An Honorable Man

by Darlene Gardner

  “Something wrong?” he asked.

  She didn’t answer immediately, then finally whispered, “People are staring at us.”

  “They’re staring at you,” he corrected.

  She crossed her arms over her chest and ran her hands up and down the bare skin of her upper arms. “Because they’ve never seen me dressed like this.”

  “Because you look fantastic,” he countered.

  She shook her head, uncrossed her arms, ran a hand over her mouth, then lowered her voice another half octave. “I don’t know what I was thinking, coming here tonight.”

  “I’m not sure what you mean,” he said. “We’re just two people having a drink together.”

  “It’s more than that.” She leaned forward so only he could hear. He could smell something light and flowery. Not perfume, like he’d thought earlier today. Scented shampoo. “I was going to try to get you to invite me back to your room.”

  His heartbeat sped up to a gallop. “You wouldn’t have to try very hard.”

  “Except I changed my mind.” The corners of her mouth drooped. “It’s pretty clear I’m not cut out for one-night stands.”

  The gallop slowed to a trot. He blew out a breath, fighting the compulsion to disagree. “Why did you think you were?”

  “It’s a long story.”

  “I’ve got all night.” Pumping her for information about Dr. Whitmore could wait. He looked around for their waitress, didn’t find her and nodded at her barely touched whiskey. “I’m having another beer. Want me to get you something else?”

  “A diet soda, please,” she said primly.

  “Coming right up.” Pretending he didn’t feel as though he’d just lost a jackpot, he maneuvered through a maze of tables to the bar and placed his order.

  The bartender was an attractive woman with curly black hair, huge, dark eyes and a warm smile. She could have been anywhere from twenty-five to thirty-five. With quick efficiency, she poured the soda, refilled his beer and set the drinks in front of him. “So how do you know the doc?”

  “What doc?” Ryan asked.

  She gestured to Sierra with her index finger, the funky bracelets she wore jangling together. “Dr. Whitmore. She looks fantastic tonight, not that she doesn’t usually. I just never saw her dress like that before.”

  Shock momentarily squeezed Ben’s windpipe. He hid his astonishment the best he could, swallowed, then muttered the blandest response he could think of. “Mutual friends.”

  He picked up his beer mug, his brain whirring. It seemed a fantastic coincidence until he noted he’d run across Sierra in the same block as Whitmore Family Practice. The office had been closed, but she must have been returning to the office, perhaps to finish up some work.

  He examined her with new eyes en route to the table, putting her age at around thirty, probably just a little younger than he was. She could be Dr. Ryan Whitmore’s youthful wife, except she’d claimed not to be married. Was she his daughter?

  Excitement flared. No matter how it had happened, he’d stumbled across a delicious opportunity to fill in the many blanks he had about Dr. Ryan Whitmore.

  He closed in on Sierra, then noticed her face go white. He followed the direction of her gaze to the bar entrance. A slender man about his age of average height with blond hair receding at the temples nodded in Sierra’s direction. She inclined her head slightly, then gazed down at the table.

  Her eyes didn’t raise until Ben took a seat across from her. They looked big and sad. He cursed inwardly, and the flame of exhilaration he felt when he discovered her last name extinguished.

  He was not about to interrogate a woman as fragile as this one about Dr. Ryan Whitmore until he got some other questions answered.

  “That long story you were going to tell me, does it have anything to do with that guy?” Ben indicated the new arrival with a slight jerk of his head.

  She started. “How did you know that?”

  “Lucky guess,” Ben said, although his deduction had more to do with powers of observation. “Here’s another. He’s the ex-boyfriend.”

  Her chin trembled, and she nodded. “He called it off last month.”

  “That’s rough,” he said. “Were you together long?”

  “We’ve known each other since high school, but didn’t start dating until I was out of college.”

  “Sounds serious.”

  She snuck a look at her ex, then spoke in a voice so soft it was hard to hear. “Everybody thought we’d get married. My father treated him like a son.”

  “So you were in love with him?”

