“All right, then. Take me to lunch.”
Eleven
The Lone Star Country Club was busy on the Labor Day weekend. Jake drove Tabitha across town in his own vehicle, a full-size truck the reporters hadn’t had time to connect to her. Several squad cars had followed them and would wait just outside the club gates, close enough in case of an emergency but far enough away to be discreet.
Instead of pulling into the parking area Tabitha pointed out on the right, Jake drove up the tree-lined, semicircular driveway to the covered portico.
“Valet parking?” she asked. “A little extravagant for a cop, isn’t it?”
He grinned. “What the hell.”
“Nice knowing I’m a what-the-hell kind of woman,” she murmured as he set the brake.
He grinned. “Better than a no-way-in-hell kind of woman, isn’t it?”
She chuckled wryly. “Not always.”
Her door opened then, so she twisted and let the young man assist her from the cab.
Jake handed his keys to another young man and met her around the other side. He guided her through a set of doors, gratified that she didn’t object to the hand he placed on the small of her back.
The huge two-story lobby was quietly abuzz from various groups in the carefully planned conversation areas. The chatter stopped long enough to be noticeable the moment they walked through the doors.
Tabitha hesitated. “I probably shouldn’t have come. I see at least three members of the hospital board here.”
“Everybody has to eat.” Jake applied slight pressure on her back to urge her on.
An older man Jake recognized as head of the Wainwright clan—Archy Wainwright—stood as they walked across the plush carpets. The Wainwrights were one of the founding families of Mission Creek and had donated half the land the country club sat on. They’d helped established the town of Mission Creek and the Mission Creek Memorial Hospital, as well.
Tabitha stopped to shake his hand. “Good afternoon, Mr. Wainwright. You know Chief White, I’m sure.”
Jake measured the man’s strong grip. “Good afternoon.”
“Everything all settled at the hospital, Miss Monroe?” Wainwright’s voice clearly indicated he’d caught her playing hooky.
Before she could reply, Jake stepped in.
“We’re just in to get a bite to eat,” he told the man, drawing his critical attention away from Tabitha. “I made the decision—and I’m sure you’ll agree—that Miss Monroe needed some time away from the stress of waiting. Especially since there’s little chance the kidnapper will call again in the next few hours, and since Miss Monroe’s calls are being forwarded to her cell phone.”
Mr. Wainwright nodded. “All right, then. Nice to know you have everything under control, Chief White. Keep up the good work.”
“We plan to.” With a tug on Tabitha’s arm, Jake drew her away from the Wainwright party.
“Thank you,” she said softly.
“No problem. Rescuing fair maidens from bullies is all part of the job.”
“He’s not a bully, exactly, just—”
“Rich and powerful and thinks he owns everything in Mission Creek.” Jake guided her to the entrance of the Yellow Rose Café, which sat at the back of the clubhouse.
Tabitha smiled ruefully. “Just half the town. The Carsons own the other half.”
“Every town’s got at least one.” They paused at the hostess stand. “Two, please. That table back by the windows will be perfect.”
The hostess glanced toward the back, then grabbed two menus. “Right this way.”
Jake pulled out Tabitha’s chair, then seated himself and took the menu from the young lady.
Tabitha set hers to the side.
“Not even going to look?” Jake asked.
She shook her head and raised her glass of water. “The menu hasn’t changed since I joined the club. I always have the Cobb salad.”
“How are their plate lunches?”
“I don’t know. I always—”
“Have the Cobb salad.” He grinned. “Kind of monotonous, isn’t it?”
“When you like something, why change just for the sake of change?”
“Variety is the spice of life.”
She lifted an eyebrow. “Experiments can blow up in your face.”
“Yes, but without experiments, we wouldn’t have electricity, or penicillin, or plastic, or—”
“Okay, okay. Monotony Monroe. That’s me.”
He lifted his chin thoughtfully. “Has a certain ring to it, doesn’t it?”
“As long as I’m confessing, I have to tell you that I make pizza every Saturday night.”
“You make pizza? You don’t order it?”
She shook her head. “I’m too picky about what I want on it and how much. I end up spending as much as I would to order it, but it tastes a whole lot better.”
“Well, maybe you can—”
“Tabitha?”
They looked up to find a tall, broad-shouldered man in a white straw Stetson standing over their table. Flynt Carson, heir apparent to the enormous Carson spread.
Jake shoved back his chair and stood. Though also formally polite, Jake meant the gesture more as a protective warning. He needn’t have bothered.
Flynt nodded to both of them. “Tabitha, Officer White. Good afternoon. I just wanted to stop and say hello. Wanted to tell you we’re all behind you one hundred percent with the situation at the hospital.”
“Thank you, Flynt,” Tabitha said. “I really appreciate that.”
Jake relaxed.
“I’m glad you could get away for a few minutes,” Flynt continued. “If there’s anything we can do to help, just holler.”
“The town could use some surveillance equipment made at least in the second half of the twentieth century,” Jake told him.
“What do you mean?”
Jake explained.
Flynt nodded. “I’ll bring it up at the next police board meeting.”
