by Jeannie Watt
“A silver necklace and a couple bags of feed.”
Dylan frowned. “This isn’t supposed to be costing me money.”
“It’s not. I’m buying that stuff.”
“That’s not fair.”
“How so?”
“You’re bribing people to come in. We could have done that without the boutique.”
“Why didn’t you?”
“Never thought of it.”
“People like giveaways.”
“No doubt. And if we could afford it, we’d do a lot of them. But giving things away is the opposite of selling them.”
“You know what I mean.”
“Yeah.”
“Do you want people to come in?”
“I want customers.”
“Give me free rein for a while and I think we can get some people in. We can drop the bet.”
“That’s the second time you’ve said that.”
“Is it?” She stared him down, forcing herself to look as though she didn’t want to lean closer and simply inhale. His frown intensified, as she’d hoped. “You’re in a better mood today.”
“Guess this is your lucky day.”
“I’m used to your moods. Heaven knows I saw a lot of them back in the day. No. Make that one mood. Cranky.”
“My dad was dying. I needed straight A’s to get scholarships. I wanted him to watch me walk across that stage when we graduated and take home as many scholarships as I could. He was worried about my future.”
Jolie felt as though someone had just smacked her. She’d been aware that his father had been sick but hadn’t known that he’d been dying while she and Dylan had been lab partners.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” she finally asked.
He gave her a “Really?” look. “It was a painful topic.”
“No doubt.” Jolie tore her eyes away from his and stared off across the room. “Sorry to have been so...unaware.”
“It’s all right.”
“It’s not.” He was shutting down fast and she didn’t want him to shut down. The atmosphere at the store was so much better when they were communicating. And, even though he’d been preoccupied over the past few days, every now and then they’d had a decent snippet of conversation. Like now. “Just let me apologize once. I didn’t know. I’m sorry.”
“You had no way of knowing. Apology accepted.” He spoke gruffly in the tone of a guy who wasn’t used to talking about the things he held inside. Jolie had a sneaking suspicion that this wasn’t the only thing he was holding inside. Something else had made him distracted and angry of late and she couldn’t help but wonder what it was.
“Maybe we should make a new bet,” Dylan said.
“What kind of bet?” Jolie couldn’t keep the note of suspicion out of her voice.
“If I win, we keep the boutique, but you take all of Mike’s excess animals.”
“That will cost me money,” she pointed out, glad that he was making an effort to lighten the mood. It didn’t make her feel any better about being so blissfully unaware of the circumstances of his life back then, but at least he was communicating.
“Well, you do work at a feed store and there is that employee discount.”
She smiled and slowly he smiled back.
“Mike got a decent offer on his place. He’ll probably take it, but he’s starting to stress a little.”
And perhaps this was an explanation for his recent preoccupation...perhaps. “I’ll put out the word, see what I can do,” Jolie said. With a wry twist of her lips, she said, “I see a lot of animal lovers in the course of my day.”
Dylan patted the counter. “Mike will appreciate it.”
And that, of course, was why she was doing it. For Mike. Not for the guy on the other side of the counter/barrier giving her one of his rare smiles and making her heart melt a little as he did so.
* * *
DANI PACED TO the living-room window, stared out at the horses in the pasture, then turned back to Jolie who sat on the sofa, waiting for her sister to talk herself down. “I know it’s not fair to leave after asking you to come back and work with me—”
“I want you to leave,” Jolie said patiently. “You belong with Gabe.”
“You’re sure.”
“Would it matter if I wasn’t?”
“Yes.”
“Then good thing I’m sure. When do you go?”
“Gabe takes off in a week.”
“Short notice.”
“Speaking of which...” Dani bunched the gray fleece she’d finally found into a wad. “Can you get Wednesday off?”
“I...don’t know.”
“Gabe and I need a witness. We’re going to the courthouse.”
“To get married?”
“No. To get fishing licenses.”
“Hey, now.” Jolie raised her hands. “Just checking.” She reached out to loop an arm around her sister. “Congratulations. Mom is going to kill you if she’s not there.”
“I’ve explained everything to her.”
“And she’s not stepping onto a plane at this very moment?”
“I’m flying to Florida to stay with her for a week or so while Gabe gets us set up...and, more importantly, we’re having the ceremony next summer here at home.”
Jolie smiled widely. “Remember how we used to plan our weddings? Your ceremony was going to be down by the river and mine was under that big oak that Daddy planted when he and Mom got married.”
“Uh, yeah. That’s why we’re getting married here.”
“Careful, sis. I may not get the day off to help you procure those fishing licenses.”
“Please?” Dani asked before smacking Jolie with a small pillow.
“Fine. Yes. I think Dylan will let me off for something like that.”
“And if he won’t?”
Jolie wrinkled her nose. “Drag the JP down to the feed store. You can do it there.”
“Good idea,” Dani said, getting to her feet. “You want to come over for dinner? Gabe grills a mean hamburger.”
