Even in the most unflattering pants, with tools of the cops’ trade wrapped around her waist, keeping his eyes off her ass as she walked out her door proved impossible.
Chapter Fourteen
Drew followed the line of cars working their way into the high school parking lot and noticed Tina leaning against her dad’s late model Civic. Her tight little running shorts had distracted him all morning, and if he wasn’t mistaken, she knew it.
She glanced up when he approached.
“Hey,” he said.
“I thought you went home to shower?” she said.
“On my way.”
Her phone buzzed.
He glanced down at Tina’s phone, saw the same image on every sent section of her text messaging. “Is that the sheriff and that guy?”
Tina opened the image for him to see it clearly. “He’s really hot.”
Drew pulled his gaze from his coach’s ass in the picture to look at the man. “If you like ancient guys.”
“He’s not old.”
Drew rolled his eyes. “He is for you.”
Tina pulled her phone away from his sight. “Whatever.” She pushed off the side of the car and slid behind the driver’s seat.
Drew backed up as she started the engine.
He’d bet money she was still upset he hadn’t wanted to go to homecoming. You would think with prom around the corner she’d be a little nicer.
Mel refilled the coffee of the guests that had come down to breakfast. Because it was midweek, Zoe wasn’t in the kitchen cooking breakfast for Miss Gina. But she had planned the menu and tutored Mel in cooking something other than scrambled eggs and bacon. Not that her culinary efforts would ever give her celebrity status. Still, the banana pancakes and quiche made the guests feel like they were anywhere but home, eating the same old stuff.
Mel felt her phone buzz in her pocket but didn’t reach for it until after she’d cleared dishes from one table and refilled juice glasses at another.
She loaded the dishwasher once she returned to the kitchen and felt her phone buzz again.
A text from Brenda at Sam’s diner was out of character.
Mel clicked on it to open a picture. She squealed, fumbled, and dropped her phone in the dishwasher.
She muttered a curse and hoped the screen hadn’t cracked.
A sigh of relief was quickly followed by another tiny squeal.
Looked like Jo’s McHottie was in town.
Mel widened the image. Oh, the man was a perfect fit for her friend. Mel did a silent happy dance, quickly copied the image, and sent it to Zoe.
Once the image said delivered, she waited.
“C’mon, Zoe.”
Finally, a dot dot dot on the screen had Mel squirming.
OMG, he is soooo Jo!
I know! Mel texted back.
I need to go to the station.
Not without me!
They negotiated a time, and Mel hurried out the back door to find Miss Gina and share the news.
Luke dug his shovel into the wet cement and kept pulling air from the mix while Wyatt and Sam continued mixing bags upon bags to fill the hole.
His cell phone buzzed.
Wyatt, bent over a new bag, reached for his back pocket. He grinned.
Luke’s phone buzzed again. When he looked, he saw Jo being kissed by a man twice her size by the high school bleachers. “’Bout time,” he muttered to himself before returning his cell phone to his back pocket.
Sam reached for the small of his back and bitched. “How many more bags is this gonna take?”
Wyatt glanced around. “Five, maybe six.”
“Damn thing is a sinkhole.”
Luke nodded. “Sure as hell is.”
Jo parked in front of the station, like she always did.
Glynis’s car rested in her designated spot. She was early.
Gill stood in front of the squad car, looked down the span of the street. “What’s going on down there?” he asked.
“Pothole.” Jo waved when she saw Wyatt’s head pop up.
“Looks like a serious hazard.”
“They can take care of it.”
If Gill had more questions, he didn’t ask.
Glynis jumped the minute Jo pushed through the door, her hand moved behind her back.
“Morning, Glynis.”
Her help stared at Gill.
Blushing.
Gossip was already flying. Jo could feel it.
“Glynis, this is Agent Gill Clausen. He works with Agent Burton. You remember her, right?”
She nodded a couple of times. “Of course I remember. You two were partners?”
“Are,” Gill said. “We work together in Eugene.”
“Oh, that’s nice. Uhm, can I get you anything? Coffee?”
Jo smirked. Since when did Glynis play hostess?
“I’m sure I can find it,” Gill said. “But thanks for offering.”
“Oh, no problem. Any friend of Jo’s is a friend of ours.”
“Ours?” Gill asked, looking around the empty station.
“The town. I mean . . . I’m not speaking for the whole town, but, well . . . oh, I don’t know what I’m saying. Welcome to River Bend.”
“Thank you, Glynis.”
Jo thought the woman was going to faint for all the color that reached her cheeks.
When Jo moved into her office, and out of earshot of Glynis, she said, “You’re going to turn a lot of heads today. Keep your ego in check.”
“I’ll try.” Gill stepped into her office. The size of the man took up quite a bit of space. “How much of this has changed since your dad was alive?”
The question took her off guard.
“Not a lot. He was efficient and wasn’t afraid of computers and technology. It wasn’t like I had to come in and update his world.”
“His world,” Gill repeated.
Jo moved around her desk, glanced at the mail from the previous day that she needed to follow up on. “It felt like his world for the first year.”
“I would think it still feels like his place.”
Jo glanced around the same walls, the same art . . . the same paint. “Sometimes. Little changes around here.”
