by Diana Palmer
She hugged him back. “I can see us now, hiking up a mountain with the baby in a backpack and a metal detector,” she chuckled.
He drew away so that he could see her face. “We’ll take turns carrying him,” he mused. “Or her.”
“He feels like a boy,” she said. “I don’t know why.”
He bent and kissed her nose tenderly. “We’ll love whatever we get. Maybe he’ll like rocks, too. And astronomy.”
He took her hand again and led her toward the car. He favored his left leg a little and winced as he moved.
“What’s wrong?” she asked immediately. “Did you hurt yourself?”
He paused by the passenger door of his car and studied her.
“Don’t you want to tell me?” she persisted when he hesitated.
“You might want me locked up when I tell you,” he mused.
“Be daring.”
He laughed. “I told the cats we were getting married and expecting an addition to the family. They looked at each other, and at me. One got on either side of me and they bit both ankles at once and flounced off in a huff.”
She didn’t say anything. She gave him an odd look.
He shrugged. “I told you you’d want me locked up.”
“Do they like tuna?”
He shook his head. “Salmon. They’re crazy for it.”
“I know where we can get some fresh salmon,” she murmured dryly.
He pursed his lips thoughtfully. “It might just work.”
“Let’s see!”
“First thing after lunch,” he promised, putting her in the car.
Chief Grier was in Barbara’s Café when they got there, sitting with a somber Leo Hart. They both looked up when Kemp walked in. Grier motioned to him. He left Violet in line to keep his place and paused by their booth.
“Something’s going on, I gather?” he asked.
“Something big,” Grier agreed. “Leo’s brother Simon got some news about Julie Merrill. Remember the drug lord who tried to set up shop here before I came to work on the force?”
“I do,” Blake replied. “He was bad news.”
“Well, a female drug lord has replaced him, and we think Julie Merrill is her lieutenant. I’ve been watching a house out of town on the Victoria road where drug smugglers had a hideout that the DEA busted. There’s some new activity. I think Julie’s involved, along with some prominent local politicians.”
Kemp whistled. “Got her in custody?”
“Chance would be a fine thing,” Grier replied. “She made bail and got out, but a couple of days later, she made bush bond.” In other words, Blake translated, she skipped town.
“If you need help tracking her down, I know a good P.I.”
Grier grinned. “Thanks. But I think my contacts are even better than yours. What I’d like to know from you is something that may be painful,” he added, and the smile faded.
“You want to know about Shannon Culbertson,” Blake said perceptibly. “Julie put something in her drink and she died. But I could never prove it. I tried, believe me!”
“If you have any notes on the case, I’d appreciate a look at them, if it isn’t a confidentiality matter,” he added.
“Not at this late date,” Blake replied solemnly. “Drop by my office in the morning and I’ll have them for you. I’d love nothing better than to see Julie Merrill in stripes.”
“That makes two of us,” Grier agreed. He glanced at Violet, who was looking at Blake with wide, soft, loving eyes. He grinned. “You’ve got good taste in women, I might say,” he told the other man.
“I do, don’t I?” Blake said complacently, smiling at Violet, who blushed.
“I hear she’s taking prenatal vitamins,” Grier murmured wickedly.
Blake didn’t fire from the hip. He actually laughed. “Abundantly,” he agreed, “or she goes to sleep in her plate.” He glanced from Grier to Leo Hart, who was also grinning. “You can both come to the wedding, if you’d like. We decided on the Methodist church. We’re announcing it in the paper. No time for invitations. Mrs. Hardy has loaded her shotgun and made significant threats.”
“As if that would matter to you,” Leo chuckled.
Blake smiled. “I never thought I’d get married, much less be a parent. But it all seems to be falling into place naturally.” He eyed Grier. “I hear you’re already taking Tippy’s brother fishing with you.”
“He’s quite a boy, Rory is,” Grier agreed. “I like having him around. I like having her around, too.”
“So?” Blake prompted.
