Not just in law enforcement circles. He’d also made the front cover of several national magazines for his controversial, get-tough policy toward crime and criminals. As isolated as she was in Paradise, even Lissa had heard how the sheriff put convicted felons onto chain gangs and housed them in crude tent cities with few amenities instead of in air-conditioned cells. Apparently he believed crime shouldn’t pay.
Her own close brush with the law had left too many raw scars for Lissa to feel at all comfortable discussing the pros and cons of such a hard stand. She felt even less comfortable when Evan suggested they walk the block or so to Jasper’s Pool Hall and see if the deputy sheriff was in residence.
Hot, sticky and sorry she’d ever involved Evan in her problems, she shook her head. “We’re wasting our time here. I’m ready to head back to Paradise.”
“I think it might be worth our while to talk to the deputy.”
“I’d rather not.”
He might recognize her, or wonder why a resident of sleepy little Paradise had hooked up with a deputy U.S. district attorney. Not that Evan had identified himself as such, but Lissa suspected law enforcement officials picked up on other’s vibes much as musicians or singers did.
Scooting out of the booth, she untangled her long skirt from around her knees and made for the door. Evan followed her into the lung-searing heat. Once outside, he caught her elbow.
“Give me fifteen minutes to talk to the deputy. Then we’ll head back.”
The long breath she blew out lifted her bangs. “All right. Fifteen minutes. I’ll check the mail at the post office and fill up the truck.”
Evan didn’t make the mistake of offering to pay for the gas. He’d learned that lesson the hard way. Sliding on his sunglasses, he watched her cross the street to the rusty white pickup. Heat shimmered above the asphalt and enveloped her in iridescent waves. She moved like a dancer through the illusion of silver. Her mint-colored sleeveless top and thin, breezy skirt somehow managed to look cool despite the broiling sun.
She was getting to him. The more time he spent in her company, the more time he wanted to spend. Searching his mind for ways to spin out their excursion into LaGrange, he made his way to Jasper’s.
He found the deputy sheriff comfortably ensconced on a high stool, elbows bent back against a pine bar blackened by age and hard use. Although his bulging stomach suggested that he over-indulged regularly at mealtime, the fact that he held a glass of iced tea in his hand instead of a beer met with Evan’s instant approval.
Ordering the same, he claimed a stool a few removed from the man whose name tag identified him as Art Ortega and surveyed the room. Pool balls clacked on the felt-covered table. Smoke spiraled from cigarettes stuck to the players’ lower lips. The TV perched precariously on a high shelf in one corner showed flashes of color as stock cars roared around a track.
It was a man’s place, similar in decor and sweaty aroma to the pool hall where the Henderson brothers had learned to drop a ball in a corner pocket with a two-rim side shot and swap exaggerated tales of their various exploits with the ranch hands who frequented the joint. Evan felt right at home. Although conscious of the ticking clock, he stayed loose. Small town curiosity and the deputy’s instinctive once-over of a stranger in his territory did the trick soon enough.
“Don’t think I’ve seen you around LaGrange before,” Ortega commented.
“I passed through yesterday and had some bike trouble about ten miles south of here.” Evan downed a long swallow of presweetened tea. “I’m just killing time until my Harley’s fixed.”
“Who’s doing the work?”
“Charlie Haines, down in Paradise.”
“Charlie’s a good man. If he says he can fix whatever ails your bike, he can.” The deputy’s gaze roamed over Evan. “If your Harley’s in Paradise, how’d you get back to LaGrange.”
“I drove up with Lissa James.”
Interest gleamed in Ortega’s dark eyes. “Isn’t she the sweet-looking blonde who plays the organ over at the Evangelical Church on the days Avis Thornton’s arthritis acts up?”
“That’s her,” Evan said easily.
From the idle conversation that followed, he was soon convinced that the deputy hadn’t connected sweet-looking Lissa James with hot-looking, onetime singing sensation Missy Marie. And if Art Ortega, Jill Jefferson and the pastor of the Christian Evangelical Church hadn’t made the leap, it was a pretty good bet that no one else in LaGrange had, either.
