THE BACHELOR PARTY

by Paula Detmer Riggs

  Ford might not have a college degree, but he sure as hell knew when he was being used. He figured that was her game and he'd play it, just so long as she knew he was playing that game by his own rules. And that meant no strings on either of them and no false promises.

  He'd broken it off because he'd found himself thinking of Sophie while he was making love to Sissy, and to his way of reckoning right from wrong, he wasn't playing fair.

  What the hell did Sophie want him to do? Marry Sissy just because she couldn't stand losing one of her playthings? Muttering a curse, he opened his eyes and sat up. No matter how many times he told himself a man was just asking for trouble wanting a woman who didn't want him, Sophie kept showing up in his dreams dressed in nothing but his imagination, waking him up so worked up he'd ended up taking an icy shower in the middle of the night two nights running. Not that it did more than put an edge on his already filthy mood.

  "Son of a bitch," he grated, gritting his teeth. Work was supposed to keep his mind off of her, not drive him up the wall because all of sudden he was imagining how her skin would warm under the friction of his hand, or how her mouth would sigh and open under his. Cursing again, he grabbed the folder Eli had just delivered and slammed it open. He was just reminding himself that he was a bachelor because he liked being alone when he heard the outside buzzer indicating someone seeking admittance.

  He started to get up, then heard Eli's boots on the bare floor. Thinking vaguely that he hoped it wasn't trouble, he returned his attention to the wanted poster on top of the stack, a new addition to the FBI's "ten most wanted." Mean looking bastard, he thought. Wanted for murder one, escaped from a small-town jail in Idaho while waiting transport back to Florida.

  "Sheriff Maguire's office is the first one on the left, ma'am. Just go on in. He won't mind a bit."

  Ford groaned aloud, wishing fervently that Southern hospitality had died a slow death years ago. He was preparing himself to hear about some domestic disaster or other when Sophie appeared in the doorway with Jessie, who was bouncing up and down in her small folding stroller. But it was the baby's mother who had his heart rate speeding and his spine straightening. Dressed in a tailored skirt and high-necked blouse, with a touch of makeup darkening her lashes and glossing her lips, she looked nothing like the harried waitress he saw every morning but Sunday at Peg's. Nor was she offering him the usual welcoming smile. In fact, she was gazing at him with a distant coolness in her dark blue eyes that squeezed his heart.

  "Your deputy said that it was all right to come in," she said, glancing nervously at the four walls of the small space, as though unsure it was safe to enter. Since his bare-bones office was anything but intimidating, he figured it was him she was wanting to avoid.

  "It'd be a poor sheriff who wasn't available to the people who pay him," he said by way of reassuring her. It seemed to work. Her slender shoulders lost some of their stiffness, and her gaze settled, if not exactly on him, at least on the bulletin board behind him.

  "It was such a nice day. Jessie and I decided to walk home from church, and when we passed the town hall, I saw your car out front. I can come back if you're busy."

  "I'm not doing anything special, nothing that can't wait, anyway," he said, getting to his feet. Jessie immediately stopped chattering to look up at him in that curious way she had. Dressed in Christmas colors, from the top of her red-and-green hair ribbon to the tips of her tiny red sneakers, she was just about the cutest thing he'd seen since Lucy had been a baby. Because he realized Sophie's unexpected appearance had shaken him, he concentrated on the baby instead.

  "Mornin', Miss Jessamine," he said, sinking to his haunches in front of her. "Have you and your mama been out for a walk on this pretty Sunday?"

  "Mama?" Jessie echoed anxiously. She had long lashes like her mama, and a tiny cleft in her chin that matched Sophie's perfectly.

  "Yeah, Mama's still here." Ford glanced up to find Sophie watching him almost as warily as her daughter. "Looks like your daughter doesn't remember me."

  "Don't take it personally," she said, looking only marginally more comfortable. "Sometimes I feel like I need to introduce myself to her when I come home after a double shift."