“You go,” Jolie said. “I want to run Jenabelle a little. Then I’m going to move the cows and have an early night.”
“Okay.” Dani frowned, then closed the space between them and hugged her sister hard. “Thank you for holding down the fort. We need someone here at the Lightning Creek.”
And that was when it struck Jolie how very alone she was going to be for the next several months.
* * *
FOR ONCE DYLAN beat Jolie to work. He was sure she wouldn’t be late. It was Tuesday and she didn’t work at the bar until Thursday, so her sleep-deprived days hadn’t started yet. He paced to the window then back to his office. Finally he heard her truck pull in and went to meet her at the door.
“Hi,” she said, apparently surprised by his being there.
“Yeah. Hi.”
“One more time with feeling,” she said as she breezed by him toward her workstation.
“I didn’t mean to sound...” He muttered a low curse. “Look. Mike accepted the offer for his house last night.”
“I hope he got a good price.”
“He did. Contingent on closing the deal ASAP.”
“Meaning?”
“I need a temporary home for all those damned animals.”
“I don’t know that wild cats do temporary,” Jolie pointed out.
“I have every intention of finding permanent homes in the near future. I’ve been contacting 4-H leaders and, as you know, I put up the posters. There are ads in all the papers I can think of, on craigslist—”
“Yes.”
Dylan blinked at her and then realized what she was saying and smiled. “Thank you.” He let out a b
reath. “Thank you.”
“How long?”
“Just until I find homes.”
“And how long might that be?”
“A week?”
She nodded slowly. “Can I have next Wednesday off? My sister is getting married.”
“Kind of sudden, isn’t it?”
“They’ve been engaged for a while, but Gabe got a temporary job back east and...well...” She made a gesture.
“They decided to get married before they left.”
“It was either that or fishing licenses.”
“I’m not even going to ask.”
She smiled. “You had to be there. I assume that’s a yes?”
“I couldn’t really say no, could I?”
“I don’t think you would anyway.”
“Know me that well, do you?”
“I honestly don’t think I know you at all. Had you asked me a month ago, I would have assured you that I knew you all too well.”
“What changed your mind?”
“I’ve found out you have a mood other than pissed off at me.”
He leaned on the counter, as he seemed to be doing more and more. “I wasn’t always pissed off at you.”
“But you were at the ready.” She cocked an eyebrow at him. “Admit it...you had a hair trigger where I was involved.”
“And who honed that trigger?”
Jolie placed a palm upon her chest. “Yours truly?”
He couldn’t help smiling at the wicked glint in her eyes that belied the innocent look on her face. “I admit that I thought I had you all figured out, too. I didn’t. I still don’t.”
That seemed to catch her interest. “What would you like to know?”
Probably more than an employer should want to know about an employee, but, truthfully, he didn’t think of her as an employee and he was certain she didn’t think of him as a boss.
Her lips tilted wryly as the silence stretched. “No questions?”
“Whatever I want to know, I’ll find out in my own good time.”
CHAPTER EIGHT
“SHE’S GOING TO take them all?” Mike asked for a second time after Dylan had come home with the happy news that he’d found a home for Mike’s girls.
“I think the cats are staying here. The real-estate agent is going to check with the new buyer and see if they mind having cats in the barn.” He’d have taken them to the warehouse to live and hunt, but that wouldn’t be fair to Marcel, who’d never been very social with other cats.
“That’s fine with me. I didn’t bring the cats here in the first place. They just kind of started moving in.” Mike grinned as he pulled up the footrest on his lounger and then stretched out to full comfort position. “What a load off my mind.”
“Yeah.” There was no way Dylan was breaking the news that the home he’d found was temporary.
“I’m going to celebrate by not packing.”
“There’s not much left to pack,” Dylan said. All the rooms in the house were stacked with boxes. With the exception of the kitchen and bedding, his grandfather was ready to move. Only the area immediately surrounding his beloved lounger and television remained untouched.
Speck jumped onto Mike’s lap and the two settled into news shows while Dylan sat in the other lounger and attempted to study for the detective exam that was coming up in another couple of weeks.
Attempted being the key word, since his thoughts persistently crept back to Lindsey and Pat. There was no reason to assume that Pat and Lindsey had been involved a year ago. That Pat had been the unnamed other guy...but the possibility ate at him. He couldn’t stop thinking back, analyzing if Pat’s behavior had changed at all prior to the accident that had ended their partnership. He came up with no answers. Finally he closed the lid of his laptop and looked over at his grandfather.
“Hey, you want a beer?”
“In the worst way.” Mike gave his usual answer, then frowned, his silver eyebrows almost touching. “Something wrong tonight?”
Dylan shrugged and set the laptop aside. “It’s been a while since I’ve studied.”
“You’d think it’s kind of like riding a bike.”
“You’d think,” Dylan agreed as he got out of his chair. And it might have been had he not had other things on his mind. He went to the nearly empty fridge and broke into the new six-pack he’d picked up on the way home. “Chips?” he called into the living room.
