My eyebrows rose in surprise. “What is it?”
“You know how I was telling you about my missing cousin?”
“Dolly Parton?”
“Yeah.” She shifted on the seat. “She still hasn’t called my aunt, so she asked me to go out to her boyfriend Billy Jack’s trailer to check on her.”
I frowned. “So what’s the favor?”
“I was hopin’ you’d take me. My car’s been acting up, and her boyfriend lives down by Pickle Junction. I’m afraid I’ll break down. Do you have time?”
I looked at the gourmet mess on my desk. “Sure. I’m supposed to meet Joe at two at the nursery.” I glanced up at the clock. “That’s plenty of time to drive down to the Pickle Junction area and come back.”
Neely Kate threw her arms around me and pulled me into a hug. “You’re the best.”
Something was up. “Why are you gettin’ so excited over this?”
She gave me a perturbed look. “Because my aunt keeps calling, and she’s gonna get me into trouble at work.”
“So why don’t you turn your phone to silent?”
“And miss her calls? I’d get into even more trouble. I snuck away early and figured I could take a long lunch break so we could drive down there, find her in his trailer while they’re on some love fest, and tell her to call her momma.”
I hopped up and grabbed my coat. I suspected there was more to this story than she was telling me, but if it got me out of eating tofu chipotle burgers, I was game.
As I headed for the door, she called after me. “Wait! You didn’t try the peppermint Brussels sprouts muffins!”
I hurried out the door, pretending I didn’t hear her.
Chapter Six
“So why doesn’t your aunt go out to Billy Jack’s herself to see if Dolly Parton is out there?” We were almost to Pickle Junction, and I couldn’t help thinking we were about to hop into a hornet’s nest.
“Well . . . she can’t on account of the squirrel jerky incident.” Neely Kate tried to hide her cringe, but she wasn’t fooling me.
I blinked. “Do I want to know about the squirrel jerky incident?”
“No.” She pointed up ahead. “See that mailbox shaped like an armadillo? Turn there.”
I slowed down and cast a suspicious glance at her. “Why did you really invite me along on this mission?”
“I already told you.”
The road next to the battered metal armadillo had seen better days, but it was less beat up than the faded metal box. The once-red paint had faded to a pale pink, and someone had tried to attach what looked like plastic tusks to its face. There were two dents on its back—one on the front and the other on the back—that made the raised middle part look like a camel’s hump.
“What in tarnation happened to that armadillo?” I asked as I turned down the dirt lane pocked with patches of gravel.
“Billy Jack’s a big Arkansas Razorback fan. Rumor has it that he was drunk enough to think it was a razorback one night. He got pretty ticked off when he found out his mistake, which explains the dents in its back. He fixed it in another drunken stupor.”
“I take it Billy Jack gets drunk a lot?”
“Define a lot . . .”
I slammed on the brakes, which didn’t exactly have the effect I was going for, since we were only traveling ten miles per hour. “Neely Kate, what exactly are you draggin’ me into?”
Her face scrunched in indignation. “Nothing! We’re checking on my cousin. It’s perfectly harmless.” She gave a half shrug. “Probably.”
I reached for my phone. “I’m calling Joe.”
“No!” she shouted, grabbing my phone out of my hand and holding it out of my reach. “Don’t! Billy Jack hates the sheriff’s department. We’ll never find her if you do that.”
“Neely Kate, if you think she’s in actual danger, let Joe come check on her. He’s better equipped to deal with something like this than we are.”
Before I could register what she was doing, Neely Kate opened the passenger door and hopped out, taking my phone with her and leaving the door gaping wide open.
I opened my own door. “Neely Kate! Come back here.”
“You can wait there if you want,” she called over her shoulder. “I’ll be back in a minute.”
“I’m gonna kill you, pregnant or not,” I grumbled as I climbed down and started after her.
She’d already disappeared around a bend in the road, and when I found her, she was standing in front of a rusted trailer surrounded by rusted cars, a pile of assorted home furnishings, and knee-deep weeds. A giant “Keep Out” sign, written in spray paint, was nailed to a tilting post.
“Your cousin lives here?” I couldn’t imagine anyone willingly living in those conditions.
“No. But she’s spent a lot of time here with Billy Jack. The last time Aunt Thelma heard from her, Dolly was hanging out here.”
I was glad she hadn’t made a move toward the front door. I had a sneaking suspicion that Billy Jack’s sign wasn’t just for show. “Is her boyfriend violent?”
“Not usually.”