  Ford found it remarkable that she could laugh about having to work as hard as she did. Or maybe he just wanted her so badly he found everything about her remarkable. At the moment he wasn't quite sure how he felt.

  "What can I do for you two ladies?" he asked, straightening to his full height. He noticed then that Sophie was wearing high heels, bringing her mouth to just the perfect height to be kissed by a man six feet tall. She was wearing perfume, too, something light that reminded him of spring showers. Though he knew it was just chemistry, her scent had his body reacting as though she'd suddenly brushed her soft body against his in a blatant come-on.

  "I came to give you the rest of the money I owe you for the medicine," she explained, opening her purse.

  "Guess it wouldn't do me any good to suggest waitin' to settle up until after Christmas, would it?"

  She smiled then, a quick curving of her lips that didn't last nearly long enough to suit him. "No good at all."

  "In that case, you'd best use my desk while I try to coax a smile out of Miss Jessamine."

  "Thanks." Sophie pushed the stroller a few more feet toward the center of the cluttered office. Just setting foot in a police station had her stomach roiling with sick memories, but she'd been determined to repay her debt to Ford as quickly as possible. Now she realized the enormity of her mistake. Seeing him behind the desk framed by the flags of South Carolina and the United States brought the nightmare to the surface again. The sooner she finished her business and left, the better.

  Ford closed the folder he'd been examining and moved it to the side, out of her way. Slipping into the chair that was still warm from the heat of his body, she opened her checkbook and accepted his offer of a pen.

  While she wrote, he hunched down and began talking to Jessie in a gentle voice that had Sophie remembering the things she'd heard about how smitten he'd been with his sister when she'd been a baby. And how totally he'd devoted his life to her care after they'd been orphaned. She didn't want to think of him as a good man. She just couldn't seem to think of him any other way.

  Finished with the check, she tore it from the pad and placed it on top of the folder, automatically reading the words printed in large block letters on the tab. WANTED FUGITIVES—CURRENT (FBI National and Local Jurisdiction). Her breath stopped, and she felt the blood draining from her face. Was there a sheet on her in that stack? she wondered.

  Panic swept through her, and her first thought was to grab Jessie and run. But somehow she managed to sit perfectly still, even as her heart pumped frantically beneath the cover of her secondhand blouse.

  She drew a breath and told herself to think. But the institutional green walk were suddenly too smotheringly close, too terribly familiar.

  "We'd better be going," she said, standing quickly, desperately needing space.

  Ford glanced up, the offer of a cup of coffee he was about to make forgotten as soon as he saw the alarm in her eyes. Wondering what had set her off, he stood quickly, instinctively putting himself between her and the door.

  "Is something wrong?" he asked, feeling some intense emotion coming off her slight body in chill waves. A quick glance told him that her skin had paled and her hands were balled into fists against her thighs.

  "Actually, no," she said, her voice audibly strained. "I'm a bit claustrophobic, and there aren't any windows in here."

  Ford glanced around, trying to see the office through the eyes of someone who feared closed places. It did seem on the smallish side, he decided, especially crammed with filing cabinets and the biggest desk he'd been able to scrounge from the county warehouse.

  "Guess I'm so used to the place I never really thought about how confining it might be to someone else." He grinned, trying to reassure her. "Mostly we live like moles down here. There's a legend that
one of my predecessors had a squabble with the town council about somethin' or other. Made himself so unpopular the council just up and moved the whole darn department to the basement, and we've been stuck down here ever since."

  She laughed, but the wild-eyed look of panic had only diminished, not disappeared. It showed in her eyes, in the faster-than-usual cadence of her breathing. She was good and spooked, yet doing her best to hide the extent of her fear. He understood that kind of courage, though fear wasn't one of the emotions he allowed himself. Not because he doubted its existence, but because it got in the way when a man needed to be at his best.

  "Just the same, we'd better go," she said, glancing at the door. "Jessie will be wanting her dinner, and when she decides she's hungry, she can threaten walls—windows or no windows."

  "I'll walk you out."