Reassured for Lissa’s sake yet disappointed that he hadn’t been able to pin down the source of her uneasiness, Evan left Jasper’s a few minutes later. A quick sweep down the street showed the pickup parked beside a gas pump at the convenience store. Hot and flushed, Lissa fretted with the nozzle.
Evan reached the parking lot just as a grizzled attendant emerged from the store.
“I’ll do that for you, miss. That pump gets ornery sometimes.”
Sweeping her hair back with a palm, Lissa gave him one of the smiles she rationed out so meagerly to Evan. “Thanks.”
She turned away then, missing the intent look the store clerk gave her in return. Missing, too, the way his gaze followed her through the cloud of heat and fuel fumes oscillating above the pickup’s gas tank.
Evan’s senses jumped to full alert. He crossed the street at a quick lope, but when he got close enough to see through the fumes distorting the attendant’s lean, gray-whiskered features, he found them curiously blanked. He made a mental note of the man’s age—late forties, he guessed—and the employee ID tag on his green striped shirt. “Arlen” could be either his first or last name. Neither one would be that difficult to run down when combined with his general description and the tattoo of an eagle peeking out from under his shirtsleeve.
“I’ll be right back,” Evan told Lissa as she handed the attendant a ten-dollar bill and climbed behind the wheel of the pickup. “I just want to get something cold and wet for the trip back to Paradise.”
In addition to cold and wet, the cardboard container he carried out of the store a few minutes later also held a paper bag that oozed hot and spicy scents. More importantly, his wallet contained a scrap of paper with the phone number of the store scribbled across it. He might just need to talk to the clerk’s supervisor.
“What’s that?” Lissa asked, eyeing the paper bag suspiciously.
“Lunch.”
“Didn’t we just eat breakfast a couple of hours ago, with a root beer freeze on top of that?”
“We did, but I was hoping to convince you to detour by Painted Rocks Dam on the way back to Paradise.”
Frowning, she keyed the ignition and elbowed the truck into gear. “That’s a good thirty miles out of the way.”
“I know. That’s why I picked up lunch.”
Hot wind dived in through open windows and lifted the ends of her hair as they left the outskirts of LaGrange and picked up speed.
“Why the sudden interest in a dam?”
“It’s not all that sudden. My brother Reece worked a major redesign of the intake tower a few years ago. I’ve been wanting to see his handiwork.”
Evan saw no reason to let drop that he’d managed to contain his desire to see Reece’s handiwork until this afternoon.
“How many brothers do you have?” she asked, tilting him a curious glance.
“Four.”
“Older or younger?”
“Both. I’m second in line. Jake’s the oldest, then me, then Marsh…”
“He’s the DEA agent.”
Surprised she’d remembered, Evan nodded. “Right. Then there’s Reece, an engineer with the Bureau of Reclamation, and Sam, the youngest. Normally he pilots Air Force test aircraft, but right now he’s flying a desk in Washington and isn’t too happy about it.”
“A pilot, an engineer, an undercover agent and an attorney. Busy bunch, you Hendersons. What does Jake do?”
“He runs the Bar-H, the ranch we grew up on. We all own shares in the operation and g
et home as often as we can to help out, but Jake’s the one with his boots planted deep in the rangeland.”
Propping an elbow on the open window, Lissa twisted a strand of fluttering hair around a finger. “No female Hendersons to counteract all that testosterone?”
“No sisters, if that’s what you mean, but my brothers have all had rings put through their noses. I’ve collected a whole passle of sisters-in-law over the years.” He hesitated before adding, “I lost one, too. Jake’s wife, Ellen, was killed in a drive-by shooting six months ago.”
“Oh, no!” Shocked, she pulled her gaze from the road. “How awful! I’m so sorry for your brother.”
“Me, too,” Evan said simply.
They were quiet for a while, each retreating into their own thoughts. Evan’s gut still twisted whenever he remembered shy, elfin Ellen. He’d loved her like a sister, yet knew his aching sense of loss couldn’t come anywhere close to the pain that ravaged Jake.