  She didn’t answer for so long he thought she regretted what she’d already revealed. Then, finally, she spoke. “I thought so. Now I’m not so sure. He’s solid and dependable, but set in his ways.”

  “Ah,” Ben said as understanding dawned. “Is one of his routines coming to the Blue Haven on Friday nights?”

  Guilt flitted across her face. “He’s here on Tuesdays and on Fridays, never for longer than an hour. He always orders mineral water with a twist of lime.”

  “Sounds boring.”

  “Funny you should use that word. He broke up with me because he said I was boring.” She crossed her arms over her midsection. “He may be right, too. I just proved it all over again with you.”

  “Because you’re passing up that chance to have your way with me?” He made his eyebrows dance, coaxing the hint of a grin from her pretty bowed lips.

  “Yes.” She cast another surreptitious glance at her ex-boyfriend, and the partial grin vanished. “No offense, but I’m calling it a night. Please don’t feel like you have to leave, too.”

  “I can at least walk you out.” No way would he let her face her ex alone and vulnerable if he could help it. He pushed back from the table, then waited for her to precede him.

  She put on her jacket and kept her eyes forward as they moved together toward the exit. The other man sat in a booth beside a window that afforded a view of the street. He stared at them intently, his gaze following them even after they were outside in the cool night air.

  Ben stopped on the sidewalk and faced Sierra, careful to stay in her ex-boyfriend’s sight line. “I take it you met me tonight so your ex could see us together?”

  She grimaced, her slightly crooked nose crinkling. “Partly. And partly to prove to myself I could be unpredictable.” She gazed heavenward, then down again. “Except neither of those worked out so well.”

  “They could,” he said. “Your ex is awfully interested in what we’re doing out here.”

  “We’re not doing anything,” she said.

  “We will be.” He advanced a step and gathered her into his arms. Before she could stiffen, he whispered, “Relax or it won’t look realistic.”

  She blinked up at him. “What won’t look realistic?”

  “The show we’re going to give him.”

  He half expected her to yank out of his arms, but she surprised him, relaxing her body so she appeared less tense than at any other time tonight. He could smell the light floral scent he now knew was her shampoo mixed with the warmth of her skin as her soft curves molded against him. A glint of mischievousness appeared in her eyes. “Do you think we can pull it off?”

  “Oh, yeah.” He winked at her, then dipped his head.

  Her lips molded to his in the sweetest of kisses, her arms twining around his neck to pull him close. He angled his body and gathered her intimately against him so her jerk of an ex-boyfriend could get an eyeful.

  Their embrace confirmed what he already knew: Her ex was an idiot. Nothing was remotely boring about a woman who could kiss like this.

  She might have been pretending, but it was a good act. She was tall for a woman, especially in her spiked heels, but felt delicate in his arms. He threaded his fingers through her luxurious long hair, which felt like silk against his skin. Her lips clung to his, her tongue darting out to stroke the tip of his. He accepted her invitation, letting his tongue slide inside her mouth.
<
br />   He’d kissed a lot of women in his thirty-one years but never did he remember a first kiss like this. Their mouths melded, their bodies fit, their hearts seemed to beat in tandem. His arousal was instantaneous.

  A rumble echoed in his ears, which he attributed to the blood roaring through his veins. A shrill staccato noise blared. A car horn. Belatedly, he remembered where he was and what he was doing. Correction. What he was attempting to convince Sierra he was doing.

  Putting on a show. With a relative of the man who might have been involved in his mother’s death, no less.

  He pulled back, his mouth reluctantly parting from hers. Her green eyes appeared huge as they stared back at his. He cleared his throat. “Well, I’ll say we fooled him.”

  She nodded, appearing dazed. “Yeah.”

  He disengaged from her, struggling to get his body under control, although she couldn’t miss the effect she’d had on him. He tried to make his voice sound natural. “Let me walk you to your car.”

  “That’s not necessary.” Her voice sounded low and shaky. “I only live a few blocks away.”

  “Then I’ll walk you home.”

  She seemed about to protest further, then closed her mouth and nodded. They walked the next few blocks in silence, not touching, a half body length separating them. The street got quieter as businesses gradually gave way to a quaint row of town houses with stone facades.