  "No, that's not necessary—"

  She was interrupted by the sounds of a commotion in the duty office next door. From the shouts and thuds coming through the wall, she concluded that someone was complaining loudly and profanely about being arrested.

  "Excuse me just a minute," Ford said over his shoulder as he headed out. "Be right back."

  Left alone, Sophie's immediate instinct was flight. And then she remembered the reason for her panic—the folder on the desk. Hastily, she flipped it open and paged through. Finding the posters alphabetized had her breathing a quick prayer of gratitude, even as a mixture of guilt and dread fluttered in her stomach. Ears straining to detect the sound of returning footsteps, she paged through quickly to the M's.

  Seeing her own face staring up at her sent shock knifing through her, even though she'd thought herself prepared. It was the picture they'd taken when they'd booked her into the country jail, and her eyes were glazed over with shock and disbelief.

  The sights and sounds of that terrible day came back to her vividly, nearly sending her to her knees. The police had waited until she'd been walking out of the church after Wells's funeral before they'd stopped her and read her her rights. She still remembered the humiliation of having her wrists shackled together in front of her friends and fellow teachers.

  Dazed and disbelieving, she hadn't understood at first that they'd been accusing her of deliberately pushing Wells down those stairs. Instead of sympathizing with the terror she'd felt as she'd struggled to save herself and her baby, they'd actually believed that she'd set out to kill him in order to inherit his money.

  Trembling, she snatched the paper from the stack. It crackled accusingly as she folded it and quickly shoved it to the bottom of her purse. Somehow she managed to regain her composure as she closed the folder and made sure it was in the exact place on the desk.

  Clutching her purse, she turned the stroller with one hand and was preparing to leave when Ford returned. "Sorry about that," he said, raking a hand through his untidy hair. "Looks like Frenchy's still doin' a land-office business out there in the Slough."

  "I take it that was another of his customers doing all that shouting about police brutality," she commented lightly, though she was certain her cheeks must be stained with guilt.

  Ford nodded. "From the looks of him, a real good customer." He scowled suddenly, turning his face to a hard mask of dangerous determination. "Hope Frenchy's savin' his money, 'cause he's about to close up shop—permanently this time."

  Sophie felt the undercurrent of anger that seethed like molten steel beneath the laconic promise. Ford might walk slow and talk slower, but the more she was around him, the more certain she became that the easygoing manner hid a sharp intellect and a will of razored flint. A man like that would make a relentless hunter—and a deadly adversary. Just realizing the risk she was taking by stealing the poster with her name on it had her going cold all the way to the marrow.

  Averting her gaze, she took a tighter grip on the stroller. She had to have been out of her mind to think she could hide for more than a few months at a time in any one place. "In that case, Jessie and I had better leave you to do whatever it is you need to do about him."

  "I'll see you to the door."

  She started to protest, then changed her mind. It didn't matter how she escaped this place, just as long as she got out. Even though she wasn't under arrest, she felt like it as Ford walked next to her through the station. Most of her memories of that time were blessedly blurred, but she could still remember the smells of burnt coffee and stale cigarette smoke that had lingered on her clothing when they'd locked her in a cell with six other women, four of whom were prostitutes caught in a sting while the fifth had been a heroin addict going through the first stages of withdrawal, the stench of her vomit filling the cell. Shuddering, she tried to concentrate on putting one foot in front of the other in order to block out the too-vivid image of that day.

  "From the expression on your face, I figure you're not interested in a tour," Ford stated, drawing her from her own thoughts with a start.

  "It's … picturesque," she said truthfully.

  "It's usually a lot busier," he replied, casting a quick look around. Sundays they worked with a light support crew, one dispatcher handling 911 calls instead of two, one traffic officer instead of three and their two detectives on call only. "And cleaner," he muttered, spying the remnants of someone's take-out lunch on one of the desks.

  "Do you enjoy police work?" she asked, glad to be diverted from her black thoughts.

  His expression turned thoughtful as he opened the door to the stairway leading up to street level. "Been doing it since I was eighteen, so I guess I must," he said with a shrug.

