THE BACHELOR PARTY

by Paula Detmer Riggs

  He sat back, his body language suggesting a man at ease and just a little amused. Sophie knew better. She'd heard the ice crystallizing his voice, and seen the cold creep into his eyes until the gray irises seemed frosted over.

  Hadn't she heard once that a man slow to anger almost always proved to be the most dangerous foe of all? She believed that of Ford. So, apparently, did Sissy, because she drew a long breath, then laughed nervously.

  "Okay, I get the message. I thought, since I was passin' through, I'd give you one last chance to make love to me. Like the man said, nothing ventured, but, hey, no hard feelings." Shifting her attention to Sophie, she let her smile fade. "If you're worryin' about Ford and me, don't bother. Last time he was down my way, he very nicely, very sweetly called things off between us. Didn't even avail himself of my hospitality, if you know what I mean. I figured it was on account of him fallin' in love with someone finally, though God knows, he's goin' to wear you out tryin' to understand him."

  Sophie blinked, conscious that Ford had shifted slightly and was now watching her with those chilly eyes. "You're mistaken if you think I'm the reason for whatever has happened between you. Ford and I scarcely know each other."

  Sissy lifted sleek eyebrows, her eyes a little sad, a little amused. "Maybe not now, but you will. Ford might like folks to think he's not much more than a slow-witted country boy with the ambition of a slug, but take my word for it, sugar, he's got this way of gettin' exactly what he wants when he wants it."

  She kissed Ford gently on the cheek before slipping from the stool with a serene grace Sophie admired. "Merry Christmas, y'all," she murmured, easing back her shoulders. "And remember, Ford, if it doesn't work out with your pretty little Yankee, you know where you can find me."

  He rose, his expression shuttered, his mouth tense. "Are you all right?" he asked in a rough voice.

  She drew a breath, then reached up to touch the spot she'd kissed earlier. "You know me, Ford. I'm so shallow nothin' gets me down for longer than it takes me to buy something shiny and expensive." Offering Sophie a smile that seemed oddly sweet, she turned sinuously on four-inch heels and walked to the door.

  Sophie saw at least three men across the room sit up and take notice, and Jimbo Stevens actually dropped his jelly doughnut into his coffee. She should be amused. Instead, she found her stomach doing flip-flops and her hands clenching around her order pad.

  "Guess if I'd gone to college I'd be comin' up with somethin' real clever to say right about now," Ford drawled, drawing her attention.

  "Don't bet on it," she murmured, thinking of her bachelor's degree in education.

  Ford shifted again, then rubbed his hand over his flat belly. "Sophie, about the things she said—"

  "Please, Ford, you don't need to explain your private business to me of all people."

  He lifted his eyebrows. His eyes were clear as smoked glass now, though the dusky color prompted by Sissy's imprudent mention of his mother still lingered on the rise of his angular cheekbone.

  "I didn't intend to."

  Hands on hips, he glanced around, causing more than one pair of eyes to skitter in another direction. "Look, Sissy didn't mean to embarrass you." A sardonic smile tugged at his mouth. "It was me she was after, but that's just Sissy. She's spoiled rotten and used to getting her way, so it takes her longer than most to let go of … things." He plowed strong brown fingers through his thick hair, leaving it untidy and wildly sexy. "Aw, hell, I don't want to talk about Sissy. I want to talk about you."

  "What about me?" Fear skittered down her spine, and she realized she'd come very close to forgetting all the reasons why she'd vowed to keep conversation between Ford and herself to a minimum.

  "For one thing, why won't you let me treat you to dinner tomorrow night?"

  The look in his eyes was pure frustrated male and should have made her smile. Instead, it only served to make her more uneasy.

  The last thing she wanted to do was make him angry with her over something so trivial as a refused date.

  "I've promised to help Katie wrap Christmas presents," she said, relieved to have the weight of perfect truth behind her words.

  "Tonight, then."

  "Tonight I'm helping to decorate the Sunday school rooms at my church."

  "No problem. I string a mean rope of that tinselly stuff myself. What time should I pick you up?"