  “It’s this one.” She stopped in front of one of the more classy residences. A wrought-iron railing led to a redbrick door. A pot of colorful flowers adorned the ledge protruding from the front window. The entire home emanated grace and beauty, like its owner. She tucked a strand of her long hair behind her ear, which struck him as sensual. Then again, at this point just about every move she made was sexy. “Thank you for what you did back there at the bar.”

  He nearly laughed aloud. “Believe me, it was my pleasure.”

  Her cheeks colored, charming him all over again. He lightly rubbed the back of his knuckles against the stain, then pulled his hand back. He knew better than to reach for her again.

  “You know what I wish?” he asked softly.

  She stared up at him with her big eyes, her head shaking back and forth so that silken hair of hers swayed.

  “I wish you were the kind of woman who indulged in one-night stands,” he said.

  She anchored her hands on his shoulders, stood on tiptoe and kissed him, so briefly it was just an electric brushing of lips.

  “Me, too.” She spoke so close to his mouth he felt her warm breath and smelled the faintest trace of whiskey. “Goodbye, Ben Nash.”

  She disappeared inside, leaving him staring at the closed door. Only then did he realize that neither of them had thought to check her ex-boyfriend’s reaction to their kiss.

  Resigned to an early night, he headed in the direction of his downtown hotel. If he meant to preserve the fiction he and Sierra had just created, returning to the Blue Haven wasn’t an option.

  The real world would intrude soon enough, because the two wishes he’d kept to himself had no better chance of coming true than the first.

  That Sierra’s last name wasn’t Whitmore.

  And that tomorrow morning he wouldn’t have to break the news to her that he was an investigative reporter.

  CHAPTER THREE

  THE SPINACH AND CHEESE omelet at Jimmy’s Diner was every bit as delicious as Sierra had always heard. So was the coffee: thick, rich and not bitter in the slightest.

  “Can I get anything else for you, Doc?” Ellie Marson, the waitress who was as much a mainstay at Jimmy’s as the red vinyl booths, bustled over to Sierra on Saturday morning. If Sierra hadn’t noticed her birth date when Ellie was in the office a few months ago complaining of foot pain, she’d never have guessed the other woman was sixty-two.

  “Just the check, please,” Sierra said.

  “Coming right up.” Ellie quickly shuffled through the orders on her pad and ripped off a sheet. “I never did thank you for referring me to that podiatrist.”

  “Did he take care of the problem?” Sierra asked.

  The waitress pointed to the pair of white thick-soled shoes on her feet. “These did the trick. Would have told you sooner if you’d come in here for breakfast before today.”

  “I usually eat at home,” Sierra said.

  Who was she kidding? She always started the day with a glass of orange juice and a low-fat, high-fiber cereal consumed at her own kitchen table. She’d complained about Chad Armstrong slavishly following his routines, yet the only thing she varied was whether she filled her bowl with Frosted Mini-Wheats or Special K.

  Until today, when she’d awakened remembering the way Ben Nash had looked at her last night.

  If she could attract the attention of a dynamic man like Ben simply by being a little more daring, it was time to act a lot less predictably.

  So she’d gone for a brisk early-morning walk instead of popping in her customary exercise DVD and skipped her cereal for the specialty omelet at Jimmy’s Diner. She’d even dug through a closet containing mostly pastels and neutral colors and pulled out her lone red top, which she’d paired with a flirty navy skirt a few inches shorter than the ones she usually wore.

  “Well, I sure am glad you decided to stop in this morning,” the waitress said. “I’d love to see you here more often.”

  “Thanks, Ms. Mar…” Sierra stopped herself, remembering her vow to loosen up. This was someone she’d known for years. “I mean, Ellie.”

  “No need to thank me for speaking the truth,” Ellie said. “It does a body good to work less and the soul to eat out more, ’cept next time you should eat at the counter.”

  She’d make a note of that, Sierra thought as Ellie went off to wait on another customer. The other solo diners had opted to sit where they could interact. Sierra knew a fair number of the customers, although none of them well, including the tall brunette who reached the exit at the same time she did. Sierra held the door open.

