Truly Madly Montana

by Fiona Lowe

  Millie scooped up her phone and ran to the door, leaving Ethan sitting next to Tara. “And that was the purple flash,” he quipped, hoping to elicit a smile.

  Her left palm pressed down on the table. “I should go, too.”

  Leaving before you’ve eaten the lunch you ordered. Okay, so she definitely didn’t want to shoot the breeze with the guy who’d just whacked her with his head. Just like she’d left Leroy’s on Friday the moment he’d finished the set, put down his cello and glanced in her direction. He was detecting a trend.

  Most guys would try and talk her out of leaving, but he recognized only too well the I’m not interested in you vibe. He’d honed his skills detecting that particular vibe in college. At thirty, he was done punching above his weight with beautiful women—it wasn’t worth the angst and the emotional put-downs. Sure, he’d like a girlfriend. Heck, he’d love a life partner, kids, a white picket fence, the whole nine yards, but he knew it was never going to happen with a woman who looked like Tara. Glamazons were for fantasy only, not for real life.

  He was about to rise to allow her the freedom to leave the booth when Hunter Bauer arrived holding a red basket and a large dish. “One turkey club sandwich with extra salad, no fries, and a chicken Caesar salad.”

  “Thanks, buddy,” Ethan said, accepting the sandwich. Over the winter, Hunter had been coming to the library regularly with his stepfather, Beau McCade, and borrowing books. It had surprised him, because Hunter was a skater kid, but then again, Ethan knew all about diverse interests.

  An idea pinged into his head. “Hey, Hunter, if I set up a LAN gaming night, do you reckon some of the teens would come to the library to play?”

  Hunter’s eyes lit up momentarily, but his expression was cautiously dubious. “Maybe.”

  “Good to know.” He’d take the spark of enthusiasm in the boy’s eyes as a sign that the idea was worth pursuing. “Can you bring me a chocolate shake, and I think Officer Ralston wants her salad to go.”

  “Sure.” Hunter reached for the salad.

  Tara put her hand on the plate, stalling its movement. “That’s okay. I’ll eat it here.”

  Hunter shrugged as if he didn’t care either way and then headed back to the kitchen to make the shake.

  She’s staying. Ethan set down the ice pack as a deluded spurt of happiness washed through him. “I’m glad you changed your mind.”

  Something flickered across her face that said she wasn’t as equally glad. “Doctor Lang—”

  “Ethan.”

  She sighed as if addressing him by his first name was stretching things. “Ethan.”

  “There you go.” He threw her what he hoped was an encouraging smile but feared it probably came off as goofy. Her mouth immediately tightened, and he saw the policewoman firmly in control.

  “I need you to move.”

  Do what now? She was staying for lunch but she wanted him to move?

  He tried to read her impassive face but got nothing except police officer on duty, do as you’re told, now! He was instantly reminded of the White Witch in Narnia, whose ice-cool beauty was both intoxicatingly tempting and frankly terrifying. If she offered him a hot drink or Turkish delight, he’d run a mile. Sadly, he was slowly moving toward agreeing with Ty that this woman was absolutely capable of emasculating him as fast and as efficiently as a cowboy with a knife at branding time.

  His shock at her request for him to move must have registered on his face, because her high, smooth forehead furrowed slightly and she tilted her head toward the other side of the booth. “It’s easier if you sit across from me.”

  Ah! He guessed that made sense. Kind of. He pushed his sandwich basket across the table, stood, and then slid along the bench seat on the other side.

  “Thank you,” she said crisply.

  “You’re welcome.” He tried not to sigh.

  She picked up her silverware, her face still set in its serious lines. Did she ever smile? He had a foolish desire to see if he could make that happen. “No problem. After all, I’m hardly going to say no to a woman carrying a gun.”

  A pained expression followed, and she silently turned her attention to her salad. She ate with such single-minded focus it was as if she thought her meal might vanish from in front of her at any moment.