  "Katie said you had intended to go into the air force."

  He lifted one eyebrow. "Been talkin' about me, have you?"

  This time the heat that burned her cheeks had to do with a different kind of guilt. "Katie has," she murmured, already regretting her rash admission. "Since I'm a polite person, I felt compelled to listen."

  "Is that so?" He held the door until she'd pushed Jessie over the threshold, then followed her into the foyer and closed the door behind him.

  "Sophie?" His hands were on her shoulders before she could answer. Strong fingers turned her so that they were facing each other squarely. As soon as her eyes melded with his, he dropped his hands.

  "Damn," he muttered, feeling about seven years old and stupid. Now that he had her attention, he was wondering how fast he could get the words out and find something to kick.

  "Okay, I'm sorry about the way I acted yesterday," he said, plunging in. "I felt pushed, and I pushed back. By the time I hit the street, I knew I was out of line. I just didn't have the guts to turn back around and tell you so."

  The relief that came at the end of the impromptu speech died the instant he saw the tears shimmering in her eyes. His immediate thought was that those pretty blue eyes weren't made for crying. Knowing that he'd put tears there had him swallowing acid.

  "Why are you crying, damn it?" he grated, feeling heat climb his neck. "I'm the one who damn near choked on that mouthful of crow."

  "I'm not crying," she declared fiercely. She almost managed to hold it together. And then he smiled one of those slow, crooked, impossibly sweet smiles, and she felt as though her stomach was trying to digest ground glass.

  When she and Darlene had talked about the lies she would have to tell, she'd managed to smother the voice of conscience by telling herself she had no choice. Lying in a good cause couldn't be wrong, she'd told herself over and over. Everyone lied—the press, the politicians, even her in-laws when they'd sworn she'd been the one who'd wanted to abort the baby, not Wells. She could still see the hatred on Anita Manwaring's face when she'd sworn that Wells must have been trying to stop her when she'd pushed him down the stairs. But now, suddenly, it hurt terribly to lie to a man who had swallowed a lot of pride along with that crow in order to right what he considered a wrong he'd done her.

  "I should be apologizing to you," she murmured, feeling more and more miserable the longer she stood there.

  "No, you were just standin'
up for what you thought was right. Once I cooled down, I couldn't find fault with that."

  "Please, Ford, don't say nice things to me. I don't deserve them," she whispered, his face blurring.

  "Matter of opinion, but I sure wouldn't want to get myself in any more trouble, so here goes." He cleared his throat. "Sophie Reynolds, you are one scrawny, sorry-lookin' woman…" He touched her face with the pads of his fingers, and she felt heat. He moved closer, his thighs nudging hers, and his hand fisted in her hair.

  "Just because your hair looks like sunshine and smells good enough to drive a man to drink doesn't mean diddly when you go and wear it short as your daughter's there. And those blue eyes of yours, well, shoot, honey. They just have to be hiding a mean-as-sin disposition, sure enough."

  His hands framed her face, and his eyes grew dark. "'Course there are those of us who like vinegar with our greens."

  "Don't," Sophie managed to choke out, but his head was already lowering toward hers.

  He touched his mouth to hers gently and felt her tremble. Pulling back only a little, he opened his eyes and saw uncertainty in hers. A gentleman would retreat, giving her time to decide if she wanted more. He wasn't a gentleman. Never had been, never would be. At the moment he was glad. Slowly, deliberately, he slid his arms around her waist. Her eyes turned quizzical, her breath came a little faster.

  "I have to go," she murmured. "The baby—"

  "—is fine. At the moment, she's taking a little siesta, lookin' just like a sleepy little angel."

  He'd checked. He'd also thanked whatever lucky star had fallen on him all of a sudden that they were in the basement where no one came unless they had business with his department, which on Sunday wasn't all that often. "But—"

  "Shh, now." He ran his hand up her spine, and felt her give. Needs he hadn't allowed for a long time threatened to erupt, but he kept them leveled. A woman like Sophie was made for sweet words and gentle loving, both of which were difficult for him.