Bile rose in Coraleen’s throat. It was clear her presence in Remy’s life was jeopardizing his career, just as she’d feared. God, she wanted to give up. The day before she’d driven into town, sure she’d be able to buy back Visada. Confident she could avoid running into Remy Toussaint. Ready to take her new-found freedom and start her life over again.
No such luck. Her horse seemed to have disappeared off the face of the earth. Remy might be attracted to her but he thought anything between them would be a mistake—like she could blame the man. Just because he’d been crazy about her once, way back in her law-abiding days, and just because he took his duty seriously enough to watch over her the night before, did not mean he had feelings for her. And besides, it was damned clear any connection between the two of them could cost him his election.
That tiny little bit of hope that had irrationally clung to the inside of her heart and soul like a burr had to let go. It was time.
It took a long second for her to realize that any remaining hope was already long gone. That last remnant had already unfurled its wings and fluttered off.
Turning to Coraleen, Remy gave her a tight smile and said, “You shouldn’t have had to hear that.”
She ducked her head. “I hope you aren’t losing too many votes because of me.”
“This town may be small, but not all of its residents have small minds. I trust the public to do what’s right. And I meant what I said, Coraleen, about you staying at my place for the rest of the time you’re in town. Don’t look for somewhere else to stay. You’re my guest, and that’s that.”
She didn’t want his pity. Didn’t want him trying to do right by her. She’d seen what being associated with her could do to his standing in this town.
She raised her chin high, tried to keep it from quivering, and said, “Thanks for the offer, Remy, but I’ll find somewhere else to stay.”
The frown that covered his face had her a little bit scared. Not really, but scared enough.
“You’re staying with me,” he stated. “There’s no arguing.”
“Sounds great, Remy,” Juliet interjected before Coraleen could respond. “I can drop her off at your place after lunch.”
“Do I not get a say here?” Coraleen asked.
Juliet shook her head. “We can swing by my house and grab a few things for you to wear, first.”
“Thought your place was being fumigated,” Remy said.
Juliet turned to him and frowned. “Whatever. I just won’t breathe.”
Remy shook his head, but placed hand on Coraleen’s shoulder, squeezed lightly, then told her where to find the Hide-A-Key and the code to the house alarm. She did her best to pay attention, but good god her brain wouldn’t work right with that man touching her.
As soon as Remy exited the building, Juliet grabbed her hands, tight, and said, “So help me god, tell me what happened between the two of you last night, or I will scream.”
She would. Coraleen had been there before. She’d shown up at school one day, in the middle of her senior year, and Juliet had suspected something was going on. Coraleen had held out on confessing she’d lost her virginity for as long as she could, but Juliet had threatened the whole Scream the Room Down thing. Then, when Coraleen still refused to spill, she’d done it. Screamed. Loudly.
The entire cafeteria had stared at the two of them, and Coraleen had about died of embarrassment.
“He kissed me, okay?”
Juliet smacked her hands on the table. “I knew it! The man is crazy about you!”
She shook her head. “Not really. I mean, he’s attracted to me—we all know that. But he doesn’t actually want me. He won’t kiss me again. Ever.”
“And how do you know? Pretty sure he did not flat-out say, ‘oh, gee, I just kissed you but that’s the last time it will happen, we’re not ever going there again, so deal.’ Am I right?”
“Your sarcasm isn’t helping much here, Juliet,” Coraleen muttered. “And no, he didn’t say anything like that. I told him we couldn’t kiss again. He said fine, there wouldn’t be a second time, that it had been a mistake in the first place. Or something to that effect. The word ‘mistake’ was definitely used.”
Juliet swore quietly. “The two of you are idiots. If you’re hot for each other, why not go for it?”
“Attraction doesn’t always mean you like someone,” Coraleen argued. “And he doesn’t much like me. I’m a criminal.”
This was who she was now, and always would be in Meadowview. A former convict. A felon. Like Hester Prynne, she’d forever be labeled and no one would forget her past. Her chest squeezed and she let her eyelids fall shut.