  Strained silence hung over the booth like a threatening black rain cloud. Careful what you wish for, pal. As much as the thought of having lunch with Tara had been welcome, the reality was far from comfortable. The woman didn’t do small talk. Heck, she didn’t seem to do talk at all. It would have been a hell of a lot easier for both of them if she’d boxed her lunch and left.

  TARA felt the beads of sweat forming in her hair and pooling at the back of her neck. What was drilled into every soldier and cop? Stick to the MO! So why had she changed her mind at the last minute and stayed for lunch when she’d had the chance to leave?

  Because you left on Friday before you spoke to him and you still have to have this conversation, her practical-self told her.

  Because you can still feel the softness of his hair on your face, her far-from-sensible-self added.

  When Ethan had slammed into her, his hair had caressed her jaw, and the wintergreen scent of his shampoo had rushed her. Every part of her had clenched then sighed. The clenching part was expected. The sighing was not. The sighing bothered her. It bothered her a lot.

  Ethan Langworthy was not her type of guy. Even if he had been, she wasn’t interested, because her type meant heartache every single time, and she’d promised herself she wasn’t going down that road again. For the first time in two years she was officially single, and she planned to stay that way. God knows, she’d earned it, and more importantly, she damn well deserved it. Besides, Langworthy had already caused her enough disquiet over the last nine days that she didn’t need to add to it.

  She’d spent most of the last several days on tenterhooks, anxiously waiting for the story of how she’d mistakenly arrested him to break all over town. She’d expected him to change his mind and lodge a complaint with Mitch and for Judy to give in to the temptation of the story and tweet it, but nothing had happened. Not even a whisper. Last Friday afternoon when Mitch had called her and congratulated her on a great first week and told her he’d been impressed by the nice haul of money she’d earned the department from her radar blitz on speeding tourists entering the town, she’d finally accepted that she’d gotten away with her biggest-ever career faux pas.

  Relief had poured through her, making her jittery and light-headed, and she’d hit the couch with a rum and Coke to celebrate. Perhaps because right up until that moment she’d never believed the incident could stay a secret, she’d not watched the video that Judy had uploaded and tagged #OnlyEthan. But that night she did. The first time she saw it, she’d laughed so hard tears poured down her cheeks. Halfway through her second viewing, it hit her that this impression of fifty percent Brazilian soccer player, fifty percent “Chicken Dance” and one hundred percent goofball had opened him up to the town’s ridicule.

  Why? Why had he done this? What was his deal? It bothered her. It had bothered her at the station, but now that she’d seen the video it bothered her even more. It had propelled her off the sofa and out to the bar to find him and to ask him exactly what his deal was. People always had an agenda. Nobody expected something for nothing—everyone exacted a price eventually. She’d learned that growing up, and she had no intention of living in Bear Paw with this hanging over her. She’d intended to clear the air and get rid of this feeling that she owed him. She didn’t want to owe anyone anything.

  Only the moment she’d arrived at Leroy’s, she’d felt out of place. Some people did the whole social scene easily. Tara did not—she was always the cop. And Ethan Langworthy in black boots, black skinny jeans, a slim-fit black Henley T-shirt and those black cat-eye glasses hadn’t made being in Leroy’s any easier. All that was missing from the ensemble was the leather jacket.

  She’d found herself looking at him
more than once. Truth be told, she’d looked about ten times. He didn’t have the build of a biker, and despite the short beard look, he lacked the breadth and menace. His mouth was too friendly, his brow too tall and his hair too thick and wavy. His intelligence cloaked him like a black academic gown, but when he’d rocked that cello, he’d totally rocked her. It had scared her rigid, and she’d left without speaking to him.

  Now he sat in front of her in blue jeans, a white T-shirt and a light gray cotton cardigan that was pushed up his very muscular and delineated forearms. Most of her had asked him to sit opposite her because every soldier wanted the enemy where she could see him, and having him next to her in her peripheral vision made her jumpy. Anyone in her peripheral vision made her jumpy. The rest of her had asked him to move because she needed a break from him being so close. Unlike the day she’d arrested him, he no longer smelled of garden mulch. Instead he had the musky scent of a man, and for some reason it was making it very hard for her to concentrate.