“Thanks. So far I’ve avoided explaining what we have to the press. But if the situation goes on much longer, it could be embarrassing for the town.”
Jake knew that was his strongest argument. Both the Wainwrights and the Carsons hated that the world considered Mission Creek the south end of nowhere—if the world thought about the town at all.
“If the board doesn’t okay the purchase, I’ll buy it myself.”
“Great.” Jake extended his hand with a smile. “Thanks for stopping by.”
Flynt shook Jake’s hand, then Tabitha’s. “I meant what I said, Tabitha. And to you, too, Jake. Burl’s been keeping us informed. No one could do a better job.”
Tabitha beamed. “Thank you, Flynt. That means a lot, coming from one of the hospital’s biggest supporters.”
Flynt touched the brim of his hat. “Enjoy your meal.”
As he left, Jake sat down. “That was profitable.”
Tabitha smiled. “He’s a nice guy. A little taciturn, but most cowboys are, aren’t they?”
“That’s what I hear.”
“Howdy, folks.” A middle-aged woman with a pencil sticking out of her bleached French twist smiled at them. The tag pinned to her white blouse said her name was Trudy. “Y’all ready to order?”
“I’ll have the Cobb salad and iced tea.” Tabitha pushed her menu toward the waitress.
Trudy pulled the pencil from her hair with the ease of knowing exactly where she’d left it. After a couple of strokes on her green pad, she looked at Jake expectantly.
“How’s the pot roast?” he asked.
“Honey, it’ll plumb melt in your mouth.”
“By all means, then, put me down for pot roast.”
“Have the okra with it. He just pulled out a fresh batch. And the lady peas came out of the field yesterday.”
He handed Trudy his menu. “My mouth is watering already.”
The waitress grinned. “I’ll bring you some sliced tomatoes on the side. Can you handle al
l that, cowboy?”
“I can handle anything you throw at me, Trudy.”
“We’ll see about that, honey.” Trudy winked at Tabitha. “I’ll be right back with y’all’s tea.”
Tabitha gave him an arch smile. “So you’re an incorrigible flirt.”
He shrugged. “A little flirting never hurt anybody.”
She uttered a sound that could have been either agreement or disbelief, then turned her gaze to the window.
Jake’s smile slowly froze as what he said sank in. He studied Tabitha’s lovely profile as she idly gazed at the gardens that stretched from the trellised walkway on the other side of the windows to the club’s eighteen-hole championship golf course.
Suddenly Jake knew that flirting could hurt somebody, and that somebody was him. He wasn’t just flirting with her. He was flirting with disaster, because he wanted more than flirtation with Tabitha. Much more. He wanted all of her—every smile, every kiss, every dream, every disappointment, every day, every night, everything.
Damn. When had it gone this far? Was he in love with her?
No. He couldn’t be.
Tabitha Monroe was not a woman he could have a casual affair with, then blithely leave after the time that remained on his contract. She needed a man who loved her desperately, who wanted to marry her and settle down and be with her twenty-four/seven.
She didn’t need him.
Jake ignored the pinprick that truth sent to his heart. He didn’t do relationships. Did he?
No. He wasn’t going to stay in Mission Creek. In exactly twelve months and twenty-three days, he was out of there. He didn’t know where yet. He didn’t have to worry about putting out feelers for another six months. But somewhere bigger, badder. Some place where crime—real crime—would consume his days and nights. Like they had in Houston.
Hell, she didn’t even want him. She hated cops.
Though he still didn’t know why. He wanted that, too. Wanted her to trust him enough to tell him about her father.
She turned to him then and asked a question about his college days.
Since that was much easier to answer than the questions he’d been asking himself, Jake eagerly bit into the conversation.
Their meal came quickly, along with another round of flirting with Trudy. He and Tabitha talked about their college days as they ate. After the main meal, while Jake ate a slice of blueberry pie, he asked Tabitha about her career.
She talked freely about her progress from midlevel management to chief administrator, seeming happy to be away from the stress waiting for them back at the hospital, glad to be talking about anything but that.
“What about you?” she asked after Trudy cleared their dishes. “Why did you decide to become a cop?”
Jake shrugged and started to spout his stock answer to this question. But he couldn’t utter the platitude about helping society. Not to Tabitha. He frowned down at the yellow checkered tablecloths that matched the aprons the waitresses wore. “Why not?”
“It’s not as if you just fell into law enforcement the way I fell into hospital management. You majored in it. You chose the University of Texas because of its law enforcement program. That means you knew from day one that you wanted to be a cop.”
Jake absently rubbed a drop of thick blueberry juice into the tablecloth. He’d never told anyone about his motivations for wanting to be a police officer. He’d never been able to before now because it hurt too much.
“Surely there’s a reason.”
He glanced up at her interested face. “Don’t you think we should be getting back?”
Both eyebrows rose. “Have I hit a nerve?”
He dropped his gaze again.
“I have, haven’t I?” She reached across the table to cover his hand with hers. “Jake, tell me.”
Jake felt his heart turn over. Such a small gesture, but he knew what it meant. She reached out to him, trusting him to accept her touch. He knew in that moment that if she reached out to him further—telling him about her father—he’d be sunk.
