Belle’s eyes met his. What did he know, or think he knew?
“For instance?” She kept her face as deadpan as Klein did on occasion. Maybe she had learned something after all.
“Confidence? Friendship?” He shook the basket again. “Success? Even love.”
“Interesting theory.”
“Isn’t it?”
Intent on proving wrong whatever it was he thought he knew about her, Belle took a piece of bread and stuffed half into her mouth. She forgot all about proving anything as the taste exploded on her tongue—too wonderful to be believed. How long had it been since she’d eaten bread drenched in real butter?
Obviously longer than she’d thought. Her head spun. Enjoying herself too much to notice anything else, she jumped in her seat when a man asked, “What’s this?”
Klein’s aggravated sigh told her who had joined them even before she turned her head to discover the mayor—dressed as if he’d just played three sets of tennis but hadn’t sweated a drop—beside their table.
Without invitation, he slid into Belle’s side of the booth, bumping her hip with his. Too bad Klein hadn’t sat next to her—so Smith couldn’t. But she imagined that if she ever wanted to sit next to Klein again she’d have to manage the seating arrangements, rather than the other way around.
She swallowed the bread, and her mouth watered for more. Deliberately, she kept her gaze off the basket and turned her attention to cutting the lasagna into miniature pieces.
“This is supper,” Klein growled in answer to the mayor’s question. “I’m sure you’ve heard of it.”
Smith ignored him, staring at the table incredulously before addressing Belle. “You eat like this?”
“Not every day.” An understatement if ever there was one.
“I would think not.”
The face he made at the table full of delicious food was insulting to say the least. How could he possibly be this annoying and still get elected? She’d known him only a day and already she wanted to avoid him for the rest of her life.
Belle slid a glance toward Serafina, who hovered behind the counter, pretending not to watch. The mayor’s grimace had the tiny woman biting her lip. Belle grabbed her fork and dug into the lasagna.
“Mmm,” she murmured several bites later. “You have no idea what you’re missing.”
Serafina’s smile was a reward far greater than any accolade. Belle would worry tomorrow about the ramifications of the meal.
“I’m missing about eight thousand calories and too many grams of fat to count. Have you ever seen what cholesterol looks like in your blood?”
The lasagna churned in Belle’s stomach. Maybe she’d worry right now.
“Shut up, Chai.”
Klein’s voice was mild, but Chai shut up. Oh, how Belle wished she could do that! She flashed Klein a grateful glance, which he answered with a flick of his finger toward the lasagna and a tilt of his head toward Serafina, who still watched expectantly.
Belle took another bite. Despite the heavy feeling in her stomach, the food tasted warm, inviting, comforting. She was reminded of a time when Mama could make everything better with a kiss and cookie.
“Shouldn’t you be off duty by now, Mayor?” Klein asked.
“No rest for the weary.”
His knee bumped against Belle’s beneath the table. She froze with her fork halfway to her mouth, but his leg moved away as if the touch had been accidental, so she ate some more, which was a lot more fun than analyzing that knee bump.
Klein’s sigh sounded more like a growl, and he gave up being polite. “What do you want?”
The mayor was undisturbed by the rudeness. No doubt he’d been confronted with it before. “I heard about the accident. About all you did to help.”
He beamed at Belle. His hand patted her knee, then stayed there. She jumped.
Klein frowned. “Something the matter?” he asked.
Belle shook her head, shifted over, and the mayor’s hand slid away, but not before he’d felt a whole lot more than her knee. Belle started eating again, so she wouldn’t say something she’d regret.
How many men in how many places had thought they could touch her any way that they wanted to, just because of what she did for a living? Too many to count. You’d think she’d be used to it by now, but she wasn’t. You’d think she’d have figured out a way to handle the insult, but she hadn’t.
“Chai, spill what you came in here for, or get out. Isabelle has had a rough day.”
“Isabelle, huh?” His friendly, down-home, good-old-boy voice took on the cultured coolness of a country club icon. “I heard you two were holding hands on Longstreet Avenue.”