“Let’s go wild,” Mike said.
Dylan smiled as he dumped a bag of chips into a big plastic bowl. Finding a home for the goats and cow had definitely lifted his granddad’s mood.
Dylan settled back into his chair, set the bowl of chips on the table between them and popped the top of his beer. Then he leaned over to touch his can to Mike’s. “To the future.”
Mike tilted his can at his grandson. “To the guy who kept my girls together and found them a good home.”
Dylan’s smile became a little strained, but he touched aluminum to aluminum again and then took a long drink. Things would work out—not that they always did, but in this case he had to keep the faith.
* * *
JOLIE TOOK WEDNESDAY morning off to attend her sister’s wedding, leaving Dylan to man the store solo. He dealt with a few regular clients, all of whom asked about Jolie and commented on what nice things she was doing to the store. They were right. She had made the place more inviting, but he still thought it was illogical to expect frou-frou items to affect sales at a feed store. People came to buy grain, not to shop for gifts. He had to admit, though, that the customers were taking long, hard looks at the artisan items, especially the iron work, before drifting to the counter to order grain or hay or minerals. And they smiled and chatted more.
Go figure.
He also noticed on the Facebook page that morning that Jolie had advertised the raffle, which he still thought gave her an unfair advantage, but as Mike had mentioned, it was hard for him to lose in this deal, unless one considered the fact that a night out on the town with Jolie had the potential for danger.
When he was around her, he felt off balance and it was in a different way than in the past. His body was encouraging him to move closer, touch her, stake a claim. His mind was telling him that was a very bad idea—they worked together, even if it was temporary and...well, Jolie was Jolie. He wasn’t in the market for a relationship and he couldn’t see having a brief, hot fling with Jolie. No sense making things awkward, especially when they were often the only two people in the building.
Unfortunately the forklift was purring like a kitten and he’d finally gotten the office sorted out, so he didn’t have a lot to fill his time at the store except for studying. He wasn’t in the mood to study.
He leaned back in Jolie’s chair and stared out the window, hands clasped behind his head. Finn loved running the feed store, puttering around, doing who knew what, which was nuts because his cousin had been so wild growing up.
Jolie also puttered around, making the store homier. She was on the verge of painting the rest of the store. Several times he’d seen her studying color chip cards and he didn’t think she was painting at home. It was kind of fun to watch her busy herself around the store when they had no customers and when he wasn’t putting distance between them by hanging out in the warehouse.
He was not a putterer, nor was he meant to sit at a desk. He stretched out his leg, flexed it. Almost 100 percent. Surely good enough to be released back to active duty. Best-case scenario, he’d get his medical release, pass the detective exam, Detective Murdock would retire and Dylan would slip into his position.
Worst-case scenario, he would stay at the desk and support his ex-partner who was secretly living with his ex-wife. The prick.
The dark thought had him sitting up in the chair and diggin
g his phone out of his pocket. He’d told Phil that he’d wait to hear from him, but he was tired of waiting. Surely the PI had discovered something.
Phil answered the call himself. “I thought you were going to wait to hear from me.”
“Were you ever going to call?”
“Not until I got another week’s pay out of you,” Phil said in his laidback way. “Actually, I was about to call. Your suspicions have foundation.”
“Lindsey’s seeing Pat?”
“When he’s on day shift, he spends the nights there with her.”
“What about other shifts?”
“I’ve only had time to observe him for a shift and a half, but when he’s on graveyard, no. He sleeps at his brother’s place. He drops by to see Lindsey when she gets home from work, then goes on shift.”
“Why not sleep at his place?”
“He rented it out.”
“No shit. But he only sleeps with Lindsey when he’s off at night.”
“Harder to hide a vehicle during the day. He never parks until after dark. He’s usually gone by daylight.”
Pat always had been slick. He could think of three ways around a problem, which had been handy when they’d worked together. Not so handy now.
Dylan knew he was lucky that Sadie had noticed and liked him enough to give him a heads-up. The thought of subsidizing that asshole, a guy he’d trusted, fried him. He pulled in a long breath through his nose as he fought to control his temper. “I’ll be there in a couple of weeks. I’ll need something to hand over to my lawyer.” And hopefully to get the split mortgage agreement adjusted.
“I’ll email a report as soon as I get it together.”
“Thanks.” Dylan hung up and carefully set his phone on Jolie’s desk so that he wouldn’t throw it across the room. He hated being played as a chump.
He got to his feet and paced out from behind the counter, shoving his hand through his hair. It would feel so damned good to get into his car, drive to Lanesburg and confront his ex-partner...except that he couldn’t risk giving Pat time to cover his tracks. Dylan couldn’t think of exactly how Pat might do that, but the guy was good. Better to get Phil’s report to the judge than get the satisfaction of a face-to-face. Or a fist-to-face.
