A Good Day for Chardonnay (Sunshine Vicram #2) by Darynda Jones

Her father got a text, turned, and headed back to his SUV down the street.

Sun shook it off and asked, “Can you send those pics to me?”

“Already did. I also set Zee on surveillance until I could brief you. I’ll take over in a few.” He took a sip of his pink lemonade spritzer topped with whipped cream and a maraschino cherry, then pointed. A plainclothes Zee stood browsing the books the Book Nook employees were just now moving onto the sidewalk, her tall, lithe form doing anything but blending in. The girl was stunning, and one of the men they were watching had taken note. A fact that could play in their favor.

She looked back at Rojas’s fruity drink. “It takes a confident man to order a drink like that.”

He tilted his head and smiled in appreciation. “Thank you, boss.”

She laughed and decided to take a second for an impromptu check-in. “Got any questions for me?”

“I have two, if you’re asking.”

She took another draw on her pinon coffee sweetened with hazelnut. “I’m asking,” she said, echoing the conversation they’d had a couple of days before.

“First, why do you call the yellow fire truck Big Red?”

A surprised giggle bubbled out of her. She’d expected something a little more … official, but that worked. “When the town ordered Big Red, they threw a naming party. They were really excited. They chose the name before she was delivered, and while they’d ordered a red hook-and-ladder, she showed up yellow. Unfortunately, they’d already ordered a nameplate for her, so Big Red she is.”

“This town is so weird.”

She couldn’t argue with that kind of solid, fact-based logic. “And second?”

He waited as though contemplating if he should ask. “I know it’s none of my business, boss, and please don’t feel obligated to answer, but what happened to you?”

“What do you mean?” she asked, suddenly self-conscious. “It was only a little box of wine and Quincy drank half of it.”

When he fixed a patient smile on her, she caved.

Poetry Rojas was direct, she’d give him that. She liked it. “You want the long version or the CliffsNotes?”

“Whatever you’re comfortable with?”

Great answer. She told him what happened to her when she was seventeen. How she was abducted and held for five days while the kidnapper demanded every penny her father had, only for her to end up dropped off at an emergency room in Santa Fe with a severe concussion and covered in blood, most of it her rescuer’s.

Sure, she glossed over a few of the sticky points, but her story was out in the world anyway thanks to a few vindictive high school students. One only had to guess the sordid details, because nine months later, a fiery ginger with the lung capacity of a yeti clawed her way out of Sun’s nether region and her world had never been the same.

She also skipped over the amnesia part. She only remembered bits and pieces of her ordeal and was missing almost an entire month beforehand.

“Now can I ask you a question?”

Rojas sat contemplating her story. He swam back to her and said, “Of course.”

“Why did your mom name you Poetry? And how often were you beat up because of it?” she teased. “I love it. Don’t get me wrong, but it’s very unusual. I would think even more so for a boy.”

He smiled as he thought back. “I don’t think she did, in all honesty. She never admitted this, but I think she was going to name me Porter after a jazz musician she was in love with, but the woman entering the information at the hospital couldn’t read my mom’s writing and typed Poetry into the computer.”

“Poetry fits you,” she said. “At least she got your twin brother’s name right. Ramses?”

He shook his head. “His name was supposed to be Ransom.”

“Wow. Your mom was clearly very creative. Another jazz singer?”

“Blues.” A sadness came over him. His parents had died when he and his brother were kids.

“Well, either your mother had horrible handwriting or that nurse needed glasses.”

He looked out the window toward Zee for the fiftieth time in five minutes.

“I frown on office romances,” she said to him, “but not for long. It causes wrinkles. No one needs to see that.”

“What, Zee?” he asked with a scoff. “Never. She’s so far out of my league it’s like we’re not even playing the same sport.”

“Not true.”

“No, for sure. It’s like she’s an Olympic skier and I play stickball with miniature horses.”

“Is that a real thing?”

“I wouldn’t stand a chance.”

She disagreed. Rojas was a little younger than Zee, but only by a couple of years. He was incredibly intelligent, charming, and quite the looker. Zee could definitely do worse.

Then again, so could he. Zee was a goddess among mortals.

Sun wanted to ask him more about how he pulled it off. How he managed to do three years in the state pen in his brother’s stead without being found out, but a nuisance she was going to have to deal with soon walked into the coffee shop.

“Sunshine,” Carver said, strolling up to their table, his coveralls folded down to reveal a T-shirt underneath.

“Hey, Carver. What are you doing here?”