Hometown Sheriff

by Cheryl St. John

  Peals of childish laughter assured her the boys weren’t frightened.

  “You can’t scare them inside!” Ryanne called. “That won’t count!”

  From the lilac bush at the corner of his house, Nick emerged in the darkness. “That wasn’t in the rules. We never said we couldn’t influence them.”

  “I just assumed you’d play fair.”

  He turned a palm up.

  “Okay, fine,” she said, turning toward the tent. “Hey, fellas! Got anything good to eat in there?”

  “Wade’s mom sent some fruit gels.”

  “How about some popcorn? Shall I make you some popcorn?”

  “Sure!”

  “That’d be cool!”

  “Okay, I’ll be right back.”

  Nick followed her for a few feet. “Wait, you’re keeping them awake to eat.”

  “You said there were no rules,” she called over her shoulder.

  At eleven forty-five, Ryanne waited for Nick to come downstairs after tucking in the boys.

  “You cheated,” Nick said from the doorway.

  She made the same upraised palm gesture he had made. “So, do you start paying up tonight?”

  He nodded. “Why not? Let me tell Dad I’m leaving.”

  He returned a minute later. “Your car or mine?”

  “Yours,” she replied. “Mine tomorrow.”

  “Okay.” He grabbed a key ring from a hook by the door and ushered her outside. They entered the garage by a side door and he pressed a button to raise the overhead door. “Give me a hand with this.”

  She helped loosen the cover from the edges of the bumpers and watched as another classic Chevy convertible was revealed. “Where did you get this?”

  “I’ve had her.”

  “You’re full of surprises, Nick.”

  He started the perfectly tuned engine, lowered the top and drove out of the garage. Reaching the blacktop highway a few minutes later, Nick increased speed. The wind whipped through Ryanne’s hair, and looking over at her, Nick laughed.

  She pointed to the CD player. “It’s not eighties music, is it?” she called over the roar of the wind.

  Grinning, he leaned over and pressed a few buttons. “This is a ’63. What do you think?”

  Martha Reeves resonated through the speakers, singing about how love was like a heat wave. Of course Nick would have the appropriate music for the car. Ryanne laughed and leaned back, enjoying the ride. He drove for miles, the songs changing, the sky a panorama of stars in all directions and Ryanne relaxed and felt better about life than she had for a long time.

  Everything here was so simple, so elemental, with time to reflect and enjoy and just be.

  Nick finally pulled over to an area on the side of the road that looked out over the river, and cut the engine. The music died, too, leaving only the sound of the water. Eventually, frogs and crickets could be heard singing their night melodies. The moon reflected off the water; a peaceful, quiet scene. Ryanne leaned her head back and studied the stars.

  She’d looked at the stars plenty since her return to Iowa. Before that, she couldn’t remember observing the night sky since her childhood.

  “Do you ever lie awake at night wondering what you’re doing with your life?” she asked. “Whether or not the choices you’ve made have been the right ones? How different your life might have been if you’d chosen a different direction?”

  Nick studied the riverbank opposite through the windshield. He’d lain awake plenty of nights—she had no idea!—but not wondering what he was doing with his life. The choice he’d made that had made all the difference had been the one to not accompany Justin the night he’d died. Every choice since then had been based on doing the right thing, taking others into consideration before himself. “You’ve done what you wanted to do,” he said. “Gone after your dreams.”

  The chirping of the frogs was the only sound for a long minute, before she spoke. “You resent me for that, don’t you?”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  HE COULDN’T ANSWER for a minute. The perceptive question made him take a good look at what he really did feel—besides the anger and helplessness and rigid sense of obligation. “I guess I do.”

  She turned in the seat and faced him. “But you didn’t want to leave Elmwood, Nick. Why did you care that I left?”

  “You don’t know what I wanted, Rye, so don’t act like you do.”

  She blinked. “What did you want?”

  He said nothing. He couldn’t. Voicing regrets would be a betrayal of his love for his father and his son.