“My, my—” Klein drawled.
Belle stopped eating and met his gaze, which said “I told you so” again much louder than words.
“Folks have been busy.”
“What the hell were you thinking?” the mayor demanded.
Klein’s eyes narrowed, and Belle jumped in before he could. This was, after all, her fault. “I was thinking I needed my hand held after the day I had today. Holding hands isn’t a federal offense. Or is it against the law in Pleasant Ridge?”
“Not that I’ve heard.” Klein stared at the mayor with his arms crossed over his impressive chest. “But you’d better check with Virgil.”
Belle began to laugh, but when the mayor glared, she turned the sound into a cough. Some of the spoiled little boy had leaked through the mask of the suave, golden man.
“Anything else you wanted, Chai?”
“I just wanted to see if Isabelle was all right.” Klein rolled his eyes. “And…well…maybe you could give us a few minutes, Klein. Hmm? I don’t need an audience.”
Ah, hell, Belle thought. He’s going to ask me out.
Before she could send Klein a “don’t you dare leave me with him!” message with her eyes, he exited the booth and strolled away.
The mayor faced her with a practiced smile. His fingers returned to her thigh. Belle glanced at Klein over Chai Smith’s shoulder, but he was already talking to Serafina and he wasn’t even looking at her. She was on her own. What else was new?
“I’d hoped to take you to supper on your first night here.”
He was so close that his breath brushed her neck. Why when Klein’s breath touched her did she feel hot, and when Chai Smith’s did, did she feel nothing but cold? Perhaps because of the chilly beast that lurked behind the heat in the mayor’s eyes.
Belle scooted a few inches away from the man, but her tailbone hit the end of the booth. Smith scooted after her with a smile. She should take his elegant fingers and twist them into a pretzel the way her brothers used to do to her. But she couldn’t afford to piss him off.
So she smiled and put her fingers atop his—the best way she’d discovered to keep a man’s hand from going any farther north.
His smile widened. “We could leave. Go somewhere much better than here.”
Belle glanced at her plate, surprised to discover she’d eaten nearly all her dinner. “I’m not hungry. But if you’d like to discuss business, now would be a good time.”
His face fell. “Business? Well, no, that’s not what I had in mind.”
She knew what he had in mind, and it wasn’t going to happen. Not in this lifetime. But how did she say that and still keep him on her side?
By pretending, of course. She’d pretend she was as dim as he no doubt believed her to be.
“I thought I’d show you some of the finer places in this part of Tennessee.” He squeezed her knee. “Just you and me.”
She waited for the wink. She didn’t have to wait long. Did women actually fall for this stuff? Belle resisted the urge to sigh. She knew that they did.
“How sweet.” She patted his hand, a little harder than necessary, true, but he didn’t notice. He probably wouldn’t notice anything short of a sledgehammer over his head.
“I couldn’t possibly.” He frowned. “At least, not right now. Why, I’m just to
o busy to give a man like you the attention you deserve.”
“I don’t need much time.”
Probably not, she thought dryly.
“Now, you know I have to make this show a success. Otherwise, where will I be?” She lifted his hand from her knee and placed it back on his own. “Where will you be if everything we’ve planned falls down about our heads, huckety-buck?”
The reminder of his part in the deal seemed to reach the mayor. If she looked like a fool, he could very well look the same, and men like Chai Smith would do anything to avoid looking like a fool.
They never seemed to realize they could hardly avoid appearing what they already were.
SERAFINA GLANCED PAST Klein and muttered something in Italian that didn’t sound like “honey.” Then she sniffed, pointedly gave him a glare and flounced into the kitchen.
Klein leaned against the counter. He’d bet money that the mayor was fondling Isabelle beneath the table. Klein had to breathe deeply and focus on staying right where he was, because what he wanted to do was stalk over there, drag the mayor out of the booth and break any part of him that had touched any part of her.
