“I would have gotten away with it too,” he muttered again. “If not for that damn dress. Who the hell in Northtown sells two dresses exactly alike? Don’t they know how gauche that is?”

Well, I guessed Finn wasn’t the only man in Ashland who had a strange interest in women’s fashion. My lips twitched, but I held back my laughter. At least I wasn’t the only one who saw the irony of the situation. This time, it had actually worked in my favor.

McAllister pushed away his brandy glass and dropped his right hand down behind the bar. He straightened up to his full height and gave me a cold, sinister glare. “Very well done, Gin. Really. Quite impressive, how you put everything together. And all this time, I thought that you were just a coldhearted bitch. I didn’t realize that you actually had a brain in that ruthless little head of yours.”

I grinned. “What can I say? I’m full of surprises.”

He gave me a thin smile. “And so am I.”

McAllister raised his hand out from behind the bar, a gun glinting in his fingers.

Chapter 32

32

Click.

Click-click-click.

Click.

McAllister pulled and pulled the trigger, cursing louder and louder when the gun didn’t fire.

I reached into another pocket on my vest, pulled out the clip that went into the weapon, and waggled it at him. “Looking for this? I took the liberty of removing it from your gun, along with the round in the chamber. In fact, I went through the whole house and took all the ammunition out of every single one of your guns. You have quite the collection, Jonah. Revolvers, handguns, even a good ole-fashioned shotgun under your bed. Why, you’ve got enough firepower in here to start a small war, even by Ashland standards. Consider me impressed.”

He looked at me a moment before his gaze dropped to the useless gun in his hand. “Dammit!”

He reared back and threw the weapon at me as hard as he could. His aim was lousy, and I didn’t even have to duck as the weapon sailed on by me, hit one of the glass doors to my left, bounced off, and clattered to the floor. The fact that he’d missed me so badly only fueled his rage. McAllister slapped his snifter off the bar, not caring which direction it went or where it landed. A second later, the bottle of brandy shattered against the wall closest to him. One by one, he grabbed and threw and smashed everything he could get his hands on. Another bottle of booze from underneath the bar. A crystal paperweight on an end table. Even the photo of his son.

I grinned, laced my hands behind my head, and watched the show.