Addicted to Love Read online

  A wall of fame. An illustrious heritage.

  “Maybe I should’ve gotten married,” he mused. “Had kids.”

  Marianne didn’t offer an opinion.

  “I had plenty of chances. I just never expected to get this old, this quick. I always thought I’d have time. Sow some wild oats before I settled down. Then again, how could I get married when I had a town to run? Valentine depended on me. Needed me. Especially after Daddy died.”

  He stopped pacing in front of his own photograph in the lineup. In the picture he was being hoisted up on the shoulders of his teammates, all the while tightly clutching the Texas State High School Championship football trophy. Back then he’d had a full head of hair, a lean body, and a thousand-watt smile. “Where’d the years go?”

  Marianne sighed.

  “This Amusement Corp deal is the only legacy I have to leave behind,” he said. “Other than the championship win. It’s gotta go through. The Amusement Corp representatives can’t show up in town on Wednesday and see that billboard in the shape it’s in.”

  Marianne barked.

  “You’re right. I’m probably overreacting about the billboard. I can get it cleaned up in time. But it’s not just the billboard. It’s that damned Giada Vito and the back-to-nature concepts she’s kicking up. What the hell is wrong with the woman? She has no idea what’s best for this town. She’s a foreigner for crissake.”

  But Kelvin knew what was best. His family had founded Valentine.

  He walked over to the pool table in the center of the room that held a mock-up of his vision for Valentine’s future. His plans had been a decade in the making and were finally coming to fruition.

  Squatting down to eye level, he admired the replica of a theme park the likes of which had never before been conceived. Valentine Land. The ultimate destination for fun-loving honeymooners. He flicked a switch on the plywood foundation and everything sprang to life.

  The Gone With the Wind roller coaster started up the incline. The My Fair Lady Tilt-a-Whirl twirled. The Pride and Prejudice waterslide gurgled. Strobe lights flashed in the It Happened One Night Tunnel of Love while the Camelot Carousel went round and round.

  And along with the theme park would come the Wentworth Airport, Wentworth Resort Hotels, and Wentworth Restaurants.

  Excitement coursed through Kelvin’s veins. Great-Grand-daddy had found oil and built this house. Granddaddy had constructed Wentworth Novelties and groomed it into the world’s largest supplier of Valentine’s Day novelties outside of China. Daddy had created Valentine Lake and started the annual Fish-A-Thon tournament to supply the local food bank.

  And now it was his turn.

  Kelvin was going down in history as the man who brought true prosperity to Valentine. He had Walt Disney dreams, and with Amusement Corp’s backing, he could make it happen.

  The telephone rang.

  Irritated at being interrupted, Kelvin straightened and went for the phone. The caller ID told him it was the sheriff. “What you want, Carlton?” he grunted.

  “Are you really serious about pressing charges against Rachael Henderson?”

  “Hell, yes, I am.” He had to nip her insurrection in the bud. He couldn’t have anti-romance sentiment floating round while trying to sell the town on Valentine Land.

  “Couldn’t she just agree to clean it up and let it go at that? There’s no reason to take this to court.”

  “My sign was vandalized, Sheriff. Do your job.”

  “Judge Pruitt is out of town until tomorrow. If you insist on pressing charges, Rachael is going to have to spend the night in jail.”

  “Boo hoo. Tough luck. She should have thought about that before she went and painted up my billboard.”

  “You’re being a hard-ass for no reason.”

  “She defaced a local landmark.”

  “It’s not like it’s the first time someone’s taken a potshot at the sign.”

  “She’s a negative influence. I’d think you’d be more concerned about her disrespect for our hometown.”

  “Okay, Mayor, you have every legal right to press charges, but I want to go on record here. I think you’re being a jackass.”

  “Thanks for your opinion. Now why don’t you take it and a buck fifty and head on over to Higgy’s Diner and buy yourself a cup of coffee. I’ll drop by to file an official complaint right after church.”

  BRODY SLAMMED THE phone down on his desk and muttered an oath under his breath.

