A/N: Ok, getting a little better with the feedback, but more is always nice. Thanks to the folks who do review, you guys are great!
Disclaimer: I don't own the boys or other Hazzardites.
Chapter 3 – Meet and Greet
Now that the General was no longer being pursued, Bo eased off the gas pedal, which somewhat lessened the cloud of steam which was still belching forth from beneath the hood. When he judged they were a safe distance away - in case Hughie's boys had entertained any ideas of following them, he gently guided General Lee off the road into a clearing in the trees.
"Brooke!" Bo yelled gleefully as he jumped out of the General, with Luke following a second later. The car that had come to their rescue had followed them off the road and a door opened to reveal their friend, Brooklyn Calloway. She got out, smiling a brilliant smile that Bo remembered very well.
"Hey, boys!" she called. Her northern accent was much more pronounced now that it wasn't being distorted by the CB. Rushing up to her, Bo caught her up in a bear hug while she laughed.
"Ok, Bo!" she giggled. "I'm glad you're happy to see me!"
"Happy to see you?" Luke repeated with a smile as Bo put her down so Luke could also greet her, giving her a hug of his own. "More'n just happy! We owe ya one for that!"
"Seems to me like you already owed me one," Brooke smirked, squinting up at him and raising an eyebrow. "So what's the story with those guys, anyways? Who's Hughie?"
"Oh, he's runnin' Hazzard now. It's a long story," Luke answered, shaking his head. "We'll tell you about it later."
Brooke nodded and pulled back so she could get a good look in at the two Duke boys. "So you guys haven't changed much, huh?"
The boys smiled, also taking in their friend's appearance. It had been nearly a year since they had met her, and even then it had only been for one day. Even still, neither Bo nor Luke had forgotten her sparkling gray eyes or the gorgeous smile that had gotten even the tough Sheriff Little from Chickasaw County to blush like a schoolboy when it was turned his way.
Not that it had been an immediate friendship. Bo and Luke had been reluctant to trust her at first, and for good reason. Even Brooke had admitted that circumstances had looked bad for her, making it appear that she was working to frame the two boys into federal prison for grand theft. In the end, though, she had managed to turn the tables and save both the Dukes and Cooter. They had all been sorry to see her leave.
"You're getting darker," Bo noticed. "Where'd ya end up after Hazzard?"
"Oh, all over the place, really," Brooke answered with a casual wave of her hand. She made a face. "I just got back from California, that's where I picked up this lovely Valley Girl tan. 'Ohmigah, like totally!' Boy, was I ready to get out of there!" she snorted, rolling her eyes.
"Well whatcha doin' back here?" Luke asked with a smile. "Not that we mind," he added in a hurry. "I just figured the FBI'd be lookin' to have one of their best agents back again by now!"
"Yes, well, the FBI can wait," Brooke said with a shrug and the vaguest hint of a blush. "I had to come back. I missed…. well, someone."
"Missed someone, huh?" Bo asked with a grin. "Well, ain't no reason ya had to come all the way back just to see me!"
Brooke grinned, still a little pink, while Luke rolled his eyes at his cousin. Frowning suddenly, Brooke nodded towards the General. "Is he going to be alright?" She had a genuine respect for the Duke boys' car, as much as any native of Hazzard.
Luke and Bo turned simultaneously to look at the General. The engine was still smoking slightly. Together, they headed back to the car and opened up the hood. Luke peered through the steam to get a good look.
"Yeah, he'll be alright," he finally said. "But ain't no way he's gonna get far until Cooter patches him up." Luke glanced over at Bo. "If Hughie sees the General over at the garage, he'll jump all over us. And after that little meetin' with his buddies, I ain't sure that's a good idea."
Bo nodded in agreement. "Nah, but General Lee'll get us as far as the other side of Iron Mountain. If we can make it to one of Uncle Jesse's old still sites, Cooter can meet us an' fix the General up out there."
"Yeah, good thinkin'," Luke said with a smile. He turned to Brooke. "Would you care to pass on the message to Cooter for us? We gotta avoid bein' seen for a while, and I know he'd be glad to see ya again."
"Sure, I was heading to town anyways," Brooke answered agreeably.
Bo frowned. "Well, if you was headin' to town, whatcha doin' out on this side of the mountain anyhow?"
