by Jeannie Watt
Ty held the door open for her and she preceded him into the building. A whiff of potpourri hit his nostrils. Garlands were hung around the ceiling and he quickly looked for mistletoe. To avoid it. He could easily see Susan demanding a kiss.
The postmistress beamed at them. “It’s good to see you two. You just missed the parade.”
“No, we saw it,” Madeline said with a smile. Susan handed her the envelope and had her sign at least three cards. Madeline’s hands shook a little as she ripped into the envelope and pulled out a single sheet of paper, which she scanned.
Ty wanted to ask if it was bad news, but kept his mouth shut. Madeline finally nodded, then refolded the paper.
“Just the formal summons to the hearing,” she said. “Rather than an informal hearing of inquiry, they’ve decided to initiate a full procedure.”
“Which is?”
“Inquiry committee hearing followed by investigative committee hearing.”
“Here’s your package, Ty.” Susan hefted a brown-paper-wrapped parcel onto the counter.
“Nothing to sign?” he asked as he took it.
“It’s yours free and clear,” Susan said with a laugh. “Enjoy.”
“I hope,” Ty muttered. Madeline, distracted, was already on her way out.
“Goodbye,” she called to Susan at the last minute. Ty gave the postmistress a nod and headed after Madeline, his package under one arm.
“What now?” he asked as the door closed behind them. He’d never seen so much uncertainty in her expression before.
“I don’t know. I’ll have to make some phone calls.”
“You can make them from the café. Have a cup of coffee and then we can shop.”
“Are you sure the café is open?” she asked, indicating the tracks in the snow from the parade.
“I’m sure.”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
THE CAFÉ WAS OPEN, but no one appeared to be inside.
“They forgot to lock the door,” Madeline whispered to Ty.“I don’t think they’ll hear you,” he replied in a normal voice that seemed overly loud in the deserted room. He leaned over the counter, craning his neck to see into the back room. “Hello…?”
His voice echoed into the kitchen. He waited a minute, then grabbed the coffeepot and two mugs.
“Are you allowed to do that?” Madeline asked as she took a seat at the nearest table and he began to pour.
“I don’t see anyone here to stop me. Want pie or anything?” he asked, still holding the pot.
“Uh…no.” Madeline peeled the top off a creamer and dumped it into her coffee. She liked to think of herself as fearless, but she didn’t often break rules—and right now, with the new development in her case, she wasn’t feeling nearly as fearless as usual.
“You need to make your phone calls?”
“Eventually,” she said. She’d already checked for messages. Nothing from Everett, and an apology from Connor for not answering her call. He’d lost his phone and it had taken him a day to find it. And this was the guy in charge of recording grades for her classes.
They drank their coffee in silence, but it wasn’t an uncomfortable one. Every now and then Ty would glance at the box he’d set on the table beside them, frown and then look back at his coffee. Or at her, but those looks were fleeting, as if he was distracted.
“Is the package something you were expecting?” Madeline finally asked.
“I can honestly say no.”
He didn’t expand on the answer and Madeline didn’t ask any more questions. When he finished his coffee, he took his cup to the counter. “I’ll step outside if you want to make your calls.”
“You don’t have to,” she said, taking her phone out of her purse. She wasn’t going to discuss anything too private. She hoped.
“I haven’t heard anything,” Connor said when she called. “People are being quiet and I can’t exactly ask them what they know.”
“No,” Madeline agreed. Ty was near the door, leaning one shoulder against the wall as he read last week’s newspaper, giving her some privacy.
“Are you still coming back on the twenty-third? Or sooner?”
Madeline inhaled deeply. “I’ll talk to Everett.”
“Come back on the twenty-third,” Connor advised. “You’ll only go nuts here. And since you can’t work at the college, what will you do?”
“Visit my grandmother, who, by the way, figured everything out.”
“No!” Connor groaned. “It wasn’t me. I deflected her questions.”
“Body language, Connor. You have to work on your body language.”
“I didn’t—” He broke off with the same sputter that had told Eileen something was up.
“Never mind. We had a long talk. I’m to learn about the ranching business before I come home.”
“Good way to keep your mind occupied.”
Madeline glanced over at Ty, letting her gaze run down to his boots, then back up to his dark head. “Yeah,” she said with a slight frown. “Exactly.”
She dialed Everett next. “I halfway expected this,” he told her, shortly after saying hello. “I think the college will want to muddy the waters as much as possible to protect Jensen, allow him to keep that huge chunk of grant funding, as well as future grant funding. But…” he paused for lawyerly emphasis “…this will have no effect on the outcome of the case.”
“You’re sure? Or are you trying to stop me from flying across the country and camping in your office?”
“Both. Have some faith, Madeline. This is just more mental flogging from Dr. Mann. A power play.”
“You’re right.” And in a weird way that made Madeline feel better. All part of the process.
As soon as she set her phone on the table, Ty came back over. “Everything okay?”
She nodded slowly. “According to my lawyer this was to be expected.” She shrugged philosophically.
“You’ve never been in trouble before, have you?”
Madeline smiled slightly. “Not really.”