Like Lissa, Jake had pulled away from the rest of the world. He was slowly burying himself in Jack Daniel’s instead of hiding out in a ghost town in the middle of the desert, but the result was the same. And like Lissa, Jake didn’t particularly want Evan bulldozing his way into his self-styled retreat.
Tough. He’d planted himself feetfirst in the middle of Jake’s problem and landed on his butt in the middle of Lissa’s. He wasn’t giving up either one until he’d done whatever he could to help.
“What about you?” she asked, breaking into his thoughts. “Why hasn’t some woman put a ring through your nose, too?”
“A couple have come pretty close, but I managed to get away with a whole hide.”
His smug male satisfaction had her shaking her head. “Your time will come, Henderson.”
And soon, Evan thought wryly, if Carrie Northcutt had her way. As the wind whipped through the open windows and his gaze lingered on Lissa’s profile, realization settled in his gut. He had to make it clear to Carrie that the incident on the conference table in his office wasn’t going to happen again.
Although he admired her legal skills and respected her ambition, Evan knew he’d never love her. Hell, he’d worked with her for three months now and hadn’t experienced anything close to the frustrating combination of lust and fascination Lissa had roused in a mere twenty-four hours.
He’d tell Carrie when he got back to San Diego, he vowed silently. She deserved to know things weren’t going anywhere between them. Deserved more than he could give her, although Evan knew she saw him as much as a means to an end as a potential bed partner. She intended to make her mark within the Justice Department with the Mendoza case.
Deliberately he pushed both Mendoza and Carrie Northcutt from his mind. He’d face both of them soon enough. For the next few hours, at least, he’d concentrate on Lissa.
It didn’t take much effort. She was eminently concentrate-able. By the time they turned onto the narrow, twisting dirt road that led to Painted Rocks Dam, Evan had memorized the clean line of her chin and throat. Memorized, too, the way her mouth pursed when she fought to contain a smile.
He was getting better at pulling them out of her. He’d won one with his smug reference to his narrow matrimonial escapes. He coaxed another with his suggestion that they take their sack lunch down to the sandy, rock-strewn edge of the reservoir behind the dam for a picnic.
Lissa studied the barren landscape beside the trapped waters of the Gila River. Aside from several clumps of prickly pear and a tall, spiky century plant that thrust its stalk a good ten or twelve feet into the air, there wasn’t a patch of green to be seen.
“You want to picnic here?” she asked with a lift of one brow. “It’s probably a hundred degrees plus out in that sun.”
“If we get too hot, we can always strip off and go skinny-dipping.”
The hopeful note in his voice drew a grin. “In your dreams, Henderson.”
She’s got that right, Evan thought as they climbed out of the pickup and he followed her down to the water’s edge. The sight of Lissa James kicking off a sandal and lifting her skirt to test the water with her toes would figure in his dreams for a long time to come.
Sunlight streamed through the flowered material, silhouetting her slender legs. The same dazzling light tinted her tanned skin to a deep gold and made a glowing nimbus of her hair. And when she jerked her toes from the dark water, laughing in surprised delight at its icy chill, Evan’s lust took a sharp turn into something he couldn’t quite define.
Chapter 8
Whenever she looked back at the stolen hour beside the Painted Rocks Dam, Lissa was always amazed at the sheer pleasure two people could derive from soggy burritos, warm soft drinks and the utterly mistaken belief they might bridge the vast differences separating them.
With the sun almost directly overhead, there wasn’t much shade to be found. The only relief was at the very base of the tower fifty or so yards from the massive, earth-filled structure that stretched between arid hills. Sliding one hand under Lissa’s elbow and balancing the cardboard food contained in the other, Evan guided her over the rocks to the miserly slice of shade projected by the tower. Gratefully she hiked up her skirt and sank down at the edge of its concrete platform, dangling her feet over the side. The cool water tickled her toes.
Evan, she admitted on an inner sigh when he pulled off his boots and socks and dropped his feet into the water beside hers, tickled everything else. Her senses worked overtime, cataloging everything from the tingly brush of his arm against hers as he made himself comfortable to the strong, masculine scent of his sun-warmed skin.
