Big Sky Dynasty

Dalton rose from his chair and stepped to the window to look out. The black clouds of the thunderstorm hung on the horizon. It must still be storming not far from the ranch.

“Do you believe in evil?” When Lantry didn’t answer, Dalton turned to look at him. “Nicci’s evil incarnate and now she’s come to Whitehorse.”

Lantry shook his head. “If she’s in town, she isn’t after your soul.”

“I wouldn’t be so sure about that.”

Chapter Three

An hour after Georgia had closed the shop for the day she glanced up at the sound of a key in the alley door. For an instant, she was startled.

The door swung open, a gust of cool evening air rushing in before the door closed again. For a moment, she’d completely forgotten that she’d rented the apartment.

“Georgia?” Nicci called as she stepped into the shop.

“Over here.” The only light was a small one near the shelves where Georgia was busy finishing unloading the boxes that had arrived that morning.

The day had gotten away from her. She’d called in Miss Thorp, her former spinster teacher, to watch the shop while she helped Nicci bring up her bags from her rental car and then had gotten caught up in visiting and helping Nicci get settled in.

Miss Thorp had been Georgia’s typing teacher in high school. “You’ll never be a typist,” the spinster had told her repeatedly during the course. Georgia still didn’t know Miss Thorp’s first name since the woman refused to be paid for watching the shop.

“Sitting here isn’t all that different from sitting at home,” Miss Thorp had said. “I like the change of scenery.”

As long as Georgia didn’t get Miss Thorp started on the evils of computers, she proved to be the perfect parttime, occasional helper for the shop. Especially since she didn’t mind being called in at the last minute and worked for free.

Since business was often slow between classes, Miss Thorp would sit and read, which was just fine with Georgia. The one time she’d had her help her with a shipment of yarn, the typing teacher had complained about the way Georgia was doing it.

Georgia had enjoyed visiting with her new renter. Normally, she was shy, especially around strangers, but Nicci set her at ease at once by getting her talking about her two favorite subjects, Whitehorse and knitting.

Their conversation had been interspersed with laughter and comfortable silences as Nicci set about moving in. For a woman not planning to stay long she had a lot of summer clothing.

“Thank you for keeping me company,” Nicci had said at one point. “I feel as if I’ve known you forever. Is that odd?”

“No,” Georgia said. “I feel the same way.” And it was as if they’d only been apart and were now just getting reacquainted.

Georgia was thankful when Nicci didn’t ask about the Corbetts. Anyway, she figured Nicci probably knew more about them than she did.

“Still hard at work just as I suspected,” Nicci said now, smiling as she joined her. She carried what appeared to be two takeout containers.

Georgia caught the delicious smell of fried chicken. Her stomach rumbled and she realized she hadn’t had anything to eat since breakfast.

“I brought you some dinner,” Nicci said. “I doubt you got a chance to eat today and it’s all my fault for talking your ear off and not letting you get your work done.”

Before Georgia could be polite and deny it, Nicci rushed on. “I hope you like fried chicken. I was walking by the Great Northern restaurant and I saw they had a chicken special. Chicken, JoJos and coleslaw with sour cream for the potatoes. I couldn’t pass it up.”

Georgia laughed. “My favorite. But there is no way you eat like that all the time and stay as slim as you are.”

“You’d be surprised. I can’t stand depriving myself of anything. It’s one of my tragic flaws,” she said and laughed. “Come on, you can’t let me eat alone.”

Georgia hesitated. She really had wanted to get the yarn all put away before the shop opened in the morning.

“Take a break and eat with me, please,” Nicci pleaded. “I hate eating alone and I refuse to let you starve given how wonderful you’ve been to me.”

Georgia couldn’t have said no under the circumstances even if she hadn’t been hungry. She could eat and finish up afterward.

“You had me at fried chicken,” she said. “Thank you.”

“I’ll take it up. Meet me in my apartment?” Nicci said over her shoulder. “I also got us some wine.”

They ate at the breakfast nook, eating the chicken and potatoes with their fingers, sipping the wine and talking.

It wasn’t until later, feeling a little tipsy, Georgia realized she wasn’t going to get her work done tonight.

Much later, she crossed the hall to her own apartment, smiling to herself. She’d needed this tonight. A workaholic, she was often too serious. Her friend Rory used to make her take breaks from work to do something fun, but since Rory’s pregnancy and marriage—and Georgia’s working on expanding the yarn line at the shop—she had seen little of her best friend except at knitting class and as Rory’s backup at Lamaze class.

Georgia hadn’t realized how much she’d missed girl talk with Rory. Spending time with Nicci today made her all the more aware of how much she’d missed her best friend.

She vowed to make plans to get together with Rory outside of knitting and Lamaze classes.

THE NEXT MORNING, waking up a little hungover from the wine she wasn’t used to drinking, Georgia realized with chagrin how much she’d told her new renter about herself.

After a few glasses of wine, Georgia had shared practically her entire life history. She blamed the alcohol and the fact that Nicci had a way of drawing her out, making her so comfortable, that she wasn’t hesitant to talk about herself.

“The woman would make a great interrogator,” Rory said when Georgia called her to tell her about her new renter and her embarrassment over last night.

“She’s just so easy to talk to.”

“So what did you learn about her?”

Georgia thought back and was even more embarrassed to realize Nicci had said little about herself. “I was so busy talking about myself apparently…”

Rory laughed. “That is so not like you.”

“I know. It’s weird. But you’ll see what I mean once you meet her. She’s really fun. You can’t help opening up to her. It’s like I have always known her.”

“How long is she staying in town?” Was that jealousy she heard in her best friend’s tone?

“I don’t know. She’s rented the apartment for a month. I guess it will just depend on how long her business here takes.”

Even though Rory was her best friend and they told each other everything, Georgia didn’t feel it was her place to discuss her renter’s personal business.

“This amazing woman has business in Whitehorse?” Definitely jealousy. “I can’t believe you don’t know where’s she from, what she does for a living, what she’s doing in town,” Rory said.

“I got the feeling she’s been living abroad. I don’t know that she does anything. She seems to have a lot of money.”

“Didn’t you look at the check she gave you for the apartment? That would at least give you an idea where she banks anyway.”

“She paid in cash.”