Grier just shrugged. “We’re waiting for a major complication to resolve itself.”
“I heard the kidnapper was still on the loose,” Blake told him. “You don’t think he’d be crazy enough to show up here in town?”
Grier met his eyes evenly. “Without Tippy, there’s no case. Kidnapping is a federal offense. It means hard time. The guy is a professional contract killer. I don’t have any illusions about Tippy being safe just because she’s in my house. I sleep light these days.”
Blake nodded. “I hope it works out.”
“It will, one way or another,” Grier said grimly.
“What about your cats?” Leo asked curiously.
Blake blinked. “What?”
“We’ve heard some strange stories from people who visited you at home,” Leo replied with a chuckle. “They say most all of them came out running.”
“And bleeding,” Grier added wickedly.
“A few scratches here and there, that’s all.”
“Yes, but Violet will be living with them.”
“She has some ideas that involve fresh salmon,” Blake replied, grinning. “They do take bribes.”
“Good luck,” Grier said.
“Amen,” Leo added.
Blake just smiled and went back to Violet.
He told her on the way out of town about Julie Merrill jumping bail, and about the evidence Grier wanted to see.
She looked at him with soft compassion. “It’s hard for you to look back, isn’t it?” she asked gently. “Shannon meant a lot to you.”
He nodded solemnly. “She did.” His head turned toward her. “But the past is gone, Violet. I’ve made mistakes, trying to live in it. She was a kind woman. She wouldn’t have wanted me to be bitter.”
She smiled. “You were just hurt,” she said. “It takes a lot of time to get over losing people. I know. I still miss Daddy.”
“I miss both of my parents,” he said unexpectedly. “My father died when I was little. I took care of my mother all the way through school. She died of a stroke the week after I graduated from law school. Shannon was there, with food and comfort, kindness. I was almost out of my mind with grief already. Then, just a few months later, I lost Shannon, too.” He glanced at Violet. “I’ve been hiding, I suppose.”
“It isn’t hard to see why.” She leaned back against the seat. “Leo looks different.”
“He’s married,” he said, laughing. “He’s definitely mellowed. All the Hart boys have. It’s just amazing. I’d have bet real money that they’d end up crusty old bachelors.”
“They said the same thing about the Tremayne brothers,” she pointed out. “And look at them!”
He smiled. “Marc Brannon, Judd Dunn, there are two other bachelors I’d have bet on staying single.” He shook his head. “Now Cash Grier’s about to fall.”
“You think Tippy could settle down in a small town?” she asked, aghast.
“You’ve seen them together. What do you think?”
She sighed. “I think they’re crazy about each other, but neither of them is willing to admit it. She’s been through a lot, including the miscarriage. That must have been tough. What if the tabloids find out she’s here and start on her again?”
His eyes twinkled. “Oh, I think Cash can handle the press.”
“Matt Caldwell certainly did, they say, when a reporter targeted his Leslie some years ago, before they were married.”
> “This is not a good place for outsiders if they ruffle feelings,” Blake reminded her.
“I’m glad. I like living here.” She sighed worriedly. “Blake, they won’t try to make some big news story out of Janet Collins when her trial comes up, will they? She poisoned Daddy and was suspected in still another murder in a nursing home. There aren’t that many women serial killers. What if the press comes in here and starts making snacks out of me and Mama?”
“Not a chance,” he promised.
His tone was curious. She glanced up at him. “Do you know something I don’t?” she asked slowly.
“Let’s just say, I’m working on something,” he replied. He stopped at the town’s only fish market and parked the car. “Fresh salmon,” he said as he turned off the engine with a grin. “Let’s hope they take bribes!”
The cats were both sitting in the front window when the car drove up.
“That’s odd,” Blake remarked. “They never wait for me like that unless it’s grocery day.”
“Maybe they smell the salmon!” she teased.
He made a face. “Fat chance.”
Violet picked up the fish and they both went in the front door together.
