by Linda Wisdom
Keely stood up. “And now I am leaving. I left the puppy in the laundry room because there wasn’t much there he could destroy.”
“How’s he doing?”
“He cried all night Steffie finally took him to bed with her and he stopped crying. I’m sure that dog will be spoiled before the week is over.” She pulled her keys out of her jeans front pocket
“Leave the letter with me,” he advised, also getting to his feet. He followed her to the door. He kept his voice matter-of-fact, but there was no way he could completely hide his concern for her.
Keely was in the process of pulling the door open when Sam grasped her arm and turned her to face him. His mouth brushed across hers in the lightest of kisses but was felt strongly by both.
“I will ask around and see what I can find out.”
For a moment, her gaze was shadowed with uncertainty. There was no denying she wanted to learn the truth. But at what price and to whom?
Chapter II
The little girl was so afraid she didn’t dare cry. If she cried, the bad man would hear her and know she was out of bed and saw everything. He would hurt her next. Why did he hurt her mommy and daddy?
Keely was jerked awake as the fear flooded her veins. She should have known better than to curl up with a book when she felt so tired. She hadn’t anticipated falling asleep and worse, she hadn’t anticipated the dream haunting her during the daytime.
She rubbed her face with her hands to dislodge any lingering sleep. She jumped when something cold and wet nudged her bare leg. Then laughed when she realized it was the puppy.
“Poor guy, did I scare you?” she crooned, picking him up and setting him on her lap.
She sat there for the longest time, holding the puppy as if he could keep away the demon that stole in and so violently invaded her dreams.
The longer she sat there, the angrier she became.
“Enough,” she stated, jumping to her feet and picking up her phone. She quickly punched out a number. “It’s Keely,” she said before Sam could get out a hello. “If you’re going to question people living on that street, I’m going with you.”
“Civilians do not accompany peace officers when they’re on an investigation.”
She blithely ignored his clipped tone. “I’m part of that investigation and I might pick up on something you won’t.”
“Keely, I am trained for this kind of work and you’re not,” he reminded her.
“And I’m a woman who still might pick up on something you don’t,” she argued. “Men don’t have that famous intuition we women do.”
His sigh was audible over the phone. “Keely, this isn’t a good idea.”
“When are you going?”
“I mean it.”
“I’ll go by myself.” She turned away from the large picture window as if by doing that she could hide from anyone who might be lurking out there. She sternly resisted closing the drapes.
“If you think that threat will work, it won’t.” Her silence sent her reply loud and clear. He swore fluently. “All right, you can go only because if I don’t let you, you’ll do this on your own. But I want you to remain in the background and not open your mouth.”
“I’ll be good, Sam,” she promised.
“You damn well better be or we’ll both be sorry. Be down to the station at ten in the morning,” he ordered.
She glanced at the clock. “Why can’t we go this afternoon?”
“Because, Mrs. Harper, the person we need to see is out of town today,” he stated in slow, sure tones. “I’m going to make some notes so we ask all the right questions tomorrow. Now, is there anything else?”
Keely opened her mouth, ready to tell him about her dreams. She felt the need to share them with someone and she felt if anyone would understand and assure her she wasn’t going crazy, he would.
“Keely?” His voice sharpened.
“No, nothing else,” she said softly. “I’ll be there at ten. Thank you.” She hung up, but her fingers rested across the back of the receiver, slowly sliding across the plastic as she stepped back.
She turned away just in time to catch an anxious-looking puppy hopping around on his oversize paws.
“Oh, no, big guy. Outside with you!” For now her attention was diverted from darker thoughts.
“Let’s go play miniature golf,” Steffie suggested after they’d finished dinner. Without prompting she had picked up the dishes, rinsed them off and loaded them in the dishwasher.
“Where did all this energy of yours come from?” Keely asked. The nap she’d taken earlier had only left her feeling more tired rather than refreshed. By the time Steffie came home, Keely had applied enough makeup so she didn’t look as drawn as she felt.
Steffie shrugged. “They have an awesome course and it would be fun.”
Keely noticed that Steffie even remembered to put powdered soap in the dispenser. If she didn’t feel so worn-out she would be suspicious of her daughter’s unusually helpful behavior.
“Could we put it off until tomorrow night?”
Steffie shook her head. “Oh, come on, it will do you good to get out” She sat down on the floor and pulled the puppy into her lap. She giggled as he eagerly licked her face.
“I don’t think we should leave him alone for the evening,” Keely said.
“A couple hours wouldn’t hurt, would it?” she asked. “Just one of those mother-daughter things.”
Keely did find the idea appealing. “All right,” she conceded. “Take the puppy outside for a while and make sure he does everything he should while I freshen up.”
“I wish you could go with us, baby.” Steffie held the puppy up and nuzzled his face. “But I don’t think they’ll let you in, so let’s go outside so you can do all those gross things a puppy should do outside.” She jumped up and went out, still holding the puppy in her arms.
Keely went into her bedroom long enough to apply blusher and lipstick and spritz on cologne. She tucked a few stray tendrils back into her ponytail and stared into the mirror.