“That should make it easier to investigate a ten-year-old case.”
She narrowed her eyes. Hope filled her chest. “Is that why you’re here? You think there’s something to look into?”
He stepped close enough for her to smell his mouthwash . . . or maybe that was hers.
“I’m here to see you. Your dad’s case is a side note, and my case is an excuse.” He kissed the tip of her nose.
He was smooth, she’d give him that.
The bell over the front door of the station rang, and Jo heard her best friends greeting Glynis.
“And so it begins.”
“What?”
Jo didn’t answer, she simply painted on a smile and stared at her office door.
Mel ducked in first, with Zoe close on her heels. Mel looked like she’d run from Miss Gina’s kitchen before clearing the breakfast dishes. If Jo wasn’t mistaken, there was flour on her cheek. And Zoe . . . in rare form, was wearing yoga pants and a T-shirt. An outfit Jo had seen many times because of their BFF status, but an outfit Zoe didn’t wear outside the comfort of her own home.
“Hey, Jo,” Zoe said.
Neither of them looked at her, both had their eyes on Gill.
“Oh, my God. Could you two be more obvious?”
Mel walked forward, extended her hand. “I’m Mel, this is Zoe. We’re Jo’s best friends. You must be Gill.”
Gill shook Mel’s hand. “I guess it’s a good thing you have my name right.”
Jo rolled her eyes.
“She described you perfectly,” Zoe told him.
Jo wanted to crawl under the table. “I did not.”
“You said big and mmmm!”
Gill laughed, moved in to shake Zoe’s hand. “I think I’m gonna like your friends, JoAnne.�
�
Mel glanced at Zoe. “He calls her JoAnne. Isn’t that cute.”
“For the love . . .” Jo said. “How did you guys find out he was here so fast anyway?”
“Mel texted me,” Zoe said.
“Brenda from the diner texted me, and her daughter, Tina—”
Jo sighed. “I get the picture.” She turned to Gill. “Tina is one of my runners that saw you at the school.”
“Ah.” He shrugged.
“I’m sure half of River Bend has a picture of you two kissing.”
“Kissing?”
Mel pulled her phone from her back pocket, showed the image to Jo.
Jo slapped a hand to Gill’s chest. “I’m blaming you,” she told him.
He looked at the photo, wasn’t fazed. “Not my best side, but I’ll take it.”
“You’re killing me,” Jo said, sliding into her chair. The day was going to be shot, and the calls would flood in.
“I’m guessing your town sheriff doesn’t have many men kissing her around here.”
Zoe leaned against the desk. “Not since she was eighteen.”
“Even then it was more like Waterville and not River Bend. Right, Jo?”
Jo didn’t answer. “Are we really having this conversation?”
Mel waved her off. “You’re a federal agent?”
“I am.”
“And you live in Eugene?” Zoe asked.
“I do.”
“Eugene isn’t that far,” Mel started.
Jo stood, slapped her hands on the desk. “Okay, enough.” She walked around the desk, shoving her friends with both hands toward the door. “I love you both, you know that. But get out of here. You’re embarrassing the hell out of me.”
Zoe looked over Jo’s shoulder. “I can make dinner tonight.”
“Get. Out!” Jo shoved until they’d both cleared the door and closed it behind them.
Gill stood by her desk, laughing. “Big and mmmm?”
Chapter Fifteen
The distraction, otherwise known as Gill, made it nearly impossible to work. The paperwork that had been put aside because of the rain had piled up and needed to be taken care of. An hour into her day, Jo decided the only way to complete anything was to move the massive man from her office. Then she’d double-time until she was finished and find a way to incorporate him into her day.
“Okay, Goliath,” she said as she grabbed her hat. “Let’s go.”
“Oh, Goliath. I like that.”
Jo rolled her eyes and walked out of the room, expecting him to follow.
“Leaving already?” Glynis said as they walked out.
“I’ll be back,” Jo informed her.
The woman smiled and waved, her eyes on Gill. “Bye-bye.”
Gill kept pace with her.
“So here are the ground rules,” she started.
“Rules?”
“Yeah. That kiss that everyone in town has now seen on their phones, no more of that in public.”
“Really?” He sounded disappointed.
“I do have to hold some kind of reputation, Gill. The town had a male sheriff for years. It took some of them time to get used to me. If they think I’m all boy crazy, who knows how it will go down.”
Gill attempted to hold her hand.
She shook him off.
“None of that either.”
“No?”
“No!”
“You drive a hard bargain.” His smile said he wasn’t offended. Besides, they hadn’t exactly displayed any affection in Virginia. It didn’t need to change in Oregon.
She lifted her sunglasses briefly, so he could see her eyes. “I’ll make up for it later.”
Gill licked his lips and pushed his hands into his front pockets. “Deal.”
“This is River Bend,” she said, as if he didn’t know. She pointed across the street. “Drugstore. As in, the one and only drugstore. Yeah, they sell the occasional ibuprofen over at the market across the street, but Benson’s Drugs sells anything and everything else.”
“Expensive?”