For the first time in eighteen years, Jake wanted to tell someone how his parents had died. He wanted to tell Tabitha everything.
“When I was eighteen, a senior in high school, my…” He leaned back in his chair. “Sure you want to hear this?”
She leaned forward. “Positive.”
“It was my grandmother’s birthday. She lived on the other side of Houston, on the edge of a neighborhood that wasn’t too great. Anyway, my parents were going to take her out to dinner and I—in my infinite teenage selfishness—refused to go. I wanted to go to a movie with my friends instead.”
“So what happened?”
He felt his face harden as he thought about the details for the first time in years. “On the way home they apparently had a flat tire, four blocks from my grandmother’s house. The police were called after someone in the area heard gunshots. They found my father shoved into the open trunk—”
Tabitha gasped. “Oh, Jake, no.”
“He had a bullet in his abdomen, and one in his heart.”
Tabitha covered both his hands this time. “Stop, please.”
But he couldn’t. “They found my mother still sitting in the front seat, a bullet in her head.”
She squeezed his hands. “Why?”
He turned his hands over and latched on to hers. The connection felt warm and real. “Robbery, for one thing. But the police thought it was more than that. Probably some gang initiation or rite. They never caught a single one of them.”
“Oh, Jake.” A tear slipped from her eye and followed the curve of her cheek. “You hear about things like that happening, but you never think it will happen to you, or someone you love. I’m so sorry.”
He smiled, feeling lighter somehow, glad he’d shared his pain with her. “Don’t cry for me. It happened half a lifetime ago.”
“It still hurts.” Another tear followed the first. “A person doesn’t recover from something like that. And you were so young.”
“At least I didn’t get caught up in some stupid custody case. I lived with my grandmother until I went to college.”
“Is she still alive?”
He shook his head. “She died six years ago.”
“No brothers or sisters?”
“Just me.”
“You’re all alone, just like me.”
He smiled sadly. “Two seeds in a pod.”
She dropped her gaze with a slight frown and only then seemed to realize that they were sitting in the Yellow Rose Café, holding hands and staring into each other’s eyes like a pair of lovers. She pulled her hands away.
“No, we’re not two seeds in a pod. There’s at least one fundamental difference between us.”
“What?”
She glanced up. “I’m not out to rescue the world.”
Stunned by her comment, Jake leaned back in his chair. “What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You have a rescue complex. That’s why you became a cop. You couldn’t rescue your parents, but you can make up for not being there to help them by rescuing other people.”
He turned sideways in his seat. “Okay, Mrs. Freud, I think it’s time we—”
“No wonder you’re so dedicated to your job.” Her face became earnest as she dug into the analysis. “No wonder you can’t maintain a real relationship. What superhero ever did?”
“Superhero?”
She nodded. “It probably isn’t a conscious thing, but you want to be Superman. You want to rescue the entire world.”
He’d never heard his motives put in those terms. He didn’t like it. “I think you’re full of Cobb salad, but say I did. Are cops such a bad thing to have around? Aren’t you glad someone takes on the job of getting criminals off the street? What’s wrong with rescuing people?”
She sat back, smugly amazed at her insight. “There’s nothing wrong with it from society’s point of view. From yours, however, there’s a lot.”
“Such as?”
<
br /> “You’ll be dead by the time you’re forty. No one is Superman. No one can rescue the entire world.”
“I know that. I never said I wanted to rescue the entire world.”
“You don’t have to say it. Your actions, as the cliché goes, speak louder than words. Frankly, I’m surprised you even came to Mission Creek. There isn’t enough crime here to keep you busy twenty-four hours a day. There aren’t enough people to rescue.”
“Yeah, well, I’m leaving as soon as my contract is up.”
“See? You just proved my point. Planning on going to a much bigger city, aren’t you?”
His eyes narrowed. “I didn’t realize you had a Ph.D. in psychology.”
She waved a hand at him. “It doesn’t take a psychologist to see this.”
No one else had ever seen it. No one else had ever cared to dig deep enough to find the clues to his psyche, to figure him out. Not even himself.
“How many people do you have to rescue before you think your parents will forgive you?” She reached across the table again and laid her hand on his arm. “Jake, it isn’t your fault that you weren’t there when they died. Don’t you see? It’s survivor’s guilt. You probably see it all the time, in your line of work.”
Though he didn’t like the way she was putting it, he knew she was right. But he was feeling a little too raw at the moment to admit it. He needed time to think about what she had said, to analyze her analysis. If what she said was true, it put a whole new perspective on everything in his life.
“I just noticed something,” he said to distract her.
“What?” She leaned back with a rueful smile. “That I’m getting too personal?”
“Well, yeah, but we’ve been sitting here for an hour and a half, and neither one of us has been fidgety, or even so much as used going to the rest room as an excuse to move.”
“You’re right.” Then she peered at him sideways. “So what does that mean?”
“Hell if I know. Maybe this place has good feng shui.”
She glanced around. “Not particularly.”
“Then it must be us.” He was as startled by the comment that slipped out of his mouth as her bluebonnet eyes said she was.
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