  “You wanted to work on your cars,” she stated. “I remember. And you’ve done that.”

  “Yes. My little hobby,” he replied drily.

  She sat back in the seat and looked away.

  “What are you regretting?” he asked. “Your marriage didn’t work out. That happens to a lot of people.”

  “Am I supposed to feel better because I’m in the majority statistically?”

  “I didn’t mean that.” He thought back to what she’d said about doubting her choices. He knew what a blow it was to strike out in marriage and feel like a failure. “Are you doubting your choice in a marriage partner or in your career?”

  She shrugged.

  “You’re young and smart. You can always make changes to your career if you’re not happy.”

  “I loved—love my job. That’s not it.”

  “You’re beautiful. You’ll find the right guy.”

  She turned to look at him finally. “I am?” She didn’t sound convinced.

  “You have a mirror, Rye.”

  “You think I’m beautiful?” she asked.

  This was steering them into waters he didn’t want to navigate. She’d always turned him inside out and he’d always been her brotherly confidant. Nothing had seemed to change, except for her sudden physical responses to him, and that had him confused. Was she needy for someone to make her feel desirable again—was that it? And was he the safest person available? “I think you’re a knockout,” he answered truthfully.

  “And you liked kissing me?”

  “Oh, yeah.”

  She sighed. “Everything’s so upside down, Nick.”

  He agreed with a nod.

  “Do you think it’s dangerous?” she asked. “You know, the kissing?”

  It was definitely dangerous. A major risk for his poor heart. A fatality for his sanity. He nodded again.

  “Uh-huh,” he said, but she’d started staring at him.

  He closed his eyes and drew a shaky breath. This couldn’t be happening. This shouldn’t be happening, but it was.

  “When you kiss me, Nick, I feel all those things. Beautiful, smart.”

  He didn’t know who had leaned closer, him or her, but her breath as she spoke touched his chin. He could smell her hair, her skin, feel the warmth from her body. “You want to be friends,” he reminded her, and opened his eyes.

  She was looking at him like he was a gooey chocolate dessert, and he discovered it wasn’t a bad feeling to be looked at like that.

  “Yes, I do,” she replied. “I don’t want anything to ruin that. I don’t want this...other thing...to ruin our friendship. What we have together is important to me.”

  “I guess that’s a risk.”

  “Just tell me you won’t stop being my friend.”

  “I won’t, Rye.”

  “Promise.”

  “I promise.”

  He leaned forward, the electrical current between them pulling like a magnetic field. He kissed her.

  * * *

  NICK RESORTED TO a sleeping pill that night—just a mild one that took the edge off and let him get enough rest so that he could function the next day. The situation was taking a toll on his mind and body. Ryanne was only here temporarily, and he wasn’t convinced that their friendship could handle a brief romance.

  However, fighting against his desire for her was obviously killing his brain cells. The following morning, he snapped
at Bryce twice and had to apologize. He ordered a carryout lunch at the Waggin’ Tongue and forgot the bag on the counter. When Shirley Rumford called to him as he was getting back in the cruiser, he’d taken one look at the bag the café owner held and felt like an idiot.

  “You okay, hon?” she’d asked.

  “I’m fine.”

  “Maybe you need a little time off.”

  “I have a vacation coming up,” he assured her.

  He took his meal to the dock along the river where he used to fish, listened for calls over the radio as he ate and had his allotted worry time. He hadn’t slept well in years, but nights were worse than ever now. He was going to have to snap out of this. His mind had careened into a rut and he couldn’t direct his thoughts back onto the road toward sanity.

  They’d bet an entire week of midnight drives. It wasn’t as if he’d have been sleeping anyway. Could he renege on the bet? Did he want to? No. He wanted to do exactly what they were doing.

  A little before 11:00 p.m. that night he called her. He’d been keeping an eye out for her lights and knew she was still downstairs. “You awake?” he asked.

  “Oh, yes. It doesn’t cool off enough to sleep upstairs until around one.”

