Love in a Nutshell - Janet Evanovich [46]
As she left the entry, Kate was greeted by a stale beer aroma she’d last smelled in Bagger’s Tavern. Except unlike Bagger’s, this place was all clean slate, wood, and ceramic tile. There was no obnoxiously absorbent carpet to be found.
Kate followed her nose to the taproom.
“This is so not good.”
Every table and chair had been flipped. Beer was running, but with no pitcher or pilsner glass to catch the brew. She sprinted behind the bar and realized that not only had the taps been left running but every keg had been shot full of holes. A note had been spray painted on the mirror behind the bar in giant red letters: You’re Next.
One foot hit where the rubber mats should have been, but weren’t. Momentum carried her forward. The wet floor brought her feet out from beneath her. And then she went down. Hard.
* * *
KATE WASN’T the most predictable woman on Earth. Still, Matt felt pretty sure if her Jeep was in the lot, she couldn’t be too far away.
“Kate?” he called before he unlocked the brewery’s employee door.
No answer. Odd, he thought. She wasn’t in her Jeep, she wasn’t waiting at the door, and she hadn’t answered his call. He was hit with a shot of protective male concern. He walked from the kitchen down the short hall, being drawn to a sound he’d caught plenty before, but never at this hour. A beer tap was spitting, then blowing. He hustled to the taproom and stopped dead at the bar’s back side.
“What the—”
Kate sat propped on her elbows, feet splayed out in front of her.
She looked up at him. “It’s a little swampy back here.”
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“Everything but my tailbone and dignity. I was just working my way back to my feet.”
“Let me help you.”
Matt scooped her up and held her tight to his body. He reached around her with his free arm and pushed each of the eight beer taps back into their closed positions. The act was a formality, since all the barrels were now drained. No wonder Kate had gone down. The keg system’s drains couldn’t handle the volume, and that floor was damn slick.
“You’re soaked,” he said.
“Half of me, at least.”
He grabbed a clean bar towel from the stack on the counter and began to mop her off. He was somewhere in the vicinity of her backside when she took the towel from him.
“I think I can handle it from here,” she said.
“Sorry,” he said, but not with a whole lot of repentance.
She smiled. “So I see. You might want to grab a towel for yourself now, too.”
“I’ve smelled like beer before,” he said, but wiped his hands just the same. After he tossed the towel back to the counter, he gestured at the floor. “Sorry about this.”
Kate gestured toward the vandalized mirror. “The note is what’s really freaked me out. Is this the first time the saboteur’s ever targeted you personally?”
Matt shrugged. “Yeah. This is sort of new.”
“Well, personally, I can’t wait to have a chat with the jerk who did this,” Kate said. “But right now, I’m wet and gross-smelling. I’d like to go home and change before we start my training.”
“No training today,” Matt said. “We’ll start fresh tomorrow.”
“I don’t want to lose a day over a bruised butt. How about if I go home and get cleaned up? I’ll come back at lunchtime and observe for the afternoon. It’s not going to do me or you any good to have me sit home.”
“True,” he said. “Are you okay to drive?”
“Yes. I’ll take some extra towels so I don’t soak my seat.”
Once he had Kate safely to her Jeep and on her way, Matt pulled out his cell phone and called in the law. Ten minutes later, just as he’d finished mopping the spilled beer, Lizzie arrived.
Lizzie surveyed the taproom. “Someone sure was busy.”
She set her clipboard down and pulled a digital camera from her uniform pocket. “I’m going to take a few pics.”
“No problem.”
“So, tell me what you know,” she said between shots.
Matt looked at the messed-up room and felt his