  His only full-time deputy Zeke Frisco’s wife had given birth last night to their first child. The baby was five weeks early, putting Brody at a disadvantage. His two part-time deputies had taken their summer vacations together in order to be off when Zeke went on paternity leave. The dispatcher, Jamie Johnston, was a single mom who worked nine to three Monday through Friday so she could take her kids to school and pick them up afterward without having to hire a babysitter.

  Damn Kelvin and his insistence on pressing charges. If the Wentworths hadn’t owned the land where the sign was erected, he would have told the mayor he could stuff it.

  As it was, he’d had no choice but to arrest Rachael.

  Hands down, the hardest part of his job was putting up with the mayor. There wasn’t much crime in Valentine. Occasionally one of the regulars at Leroy’s Bar on the outskirts of town would kick up a fuss and Brody would have to lock him in the drunk tank overnight. Or he’d have to haul someone in on a warrant for child support violations or unpaid traffic tickets. Once in a rare while there would be a few petty thefts or shoplifting incidents or he’d catch some high school kid selling weed from the trunk of his car. But most of the time things were pretty peaceful in his hometown and that’s the way he liked it. He’d had enough excitement in Iraq to last a lifetime.

  Kelvin was the only thing that got under his skin. That and his insecurities over his leg. He was determined to be a good sheriff in spite of his handicap.

  Don’t let Wentworth get to you.

  Good advice. Now if he could just heed it.

  Of course, the real source of his problem was the woman in the wedding gown sitting in lockup.

  Inexplicably, his gut tightened as he remembered just how good it had felt to have her firm thighs wrapped around his waist. He still couldn’t believe she was the same kid who used to live next door to him all those years ago.

  Nor could he believe the way his body had responded to her. He hadn’t felt much in the way of sexual interest since Belinda had taken off with another man. It had been over two years and while he’d gotten over her betrayal, he knew he still wasn’t ready to lay his heart open again.

  Lay your heart open? Hell, you’re just horny. That’s all it is.

  But deep down inside, he feared that wasn’t true. He was lonely and he missed the good parts about being married. The long talks, the intimacy, the fun times.

  Love’s not worth the risk.

  He took a deep breath and pushed his hands through his hair. If he tilted his head, he could see through his open door to the jail beyond. Rachael sat behind bars, her head cradled in her palms.

  Sympathy kicked him. He hated this but he had no choice. He had to go tell her she’d be spending the night in jail.

  “HOW YOU HOLDING UP?”

  Rachael sat on the cement jail slab amid the billowy taffeta of her paint-smeared wedding dress. She raised her chin to see Brody Carlton walk over to stand in front of her jail cell, his leather shoes creaking against the cement, his hands on his hips just above the holster of his gun. He looked amused.

  “You think this is funny?” she snapped.

  “I didn’t say that.”

  “You’re smirking.”

  “I’m not smirking.”

  “You are.”

  “Okay, maybe I am a little,” he said, “but you’ve got to admit, it’s sort of funny.”

  She glared. “It’s not the least bit funny.”

  He wiped the smile from his mouth, but not from his eyes. “Can’t say I�
�ve ever seen a bride behind bars.”

  “What’s the matter with you,” she scolded, “enjoying the tragedy of another?”

  “You call this a tragedy?” he growled, the expression in his eyes suddenly flashing from teasing tolerance to borderline anger. “Princess, come down out of your ivory tower. You have no idea what real tragedy is.”

  She remembered something her mother had told her about him in passing. Brody had been sent to Iraq. He’d been wounded and won some kind of medal for bravery. But that’s all she knew about him. She hadn’t even known he was the new sheriff. She hadn’t paid much attention to Selina’s gossip about Valentine in the years after she’d moved away. She’d been too busy repeatedly falling in love with all the wrong guys. And she hadn’t been back home for a long time. Usually her parents came to see her in Houston, or they all gathered at her younger sister’s home in San Antonio. Hannah was married and had two babies.