“Reece built this tower,” he told her, his voice echoing with quiet pride. “The original intake couldn’t handle the Upper Colorado’s floods of ’92. The Bureau of Reclamation brought him back from a UN project in Africa to head the emergency reconstruction and repair team.”
Craning her neck, Lissa peered upward. The tower stood tall and ramrod straight, like a sentry at Buckingham Palace. Its concrete gleamed a cleaner white than the weathered face of the dam.
“What, exactly, does an intake tower do?”
“Reece could give you the technical explanation, but essentially, it sucks water from the reservoir and deposits it on the other side of the dam. If the reservoir rises too high because of heavy rains or snow melt upriver, the intake opens wider to prevent flooding.”
Jamming a straw into one of the super giant-size soft drinks, he offered it to Lissa. She sipped the warm contents contentedly while he peeled the paper off a second straw.
She couldn’t believe how relaxed she felt…and curious. The bits Evan had told her about his brothers had subtly altered her mental mosaic of the man beside her. Made him seem more real somehow. More three-dimensional.
More than just a lazy grin and a pair of sexy blue eyes, anyway.
Setting aside her drink, she drew up one leg and wrapped her arms around her knee. Her chin found a comfortable prop on the bony shelf. “Tell me about this ranch you grew up on.”
“The Bar-H?” He angled around to lean a shoulder against the concrete wall behind him. “The Bar-H is twenty thousand prime acres nestled at the base of the San Francisco peaks. Summers, the cattle graze high meadows thick with the sweetest grass this side of the Rockies. Winters, we bring them down below the pine belt to lower ranges sheltered by the mountains.”
“It sounds like beautiful country.”
“It is. It can also be brutal. I’ve spent more hours than I care to remember with Sam at the controls of our twin-engine Commanche, flying through blizzards to air-drop hay to near frozen cattle.”
“Do you ever regret leaving the Bar-H to practice law?”
“All the time.” The skin at the corners of his eyes crinkled. “Especially when I’m up to my, uh, ears in dope runners and embezzlers.”
That last cut too close to Lissa’s own past for comfort. Her gaze dropped to the water swirling around her foot.
“What about you?” he asked quietly. “Do you ever
regret leaving the recording studios and the bright stage lights behind?”
“No, never.”
She drew a circle in the water with her big toe, watching the ripples weave a pattern from the base of the tower. Evan didn’t press, which was probably why she opened up. Slowly. Cautiously. Dragging out memories that could still make her writhe with embarrassment at her incredible stupidity.
“I admit I loved it at first. The first year or so, I was still singing the songs I’d learned as a child. It thrilled me that people would want to hear messages of faith and joy. Every time I stepped out on the stage or clamped on a set of earphones in a recording booth, I’d shiver with the sheer magic of it all.”
The ripples she’d stirred widened, flattened, gradually disappeared on the placid surface of the reservoir.
“What happened to the magic?”
“The business end of things sort of swallowed it up. The audiences kept growing and CD sales went crazy and Doc…”
Lissa caught her lower lip between her teeth. She couldn’t blame anyone except herself for what happened.
“I changed to fit the spiraling demand. My appearance, my vocal techniques, my backup singers. Even my music.”
Especially her music. She could still remember her nervousness when she’d recorded her first crossover CD. Just to test the waters, Doc had said. See if her gospel fans would buy a new sound. They’d bought it, along with millions of country fans.
Seemingly overnight, Missy Marie was the hottest new commodity in the high stakes, multibillion-dollar music entertainment industry. Her public concerts tripled, soon eclipsing and then edging out completely the revivals and church-sponsored singing festivals that had given her such inspiration and joy. In her new persona, she spent three weeks out of every month on the road, slept most of the day after exhausting, four-and five-hour concerts and crammed whatever leftover energy and time she had into recording sessions.
Just about the time Lissa had started questioning whether that was the life she wanted to live, it all fell apart.
The Harder They Fall (Intimate Moments) Page 8