  Sophie cast a fast glance around, hoping to see a customer in need. Instead, she saw only contented faces, heard only the buzz of lazy Saturday-morning conversation layered over the plaintive wail of a Christmas carol done to a country beat. Not even crotchety, demanding Jimbo was looking her way. She'd never thought she'd be longing for a sudden rush of business that would have her feet aching and her head spinning, but she was.

  Chin up, she let her gaze find his. "Please believe me, the last thing I want to do is hurt your feelings." She stopped abruptly, aware of the stilted quality of her voice and the banality of her words. "I'm not good at this," she muttered.

  Emotion flickered in his eyes, quickly absorbed. It wasn't danger she sensed from him, but it shivered her skin nonetheless.

  "Would it help if I told you I didn't break it off with Sissy because I was in love with you or anyone else?"

  "Of course you're not," she hastened to agree. It was ridiculous to even consider such a possibility. "Sissy was hurt, that's all. She needed to blame something, someone…"

  His mouth moved. "Don't waste any sympathy on Sissy," he drawled, an odd look in his eyes. "Before we started out, I told her what I was willin' to give, and it wasn't love."

  "Which makes it her problem if she gets hurt, is that what you're saying?" she couldn't help challenging, even though she suspected he wasn't nearly as cold and calculating as he sounded.

  "That about sums it up, yeah."

  She took a deep breath. "And what speech did you intend to give me over this dinner you were offering?"

  "No speech, though I can't promise I won't try to steal a goodnight kiss."

  Sophie let the image of his hard mouth coming down on hers linger for only an instant before forcing it from her mind. "As I said, I don't date."

  "Don't date me, or anyone?"

  "Anyone."

  "Are you still grieving for Jessie's daddy?"

  Sophie drew a breath. She knew what he was asking, just as she knew what her answer had to be, but even as she opened her mouth to answer, the lie she needed to tell him for her own safety and maybe even for his stuck in her throat.

  "I was married for almost five years," she hedged, forcing herself to keep her gaze level on his. "I'm still not used to being a widow."

  He narrowed his eyes and stared into hers. "You figure cutting yourself off from dating again will help get you used to it?"

  "Well, no … that is, I'm not cutting myself off—exactly."

  "Sophie, I'm not much good at flirting. Always seemed like a waste of time." His eyes crinkled. "But I have to tell you straight, there's no way I'm gonna stop buggin' you till you agree to go out with me at least once."

  She blinked at him. He was becoming too important to her, she realized, panic dawning. "And if I don't?"

  He shook his head, his mouth twitching. "Then you'd better prepare yourself to see a grown man pining away to a shadow right before your eyes."

  She tried to imagine that superb body diminished in any way, and realized her pulse was speeding. "I doubt that very much," she said, picking up the menu Sissy no longer needed.

  "Like I said, you are one stubborn lady," he drawled. "But I've been known to be a little mule-headed myself."

  "I'm sorry," she said, feeling more and more miserable. "But I'm just not interested in taking Sissy's place in your bed, especially when the sheets are probably still warm."

  His eyes took on a deadly flatness. "Is that the kind of man you think I am?"

  "I don't know what kind of a man you are, and I … don't want to know. As far as I'm concerned, you're one of Peg's best customers a
nd a friend of many of my friends. And that's all you are."

  "Forget the breakfast," he said, dropping a couple of dollars on the counter. "I've already wasted too much time hangin' around here as it is." He grabbed his hat, nodded curtly and walked out. Watching him go, Sophie felt like putting her head down and crying.

  * * *

  Chapter 5

  « ^ »

  Ford heard a sharp rap on his half-opened office door and glanced up, furious at being interrupted, a reaction that was unusual for him. But he'd been restless and moody since he'd given up on a sound night's sleep around 5:00 a.m., and left his solitary bed for an early-morning jog.

  Running hadn't helped his mood or his sleep-starved muscles. Nor had chopping a quarter cord of wood for the fireplace he only rarely used. In the back of his mind he had a feeling what was digging at him. He'd acted like a jerk with Sophie yesterday, and he owed her an apology he was too mule-headed at the moment to make. So he was punishing himself by doing paperwork on the most beautiful Sunday morning they'd had in months.

  "I thought you were on patrol," he said to Eli Grover, who started to grin, then thought better of it.

