They had lunch at a cute shop somewhere around La Conner, maybe in La Conner for all he knew. He was just the driver. The driver for six women, ranging in age from 50 to 70, who thought he was “cute.”
Some 100,000 people that weekend alone, Mac heard later, visited the Tulip Festival.
Mac told his phone to call the office.
“Janet? It’s the Tulip Festival,” Mac began.
“Oh good,” she said. “Have Angie take some extra photos of it will you? And if you see any good deals on bulbs, order me some. I’ll need them next fall for my garden.”
She hung up.
Angie laughed hysterically.
Mac drove on.
When he’d unclenched his teeth and calmed down enough to be able to talk, he said, “Will you look at Mount Vernon and see if we can find motel rooms? It might be difficult.”
Angie checked. “Not for under $130 a night,” she said troubled. “Even the campgrounds start at $100.”
“Try Sedro-Woolley.”
“They’re booked completely. There’s something called the Crocus Motel in Burlington,” she said.
“What’s our per diem, do you know?” Mac asked grimly. She shook her head.
“Call Janet,” he said out loud to his Bluetooth again.
“Janet, what’s the max we’ll get reimbursed?” he asked when she picked up.
“$100 per day, per person,” she said. “I didn’t think about that. Let me see what we can do from here.”
And she hung up again.
“Is she always that abrupt with you on the phone?” Angie asked, perplexed.
“Sometimes,” he said morosely. “Conversations get shorter if she’s got breaking stories going on. Which my guess? Something is.”
And he was here, driving north into the Tulip Festival instead of being in the newsroom where there was a breaking story. Better not be a good cop story, he thought grimly.
Calm down, he told himself. You’re driving north with a woman you’ve wanted to get to know better for months. Take a deep breath.
“OK,” he said. “Let’s do this. We’ll trust Janet to find us lodging. Find a number for the sheriff and let’s set up an appointment for right after lunch. And then we can settle back and look at tulips for the next couple hours.”
Angie looked up the number and dialed.
“Sheriff Norton, this is Angie Wilson of the Seattle Examiner. We’d like to set up an interview with you for right after lunch.”
She listened, then responded, “I’m with Mac Davis. He’s the reporter, but he’s driving, and I’m doing the phone work. I’m the news photographer.”
She listened again, and then put him on hold. “He wants to know what the story is about.”
“Put him on Bluetooth,” Mac said. She nodded.
“Sheriff, Mac Davis. My editor wants a profile of you focusing on the rising interest in the constitutionalist sheriff’s association.”
“You do realize this is the last weekend of the Tulip Festival?” Sheriff Norton said. He had a nice, John Wayne, kind of voice.
“Yes, sir,” Mac said. “I’m currently stuck in traffic on I-5. That’s why I thought we’d better call ahead.”
“All right,” he said. “I’ll wait for you. I usually take a two-hour shift and drive through part of the county every day. You all can join me. Give you a chance to see the tulips.”
“Yes, sir,” Mac said, resigned.
Sheriff Norton laughed as if he heard exactly how much Mac wanted to see tulips and hung up.
“Sir?” Angie asked.
Mac shrugged. “Never hurts. Military training, I guess.”
“You don’t seem overly enthusiastic about tulips.”
And so, he told her about driving Lindy and her friends around for 15 hours while they celebrated and looked at tulips.
Angie laughed. And laughed some more. She went back to reading, but periodically she’d look at Mac and laugh.
Mac looked at her sideways and grinned at her.
Mount Vernon was a pretty town, Mac acknowledged. Its main street was lined with trees, and red brick buildings with white pediments and trim. Planters everywhere were filled with tulips. People filled the sidewalks, window-shopping, taking a break from the tulip fields. Mac pulled into a parking spot near the court house, and he and Angie went looking for lunch.
“Here,” she said, and took his arm to pull him into an old-school café with dim lighting, and cracked Naugahyde booths. There was no waiting. Mac wasn’t sure whether to be grateful or alarmed.
He looked at Angie and raised one eyebrow.
“I emailed my Dad,” she said. “And unlike you, he responds promptly. He recommended it. He’s been up here often. Said it’s got good burgers and fries, and wasn’t likely to be all gussied up for the festival.”
“Well, he’s right about the last,” Mac conceded. “Let’s hope he’s right about the burgers.”
Turned out he was. Mac took a bite, and nodded. “Thank your Dad for me,” he said. “When Lindy dragged me up here, we ate at a ‘cute’ outdoor café with those damn white wire chairs for lunch, and then for dinner, they found a steak house with dancing afterward.”
The steak house had good food, but he’d held his breath the entire evening. He decided later that the cowboys were too surprised by Lindy and her lesbian friends dancing together that they didn’t snap out of it in time to cause trouble.
That, and he may have stood guard by the bar, with full Marine tats showing on his arms.
Angie giggled. “I need to meet your aunt,” she said. “She sounds wild.”
Mac looked at her skeptically. “If you’re gay, I’ll be glad to introduce you,” he said. “If you’re not? I usually don’t take women home to meet my aunt until I’m sure they can handle it. They’ve run for the hills on occasion.”
Which reminded him of Kate, who apparently had wanted to run for the hills, and he called up the email on his phone and read it. It was indeed an invite to Sunday dinner. He sent her a response, apologizing for the delay in responding because of work, and that he would be out of town