But when he’d asked if anything was the matter, she’d shaken her head. Klein wasn’t going to embarrass himself by stepping in when he wasn’t needed. He’d been there and done that.
Still, he continued to watch them both, wondering what she was up to. She’d said the mayor was a molting vulture. From where he stood right now, Isabelle seemed to have developed a deep fondness for molting vultures.
Her face was animated, and one hand emphasized her words while the other hid beneath the table, no doubt holding hands with this new friend, too.
Klein was gritting his teeth again, so he forced himself to stop. He knew better than to get emotionally involved with a beautiful woman. Heck, with any woman. He’d done so well for so long. Then Isabelle had come to town, and in the space of one day all his carefully laid plans, all his meticulously thought-out rules had gone into the trash.
He was lonely, but he would live. If a person could die of loneliness, Klein never would have made it past the age of eight.
Despite his good intentions, he found himself fascinated with the movements of her fingers and the shape of her mouth. Klein shifted against the countertop as an image of those clever fingers doing something else entirely sprang to life in his brain. If he didn’t put a stop to this sudden obsession, he was going to get hurt, or at the very least be embarrassed. And he’d have no one to blame but himself.
Klein forced his thoughts from flashes of Isabelle in a towel, wet and warm from her shower, staring at him with what he’d sworn was invitation in her eyes, until he’d come to his senses…to the way she’d been only a little while ago.
Her tale of the afternoon accident had been different from Virgil’s. From her point of view, the afternoon had been an adventure, though she had not styled herself a heroine. Instead, she’d added humor in just the right amount to make the tale bittersweet. She’d had everyone laughing if not smiling, including him. Isabelle had a wonderful imagination, a gift for words and an incredible sense of timing. Why hadn’t she become a writer instead of an actress if she could concoct stories out of the air and keep people entertained with such ease?
One look at her face and he knew why. That face didn’t belong in front of a computer; it belonged on the screen.
Because Klein was looking at her so closely, he saw her gaze lower to the nearly empty plate of lasagna. She blinked. He’d observed her methodically cutting the noodles into itty-bitty pieces and rearranging them on her plate, but since she’d been eating, too, he hadn’t thought much of it.
Her eyes shifted to the brownies, and she turned away from the dessert so abruptly it was almost as if she was afraid of them. Which was too silly to be believed. So why did he believe it?
Focused on Isabelle and her odd behavior, Klein didn’t notice Chai coming toward him until the man spoke.
“She’s even more beautiful in person, isn’t she.” He sighed like a love-struck teenager.
“I wouldn’t know, since I’ve only seen her in person.”
Chai laughed. “That’s your story and you’re sticking to it, huh?”
Klein didn’t bother to answer him. Of course, Chai had never needed any encouragement to keep right on talking. “What I’d like to see in person are those jugs.” He smiled at Isabelle, who smiled back, unaware. “What a rack,” he breathed.
Klein’s hands curled into fists. Would the mayor be an idiot if he wasn’t twenty-three and hormone challenged? Probably.
“Watch your mouth, Mr. Mayor.”
Chai didn’t even bother to glance his way. He was too busy staring at Isabelle, who slid from the booth and bent over the table to retrieve her pan of brownies.
“Would you look at her.” The man actually licked his lips. “Honestly, Klein, don’t tell me you haven’t been staring at that all day and itching to put your hands on it.”
Guilty as charged, but at least he wasn’t talking about “that” in public or drooling over “it” in Murphy’s Café. Yet.
“I asked her to go out with me,” Chai murmured.
“What did she say?”
Klein held his breath. What would he do if Isabelle agreed to go out with the Mayor Wonder? Kill him? However appealing, things were no longer handled that way, even in Tennessee. He missed the good old days.
“She’s too busy now. But later.” Chai licked his lips again, as if Isabelle were a prime steak sizzling on his own personal barbecue grill. “Later she will. I just know it.”
“She turned you down?”
The mayor flicked him a petulant look. “Because she’s busy.”