"Yeah, what were ya doin' out here?" Luke asked, remembering suddenly what a strange place it was for her to end up in. Brooke flushed deep red suddenly, looking embarrassed.
"Oh, um…I, uh…I - I kind of…got lost..." she admitted, completely chagrined. Luke and Bo both laughed. The poor New Yorker hadn't been able to find her way around very well the last time she had been there either.
"Well, you can follow us to the still site. We'll show ya how to get back from there."
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The car that Billy and Marv had been driving was beyond hope. Rolling down the mountain side, it had come crashing to a halt into a tree, though they had somehow managed to avoid injury to themselves. From there, there was really nothing they could do but hike back up to the road and continue walking until someone chanced to come along.
Flagging down the car, Billy had the unpleasant task of calling Hughie on the CB to let him know that the plan had failed. No wonder he was so tired, he suddenly realized. They had hiked all the way to the other side of the mountain, where Hughie's radio would actually be able to pick them up. He decided he should ask for more money. But not at that particular moment...
"Whaddya mean, they got away?!" Hughie raged at him from the warehouse. "I put them in your hands! How could ya lose 'em?"
"Wasn't that simple, Boss Hughie!" Billy apologized. "They had help. Someone ran into us from behind."
"Well, did ya see who it was?"
"Uh…no, sorry Boss. They came up too fast. By the time we realized what was happenin', we was already flippin' down the road."
From the warehouse, Hughie took a deep breath, trying to control his anger. It wouldn't do to lose his help this early in the game. Billy exchanged nervous glances with Marv when Hughie didn't answer immediately.
"Ok," Hughie said once he'd finally calmed down. "It don't matter now, we're almost finished settin' things up in here, so they cain't get in the way now. You boys just… wait there. I'll send Cooter to tow the car, but once you get back here I got more work for ya. And listen…" Here his voice got dangerously low. "If you two screw things up for me again, you ain't gonna get no more chances. You got that? I'm gone."
"Trouble, Boss?" Jack asked, from the table nearby where he was marking off names of potential buyers for their drug merchandise.
"Nothin' I can't fix," Hughie retorted. "We gotta get back to Hazzard. Let's go."
The two headed out of the warehouse. As they did, Hughie turned back to examine the day's work. He nodded in approval at the setup. He was pleased with himelf… the odds of anyone, including the Duke boys, stumbling in on this particular warehouse were slim to none. It was one that his uncle had set up years ago but never used. Quiet, out of the way, it couldn't be seen from any road. The only way to get to it was by driving all the way down a dead end road that few people knew the existence of, and hiking a quarter of a mile through the scrubby woods. No, he thought with a grin, ain't nobody gonna find this place.
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Brooke tiptoed silently into the Hazzard County garage. She saw Cooter leaned over into an engine, whistling quietly, completely absorbed in his work. She snuck up behind him until she was practically standing over his shoulder.
"Hey, Cooter!" she shouted in his ear. Cooter jumped a foot in the air, just barely missing hitting his head on the open hood of the car he had been working on.
"Shoot fire, lady!" he yelled as he spun her direction. "You had-" He paused in the middle of his sentence as her face sunk in. Cooter gasped, his jaw dropping and then spreading into a wide grin as he realized who the intruder was.
"Brooklyn Calloway," he said in disbelief. "You came back!"
Brooke nodded, laughing gleefully at his reaction. He continued to stare at her, caught in her smile and the fact that she was standing there in his garage at all.
"Is that all I get?" she asked him teasingly. He could only shake his head mutely, the grin never leaving his face.
"Naw, come here, girl!" he finally said, pulling her into a hug. "It's great to see ya! I tell you what though," Cooter continued, letting her go and closing the car hood with a slam. "You sure got back to Hazzard at a bad time. You ain't had the pleasure of meetin' Hughie Hogg yet."
"Yeah, I heard you guys were… under new management," Brooke said with a frown. "Bo and Luke don't seem to like him very much."
"You already seen Bo and Luke?" Cooter asked in surprise. "You see 'em again, you tell them to be careful. I've been keepin' my ears on Hughie, and from the sound of things he's on the warpath after them two boys."