“I was probably in enough trouble for both of us when I was a kid.”
“You were a bad boy?” She tried to imagine Ty being bad. It wasn’t that difficult, since there was more to him than he let show, and he was serving her coffee that didn’t belong to him.
“An unsupervised boy, since Mom was working nights back then. But…I didn’t do anything other than normal kid stuff.”
“I didn’t even do that. Skip did, but I didn’t.” His face went blank at the mention of her brother’s name, as it always did.
Should she tell him that talking about Skip kept him alive in her heart? Suggest he try it?
One look at Ty’s closed-off expression gave her the answer to that question. No.
They put their cups on the counter, Ty slipped the five-dollar bill under one of them, then they got in the truck and drove the two blocks to the mercantile. Anne was at her post.
“Why aren’t you two at the park?” she demanded.
“We have other things to do,” Ty said easily. “How are you, Anne?”
The woman’s expression unexpectedly softened. “Not bad,” she muttered. “Yourself?”
Ty gave the woman that fleeting smile Madeline kind of wished she saw more of. “Hanging in.”
“You?” Anne said curtly to Madeline, who felt like a deer in the headlights.
“Uh, well. I’m doing well.”
Anne nodded and sat back down on her stool next to the cash register. She had a game of solitaire spread out on the shelf under the checkout counter. She waved a hand.
“You two better get your shopping done. I’m closing in half an hour to join in the festivities.”
Ty took a plastic basket off the stack and handed another to Madeline. She ended up filling two baskets while Ty filled five. It had apparently been a while since he’d been to a grocery store. Or anywhere, for that matter. To her knowledge, he’d left the ranch only once while she’d been there.
They loaded
their purchases in the back of the ex tended cab and Alvin happily jumped into the truck bed.
“Won’t he get cold?” Madeline asked.
“No colder than he’d get feeding.”
“Good point.”
As they pulled out of town, Madeline cast a wistful look toward several antique automobiles and two horse-drawn wagons in the park. There was a fire in the barbecue pit and people milled around holding drinks.
Ty briefly considered stopping, but when he saw folks starting to take their places on the homemade risers, he gave the truck some gas. No Christmas carols. Maybe in a year or two, but right now, with Skip’s sister next to him…no. All he needed was to wig out while she was there.
Madeline didn’t say a word, which made him feel even worse. But it wasn’t as if he could just drop her off at the park and pick her up again later. The sky was growing gray and another snowstorm was predicted for tonight. He needed to get home, take care of the cow, work on the grant.
And Madeline would do what?
Write her book, probably. How did she keep from going stir-crazy in that house all alone? Skip had had about a million things going on—calculating budgets, reading books on ranching techniques, learning to silversmith.
His half-finished spurs were still in the shed. Ty should give them to Madeline. He hadn’t known if she could handle it before, but she was dealing with grief a lot better than he was. Probably because her grief wasn’t tainted with guilt.
“You wanted to go to that Christmas party in the park, didn’t you?” He waited until he’d turned into the driveway before asking the question. It was the first words spoken during the entire forty-minute drive.
“I wanted to see what it was about.”
Ty pulled the truck to a stop, then half turned in his seat.
“How about I make it up to you?” he heard himself ask.
Stop now.
“How?” she asked.
Alarm bells continued to go off in his head, but unable to stop himself, he pressed on. “I’ll cook you some dinner.”
“Real non-microwave food?”
“I didn’t say that.”
Madeline laughed. He liked her laugh. It was husky, and the few times he’d heard it, it had taken him by surprise. Maybe because she was so uptight and serious most of the time that when she let go it drove home the point that there was another side of her.
“What time?”
“Six?” That would give him a few hours to regret giving in to himself.
“I’ll be there,” Madeline said, reaching for the door handle. She jumped out into the deep snow and started pulling her bags out of the back. Ty helped her, so it took only one trip.
“No longer locking the door?” he said when she twisted the knob and let them into the trailer.
She gave him a sidelong look. “I’ve gotten to where I trust my neighbors.”
TY’S HAIR WAS STILL DAMP from the shower when Madeline knocked on his back door, but he was dressed and ready to cook. It was the first time he’d cooked for anyone since Skip had died, and he was trying hard not to think about that.
Madeline took off her coat and draped it over the sofa. He pointed to a cabinet. “I have some wine if you want to pick out a bottle. Or there’s beer in the fridge.”“Wine?” Madeline arched an eyebrow.
“No Amuma,” he said as he tore lettuce into a bowl. “Just regular old house wine.”
“In that case, I’ll take a chance on the wine.”
Madeline opened the cupboard and pulled out a bottle of Spanish red.
“Glasses are over the stove.”
“Got a ladder?”
“I’ll get them as soon as I’m done with this,” he said.
Madeline ignored him and dragged a kitchen chair over to the stove and stood on it. “I’m kind of used to this,” she said. “Five foot two is a nice height to sing about, but a bit unhandy in the real world.”
“Five foot two, eyes of green?” Ty asked, as he finished dicing a tomato.
“I know. Doesn’t have the same ring as eyes of blue.”