  Just do it. She drew in a long, slow breath. “I watched the video.”

  The slightest ripple of movement crossed his shoulders. “I hope it gave you a laugh.”

  “It confused me.”

  “Oh?”

  “Why would you publicly embarrass yourself for me when you don’t even know me?”

  He shrugged. “We all deserve one get-out-of-jail card. This was yours.”

  He’d done her a favor, and it bristled, because her experience with favors was bad. They always came back to bite her. They always had strings attached. “Thank you, but you didn’t have to do it. I’m more than capable of taking care of myself.”

  “I’m more than sure that you are,” he said mildly before taking a sip of the shake Hunter had delivered to the booth.

  She dragged her gaze away from the way his lips closed around the straw and how, when he sucked, his cheeks indented, deeply outlining his prominent cheekbones. Wayward and unwanted thoughts beamed through her brain, and she cut them off briskly. Unfortunately, that briskness carried over into her voice. “As long as you know that.”

  He set down the damn cheek-sucking shake and raised his toffee-colored eyes to hers in an unflinching stare. “This is your first job in a small town, isn’t it?”

  She speared a piece of chicken with her fork, unnerved that he’d worked that out. “Maybe.”

  His gaze softened. “I’m taking that as a yes. Look, Bear Paw’s a decent town, which is why I came back here to live, but parts of it can be a bit like high school. Believe me, you do one dumb thing here and you own it forever.”

  She thought about the guy who’d just taken the photo of Ethan with the ice pack on his forehead. If it had happened to her, she would have grabbed the man’s wrist and removed the phone instead of sitting by aiding and abetting yet another humiliating photo. “And you’re the voice of experience.”

  “I have a PhD in it as well as in Library and Information Science.”

  He didn’t sound unhappy—if anything, his tone was one of mild resignation. She didn’t understand why he allowed the town to do this to him. “And you have a hashtag.”

  “I do. It’s a term of endearment.”

  He took another suck of the thick shake, and she looked down at her salad, hoping the cos lettuce and mayonnaise would offer her some respite from her unwelcome tangential thoughts about how his lips would feel on her body. The fact that notion even occurred surprised her. Sex wasn’t something she thought about very often, and she had no intention of starting today.

  “Do you have any experience in community policing, Tara?”

  “Some.” Not really. Her thoughts shied away from the weekly meetings—shuras—she’d attended with local Afghan women in Afghanistan as a stab of guilt hit her that she’d gotten out and they were still living in a war zone. Her time in Detroit had been more about locking up criminals than community liaison.

  His fingers toyed with a folder that he’d brought in with him. “It takes a while to find your feet in a new job and a new town. The best way is to get involved in local events. You know, give people a chance to get to know you.” His eyes lit up. “I’ve got an idea, and if you’re worried that you owe me about the other day, then this will make us even.”

  Finally! They’d reached payback time. This was exactly what she’d been expecting from him for nine long days. At long last, she was on solid ground with him. “You do realize, Doctor Langworthy, that blackmailing a police officer is an offense.”

  His mouth widened in a smile, and with a flash of white teeth, he threw back his head and laughed. It was a rich, genuine sound that trickled through her veins, making promises she didn’t want—promises she certainly didn’t trust. She felt her lips clamp together hard and the accompanying sweep of tightness pull across her jaw, travel along her neck and shoot down her spine, until her entire body was ramrod stiff.

  He suddenly stopped laughing, and his face shifted gears, settling into grim and unfamiliar lines. Not even when she’d mistaken him for a thief, handcuffed him and placed him in a holding cell had he given her a look like this.

  “You’re deadly serious, aren’t you?”

  She kept her chin tilted up. “I never joke about the law.”

  “Faa-rrr out.” He dug his fingers into his scalp. “I can’t believe this. What exactly did you think I was suggesting?”

  “Well, I . . .” Her absolute conviction that he wanted something reprehensible from her started to wobble on its foundations.