“Juliet,” she whispered, “I’m not good for him. Look at what being around me would do to his career. You saw what happened with those jerks. He’ll lose votes. What’s worse, he’ll lose the respect of the community. And I, for one, know how incredibly painful that can be.”
“You are so very wrong on all levels,” Juliet snapped out, bringing Coraleen out of her faraway place. “Remy Toussaint wants you, that’s for sure, and he actually likes you. He cares about you. A lot. Besides, you’re no criminal—you served your time, and it was for something you didn’t even do.”
She held a hand up when Coraleen opened her mouth to object. “You know I’ve always figured your pop stole the money and you went to prison to protect him out of some sort of distorted sense of loyalty, even though you deny that over and over again every time I bring it up. I believe you’re innocent. And I bet if you asked him, Remy would say the same thing.”
“You’re wrong,” she said flatly.
“Not on this, I’m not. You love hard, Coraleen. Hard enough to serve hard time to protect someone you love. That’s the woman I know. And that’s the woman Remy knows, too. It’s why he still wants you. Give the two of you a chance. Jump his bones or something. You deserve to be happy.”
Coraleen blinked back the sudden moisture in her eyes. Even if she couldn’t do anything to confirm that belief, it felt good to hear her friend say it. And it felt good to remember that at first, Remy hadn’t believed she’d committed the crime, either. It wasn’t until she provided evidence that could prove her guilt that he’d backed off of trying to demand she tell the truth. Could Juliet be right? Was there a part of him that still thought her innocent?
Juliet reached out and took Coraleen’s hand. “I was so worried to see you when you got back to Meadowview. I thought maybe missing your grandpop and being here where you’d lost everything might smash your spirit. But except when you talk about your grandpop or Visada, or when you think there’s no chance between you and Remy, or when you get hounded by idiotic locals like Reinhardt—”
“That’s a lot of ‘or when’s’, Juliet,” Coraleen commented wryly.
“What I’m trying to say is that other than those moments, you look the same as you did when we were young—all sparkly and shimmery and with that gigantic smile that brings sunshine everywhere. You seem maybe even happier than before you went away.”
Juliet glanced at her, worry in her eyes. “Um, hope that didn’t sound, like, totally wrong. But your eyes sparkle and your smile comes naturally, the way it did before the embezzlement…before everything changed forever.”
A memory floated over Coraleen and she started. “It’s weird, Juliet, but as much as I did change over the last five years, when I drove into Meadowview, even though I missed Pop so much and even though I was worried about how people would respond to me, I felt this…this…” Coraleen paused, not sure how to convey that brief moment of emotion, or maybe sensation, that had come over her when she’d neared to town limits. “This sense of peace came over me.”
“Aw, sweetie…” Juliet leaned forward and clasped Coraleen’s hand in hers.
“I’m not sure I understand it—or even why. But after years of thinking my world was falling apart, suddenly everything felt like it would be okay.”
Because she’d been coming home. But that feeling had s
hifted mighty quick.
She snorted. “Of course, then I crashed my car into Delilah’s and Judge Reinhardt said nasty things about me to Remy and Doc Witting was more than a little bit rude and Bill keeps trying to arrest me so obviously things are not okay.”
“Things are, though,” Juliet argued. “And Coraleen? That sense of peace you felt? That was because you knew you were coming home. And maybe part of you knew, even though you’d made plans to move into Janice’s place in Placer County, you were coming home for good.”
“I don’t know, Juliet,” she said quietly.
But during the ride over to Juliet’s to gather enough clothes to get Coraleen through the next few days, and on their way over to drop Coraleen off at Remy’s, and even after Juliet left (after falling in love with the adorable Hot Tub even though the kitten attacked her toes with the seriousness and intensity of a ninja warrior), she couldn’t help wondering if maybe Juliet was right.
Had part of her always believed she was coming back to Meadowview—and back to Remy? Had that little bit of hope that she kept trying to reject flicker back to life the minute she rounded the corner and Meadowview came into sight?
She kept trying to stifle it, but was that light of hope inside her even now?