“I like green eyes,” he said offhandedly. He was trying to be civil, but was edging into man-woman territory and needed to take a step back.
“Yeah?” Madeline asked as she stabbed the corkscrew into the top of the bottle.
“I’ll do that,” he said, dropping the knife and stepping closer.
“I can do it.” Madeline started working the cork out, a pout of concentration on her face as she turned the mechanism.
“Have at it.” He went to the oven.
“Smells good. Somehow I thought we’d have the classic guy meal.”
“Which is?”
“Steak, potatoes and salad.”
“We were this close,” he said, holding up his thumb and forefinger, “but all the steaks are frozen rock-hard and I hate defrosting them in the microwave. Destroys the texture.”
“And this is real lasagna?” she asked, pouring two jars of wine and then handing him one.
“Real as it gets…while still coming out of a box. But it isn’t in the microwave,” he said, gesturing to the oven.
“I would have settled for microwave food just to have a chance to eat somewhere other than in that trailer.”
“Lonely over there?” Of course it had to be lonely. He was used to this life. She wasn’t. But it wasn’t as if he hadn’t warned her.
“The place is a little stark.”
“I would think that all that starkness would be good for writing. No distractions.”
“It’s much better now that the ink in my pen is no longer freezing solid.”
She smiled at him over her glass. The same smile she’d smiled when she’d gunned the tractor, nearly knocking him off.
“I hear there’s a special ink antifreeze additive that will solve that problem if you ever run out of wood.”
Her smile widened, lighting her eyes. “I’ll have to look into it.” She sipped the wine she’d been swirling in her glass. “Not the same as Amuma.”
“No,” Ty agreed. “This wine doesn’t sneak up and knock you on your ass.”
The timer dinged and he took the lasagna out of the oven.
“Are you going to let it sit?”
“Nope.” Using a spatula, he started dividing portions.
“I’ll get the salad.”
It had been more than two years since Ty had shared a table with a woman, but he hadn’t forgotten how to go through the motions, refilling her glass, smiling when she said something funny—and Madeline could be surprisingly amusing.
“How was Sling Cow tonight?” she asked after he’d cleared the table. He was going to have to shoo her on home soon, before he did something stupid and dangerous, such as suggesting that they settle in for a movie on DVD.
“I think she’s improving. We’ll know tomorrow when Sam stops by.” Who is married, by the way. “I called him to come and take a look.”
Madeline swirled more than she drank, Ty noticed, and he vowed to do the same. He wanted to avoid loose lips, although he couldn’t exactly blame the wine for telling her she had nice eyes earlier, since he hadn’t had a drop at that time.
For a moment there, he’d forgotten the circumstances. Lonely guy. Attractive woman. Dinner. Etc.
Except that tonight held no etc. for him. Or her.
They would both do without, although he had to admit he was getting something out of the edgy feeling she gave him, and had a dangerous urge to surrender to it and push a little. See how Madeline would respond.
And then the guilt would smack him back.
If she’d been there under different circumstances, related to anyone else…
“What happens when you go back home?” he asked abruptly. The smile faded from her eyes. “I mean concerning your job. You have the hearing and then what?”
“After the inquiry hearing, there will be an investigative hearing. I was hoping to skip that step, but Everett, my lawyer, says it was inevitable. I only
hope I can teach my spring classes. Everett says I shouldn’t worry.”
“But you still do.”
“Of course I do,” she said. “I’ve worked hard to get where I am.”
Ty leaned back in his chair. “Can you tell me what happened? The articles were sketchy.”
“Not much to tell really.” She poured another glass of wine and offered the bottle to Ty. He shook his head.
Best to keep his wits about him.
“There’s a small isolated group of indigenous people in northern Canada. They gave blood samples to the university for tests. Very specific tests involving certain diseases. Dr. Jensen—and I don’t know how he got access—used some of the samples for other studies.”
“And that’s bad?”
“It is if the tribe didn’t give permission for that usage.
Giving blood doesn’t mean it can be tested for just any thing. Plus…Jensen discovered links to northern European races that counter the tribe’s traditional beliefs about their origins. He was very excited. They were not.”
“So it’s a big deal?”
“It could affect federal funding to the college. He shouldn’t have had the samples, shouldn’t have used them without permission.”
“How long ago did this happen?”
“He did the work two years ago. I got my position as associate professor a year and half ago, so I was still his assistant.”
“And the situation is just coming to light.”
“The work just got published. I don’t think he believed the tribe would notice, but he was wrong. It caused an uproar.”
“Did you suspect at all?”
Madeline’s chin went up as she regarded him through slightly narrowed eyes. “What do you think?”
“I think you’re the original Goody Two-Shoes, which is why you were so nervous about drinking coffee today without permission.”
“It showed?”
“It showed.” He felt himself getting sucked in again, wanting to respond to her in a way that he didn’t think his dead partner would approve of. Ty really wanted to reach out and touch her face, see what that silky dark hair felt like as it slid through his fingers. It’d been so long since he’d been with a woman, or even felt the warmth of connecting with someone. Why this woman?