Read Online Texas Gothic by Rosemary Clement-Moore - Free Book Online

Anger at the condescending deputy, and because I suspected
someone
had told him we needed checking up on. “We’ve been here all night.”
    Deputy Kelly could have felt the car hoods and made sure the engines were cold, I guess. Or maybe he thought he’d be able to tell if we were lying, with his super-cop skills.
    “All night?” he challenged, glancing from me to Phin, whose bed head was impressive, but nothing compared to mine. I looked like I’d been in a wind tunnel, and I could feel the sting of a furious flush in my cheeks. I was sure that didn’t look guilty at all.
    “Since Phin got back from the store.” I forced myself to relax before my anger and my nerves got me in trouble for something I hadn’t even done. “I was reading and she was working on her independent study for school.”
    “Which is?” the deputy asked, still with his thumbs in his gun belt.
    Phin pointed at the thing in her hands and said, “Coronal aura visual medium transfer device,” and then
stopped
, thank God.
    The deputy, after a blank look, pretended he was smart enough to know what that was. “I see.” Then he turned to me, since I was obviously the spokesperson. “Well, you know, there’s some pretty wild stories going around these days, thanks to what they found out by the river. I just wanted to make sure you girls were tucked in tight over here.”
    My heart hammered, because he was so patronizing and so threatening at the same time. We’d done nothing wrong—yet—but all I could think of was the park ranger in Goliad standing witness to Dad as he ranted about our crazy mother letting us believe in ghosts.
    Phin saved me in the most unlikely way. She cocked her head, as if studying some strange species of wildlife, and said, “Waking someone up to see if they’re asleep is counterintuitive. You wanted to see if we were home. We clearly are. If you want us to be tucked up tight, you’ll have to leave.”
    The deputy stared at her, jaw slack. I shouldn’t have been happy to see my sister call him on his bullshit. But I was.
    “As you can see, sir,” I said, starting to swing the door closed, my polite facade back in place, “we’re fine. Thanks for your concern, and I hope the ranch hand gets better soon.”
    He recovered his dignity, with a stern nod of dismissal and an “All right, then. You girls take care.” He turned to go, and the front yard lights went off just in time to make him stumble on the last porch step.
    “That’s not funny,” I told Uncle Burt, addressing his rocker after I’d closed the door. “If he had twisted his ankle, we’d be stuck with him until help arrived.” Now that the deputy was gone, outrage could blossom without the intimidation factor. “The
nerve
of him!”
    Phin, caught midyawn, looked at me, puzzled. “Why?”
    “He practically accused us of going over to the McCulloch place tonight and … I don’t know what he thought we were doing. Ghost hunting and causing that accident or pretending to be a ghost, like some kind of Scooby-Doo cartoon.”
    “Why would we do that?” she asked, applying logic to an illogical situation. And I had to admit, I wasn’t exactly being reasonable just then.
    “I don’t know. Because our aunt is the local nutcase, accordingto Ben McCulloch. I’ll bet he told the deputy to come check on us.”
    Phin fiddled with the controls on her camera. “I’m very curious to meet a guy who makes you completely forsake the scientific method in favor of unfounded supposition and speculation.”
    “It’s called
intuition
,” I snapped, at my wits’ end. She just snorted, so I took a deep breath and changed the subject. “Do you at least see why you can’t go around talking about ghosts and ghost hunting?”
    She sighed heavily. “I suppose this means you’re still not going to investigate the McCulloch haunting with me. Even though this is an unprecedented opportunity.”
    I wanted to answer “Absolutely not,” no, I would not climb