  "Sorry to bother you, Sheriff. I can come back later if you're busy."

  Ford threw down his pen and settled back in his chair. Eli was the closest thing to a son he figured he'd ever have.

  A few years younger than Lucy, the kid had grown up in a tar-paper shack on the wrong side of Yahoo Flats, the eldest of four. His father, Gresham, had been a Vietnam vet and, when a badly injured back had allowed him to work, had been a whiz at rebuilding gasoline-powered engines. He'd also been a falling-down drunk, using cheap wine to numb the ache in his back and his soul.

  Eli's mother had been Vietnamese, a tiny wisp of a woman who cleaned other women's houses until her hands bled and her hopes for a good life for her children shriveled. Still, she never complained. Nor did she ever smile—or so Eli had told Ford at her funeral.

  Gresham had disappeared a few months later, his already tenuous hold on reality snapped by the loss of his wife. Eli had been twelve, his youngest sister just starting school. For six months he'd managed to keep his father's desertion a secret, even from Ford, who'd stopped by periodically to check on the family's well-being.

  By working at two paper routes and a lawn-mowing business, he'd kept his sisters fed and clothed and in school, but when he himself had been turned over to the juvenile authorities for chronic truancy, the report had ended up on Ford's desk. He'd gone to the shack and discovered the kid worn-out and much too skinny, trying to fix a lawn-mower engine with the few broken tools his old man had left behind.

  Enlisting the aid of a sympathetic social worker, Ford had found a foster home that would take all four kids, then discovered that Eli was refusing to leave the rat-infested shack that had been his only home. When reasoning with the boy hadn't worked, he'd locked Eli in his squad car and burned the place to the ground.

  At the time Eli had called Ford a long list of insulting names in a mixture of English and Vietnamese. Six years later he'd invited Ford to his high-school graduation and asked him for a job. Ford had ordered him to go to college first. Eli had resisted. They'd compromised on a two-year degree.

  Eli had been a member of Clover's twenty-two-man sheriff's department for almost two years now, and Ford was generally satisfied with his performance. There were times, though, when he wondered if Eli wasn't a bit overly zealous in tracking down dead-beat fathers.

  Ford understood his reasons. He also understood the parallels that some people had drawn between his life and Eli's. They figured he'd felt sorry for Eli the way half the town had felt sorry for him, which was one of the reasons he'd wanted Eli to grow up in another town where he wouldn't always have to drag around the baggage from the past he'd neither created nor could control.

  "Since you've already got my attention, you might as well tell me what you need," he drawled, glancing at his watch.

  Eli added a thick folder to the stack threatening to topple out of the in basket. "Here's another batch of wanted posters. There's a couple you might want to check out on top, nothing really urgent, though."

  Ford stifled a sigh. "Thanks. Anything else?"

  "Yep. Got me a call from a lady out near Deadman's Slough. Says she's been smelling mash cookin' when the wind's from the south. I figured to take a run out there this afternoon after I get relieved at the duty desk and poke around a bit."

  Ford nodded. "Don't forget to move slow and soft while you're doin' that pokin'. And if you get a lead on Frenchy, don't try to take him down yourself. Get on back to the car and call for backup."

  Eli looked crestfallen, and Ford had a hunch the kid was setting himself up to play hero. "I mean what I say, Eli. Frenchy's a crack shot, plus he's a mean hand with a bowie knife. Last thing I want to do is tell that sweet little wife of yours you made her a widow right before she's fixin' to become a mama."

  It was the right thing to say. Just thinking about his wife and the baby she was about to deliver had the bloodlust fading from Eli's eyes.

  "Good thing you mentioned Ellie, 'cause I almost forgot the most important reason I came in just now. We're havin' us a party New Year's Eve, and we'd be proud if you'd attend."

  "Thanks, but I'll probably pull duty that night. Let you young folks do the celebratin'."

  Eli looked genuinely disappointed. "Maybe you could drop in for a few minutes, anyway. Ellie really wants you to see the house, you being the one to lend us the down payment and all."

  Ford sat up straight and picked up his pen. "Tell Ellie I'll try to make it, but not to be disappointed if I don't."