  Humiliation burned in her chest over what she’d just said to him. The man was a war hero. He’d seen real tragedy.

  Oh God, she was so selfish.

  “You’re right,” Rachael admitted, shamefaced. “It was a stupid thing to say. I was just feeling sorry for myself. I know this is a problem of my own making.”

  “You’re upset.”

  He’d come closer and was now leaning against the bars with his hands on his hips, elbows thrust out, studying her like an anthropologist in the Outback. As if she were some curious creature who’d caught his attention. But it was a clinical, controlled interest devoid of personal feelings.

  He’s learned how to step outside himself, she realized. To detach from whatever emotionally chaotic situation he found going on around him. A handy skill. One she’d do well to emulate.

  But instead of emulating his calm, cool manner, she found herself remembering what it had felt like straddling his hard, muscular body after they’d fallen from the ladder together. She recalled the tumble and the disconcerting thrill that had shot through her. The same thrill that — whenever she experienced it — had always signaled potential romance.

  She’d managed to ignore it at the time, to thrust it from her mind. But now, looking at Brody’s hard, lean frame, she was finding it very difficult to forget. He reminded her of the actor Matthew Fox. He played the character of Jack Shepard on the television show Lost: moral, principled, self-contained, not to mention a stone-cold hottie.

  Rachael couldn’t stop her gaze from drifting over him. She could smell his scent from here. Manly — all leather and gunpowder overlaying the aroma of clean soap. Stupidly, she found herself wondering if he tasted as masculine as he smelled. He possessed a strong, stubborn jaw and dark enigmatic eyes. The look he gave her seemed to say, I know all your secrets; you can’t hide anything from me.

  Rachael gulped. Not that she’d ever been any good at hiding her feelings.

  He was tall. Well over six feet. A tower compared to her own five-foot-three inches. His dark brown hair was clipped short. Not quite a military cut, but not much longer. His tan uniform fit him to perfection. The sleeves of his shirt and the creases of his pants were crisply starched. Even in the muted jail lighting, the badge on his chest gleamed smartly. Give the man a black mask and a white horse, and he could pass for the Lone Ranger.

  Involuntarily, Rachael licked her lips.

  He was as tempting to her as a double scotch on the rocks was to a boozehound. Just looking at him had her spinning happily-ever-after daydreams.

  Stop it!

  She had a very serious problem. Fantasizing about a new guy the day after the old guy had stood her up at the altar.

  Warped. She was warped.

  Brody’s not new. He’s the very first guy you ever spun romantic fantasies about.

  Yeah, and look where that had gotten her.

  “Um,” she said, “I need to use the bathroom and I have the most awful feeling that hole in the floor is where I’m expected to go.”

  A look of pity crossed his face. That irritated her more than his amusement. She didn’t need his pity.

  “I’ll let you use my private restroom,” he said, taking the jail keys from his pocket and opening the door. “And I’ve brought you a sandwich from Higgy’s.”

  Her mouth watered but she wasn’t going to let him know she appreciated his kindness. “Don’t do me any favors,” she muttered.

  He arched an eyebrow. “You want to use the hole?”

  “No, no.”

  The amusement was back on his lips.

  Okay, he was officially making it easy for her to swear off men forever.

  “This way.” He took her elbow and guided her out of the cell. His fingers were calloused. His grip strong. Rachael felt something twist inside her. Something she couldn’t name curled against the wall of her chest. She caught her breath, suddenly afraid to breathe.

  Brody led her through the main lobby and back into his office. His shoulder brushed against hers. Rachael’s skin tingled beneath his touch. Unnerved by the sensation, she felt her muscles coil up tight. This was ridiculous.

  He shut the door behind them, indicated a second door on the other side of the room. “Don’t get any ideas about escaping.”

  “You think I could shimmy out a window in this getup?” she asked, fluffing the skirts of her wedding gown.

  “You climbed up on a billboard in it.”

  “You’ve got a point,” she said and went into the bathroom.