  “Don’t stop there.” He leaned back, folding his arms. “Tell me. I’m utterly fascinated.”

  “It doesn’t matter.” She reached for her hat, which was sitting on the table.

  Ethan got to it first, holding it hostage. “Actually, it does matter, Tara. I’m sick of you making snap judgments about me. First I was a thief and now I’m supposedly blackmailing you?”

  “You said I owed you and this would make us even. That sounds like blackmail to me.”

  His brow creased as his thoughts clicked over—thoughts that were illuminated in his intelligent eyes. “I was talking about you joining the Fourth of July family fun day committee.”

  “Oh.” It came out softly on a whoosh of air that left her breathless and winded.

  “Oh is right.” He fingered the brim of her hat. “You know, last week I wanted to help you out, so your first day didn’t dog you for your entire time in Bear Paw. Right now, I’m rethinking the whole nice-guy thing.”

  She was still floundering, desperately trying to hold on to anything that would make sense of this. “Can you honestly sit there and tell me that you had no other agenda in putting up that video other than helping me out?”

  He rubbed his jaw and gave a wry smile. “You’re a very attractive woman, Tara, and okay, maybe on some level I wondered if helping you out might make you view an invitation for a date favorably.”

  Her finger slammed into the middle of the table. “That’s exactly what I’m talking about.”

  His eyes flashed burnt butter, and his deep but usually calm voice took on an edge. “No, that is not it at all. Had I asked you out and you’d given me the expected no, I would have accepted it, no questions asked.” He leaned forward, his voice low. “Look, I have no clue where you’ve come from or what sort of people you’ve been associating with, but most of us here are decent folk. And you can relax, because hell would freeze over before I ever asked you out.”

  Before she could say a word, he pushed her hat back toward her and rose to his feet. “You have no clue how to work in a small town, Tara, and I’m done helping. You’re on your own now.”

  Without saying good-bye, he strode across the diner, pausing only when a little girl jumped to her feet and called his name. She started singing and doing the “Chicken Dance” for him. He joined her for one round before twirling her back to her mom. The patrons clapped and wooted, and he did an ostentatious bow before walking out the door.

  Her chest tightened. Who was this guy? She
’d never met anyone quite like him. Had she got it all wrong? Had she just accused a good man of something immoral based on him doing something relatively selfless? Had she lost so much faith in humanity over the years that she’d just offended a decent guy who’d been trying to help?

  “You want coffee or pie?” Hunter said, appearing next to her and removing the now empty salad plate.

  “No, thanks, I’m good.” She laid down some bills for him and rose to leave. Halfway across the diner, her phone rang and she checked the caller ID as she made for the door. “Hey, Chief. How’s the itching?”

  “The least of my problems,” Mitch grumbled down the line. “I’m in Great Falls and the physician isn’t happy. He wants to replace the plaster.”

  “Sorry to hear that,” she said as the afternoon heat hit her.

  “Yeah.” He sighed. “It’s gonna kill my afternoon.”

  She almost said, It’s not like you were doing anything, but he kept on talking. “I’ve been going to some town meetings so you didn’t get overloaded, Ralston, but you’re gonna have to do this one for me.”

  “Okay. What and where?”

  “City hall in fifteen. Doc Langworthy, Ethan, the librarian. You met him yet?”

  Somehow, she managed to force a strangled yes out of her spasming throat.

  “Good. He’s the convener of the family fun day on the Fourth. Can get a bit overenthusiastic, so your job’s making sure whatever he suggests is safe in a crowd situation. Think traffic control for the parade and around the park where the festival takes place. If it’s not safe, just tell him. Got that?”

  She tried to speak, but her lunch was back, filling her mouth.

  “Ralston?”

  She forced her salad back down her throat. “The thing is, sir, I was doing further investigations on the theft of a cattle truck this afternoon. Can’t you just respond to the written minutes?”

  “No.” She’d never heard Mitch Hagen sound so emphatic. “They’ll come up with some half-assed plan, and we’ll be left to clean it up. We don’t want another disaster like 2010. You’ve got to be there.”