She wasn’t sure what she thought she’d see, but she knew what she did see. A thirty-five-year-old woman who had survived a bad marriage and gone on to make a new life for herself and her child.
For a brief second she imagined the reflection in the glass wavered until a little girl’s face looked back at her.
Keely leapt back. She knew it was her imagination, but the image was just a little too startling since she knew the little girl’s face she thought she saw was her own.
The miniature golf course was busy that evening but not so busy that too many people had to wait to play. While Keely paid and retrieved clubs, balls and score cards, Steffie fidgeted and looked around.
“There are days when you’re worse than a five-year-old,” Keely said, handing her a club and ball. “Do you want to go first?”
“Sure.” Steffie still glanced around.
“Then go,” she suggested in a level voice.
Steffie grinned sheepishly and set her ball down. Within seconds, the bright blue ball was rolling down toward the hole and rolling right past it
“Concentrate on the ball and not who’s here and you’ll do better,” Keely advised, setting her green ball down next. “If I find out we’re here because you’re hoping to run into a boy, you will be cleaning the bathrooms for the next month.”
“So far I haven’t seen any boys I’d want to run after,” she said with a sniff.
“We’ll see.”
“Hey, Steffie!”
Keely’s head snapped up the same time as Steffie’s. Mother looked at daughter with that expression that told her the jig was up. Father and daughter walked up with daughter having the same look of surprise on her face and father having the same expression mother wore. Sam cocked an eyebrow at Keely.
“Fancy meeting you here,” he drawled.
“Yes, amazing, isn’t it?” she returned. “Did Lisa happen to have the same uncontrollable urge to play miniature golf a
s Steffie did?”
“She suddenly decided she couldn’t manage to spend the evening at home with her old man,” he replied dryly.
Both girls sported smiles of innocence as they gazed up at their parents.
“Funny we all showed up here, isn’t it?” Steffie chirped. “Why don’t Lisa and I play ahead of you two? You adults would probably have more fun playing each other than with us anyway.”
“Oh, but Steffie, I thought it was a mother-daughter thing,” Keely said cooed, with just a hint of hurt in her tone.
Steffie wiggled under her mother’s gaze. “I’m thinking of you, Mother.”
“Of course you are, dear.”
“Go,” Sam said, letting the two of them off the hook. “While you two play, I’ll buy Keely a cup of coffee.” He moved over to stand next to Keely and rested his hand against the small of her back.
He barely got the words out and the girls were moving on to the second hole.
“We were set up,” Keely said, watching the two girls with their heads together.
“I know.”
She looked up, curious to see his reaction and was surprised to see him grinning.
“Come on, Mrs. Harper.” He steered her in the other direction. “You can tell me about some of those uncontrollable urges of yours.”
The moment they stepped into the snack bar, they were both aware they were under scrutiny of the other patrons. Most just nodded while a few tried to make conversation. Sam, politely but firmly, cut it short and headed for the end booth.
“Small towns love to have something to talk about,” he said. “Coffee all right with you?”
Bemused, she could only nod.
Keely watched Sam stand at the counter and give their order. He was dressed casually in jeans and an oatmeal-colored T-shirt, but all she could think about was seeing him sleepy-eyed and wearing nothing but a pair of white cotton briefs. She quickly looked away as if her thoughts could be heard by everyone else there. When he returned with the coffee, she managed a smile and a murmured thank-you.
“So,” he said, taking the seat across from her, “do you
want to tell me what got you going that you had to call me this afternoon and demand to play junior sheriff?”
She wished she used cream or sugar in her coffee so she would have something to do to put off answering his question.
“How long has the golf course been here?” she asked brightly, as if he hadn’t already asked her a question.
“Two years. What upset you enough you felt you had to call me?” His eyes bored into hers. “Did you get another note? A phone call?” Something about her posture must have alerted her he was on the right track.
Keely looked furtively around the brightly lit snack bar with its vivid orange plastic tables and blue molded plastic booths. The chattering was noisy and enthusiastic. Not exactly the right place to talk about nightmares even if she didn’t have to worry about anyone overhearing her.
“It’s the idea that someone would plant such a hateful note in my truck,” she said in a low voice. “I’ve thought so much about it that I feel very strongly that I need to search out the truth myself.”
He stared at her for several moments. She forced herself not to fidget under his gaze. She sensed he didn’t believe her and she was preparing herself to spout more lies when he slowly nodded.
“That’s understandable as long as you realize that you might not like the answers you get,” he told her.
“Well, well, look who’s here.”
Keely silently cursed before she mustered up a smile and lifted her head.
“Hello, John.”
While the pharmacist was smiling, his eyes appeared ice-cold as he looked down at them.
“Playing some miniature golf?” he asked pleasantly.
“Just waiting for the kids to finish,” Sam replied. “The last thing they wanted was the old folks horning in, so we
agreed to wait for them here. I guess they’re afraid we’ll ruin any chance they have of attracting admirers out there. Admirers for their golf skills, of course.”
John just kept smiling. “Yes, of course.” He glanced again at Keely. “I’m glad to see you’re doing so well, Keely.”