  A few minutes later, she emerged to find him lounging against the desk, arms folded across his chest. The thought that he’d overheard her in the bathroom made her cheeks burn.

  “Eat your sandwich,” he said, kicking a rolling chair over for her.

  Rachael sat down on the other side of his desk, grateful for the ham-and-cheese sandwich on a plate covered with plastic wrap, along with a pickle and a scoop of potato salad. There was also a plastic glass filled to the brim with ice-cold sweet tea.

  She was starving. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d eaten. After Trace had left her at the altar, she’d taken off without thinking, without changing clothes, without even stopping for food. She’d hopped in her VW Bug and driven the four hundred miles from Houston to Valentine through the dark of night — with only a slight detour to Wal-Mart for the black paint — bent on annihilating that damned billboard because it represented a decade of bad dates, broken hearts, and shattered dreams.

  She tore into the sandwich and Brody sat down opposite her. “So,” she said between bites, “how long you been sheriff?”

  “A few months. Ever since Mel Hartly got sick and I was elected his replacement.”

  “Aren’t you kind of young to be a sheriff?”

  He shrugged.

  “It’s the war vet thing, right?”

  “I don’t like to talk about it.”

  She studied him over the rim of her glass. “I heard you got some kind of a medal.”

  “That’s talking about it.”

  “It might help if you discussed it.”

  “Does talking about getting dumped at the altar help you?”

  He had her there. “No.”

  “Glad we settled that.”

  Rachael polished off the rest of her sandwich. “Hey, you remember that time we climbed the chinaberry tree in your front yard and I got stuck and you had to help me down?”

  “Vaguely,” he said.

  “Seems like you’re making a habit of helping me climb down when I get myself up a tree. I wanted to say thanks for getting me off that billboard in one piece. Thanks for the chinaberry tree, too.”

  He grinned. “Don’t mention it.”

  She dusted off her fingertips. “So when can I get out of here?”

  “Not until tomorrow morning. Judge Abigail’s out of town. She’ll be back to arraign you at ten.”

  Panic took hold of her then. “What? I’m going to have to spend the night here? Just for painting the billboard?”

  “I couldn’t talk the mayor out of pre
ssing charges.”

  Her eyes stung. She swallowed hard. “Don’t I get a phone call?”

  “You do.”

  “Can I make it now?”

  He nodded, plucked the receiver from the phone on his desk, and extended it toward her.

  Rachael started to reach for the phone, but stopped midway. Who was she going to call? She was furious at her parents. Trace was on his way to Chicago. She certainly wasn’t going to alarm her sister, Hannah. Immediately, she thought of her three best friends, all of whom had been at the wedding: Delaney, Tish, and Jillian. But Delaney and Tish both had little kids. She couldn’t ask them to drive four hundred miles to bail her out of jail. And Jillian, well, much as she loved her, Jillian was such a cynic when it came to love she would probably get a huge kick out of the whole thing.

  But what choice did she have? It was either Jillian or her parents and she wasn’t speaking to them.

  Taking in a deep breath, she spun around in the swivel chair until her back was to Brody and placed the call, all the while extremely aware of the heat of his gaze burning the nape of her neck.

  “Samuels.” Jillian answered the phone on the second ring in her usual clipped, no-nonsense style.

  “Jilly?” She was alarmed to hear her voice sounding so shaky. “It’s Rachael.”

  “Rach! Where are you? Everyone is worried sick. You just took off without a word to anyone. Your parents are frantic. Have you called them?”

  “No! And don’t you tell them that I called you.”

  “Rachael,” Jillian chided gently. “It’s not like you to be so inconsiderate.”

  Well, it wasn’t like Jillian — who often wore steel-toed army boots when it came to other people’s feelings — to scold Rachael for being insensitive. That hurt.

  “I’m sick of it, Jilly. My parents, my town, the media, advertising. Force-feeding me romance for twenty-six years when it’s all just a load of bull . . . ” Rachael paused to take a deep breath.