"Speaking of," Brooke said, suddenly remembering why she was there. "They need your help…"
Cooter listened to Brooke's story with interest and admiration, both at his friends' natural ability to get into trouble and at Brooke's marvelous sense of timing. He jumped again as the garage door slammed open and Hughie Hogg came stalking in.
"Cooter, I've got a job for you." he said grumpily. He stopped short as he caught sight of Brooke. "Oh hello," he said with a sickeningly charming smile, taking off his hat. "And who do we have here?"
"Brooklyn Calloway. How do you do?" Brooke answered with calm politeness, extending a hand. Cooter blinked in surprise. It was strange to see the marked difference in her demeanor, going between friendly and open with him to closed, cautious, and aloof with Hughie. The mechanic recognized the attitude all too well… Brooke had acted the same way to the boys until they became friends. He hadn't realized at the time just how cold it made her appear. Seeing that face directed at someone else now made him grateful to be on her good side. Hughie, of course, was utterly oblivious.
"Oh, I do quite fine, thank you," Hughie said with a giggle. "You ain't waitin' on this lazy idiot to fix your car, are you?" Cooter glared at Hughie and folded his arms, but didn't say anything.
Brooke felt herself staring at Hughie with the same masked expression she always used while profiling. She had already slipped into her professional mode, observing every slight move of Hughie's, analyzing his character and forming his profile rapidly in her mind. It was obvious why the Duke boys and Cooter didn't like this man. Her initial impression of him was a snake, pretending to be an innocent garden hose until someone came near enough for it to strike.
"My car's fine," she finally said, snapping out of observation mode. "Just catching up, you know? I should go, though, I have to talk to Sheriff Rosco about getting my job back."
"Hey, you gonna be a deputy again?" Cooter asked, his face lighting up. "That's really-"
"Cooter!" Hughie interrupted with a scowl. "You have a job to do. If you want to keep it, I suggest you get to it." Turning away from Cooter, Hughie bowed slightly in Brooke's direction. "But I'd be more'n happy to accompany you over to the courthouse to see the sheriff."
"No, thank you," Brooke said, biting back a smile as Cooter pulled faces at Hughie behind his back. "I believe I remember how to get there. See you later, Cooter," she said, nodding at the mechanic. She turned and stalked out of the building, aware that both men were watching her.
"Cooter, why ain't you left yet?" Hughie snapped, not taking his eyes off of Brooke's retreating form.
"Cause you ain't told me where the job is," Cooter answered matter-of-factly. He knew perfectly well that Hughie was talking about the car that Brooke had flipped down Iron Mountain, but he figured it might look rather suspicious if he somehow already knew about that. Hughie don't know what he's up against, he thought with a smile as Hughie started ranting the whole story of how some idiot had driven his boys off a mountain. But sure as shootin', he's gonna find out. Cooter almost felt sorry for him. Almost.
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Back in Atlanta, Vincent Haynes took one last glance around the building he'd been staying at. He had to make sure that nothing was left behind that would incriminate him later. Satisfied that the place was clean, Haynes smiled with malice. So, they thought they could just fire him and get away with it? All the years he had put into that job, crashing down around him for 'professional misconduct'?
So evidence had disappeared. They couldn't prove he had anything to do with it. So he had his own methods of dealing with uncooperative suspects. Others had done it before him. So one of his key witnesses had ended up dead on his watch. Well… the witness had needed to be dispatched. He couldn't have afforded to lose the money he had invested in the man the witness was testifying against.
Alright, fine, he conceded to himself. He was a dirty agent. He knew it. But they had no proof. They had no right. Professional misconduct, my ass, he thought, glaring around the room. They were just lookin' for excuses to get me out. He would show them. When he had become the biggest drug kingpin in the south… he would show them. He would show them all.
Pulling out the photos that the scrawny little Hogg had sent him, Haynes shuffled through them rapidly.
"Bo Duke," he muttered. "Luke Duke. So these are the boys you're worried about, Hogg? They ain't nothin'. Just let 'em get in my way."
Y'all, I think this boy means business. I wouldn't go to the kitchen just yet, folks, it looks like things are gonna heat up for ol' Bo and Luke here.
A/N: So I know it's kind of got a slow start, but there's more action coming, don't worry. Especially within in the next couple chapters. I think. Of course, it goes much faster with more reviews... :)