An hour after the incident with Reinhardt, Ned, and Albert at the Goldpan, Remy still wanted to smack something. He drove along Riverbend Road, the barely paved one-lane road that dipped and twisted on its way out of town. The road passed Macer Pettigrew’s old place and led down into the Maidu River canyon. A quiet, lonely drive he often used to calm his anger, but the bucolic setting didn’t seem to be working today. His right hand gripped the steering wheel, his left hand braced against the open driver’s-side window as he let the spring air buffet around him, but rage still filled him.
He’d hoped the fresh air and the drive would clear his mind, but so far he was still pissed. Why the hell would three respected members of Meadowview go out of their way to make a citizen feel so unwanted? He’d known those men for years, had respected them. Had assumed they respected him.
And all three of the men had been close to Macer—they’d all served as trustees on the Board of Education together, had been members of Elks and the Oddfellows Lodges; heck, both Ned and Albert had used Macer as their accountant. Reinhardt had even introduced Macer to Lydell Barnaby.
Maybe that’s why they were so rude to Coraleen. Like most in the community, they thought she’d done her grandfather a huge wrong by stealing from one his clients’ accounts, then almost letting him go to prison for her own actions.
“Loyalty,” Remy muttered. The men were trying to prove their loyalty to their recently deceased friend by snubbing Coraleen. That, however, wasn’t the kind of loyalty Remy respected.
Remy had visited Macer numerous times after Coraleen had gone off to prison, seeking to understand why the man’s granddaughter had committed such an egregious crime.
Macer always claimed his granddaughter was innocent, even with a signed confession by his granddaughter in the hands of the courts.
Now that was loyalty.
He still wasn’t sure what to think about the kiss the night before. After he’d brought Coraleen back from the sheriff’s office and spent the night waking her up to make sure she was okay because of the concussion, and even after the next morning as they made breakfast together, he’d avoided the subject. So had she. Maybe he should have brought it up, though.
Then again, if they talked about the kiss, he’d probably have wanted to kiss her again, right then. And again. And again. God knew he wanted to on a near-constant basis. Seemed like his body wouldn’t stop recalling the kiss—how her mouth trembled under his, how her breath had come out in a heated rush, and how he could almost hear her heartbeat intensify.
Oh yeah, she’d been into kissing him. Until she wasn’t.
He still was, though. Into kissing Coraleen, that is. And into doing other things to her. But she’d made it clear—sexual attraction was one thing, mutual respect, quite another.
Most likely her Impala would be ready tomorrow, and she’d be leaving town for good. That probably was for the best. But he didn’t want her to leave empty-handed. He knew what her horse had meant—and still did—to her.
If she couldn’t have her grandfather, then maybe, just maybe, Remy could give her the one thing that would make her happy: Visada.
But he’d asked around town, and so had she, and so far, no one had a clue who’d bought the horse. Damn—if only he’d gone to the auction.
An idea hit him. He wrenched the wheel to the right and skidded to a halt on the side of the road, billows of reddish-brown dust roiling around the Jeep. After quickly checking his side view mirror, he wrenched the wheel hard to the left and hit the gas, steadying the Jeep as it leapt forward, headed back to town.
An hour later, he felt his heart sink down to the heels of his boots. He’d been so sure there would have been a record of the sale at County Records. But no, nothing existed there that could lead Remy to Visada’s new owner.
Charity Jones, the sixty-something woman with bright orange hair who staffed the Records counter, had told him she’d heard someone saw Visada in a pasture somewhere, but she didn’t know who saw him or what pasture.
Then she asked him if he was still single and mentioned oh-so-innocently that her daughter was in town.
He thanked her kindly for her efforts, ignored the “single” comment, and headed outside and sat in his Jeep’s driver’s seat, pulled out his phone, and sent out a few more feelers. He even asked Mac to post on Facebook asking for leads.
Remy was once again on his way out of town when he noticed one of the young firefighters, Peter Leary, wave him down.
“What’s up with Lydell Wallaby?” Peter asked, frowning. “The dude just stopped me and wanted to talk about his campaign for sheriff. Acted all smug and like he had the election in the bag. I laughed in his face. That wanker doesn’t think he has a chance in hell of getting elected, does he?”