  “Why don’t you run the air?”

  “It doesn’t work that well when it’s this hot.”

  “Why don’t you call Nate Keenan at the hardware store? He has a repairman.”

  “Maybe I will.”

  “Are we still on?” Nick asked, thinking she might have changed her mind after she’d had time to reconsider.

  “Unless you need to sleep,” she said. “This wasn’t very fair of me, because I know you have to go to work in the morning.”

  “I’m a night owl,” he assured her. “Want to leave now?”

  “I’ll meet you in back. We’re taking my car, right?”

  “You said I could drive it.”

  “You’re on.”

  Ryanne hung up and checked her hair in the mirror on the dining room wall. She ran a hand over her cotton top and the gauzy calf-length skirt, then picked up her purse and keys.

  She could feel his appreciative gaze, even in the darkness, as she walked toward him, and she returned the admiration, taking in his long legs in faded jeans, his broad chest and ample shoulders in a gray T-shirt. Nick took the keys and unlocked the garage, spreading the aged wooden doors to each side and walking to the driver’s side of her black Lamborghini.

  Ryanne opened the passenger door and got in. She buckled her seat belt as Nick started the powerful engine and found the switch for the headlights.

  Nick adjusted the driver’s seat for his longer legs, tested the sensitive clutch and backed out of the drive, heading for the highway. The sound of the engine always gave her goose bumps, and from the look on Nick’s face, he was experiencing the same reaction.

  He gave her a sideways glance. “A hundred and seventy-eight, you said?”

  “That was in the middle of nowhere,” she replied. “Don’t even think about it.”

  “There’s a straight four-mile stretch between the water tower here and the Cooperton Bridge,” he said.

  “You’re the sheriff.”

  “Right. So, who’s going to give me a ticket?”

  “Not over a hundred,” she warned him.

  He downshifted and stepped on the accelerator. Two minutes and a near cardiac arrest later, he slowed to the speed limit. Glancing at her face, he laughed. “What? You’ve driven it faster.”

  “It’s different when you’re the one driving,” she told him.

  “What are you doing with a car like this, anyway?”

  “What do you mean?”

  “I’d expect you to drive a Lexus or a Beemer or something.”

  She didn’t have time to reply, because a beeping sound interrupted.

  Her first instinct was to reach for her pager, but she hadn’t worn it in weeks. Nick flipped up the hem of his T-shirt and snagged the phone from his belt. “Sinclair...How long ago?” There was a longer pause. “No, I’m only about ten minutes away. Tell him to sit tight and I’ll get it.”

  He broke the connection, and Ryanne waited to hear what was going on.

  “I need to stop by the Clement place. Harold Clement thinks someone shot at his house.”

  “Oh, my, a drive-by shooting in Elmwood?”

  “We don’t have any gangs or anything. But this isn’t the first time this has happened. I suspect someone has a grudge against Harold, for whatever reason. Probably just a kid with a rock, but I haven’t found any proof. I’ll drop you off at home.”

  “As long as you think it’s safe, I don’t mind riding along. It’ll save you time.”

  “That it will.”

  He drove back to town and cruised up the street where the Clement house sat. Several neighbors in varying stages of dress, from robes and slippers to sweats and bare feet, stood on Harold’s lawn. Most of them turned to stare when the car roared to a vibrating stop at the curb.

  Ryanne exchanged a look with Nick as he reached for the door. Gossip would zing along the telephone wires and at the grocery checkouts tomorrow.

  Nick got out and strode toward Harold.

  Ryanne leaned out the window Nick had rolled down before turning off the engine.

  “Look at this, Nick,” Harold said. The fifty-something pharmacist wore a plaid robe belted around his wide belly, plus white socks and slippers. What little hair he had stood on end. “Someone was shooting at our place again.”

  Nick studied the broken glass from the faux gas lamp that stood in their front yard. “Did you hear a shot? Could it have been a rock?”

  “I heard it,” Harold assured him. “Popped like a gun.”