  "Yes, sir." Eli took the hint and left, leaving the door half-open. Ford's men knew he was always available to them, even when he was off duty. They also knew he didn't second-guess every decision or monitor their every move. Some folks called that his style of managing. He didn't much care about labels. He just knew it worked, just as he knew most of the credit went to his deputies.

  He had a good crew, he thought, signing the recommendation for promotion passed up the line by his next in command. There were half a dozen senior officers who could do his job as well as he could, air trained by him. And the youngsters coming up were all sharp and dedicated.

  Too bad Lucy hadn't fallen in love with one of them instead of that Dooley character. Ford frowned, just thinking about his baby sister mixed up with a man who not only aroused Ford's protective instincts, but also his suspicions.

  Dooley's story seemed too pat to his thinking, almost like a bad movie plot. As long as Ford could remember, Hannah Franklin had claimed to be the last of her line. And then, six months after her death, Dooley shows up claiming to be her long-lost great-nephew and, coincidentally, of course, her heir.

  While the lawyers wrangled, Dooley had taken up residence in the big old house on Highgate Road

  , behaving for all the world as though the rumors about Hannah's having hidden away a fortune were true.

  Ford had his doubts about that, all right, but as far as he'd been able to determine, Dooley didn't work at anything much except charming gullible young women into thinking he was the best thing walking on two legs so he must have been getting his money from somewhere.

  He was a good-looking bastard, Ford gave him that, but he had shifty eyes, the kind that couldn't quite hold steady on yours for more than a second or two. As soon as he'd found out Lucy was mooning over the man, Ford had wanted to run a routine check on his background. If Dooley had turned up clean, no one would have ever had to know Ford hadn't trusted the guy. But fool that he was, he'd made the mistake of telling his sister what he'd planned to do.

  She'd threatened never to speak to him if he so much as sent out a motor-vehicles check on Joe Dooley or any other Dooley, and Ford had been dead afraid she'd meant what she'd said. Still, he hadn't quite abandoned the notion to do some discreet checking on the man, just shelved it for a time in order to let Lucy cool down some.

 
; Lord a'mighty, it was tough dealing with women, he thought. A man never knew what they were going to do next. Now take Sophie, he thought, sitting back again, a scowl playing over his face and his gut tightening.

  He'd been turned down for a date before. Hell, since the first time he'd worked up his nerve to ask Robin Sue Bobo to the church picnic when he'd been thirteen, he'd been turned down more than he'd been accepted. He figured that went with being homely and mostly uneducated and stained by his old man's madness. Sometimes he'd been flat out crushed to find out the lady of his choosing didn't share his interest. Sometimes he'd been ticked off, but mostly he'd shrugged it off the way he managed to shrug off most things he couldn't change.

  So why the hell couldn't he get Sophie out of his head?

  He swiveled his chair to the left and shot a disgusted look at the photo board showing his officers and the chain of command. It wasn't as if he was pining away of loneliness or any such nonsense like that. In fact, he had a pretty great life. Maybe law enforcement hadn't been his first choice, but mostly he liked what he did. Though not a man to brag in public, he was privately proud of the job he'd done building a solid, reputable force. If he wasn't universally liked, he was generally respected, and he slept easy every night knowing the people under him knew their jobs and did them honestly and with pride. Since he'd exchanged the silver shield of a deputy for sheriff's gold six years ago he hadn't lost a man, and the only injuries had been minor ones.

  Closing his eyes, he ran his hands over his face, more tired at half past eleven than he would have been if he'd been picking cotton all day long. What the hell, Maguire, haul your butt over to Sophie's place and apologize to her.

  But damn, she'd been dead wrong about him. He might not be the most tactful guy who ever walked the dusty streets of Clover, but he'd never held much with the tomcatting some men held with.

  He'd been celibate for more than a year when he'd met Sissy at a board meeting for a child-abuse prevention group they both belonged to. They'd gone out for coffee afterward, at her invitation and at her place, and she'd been on him like a sweat in a heat wave. She'd been bored and mad at her daddy for cutting back her spending money, and an affair with a poor country sheriff was just the thing to make Daddy choke on his Havana cigars.