A sharp pain flashed across the back of Remy’s neck. Lydell as sheriff would not be a good thing for Deloro County, especially if he was going for the hard-ass reputation. Remy was all for following the rules—he’d certainly never jaywalked or littered or parked illegally—but Lydell probably would have put Jacob Bullard in juvie for trespassing. And would have thrown Ike Bullard in jail for drunkenness, not convinced him to go into rehab. Yeah, Mrs. Peterson’s jaywalking escapades weren’t exactly safe, but she hadn’t jaywalked for a good year—he and his deputies had contacted County Planning and had the sidewalk repaired.
“Lydell seems to think he might win,” he said slowly. “He must have support to back that feeling up.”
Peter barked out a laugh. “I sincerely doubt it. But who knows?” He shrugged. “You’ve got my vote, and probably all the people associated with the fire department, but folks can be swayed by false promises, even if they know in the back of their minds those promises are bullshit.”
“Damn.”
“You got that right. Maybe, though, think about putting up a few campaign signs of your own. Get an interview on KQDC Radio.”
“I have posters up. I sent out flyers.”
Peter pressed his lips together, tight, then said, “Not enough, though. Get out in front of this, Remy. People need to be reminded of who you are, and of all you do for this county.”
Dispatch came in on the walkie-talkie—Gail noting that Jimmy Loftus was yelling at one of his neighbors. Some dispute over a six-foot wood plank fence that would block Jimmy’s view of Elderberry Creek.
Remy sighed and pressed the button on the hand-set. “Better let me head over there, Gail. I saw Jimmy yesterday. I was able to talk him out of using bullets with his Dump Day shots; I can talk him down from yelling at his new neighbor.” Dealing with locals took finesse, skill. A talent, in a way.
Hell, he mentally swore. If Lydell won the election, no telling how things in Deloro County would end up. And that’s
something he didn’t want to see.
An image of Coraleen drifted into his mind. Of her when she was nineteen, on the back of her horse, cantering fast across a field. He’d caught sight of her one day as he’d been on patrol. She’d been riding bareback, and her legs were wrapped tight around Visada’s barrel, her head was tipped up into the sun, her arms outstretched, her blond hair floating in the wind, Visada’s red mane flicking in rhythm. The smile on her face radiated pure and utter joy.
In that moment he’d caught his breath—mesmerized not only by her beauty, but by her freedom. He’d envied her that. The ability to simply exist freely, unencumbered by fences, boundaries, rules….
Coraleen had known how to live.
He just wished he could give that back to her.
Six hours later, Remy placed the cardboard box with the extra-large Popeye pizza down on the coffee table in the great room and glanced around his house. Well, he hadn’t ordered Coraleen to take it easy today, and she had threatened to clean his place. He just hadn’t expected…this.
A fire crackled in the fireplace, casting soft shadows on sparkling windows. Every pile that had ever existed (and yes, there were many, many piles that existed in his living space) was gone—as if beamed up by Scotty to the USS Enterprise and hauled off into space. There wasn’t a stray dish to be seen, or speck of dust, and even the chairs around the dining room table were placed neatly and orderly, as were the ones along the kitchen counter—all lined up like little soldiers.
And he’d bet dollars to doughnuts that the inside of his microwave was cleaner than the day he bought it. He’d still been concerned about Coraleen’s health until he saw her at the Goldpan. Even with the smackdown Reinhardt and his buddies had given her, she’d kept the color on her face. She’d seemed steady and sturdy and most definitely out of the woods.
“Coraleen?” he called out.
A high-pitched meow echoed throughout the house, and suddenly loud thumping sounded from the hall behind him. Along with the sound of giggles. He turned around to see Coraleen and Hot Tub racing down the hallway, Hot Tub in the lead, the kitten’s tiny legs racing fast, an expression of determination on her fluffy little face. Coraleen followed, overly-long flannel plaid jammie pants (a loan from Juliet?) slowing her up. Or were they?
Always the One: (Meadowview Heroes # 2) (The Meadowview Series Book 6) (Meadowview Heat) Page 14