“Hi, guys,” Violet said, wafting the brown-wrapped fish above their heads. “Hungry?”
They both started yowling, sounding for all the world like crying babies as they stood on their hind legs trying to swat the package out of her hands.
“That has to be a good sign,” Violet told him.
“We’ll see. Come on, girls,” he called to them, leading Violet through the living room and into the spacious kitchen. “I’ll get their bowls.”
He pulled them out of the dishwasher and settled them on the counter. Violet opened the brown package and split the salmon down the middle. The cats were all but climbing the cabinet.
“Here you go, babies,” she said softly, and put the fish down.
They both glanced at her with big blue eyes, but only for a minute. They started eating and growling at the same time, determined that each was going to get her own fair share without having her bowl raided.
Blake and Violet moved away while they ate, watching them. It didn’t take long. The cats licked their bowls clean and then started bathing themselves. They ignored the humans completely.
“Ungrateful wretches.” Blake laughed. He picked up the bowls and put them in the sink, shaking his head.
But Violet had more confidence than before, and she squatted down next to them on the floor. “Beautiful babies,” she said softly, smiling. “I’ll make sure you have salmon any time you want it.”
They stopped bathing and looked at her with those piercing blue eyes.
“Honest,” she added.
Mee called to her, got up, and rubbed against her knees. Yow blinked, hesitated, then moved closer, too, but stopped at one brief head-butt against her thigh.
She looked up at Blake. “It’s a start,” she said optimistically.
He grinned from ear to ear.
They went together to Libby Collins’s wedding. She married Jordan Powell in a beautiful church service, with most of the leading citizens of Jacobsville for witnesses. As her brother Curt led her down the aisle, she glanced at Violet, sitting so close beside Blake Kemp, and grinned. They grinned back.
It was a nice ceremony, brief but poignant, and a reception was held afterwards in Barbara’s Café. Tippy and Cash waved to them from across the room. So did the Ballengers. Calhoun was euphoric after having soundly beaten old Senator Merrill for the Democratic nomination for state senate in his district. His wife, Abby, was there, too, clinging to her husband’s arm. After three children, all boys, they were still very close. Justin Ballenger attended as well, with his Shelby. Like Calhoun and Abby, they had three sons of their own. Shelby was a direct descendant of Big John Jacobs, who’d founded Jacobsville and Jacobs County.
Violet had felt uncomfortable around all the bigwigs at first, but she learned very quickly that they were just ordinary people, and they didn’t put on airs. She liked them. It wasn’t going to be hard to fit in here.
But she worried about the case against Janet Collins. There was DNA evidence, of course, but there were ways a good defense attorney could twist the truth. She didn’t want the woman to get away with what she’d done to Violet’s father.
Blake noticed her distracted expression. “Cheer up,” he whispered. “People will think it’s a wake instead of a wedding!”
She moved, and smiled up at him, clutching her small cup of punch. “Sorry. I was thinking about Mrs. Collins.”
He moved closer, tilting her chin up to his blue gray eyes. “Let me worry about it,” he said softly. “I promise you, she’s not going to get away with it.”
She sighed. “Okay, boss man,” she said. She stood on tiptoe and touched her lips to his hard mouth. “Whatever you say.”
He smiled, pulling her close to kiss her back, very emphatically. When he drew away he was aware of a faint silence around them.
He looked around and discovered that everyone was watching them instead of the newlyweds.
“Better get a ring on her finger by sundown,” Cash Grier whispered as he walked by. “Or you may be the next tabloid centerpiece.”
Blake grinned at him. “The wedding’s next week,” he told the police chief. “You’re invited.”
“I’ll bring my whole department,” Cash promised.
Blake’s eyebrows arched. “All of it?”
Cash nodded thoughtfully. “And I’ll have something very nice planned for your wedding day,” he added.
