Points West (A Butterscotch Jones Mystery Book 5) by Melanie Jackson Read Free Book Online Page B

have the name of Jones when he was clearly Russian.
    “We have large heap of trash gathered for bonfire. We will
have one tonight. Only perhaps we will not mention it to my wife,” Sasha added.
“Not until we are done with testing the little bombs.”
    “Or my son. Brave lad—won’t say a
word against him. But he sometimes gets a bit officious when he is working.
Forgets that I’m the father and tries to wrap me in swaddling cloth.”
    “Is good to have son who cares,” Sasha said. “If I have son
I hope he will be like brave and loyal Mountie Chuck Goodhead.”
    Horace felt a wave of pride.
    “So what are your thoughts about this zoologist?” Horace
asked. “Think he’s here to try a cover-up?”
    “Bah! Is not zoologist. He is spy.
Well, perhaps zoologist spy . Is possible,” Sasha
conceded as he coaxed the truck forward.
    Horace blinked, wondering if his new friend was actually a
loony. But then he thought about it for a minute.
    “What other kind of a spy would he be?” he finally asked,
willing to be fair-minded.
    “ Hmph . It
is hard saying because the dead man was a bad, disloyal person. He was a whore
to everyone with money.”
    “You knew the dead man?”
    Sasha shook his head.
    “But your son says he is a bad whoreson man and I believe
your son.”
    “Chuck says he is a bad man, does he? Maybe it’s good that a
bear killed him then.”
    Sasha shook his giant head again.
    “Woman was eaten by bear,” he corrected. “The man was shot. And poisoned. By the woman. Probably.”
    Horace realized that there was actually quite a lot going on
in the Gulch that Chuck had failed to mention to him.
    “Tell me your theory,” Horace invited.
    “I do not need theory. Mountie Chuck Goodhead will discover
the truth and then we will make a plan.” Sasha sounded complaisant.
    “Are you sure?” Such faith in his son baffled Horace who never
really thought of him as a leader of men. It was almost as strange as the idea
that Chuck had anything to do with undercover agents of any ilk.
    “Always before he finds the truth about
spies.”
    Horace was feeling disoriented.
    “Spies have been here before? But why?” He couldn’t imagine that there was anything in the Gulch that would be of
interest to anyone.
    “The first time it was our fault. Anatoli and I were with Russian mercenaries hired by mafia. We served with an evil
colonel who came to the Gulch looking for a plane that had crashed in snow. He
took prisoners and held them at the Lonesome Moose saying he would hurt them if
Butterscotch did not bring the money from the plane to him.”
    “Holy hell.”
    “ Da . But your son and Butterscotch rescued everyone before he killed them. They said
that we could stay if we did not want to go back to mafia. We are not stupids . We stayed and married with the Flowers.”
    Horace was speechless.
    “After that the government sent spies twice, looking for the
money and something else that was on the plane.”
    “Did they find it?”
    “No. Always they went away again after a while. The Mountie
has kept the secret so we can stay in Canada and not return to Russia to be
killed by mafiosos .”
    “That’s good,” Horace said, completely caught up in the
drama and the idea that his son would place personal loyalty ahead of his job.
“Was it a lot of money on the plane?”
    “Yes,” Sasha said simply. “And jewels. It is why I could marry with the Flowers.”
    Horace shook his head in wonder.
    “You said there was something else on the plane?”
    “ Da . But we do not know what. It made an explosion in the lake. We thought then that
the spies would never come again.”

 
    *   *   *

 
    Chuck allowed himself to pace the
floor of the cabin. Probably he should go find Butterscotch and Max and take
the wolf for a walk—a short one. In town. And then it
would be time for the town meeting. He was rather looking forward to this
ritual.
    And he needed to come up with a
good excuse for not being at work