  “Were there any cars? Did you see anyone drive away?”

  “I looked out soon as I heard the sound.” Ryanne recognized the young woman who spoke; she worked in the post office. Her name badge had read Larken.

  Nick turned to the woman. “You heard it, too?”

  She nodded. “I was letting my dog out.”

  “Did you see a car?”

  “No. Nothing.”

  “Anyone on foot?”

  She shook her head. “It was too dark and the light was behind me, from my doorway.”

  “A person thinks they’re safe in a little town like this,” Harold grumbled. “Then they get shot at. I just got this lamp fixed after the last time, too. Cost me forty-five bucks for the glass panels and the bulbs.”

  “Maybe the bulb just burst,” Nick suggested.

  “It was a shot,” Harold insisted. “I know a gunshot when I hear one.”

  “Well, just like last time, everybody in the neighborhood has trampled the area. If there was evidence, it’s gone now,” Nick told the bystanders, waving them away. “Back up, people. I’ll come out first thing in the morning and look over the ground.”

  On her way back to her house, Larken gave Ryanne a little wave. The others headed to their homes, mumbling and giving Ryanne and her car inquisitive looks.

  Nick walked Harold up to his porch and spoke with him briefly before returning to the car.

  “Sorry about interrupting our drive.” Starting the engine, he turned on the headlights.

  “No problem. That kind of thing happen often?”

  “Always something.” He glanced in the rearview mirror and pulled onto the street.

  “Tired yet?” he asked her once they were out on the highway.

  Ryanne assured him she wasn’t. Alone in this car with Nick, she was more awake than she’d ever been, her senses more acute, her nerve endings tingling.

  He took a rutted side road, the headlights illuminating trees and the silver-red reflection of small animals’ eyes along what soon became almost a dirt trail. “If I get your car dirty, I’ll wash it.”

  She hadn’t even been thinking of that. She’d been wondering where he was headed down this deserted road into darkness, and her heart had started to pound with anticipation. He k
new where he was going, and eventually stopped the Lamborghini, turning off the engine.

  He switched off the headlights, and they sat in near total darkness.

  “Where are we?” she asked, her breathy voice almost a whisper.

  “I’ll show you.” He got out of the car and she followed. He took her hand and led her along a dirt path as their eyes began to adjust to the moonlight. Thick clumps of trees and shrubs eventually gave way to a clearing on the shore of a lake. Half a dozen houses stood on the opposite side, most of them dark, but a few trailing streams of yellow light across the surface of the water.

  “This is a beautiful place,” she said quietly.

  “Cooler here, too, did you notice?” He stood close, her hand still clasped in his.

  She nodded. “Who lives over there?”

  “Beverly Bell lives in the one on the far right—looks like a cabin? She still owns the Three B’s. A family named Murphy lives in the next one. Andy Murphy works construction projects for Jon Langley.”

  “How about that one?” Ryanne pointed to the home on the far left, where a dock jutted into the lake.

  “Paige Duncan bought that place a while back. She runs the pet store. Does dog grooming. Single. In her twenties.”

  Ryanne looked up at Nick’s face. “Attractive?”

  He nodded. “But not a knockout.”

  She smiled.

  Nick stepped behind her and placed his arms around her, hugging her gently. Leaning back into his sturdy embrace, she laid her head against his shoulder and gazed up at the stars. A gentle breeze flattened her filmy skirt against her legs. “It’s peaceful here.”

  Nick nudged his nose against her hair, touched his lips to her ear. A shiver raced along her skin. Ryanne and Nick were the only two people who existed right then and there, and that was as it should be. They had no past and no future, but only that moment.

  “I’ve never felt...this...” She made a fist and tapped it against his chest, frustrated at the lack of words—and too embarrassed to choose any to explain. “This,” she said helplessly.

  Nick used a knuckle to raise her chin. “I’ve never felt this before, either, Rye.”

  He understood, and that pleased her immeasurably.