Klein grunted as Isabelle spun about with the pan of brownies in her hands. Her gaze went directly to him. She smiled, and not just with her mouth. The expression went all the way to her pretty brown eyes. Klein’s lips lifted in response.
“I’ve got to get her to go out with me.”
The intensity in Chai’s voice reached through Klein’s foggy consciousness. Had the mayor become a charter member of a stalkers’ association? From the expression on his face, Klein had to wonder.
Isabelle turned to speak with Serafina, and Klein fixed Chai with a glare. “Why do you have to?”
“Can you imagine Isabelle Ash and me? What a couple. I could go much further than Pleasant Ridge with Isabelle on my arm.” He wiggled his eyebrows. “And in my bed.”
“You’ve lost me.” Too bad not literally.
“With her fame and face, my connections and looks, we could go straight to the top. You know, people miss glamour in the White House. They talk about Jackie all the time. They even elected an actor once.”
“You think Isabelle could be president?”
Confusion settled over Chai’s face momentarily before understanding dawned. He snorted. “Right, Klein. That’ll be the day.”
Besides being a pretty-boy moron, the mayor was a chauvinist. That oughta get him reelected.
“Does Daddy know you want out of town?”
Chai tensed. Klein smiled. Nope, Daddy didn’t know.
“He won’t mind if I leave to be a senator.”
That remained to be seen, and Klein would love to see it. He’d just store Chai’s secret political ambitions away for use on a rainy day.
“Can’t you just see that face on CNN?” Chai breathed. “Staring at me with such pride and devotion. That body next to mine as she waves to all the people. Securing me every male vote.”
The mayor was definitely adrift in fantasyland.
“What about her?” Klein asked.
“Her?” Chai repeated, as if the concept were a foreign one.
“Yes. Her. Isabelle,” he enunciated. “What if she doesn’t want to be on CNN?”
Chai laughed. “Her life is television and print. CNN would be an incredible coup. Besides, what woman wouldn’t want to be a senator’s wife, instead of an underwear model? Do you think s
he’d be better off as a Mayberry-Baywatch hottie than a political asset?”
If that was what she wanted, yes. But Klein didn’t bother to share with Chai a concept beyond his understanding. He was going to have to keep an eye on the mayor and make sure he didn’t cross the line any more than he already had. Though, if Isabelle refused to complain, there wouldn’t be much Klein could do. Legally, at any rate. Klein cracked his knuckles.
“Do you even like her?” Klein couldn’t help but wonder aloud, even though he felt as if he were in the seventh grade. Next thing, he’d be asking Chai to ask her if she liked him!
“Like? Hell, I love her. What’s not to love?” He leered in Isabelle’s direction again. Luckily she was still talking to Serafina and missed it.
“So you’re interested in her face, her body and her fame?”
“What else is there?” He flicked a glance at Klein. “Oh, you mean her personality and her mind.” His lips twitched. “That, too.”
Chai began to leave, but unfortunately he came right back. “She said she’d be too busy to give me the attention I deserved until the pilot was finished, and I can understand that. The next month is going to be important to us all. I’d be worried about other men poaching, but then she’ll be with you. Her hand holding pal.”
Klein merely raised his eyebrows and waited for the mayor to get to the point.
“Keep the others away from her for me, Sheriff. I’m counting on you.” He glanced at Isabelle one last time. “Damn, we’re going to have beautiful kids.”
Chai strolled out of Murphy’s, and Klein watched him go as the past swirled all around him. The last time he’d watched over a beautiful woman for another man, he hadn’t even known he’d been doing it. He’d been in love with Kay Lynne, and he’d believed she was in love with him. She’d wanted beautiful children, too. He would have given her anything. But some things lay beyond his control.
He’d grown up in the years since Kay Lynne had told him the truth about everything. He was not the kind of man who inspired deep, true, unconditional and forever love in women. He’d learned to accept that—to live with it, if not to like it.
A Sheriff in Tennessee Page 12