“Competitive. Charlie, the owner, knows the dollars in gas it takes to drive to Waterville to pay for your basics and makes it worth your while to buy here. His prices for all prescriptions are the same as if you bought them online, minus the shipping.”
“Smart man,” Gill said.
“He stays in business. Not to mention his sister makes the best strawberry jam in the county and sells it by the pint seasonally.”
Gill grinned.
Jo pointed to the next storefront. “Hardware store. Again competitive, with the edge of farming equipment supplies and seed to offset that which the feed store doesn’t always have on hand.”
“You have a feed store in town?”
“Just outside town. Close to R&B’s.”
“The bar I saw coming in?”
“That would be the one,” she confirmed.
“I saw a barn . . .”
Jo nodded. “That would be Cody’s Feed Store.”
“Cody?”
“It’s actually Cody’s son. But that’s how it goes around here.”
Gill pointed to the next marquee. “Sam’s diner, I presume?”
Jo stopped, spread her hands wide. “Breakfast.”
They pushed through the glass door of Sam’s and were greeted with the stares of several people from town and more than a half dozen friends.
Luke and Wyatt were a welcome sight. The very men she needed to entertain Gill for a couple of hours.
She approached the counter with a smile.
“Hey, Luke,” she said since he made eye contact first. “The road looks like it’s coming together.”
“It is.” Luke eyed Gill.
“Luke, Wyatt, this is Gill.”
They were both silent for half a second.
“The guy on your phones. Don’t even pretend you haven’t got the text. Both Mel and Zoe have already been by the station.”
Luke and Wyatt turned in their swivel seats and extended their hands.
“Mel’s my wife,” Wyatt said with pride.
Luke was next. “I’m Zoe’s fiancé.”
Gill shook hands with both of them. “Jo and I are hookin’ up.”
Jo cringed with both eyes closed and prayed to God that Gill’s voice didn’t carry as much as she thought it did.
Luke stood with his handshake and held on a little long.
“You’re a little big to take down, but Jo’s like a sister.”
The men paused, and for the first time in Jo couldn’t remember how long, Luke’s sentiment had her heart pinging against her chest.
“Point taken,” Gill said before suggesting that Jo sit.
Jo lifted a hand in the air. “I’m good, actually. Just send a bagel my way.”
Gill tried to stand.
“No, no, sit. They have a great country fried steak and eggs here. Zoe’s gravy recipe.” She pointed at Wyatt. “You should show Gill around.” She turned to Luke. “Introduce him to . . . introduce him.”
“I’m being pawned off.” The man was perceptive.
“You,” she tapped his chest, “showed up unexpected.”
She didn’t sit, only waved at Brenda, who made goo-goo eyes at Gill.
“I’ll see you at lunch. Miss Gina’s, here . . . wherever.”
“Who is Miss Gina?” Gill asked.
Jo glanced at Luke.
“I’ve got it!” Luke exclaimed. “Go.” He waved Jo off. “Be the town cop. I’ve got this.”
Gill looked her in the eye, his face softened. For a brief second his lips puckered, almost like he was blowing her a kiss.
And Jo walked away.
Jo made the house call she’d put off since getting back to town.
She knocked on Cherie Miller’s door and was greeted with a chorus of dogs barking. Jo took a step back so when Cherie looked through her peephole she’d see Jo’s whole body in the small viewfinder. Chances were the woman wasn’t opening her
door to very many people since the pound had been called.
The door cracked open, followed by Cherie yelling at her dogs all at once. “Hush up. Sampson, stay back!”
The woman looked a little haggard, like she hadn’t slept much but still managed to shove a shower in and then promptly forgot to blow dry her hair. Luke’s aunt had never married. And unlike the normal spinster stereotype, she collected dogs . . . not cats.
“Look who finally showed up,” Cherie scolded once she cleared the door and closed it behind her to keep the dogs inside.
Instead of defending herself, Jo smiled and acted as if the other woman had said something pleasant. “Hello, Cherie. How are you doing today?”
“I’m doin’ fine, just fine, considering I have to find new homes for my babies.”
“How is that going?”
“Going? I’ll tell you how it’s going . . . it’s not. Do you know how many dog lovers we have in this town?”
The question was rhetorical.
“Zero.”
“Cherie, that’s not true.”
“I don’t hear my phone ringing with people lining up to help me out while I raise these tiny little pups.” As if to prove her point, Cherie opened the door, leaned down to grab the collars of three of her dogs, a trick in itself with only two hands, and motioned Jo inside.
The dogs barked, but didn’t do more than sniff once she made it into the house and closed the door. Cherie started yelling out names of her dogs like a mother does for her children.
Everything in the small home centered around the animals. Beds lay on the floor, covering the carpet underneath. A hair-covered afghan sat in a heap on one end of the sofa, multiple bowls for dog food took up space in the three-step hall from the living room to the kitchen.
Cherie let her dogs loose once she cleared the kitchen and reached the covered porch through the sliding glass doors.
Jo didn’t pretend to know the names of the dogs that swarmed her. The wagging tails and panting let her know there wasn’t a threat.
The screen to the back porch closed the adult dogs on one side, the puppies and their mother on the other.
The distinct smell of puppy overwhelmed her as they stepped into the back room.
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