  “Thanks.” Sara Brenneman held a foam cup of take-out coffee in each hand. A lawyer who lived and worked in the block adjacent to Sierra’s town house, Sara was dressed in jeans and a windbreaker instead of the smart, stylish business clothes she favored. Her windbreaker, however, was hot-pink. “I was just talking about you this morning.”

  Sierra felt her cheeks grow warm despite a temperature that probably hadn’t yet hit sixty. Had Sara been at the Blue Haven last night? Had she seen Sierra leave the bar with Ben Nash? Had she witnessed the kiss?

  “I called Annie this morning about festival business and she said you might take her place on the committee,” Sara explained.

  Sierra relaxed. “I’m thinking about it.”

  “Think fast because we need the help, not to mention Annie says you’d be great at it.” Sara walked quickly and purposefully down the sidewalk even though they were heading more than slightly uphill, past shops and restaurants not yet open for business. On a Saturday morning, the town was slow to wake up. “If you decide to fill in, the meeting’s tomorrow at Quincy Coleman’s house.”

  “Really? Quincy Coleman?” Sierra wondered if Annie had purposely neglected to mention who was hosting the meeting. Surely she was aware that the retired banker’s one-sided feud with her late father hadn’t endeared him to the rest of the Whitmore family.

  “I was surprised when I found out he was on the committee, too,” Sara said. “He’s been unexpectedly easy to deal with. He seems to be trying to make amends for the past.”

  Coleman’s most egregious offense was unfairly holding Michael Donahue, Sara’s fiancé, responsible for the death of his daughter. Taking potshots at Sierra’s father whenever the opportunity presented itself paled in comparison.

  “Anyway, I hope to see you at the meeting,” she said. “Oh. And I almost forgot. Annie says you have a friend in Harrisburg who owns a bridal shop. I’d love her business card, if you have one.”

  “Does that mean you and Michael have set a date?” />
  Sara beamed, her entire face lighting up even though the sun was rising at her back. “The last Saturday in June.”

  “And you don’t have your dress yet?”

  “Now you sound just like Annie,” Sara said in a long-suffering voice. “Two months is plenty of time.”

  Not if the dress needed alterations, it wasn’t.

  “I’ll be sure to get you that card,” Sierra said.

  “Great.” The lawyer left Sierra with a smile, then immediately picked up her pace, no doubt eager to rejoin her fiancé. Sierra wondered if Sara served Michael Donahue coffee in bed and had a pang that she’d passed up the chance to do the same for Ben Nash.

  Ben Nash, who was passing through town and who she’d probably never see again.

  Before regret could take hold, she focused on the morning ahead. Unlike many other family physicians, she and Ryan didn’t start the morning with hospital rounds. Because of time and distance constraints, it made more sense to use hospitalists—specialists who provided care to patients while they were in the hospital. She let herself into the medical practice through the back entrance and was shrugging into her lab coat when Missy Cromartie rushed down the hall.

  “Dr. Sierra, am I glad you’re here!” Missy was short and slight with large eyes that nearly overwhelmed her pretty, elfin face. Her dramatic coloring, black hair and blue eyes set in pale skin, suited her personality. “When I got to work ten minutes ago, a man was waiting outside to see Dr. Ryan. I told him to come back at nine when we opened, but he wanted to come in and wait.”

  “You did fine, Missy.” Sierra gentled her voice to calm the excitable receptionist. “It’s okay if he waits inside.”

  “You don’t understand.” If possible, Missy’s light-colored eyes grew larger and rounder. Her shoulder-length hair shook along with her head. “He doesn’t have an appointment.”

  “I’m sure you can squeeze him in.”

  “But he’s not sick! I tried telling him how busy it gets on Saturdays, but he said he’ll wait as long as it takes. I don’t know what to do with him.”

  Sierra started to tell Missy to handle the problem the best she could, then thought better of it. That’s what the old Sierra would say. The new Sierra met challenges head-on…if she didn’t count her reluctance to join the festival committee.