Marc Brannon overheard him and drew his very pregnant wife, Josie, closer. “Run for the border,” he advised Blake and Violet. “He was waiting for us at my ranch after our wedding, with half the county law enforcement personnel, and I had to threaten him with a shotgun to get rid of him!”
Grier glared at him. “I did not have half of them.” He shifted. “Some people I called refused to come. They didn’t want to impose on newlyweds, can you believe that?”
“We’re leaving town right after our wedding,” Blake promised Violet at once.
Grier really glared then, at Blake and the Brannons. “Hmmmph!” he muttered. “Some people have no sense of humor.”
“Some people have no sense of privacy,” Marc shot right back.
Grier glanced at Josie and grinned. “Didn’t I warn you about him?” he pointed at Marc. “And you didn’t listen!”
Josie leaned closer to her husband’s tall frame. “Oh, he’s not so bad,” she said complacently. “In fact, neither are you,” she added to Cash, “despite your far-reaching reputation.”
“What reputation?” Tippy Moore asked with a soft laugh as she walked to Cash and was gathered against him gently. “He’s as pure as the driven snow,” she drawled with a mischievous flash of green eyes.
Cash bent and kissed the tip of her nose. “Pest.”
She smiled back at him and it was like fireworks. “And I planned to make you beef Stroganoff tonight,” she said. “But here you are calling me names…”
“Nice pest,” Cash qualified.
She shrugged. “Okay. I guess I can live with that. Good to see you,” she added to the others as she let Cash lead her away to the punch. She still had plenty of cuts on her pretty face, and some bruises, and she was a little shaky. But what she’d lived through in New York had gained her a lot of sympathy around Jacobsville. It was pretty much an open secret how Cash felt about her, and vice versa.
“There goes a prospective bride and groom, or I miss my guess,” Marc Brannon mused.
“Same here,” Blake replied. He curled Violet’s fingers into his. “I suppose it’s contagious,” he added, looking warmly into her eyes.
“What about your cat harem?” Marc asked.
“They take bribes,” Violet said before Blake could speak. “Fresh salmon.”
“Way to go, Violet,” Josie chuckled. “Leave it to a woman to find a way around a diff
icult situation.”
“She’d know,” Marc replied, smiling at his wife. “She’s just joined the local D.A.’s office as a prosecutor. After the baby comes, that is.”
“What do you want?” Blake asked curiously.
“Well, we already have a little boy. I’d love a daughter next. But we’ll settle for whatever we get,” Josie said warmly, smiling up at her husband, who readily agreed. “I can hardly wait.”
Blake looked down at Violet with a softness in his eyes that made her heart float. “Neither can I,” he said gently.
Violet blushed scarlet and nuzzled her cheek against his chest.
“We’re expecting, too,” Blake told the Brannons with a quiet smile. “It’s going to be a wonderful year.”
“You can say that again,” Marc replied. “Congratulations.”
“You, too.”
Violet closed her eyes as the conversation drifted away. She wondered if she could die of happiness.
Twelve
Violet was nervously waiting in the hall for the organ to sound. Her mother was in the front pew. Half of Jacobsville was seated in the rest of the pews. She noticed that big Cag Hart was acting as best man for her husband-to-be. She had nobody to give her away. But it was something of an archaic custom, she tried to remind herself. She wasn’t being given or sold to any man, regardless of how much she loved him.
She plucked nervously at the waistline of her beautiful white satin gown, hoping the slight swell didn’t show too much. It wouldn’t matter a lot. Most people already knew she was pregnant. She smiled. She and Blake would love their child. She had no more doubts about him, or herself. It would work out.
The organ sounded and she jerked her mind back to the occasion, tightening her grip on her bouquet of baby’s breath, white roses, and lily of the valley. She took a deep breath and stepped out on her right foot, just as a big, gentle hand caught her left hand and tucked it into his elbow.
She looked up, startled, into twinkling green eyes.
“I’m not quite old enough to be your father,” Cy Parks said in a loud whisper, “but Blake said you wouldn’t mind.”