Bait & Switch (Mayfield Cozy Mystery Book 1) Read Online Free PDF Page A

not conducive to conversation.
    Clarice pulled through the automatic gate onto the county road. Steam rose off the pavement in wispy waves.
    I swallowed and cleared my throat. “I heard from Robbie.”
    She shot me an arched brow glance and stomped on the accelerator.
    “He’s been informing the FBI — of what, I don’t know — for a year. It sounded like he was on the run. Again, I don’t know why.”
    Clarice turned toward me, her drawn-on brows flattened in a fierce line above her narrowed eyes. “That weasel.”
    “Well, I don’t know. If there was something illegal going on, he had to—”
    A flash of mangy brown fur and antlers crossed the windshield.
    I screamed.
    Clarice stomped on the brakes, and we both slammed against our seatbelts.
    The animal — like a deer, but bigger, with its neck stretched uncomfortably by the weight of its antlers — stood straddling the yellow line and slowly turned its head our way. It blinked in a leisurely fashion, its nostrils flaring.
    “What is that?” I breathed.
    “Stupid—” Clarice rasped, “—elk, I presume, never having seen one in person before. Stupid!” she yelled and cranked her window down. “Shoo. Shoo.” She flapped her arm out the window.
    The elk was unimpressed — and unmoved.
    Clarice honked, long and loud.
    The elk took a step toward us, its head lowered.
    “You’re scaring it.” I patted Clarice’s shoulder, then squeezed as the elk swung its head in a menacing gesture.
    With a terrific charge, the elk nailed the grill with its rack. The station wagon rocked back on its heels, jouncing us in our seats. The elk backed up, shuffling his feet for another attack.
    Clarice pulled her arm in and rolled the window up. “Scared? I don’t think so.” She revved the gas pedal.
    “Oh, no. No, no, no. You are not taking on the wildlife.” I clutched the dashboard.
    “Evasive maneuvers, girl. He’ll never know what swept right past him.” She let the car roll forward then jerked the wheel hard to the right. The tires spit gravel and balked for a second before we got traction and shot down the shoulder and bounced back up onto the pavement.
    I twisted and glanced out the back window. The elk was still standing in the middle of the road, ready to challenge the next car to intrude on his territory. “You’re making friends left and right this morning,” I muttered.
    “Low blood sugar,” Clarice gritted between clenched teeth as she hunched over the steering wheel.
    I closed my eyes against the blur of trees whirring by and concentrated on breathing. At the word ‘town,’ I’d been anticipating a series of light-controlled intersections, several choices for grocery shopping, banks, a library, an ice cream shop. I’d even settle for strip malls populated with nail salons, questionable sushi bars and laundromats. There had to be at least one drive-through espresso stand.
    When the car rocked to a stop and I cracked my eyelids open, I saw trees — more trees. Actually, I saw the trunks. At least they weren’t moving. I had to tilt way back to see to their tops. Their needled branches rippled like feathers in the stiff breeze.
    “Come on,” Clarice grunted and popped open her door.
    A weather-beaten building with a covered porch along the front occupied one corner at a crossroads. The opposite corner boasted a dilapidated service station with a U.S. Post Office sign in the dirt-streaked front window. A teetering gingerbread Victorian house — probably technically a mansion when it was built, but no longer extravagant — spread her flanged porticoes in the third corner. The painted lady’s trim had merged into worn shades of taupe. The fourth corner was filled with hip-high weeds.
    “I’m guessing this is it,” Clarice panted as she clumped up sagging steps next to a rusty ice cooler with a faded bait sign taped to the front.
    “Maybe we should go a little farther. Maybe there’s a Safeway.”
    “You want to be cooped up in the car