired of slumming, you could go back to Boston. I’m sure we can find a more suitable sheriff. You wouldn’t have to deal with our grandmothers anymore.”
“They’re a public menace.”
“Sure.” She laughed curtly. “Gang members are a joke in comparison. Please. Give me a break.”
At the sound of a motorcycle, Adrian turned around. “Of course Josh is here. Did you call him?”
She hadn’t, but she wasn’t going to give him an inch. “None of your business.”
“Yeah, nothing around here is any of my business. You made that pretty clear.”
By the time Josh walked up to them, they were almost screaming at each other. “What’s going on?” Josh asked.
“Not sure,” Mike replied, “but stay in case we need to pull them apart.”
The hot-air balloon landed, fortunately without incident. The OGs looked around at the paramedics, the firemen, and Adrian’s sour face and must have realized they were in trouble, because Rachel overheard Wilma asking the wannabe-instructor if he could launch the balloon again and land somewhere else. Thank God he had the presence of mind to refuse. Rachel didn’t want to think about what the sheriff would say if they tried to flee from the authorities in a hot-air balloon.
Rachel opened the door of the basket.
“We asked Connor,” Greta said, sounding apologetic. “He said no.”
“For the record,” Wilma said, “you never mentioned anything about rides in hot-air balloons being prohibited.”
“And we hired an instructor,” Rebecca added.
“He’s not fully licensed yet,” Mike replied.
The three OGs turned to the guy. “Shame on you, young man,” Wilma chastised him.
After the paramedics made sure the old ladies were okay, the sheriff approached them, looking mighty pissed.
Rachel stopped him. “Do not dare harass them. Go and talk with that instructor. It’s not their fault. They’re the victims here.” She wasn’t sure about this, but the best defense was a good offense. She grabbed her cell. “If you dare put a finger on them, you sanctimonious prick, I’m calling a lawyer and suing your whole department.”
“The pictures are a bit blurry, but we got some good ones,” Rebecca said, glancing at the screen on her phone.
“There is that,” Wilma conceded. “Didn’t I tell you curtains would brighten the whole place? I was right.”
Rebecca and Greta agreed. “Never thought we’d visit so soon, though.”
They were sitting on the bench in the happy-hour holding cell. The instructor was there too. It wasn’t clear if they were under arrest or not, but they’d walked in of their own accord to wait out the resolution of the shouting match that was taking place between Rachel and the sheriff in his office.
“I have a feeling your poor Rachel is going to end up in here with us again,” Greta whispered to Wilma.
“Don’t worry. Mike is here,” Rebecca said. “He’ll calm the situation down.”
Wilma wasn’t convinced. Last she’d seen, Mike had been at a loss for words, lifting his hands up in surrender and sitting down.
“Thank God we didn’t try fleeing the scene,” Rebecca added.
The three OGs laughed softly. Yep. How many laws had they inadvertently broken? Wilma counted with her fingers. “Reckless and unlicensed maneuvering of a special vehicle. Endangering the public. Were we driving over the speed limit, Arnold?” she asked the instructor.
“Balloon flight doesn’t work like that. The wind and the amount of hot air creates the speed. I already told you, ladies.”
“Let’s say we did,” Wilma decided. After all, what was one more charge? “Then there’s negligently mobilizing paramedics and the fire department. Disturbing the public order? I can’t come up with more charges, but the sheriff probably can. I’m afraid this time we’ll be doing community service until we drop dead and beyond.”
“What were you thinking, partying the night before?” Greta chastised the young instructor. “No wonder you were white as a sheet and got disoriented.”
“Never again,” he swore pitifully. “Lesson learned.”
“In his defense, his condition got worse the second we tried to help,” Rebecca mused. “Those thingies aren’t so easy to control.”
Wilma nodded. “I told you watching a YouTube tutorial wouldn’t help.”
“Oh,” Greta added, lifting his finger. “He threw up over Alden. That’s littering. I didn’t see where it landed. You?”
Wilma and Rebecca shook their heads. If it had fallen in someone’s face, that was probably punishable by law too.
“I should have stayed in bed,” Arnold complained.
Yes, he should have. “Don’t worry.” Wilma patted him on the arm. “We’ll take the fall for everything except for not having the license. That’s on you. You have to go get one ASAP. Are we clear?”
Arnold nodded, almost in tears.
Wilma would follow up on that and check on Arnold. Young people were allowed to make mistakes, and they were allowed to repent and make up for them. They were allowed to get their asses kicked if they didn’t, too.
“This thing between the sheriff and Rachel is going from bad to worse,” Greta whispered, as they heard Rachel yell something about an age-based discriminatory hunting of minorities.
Wilma nodded. Such a pity. They did look good together. Too bad they couldn’t get within ten yards of each other without fighting.
“Let’s get a selfie for posterity,” Rebecca proposed.
“Are you sure?” Greta grimaced. Her turban had gone AWOL somewhere over Alden, and none of them was having a good hair day, to say the least. “What the heck. Let’s go for it, girls.”
They patted their hair down with little effect. “We would have killed in our youth for such a blowout hairdo, huh?”
Laughing, Wilma positioned the cell in front of them. “Okay, girls. Now.”
The three of them yelled “LOLO” while Rebecca grabbed a freaked-out Arnold by the neck and Wilma took the picture.
Chapter Fourteen
Adrian was already changed out of his uniform and ready to go to the gym when he got a call from a freaked-out Sara.
“Sheriff, XL got hurt at the garage. We’re at the doc’s office.”
“Is he okay?” he asked, running out of the locker room.
There were some groans of pain in the background from his kid. “His hand is injured.”
“On my way.”
Fuck, that unruly punk meant the world to him. If XL was at the doc’s office instead of the ER, he couldn’t be losing his hand, right? Or maybe the doc was doing first aid to tide him over until the ambulance arrived. Shit.