“Thank you.”
“Yes, those kind of accidents can be pretty nasty.” He lightly tapped the top of the table with his fingertips as if to punctuate his words, then he moved on.
“Is it my imagination or did the temperature just drop a good fifty degrees?” Keely murmured.
“A rejected suitor, perhaps?” he quipped.
“He’s a nice man, but…” She shook her head.
“But what?” Sam leaned forward.
“I don’t know.” Her brow furrowed in thought as she tried to put her feelings into words, but it wasn’t proving easy. “There’s just something about him that bothers me and I can’t figure out why.”
“I wouldn’t worry,” he soothed.
“True, why should I when there’s so much else going on in my life?” She picked up her coffee and sipped the hot brew. “But I don’t like hurting anyone’s feelings.”
“Considering the number of widows in the area who have their eye on John, you don’t have to think he’ll be pining away for your company. I can think of four offhand who wouldn’t mind getting their manicured little claws into him.”
Keely shook her head in wonderment “I swear this town is better than a soap opera.”
Lines crinkled around his eyes as he grinned at her. “Honey, soap operas are based on this town. You’re just the new face for this season. Don’t worry unless someone talks about comas.”
“Sheriff, are you telling me you watch soap operas?” she teased.
“Our dispatcher does. She has a small TV in the back room where she takes her lunch break and catches up on her favorite show. No one is allowed to disturb her during that hour if they want to live. We tease her a lot about it, but we find ourselves wandering through there to see what’s going on.” He looked a little sheepish about his Carlos was only seeing her because he was secretly in love with her twin sister Lorna.”
Keely rolled her eyes. “Wrong!” she sang out. “Carlos is actually Lorraine’s illegitimate child from her college days, but he’s been cautious about telling her the truth.”
Sam’s face broke into a slow grin. “Well, damn. You watch ‘Fall River Nights,’ too.”
She nodded. “Thanks to the magic of VCRs, I haven’t missed an episode since the first day. Steffie went to school with Veronica Blake’s daughter.” She named the star of the show.
Sam let out a low whistle. “Your kid ran with fancy company.”
“Along with the son of a computer company CEO, the daughter of an international banker, a son and daughter of a retired diplomat and the daughter of a Secret Service agent,” she told him. “The nice thing is they were all perfectly normal kids without a shred of egotism. They used to spend a lot of time at our house emptying the kitchen cabinets of food, splashing water out of the pool and playing the stereo full blast”
“I’m surprised she doesn’t feel as if she’s come down in the world,” Sam said.
“Steffie’s never been class-conscious. I’ve always been proud of her ability to look within a person instead of considering what they have materially.”
“Thing is, she and Lisa act as if they were twins separated at birth.”
Keely nodded. “They do tend to think alike.” She looked out over the course and could see the two girls giggling as Steffie attempted to hit her ball into a dragon’s open mouth. When her ball finally rolled through, red and orange lights lit up and a roar sounded from the dragon. The girls jumped up and slapped a high five.
“Which may not make it safe for us.” Sam glanced around. Luckily, no one was in their area, but he still lowered his voice. “How do you feel about that?”
She didn’t turn away or act coy because that wasn’t her style. Keely had always prided herself on her directness with others
. She wasn’t about to change her ways now. She looked at him straight on, unblinking, no delicate flush of the cheeks.
“When I moved up here, I was still smarting over a nasty divorce and had no plans to become involved with anyone,” she said quietly. If she hadn’t been watching him so intently she wouldn’t have noticed the faint flicker of light in his eyes die. “But then, I hadn’t planned on meeting you, either.” The light just as quickly reappeared. She smiled. “Besides, it already seems we have a seal of approval from our children.”
He grinned back. “But do we want them to know about this too quickly?”
She gave him a mock frown. “Of course not! Their puberty is making us crazy. The least we can do is make them a little crazy as they try to figure out what’s going on.”
He lifted his coffee cup in a silent toast. “I’m always for that.”
Keely lifted her cup and tapped his with it “I still want to take things slow,” she warned him. “I don’t believe in taking chances.”
“Does that mean I can’t ask you about those uncontrollable urges you happened to mention earlier?” he whispered.
Now she did blush. “I think that’s a subject better left for another time.”
“Too bad. I was interested in hearing your ideas on the subject.”
“Finish your coffee, Sheriff. We have two girls to chaperone.” She smiled.
“Just remember they won’t always be with us.”
Keely knew that. In fact, she was beginning to look forward to a time the girls weren’t around.
Sam didn’t believe in watching the clock. He always felt it didn’t accomplish anything. And it hadn’t Not until he knew Keely Harper was showing up that morning at ten to accompany him. He had a hunch she was the prompt type and her appearing before Freda’s desk at ten sharp told him he was right. She stood out there looking lovely in a navy-and-cream plaid skirt that brushed against her calves and a dark indigo denim shirt with the tails tied just above her waist She had piled her hair on top of her head in a careless twist. His fingers itched to release the pins holding her hair in order to watch it tumble down around the silver earrings that dangled by the side of her neck. He regretted he was on duty.
