Artie Buell, however, hadn’t changed a bit in nine years. If he wasn’t such a good mechanic—and the sheriff’s son—she’d have raised a stink about him working here. But she had her own reasons for wanting to stay on the Buell family’s good side now. The truth might depend upon their cooperation. And for that reason alone, she summoned a smile. “I can handle my dad just fine. Thanks.”
“I think I impressed him when I won the Moonshine Run last month.” Damn. The polite chit-chat wasn’t over. Alex froze her smile into place and endured. “You know, I didn’t see you at that race. I kind of thought you might want to root a friend on, especially seeing as how I rebuilt most of that car right here in your daddy’s garage. Remember I ran some of those last-minute calibrations by you?”
“Sure. I’m glad they helped. Gotta go.”
When she would have scooted around him, Artie’s hand snaked out to grab her arm and halt her beside him. “You should have at least helped me celebrate at the party afterwards.”
Working with Artie was one thing. Anything more personal would be like reliving a nightmare. Keep it nice. “I told you I was busy that weekend. Congratulations again, though.” She tugged against his grip. “Dad’s waiting.”
Instead of releasing her, he pulled her close enough that she got a whiff of the cigarettes on his breath when he leaned down to whisper. “You haven’t even been down to the pit to see my trophy. It’s a bigun.”
Right. Like she’d ever venture down into that sunken room that reminded her of a burial chamber unless she had a damn good—work-related—reason to do so. The fact that it was Artie’s main work space at the garage probably added to the eerie claustrophobia she got whenever she went down there. “A bigun? That’s a pretty lame line, even for you.”
“C’mon, Alex. I’m not the bad guy in the family. Remember?”
“Artie.” Tater was out from underneath the Ford again. This time, he wasn’t laughing. “I thought I asked you to get the specs for this car off the computer for me.”
Artie winked one dark eye at Alex but spoke to Tater. “I got ’em.”
“Then move it.”
“I’m movin’.”
When he pulled the printouts from his pocket and released her to deliver them, Alex glanced down at her forearm. She didn’t know which bothered her more, his grimy fingers on her skin, or the memory of another Buell’s touch. Both turned her stomach.
“Alexandra!”
The steel door connecting the garage to the office corridor swung open. Alex jumped as her father’s barrel-chested physique filled the doorway.
For a moment, his stern green eyes looked beyond her into the garage. “Get to work, Artie. I need you back down in the lube pit to change the oil on Jeb Worth’s car before he stops by at one to pick it up. I don’t pay you to stand around and flirt with my daughter.”
“Yes, sir.”
As Artie handed off the papers to Tater and both men returned to the cars they were working on, Alex hurried on over and greeted her father’s ruddy expression with a wry smile. “Thanks for the rescue, Daddy.”
But Staff Sergeant George Montgomery Morgan, USMC, Ret., didn’t smile back. Instead, he waved a bill at her face. “What is this? What new scheme are you cooking up now? You know I don’t like surprises. I told you I wanted to be cautious about expenditures now that the Fisks are selling the track to Whip Davis.”
Alex’s relief came out as an embarrassing snort. Thank heaven. He hadn’t found the papers she’d taken from Nick’s things, after all. She stuffed the shop rag into the back pocket of her baggy denim overalls, using the moment to compose her thoughts before she gave away what she’d been working so hard to hide. “I thought something serious had happened.”
“This is serious,” he groused.
“Right. The money. Of course, it is.” She should have known her father wouldn’t go snooping through her personal things. But if he’d found the stash of notes she’d been sorting through regarding her brother’s death, he’d be in a whole new world of hurt. She’d worried and confounded him enough over the years. Not enough of a lady. No husband. No man. She knew he didn’t blame her for their trouble with the Buells, but still, it had to be disappointing for him to know how Artie’s older brother had forever changed her view of men and relationships. Causing her father more pain was the last thing she wanted. In fact, she was doing her best to help her father climb out of the emotional pit he was already trapped in by investigating the truth behind Nick Morgan’s car crash.
Artie’s father had declared it a tragic accident—said Nick had probably fallen asleep at the wheel and careened off the country highway into the bottom of a ravine. Maybe she was grasping at straws, but Alex had seen two sets of tread marks on the muddy shoulder before winter rains had washed the evidence away that night. “Somebody probably stopped there to see if they could help him,” the sheriff had suggested. So how did he explain away the twin sets of skid marks on the road near the crash site? Sleeping drivers didn’t slam on their brakes. And what was the likelihood of a second driver laying tread in the same exact location?
Sheriff Buell had come up with many plausible scenarios to explain away Nick’s death, but Alex wasn’t buying them. The rain hadn’t started until after the crash that January night. The family business was taking care of cars, for God’s sake, and Nick’s had been in top-notch condition. Nick had raced at the speedway before heading to law school. He knew how to handle a car. Knew how to handle any road condition. The crash made no sense. His death made even less.
Though George Morgan seemed to accept walking through life with his son in the ground and his heart buried there beside him, Alex wasn’t ready to let this town deal her another cruel blow. Especially not when, in Nick’s last phone call before his accident, he’d told her that he’d be missing their traditional New Year’s Eve game night because he was working on something for the state attorney general’s office—and that that something could have serious consequences if the wrong people found out what he was up to.
“Wrong people?” she asked. “Here in Dahlia? Who?”
Nick laughed at her curiosity and ignored her concern. “Don’t worry, Shrimp. It’s just some paperwork I need to finish up. Boring stuff. I’m afraid you’ll have to find someone else to play that marathon game of RISK with this time. But I’ll be looking for a rematch next year. Okay?”
“Okay. I’ll give Dad the message. Happy New Year, Nick. I love you.”
“Love you, too, Shrimp.”
The next time she saw her brother was at the county morgue. That night Alex had wept with her father and vowed to uncover how boring paperwork could get a good man killed.
But right now she had to deal with whatever current crisis she’d brought into her father’s world. “Is there a problem?”
“A five-hundred-dollar problem.” He smacked the paper with his hand. “I appreciate you stepping up to help with the business side of things now that—” Alex’s heart twisted at the hesitation “—now that Nick isn’t here. But the racing season has only been going for a couple of months. I don’t want to be spending money we may need to see us through the rest of the year.”
Alex reached out and wrapped her fingers around her father’s fist where he clenched it at his side, holding on until the tension in him began to relax. When he turned his hand and squeezed hers in return, Alex knew he was going to be all right. For now. Her secret was safe. Suspicious bills she