The Sheriff's Son Read online

  Normally, she would curl up in a chair in the conversation area with a book she had saved for just such a time. Today, she couldn’t seem to settle anywhere.

  By midafternoon, black clouds had gathered overhead, turning the bookstore gloomy. The sheet of plywood over the one window only made it worse.

  Once in a while, thunder rumbled in the distance.

  Though she tried not to look at the clock, her gaze kept straying to the unstoppable hour hand that slowly but surely moved her closer to the time she dreaded. Half of her, for Kevin’s sake, wanted Tanner to show up. The other half, again for Kevin’s sake, hoped he would never darken her doorstep again.

  She couldn’t even begin to think about what she wanted for herself.

  Since Saturday, she had struggled with her promise to herself to keep a firm hold on her emotions. Impossible. How could she get a grip on her feelings when they changed so rapidly, she couldn’t even identify them?

  Things had gone from bad to unbelievable Monday evening, when she had come home from making her rounds to find Tanner waiting for her.

  Once they’d found the baseball, the broken window didn’t upset her too much—except for the expense of replacing it. What bothered her was having Tanner so close to her again.

  And, worse yet, her reaction to him.

  His search of her home should have felt like an invasion of privacy. But he had visited there so often, years ago, had spent so much time in those rooms, had practically lived there, for heaven’s sake, that his presence Monday evening felt normal. Expected. Right.

  So did their goodbye at the doorway, and his hand gently touching her face. The only thing missing was him taking her by the arms, looking into her eyes, and bending down to kiss her.

  And what reaction would she have had to that?

  She just didn’t know—again, those emotions she couldn’t identify.

  At last, three o’clock came. The school bus arrived.

  And Tanner showed up.

  Kevin, who’d walked into the bookstore only minutes ahead of him, stared at the brown paper sack Tanner carried under one arm. “Whatcha got there?”

  Before Sarah could say a word, Tanner laughed. “Curious, aren’t you, kid?” He reached into the sack.

  A moment later, Kevin stared down openmouthed at the baseball mitt Tanner held out to him. “That’s for me?”

  “Well…it’s for a lefty like me, but it won’t fit my hand. And you’re the only other lefty around here, aren’t you? Guess it must be yours.”

  “Wow!”

  Her heart plummeted to her toes at the glow in her son’s eyes. And at the mention of another physical similarity between the two of them. It couldn’t be long now before Tanner put all the clues together, and then what would she do?

  “Mom, can I go outside?” Kevin looked at her, wide-eyed.

  She hesitated, then nodded. Anything to get him away from Tanner right now.

  “All right! Let’s go.” Kevin jogged toward the door.

  “In a minute. You start loosening up that glove.”

  So much for her hopes of separating them.

  Once Kevin left, Tanner turned back to her.

  She crossed her arms and stared at him. “I don’t know that you ought to be giving him gifts—”

  “The glove he’s using isn’t worth the leather left in it.”

  “I can buy him whatever he needs.” Outside, thunder boomed, as if Mother Nature mocked her. She winced. The statement had been true enough; she could still afford the necessities. For now. It was only the extras, like gloves and bats and balls, she couldn’t give Kevin.

  Tanner narrowed his eyes. “No sense riding your high horse about it, Sarah. He’s already got the thing. You wouldn’t make me take it back from him?”

  No, she couldn’t do that.

  “Besides, he’ll need it for the baseball game Saturday.”

  “What game?”

  “The one we’re having at Dillon High after we finish painting at the grade school.”

  She blinked. “When I saw Sam Porter on Monday morning, he didn’t tell me you planned to help out. And he didn’t mention anything about a game.”

  “Sam didn’t know about all that until today.”

  She nodded slowly. “Let me guess. You had a hand in the arrangements?”

  “You got it.”

  But she hadn’t gotten it. “I don’t see the point of involving yourself in a baseball game. What does that have to do with why you’re in Dillon?”

  “A lot, when it comes to finding out about our vandals.” He put his hands on the counter and leaned forward. “Sam originally intended the painting as punishment for certain kids, but he doesn’t care who helps out—he just wants the fence painted. So I talked to a bunch of the high school kids at lunch today, including some who could be our likeliest candidates. Convinced a few of them to join the painting party, too, in exchange for potluck and the baseball game after.”

  “The high school students agreed?”

  “Hell, they jumped at the offer. Seems like they’re all looking for something to do around here.”

  Once again, she couldn’t find fault with Tanner’s efforts if they led to discovering the vandals. And to him leaving town.

  Why didn’t that thought please her as much as it had a few days ago? As much as it should?

  “Also,” he continued, “I ran into Doc and Mrs. G at Delia’s earlier, gave them an updated report.”

  “About?”

  He frowned. “Trouble out at Charlie’s spread. Somebody took out a few rails in the far west pasture, let several dozen of his cattle loose.”

  “Not rustlers?” she asked in alarm. Bad news, if so, for any rancher. For all of Dillon.

  He shook his head. “The cattle’s accounted for, anyway.”

  Her turn to frown. “You’re sure they didn’t just ram some weak fencing?” It happened.

  “Even a stampeding herd wouldn’t leave saw marks behind. And there’s an odd coincidence…we found bicycle tracks nearby. Make you think of any other kid’s toy we found lately?”

  “Wait a minute! You can’t blame this one on Kevin, either, Tanner, no matter how much you try. We don’t own a saw. And, even on his bicycle, he’d never make it out to Charlie’s place.”

  Tanner glared. “I was trying to say maybe you had the right idea about some other kids breaking your window.”

  “Oh.” She swallowed hard. “I—”

  “Older kids. Things are escalating. I’m doubling the watches, as of right now. Mrs. G’s setting up a Town Hall meeting tonight at seven. You’ll be there?”

  If she didn’t go, no doubt he’d enjoy having full control.

  Another boom of thunder rattled the windows. Lightning flared, brightening the room for a second.

  She glanced toward the front of the store. “I’d better get Kevin.”

  “I’ll yell for him. If you’re pulling him in, I should be on my way, anyhow. We’ll throw the ball around another time.” He went toward the front door.

  Sarah thought quickly. She had an errand to run on the outskirts of town that evening to one of her best customers, an elderly widow who lived alone and didn’t get out much. Sarah made deliveries on a monthly basis, honoring the agreement Daddy had set up with the widow long ago. But the trip wouldn’t take much time. She could close up shop as usual, be out and back before the meeting started.

  Her son bounded down the steps and into the store, grinning eagerly. He punched the mitt Tanner had given him, then held it up for inspection. “I’m breaking it in real good. See? You ready to go out?”

  “Not tonight, honey,” Sarah told him. “Deputy Jones has work to do.”

  “We’re gonna play ball.” He glowered at her, his lower lip set in a pout. Crossing his arms over his chest, he turned his back on her and faced Tanner. “You said so.”

  “Kevin!”

  Tanner frowned. “That’s no attitude, kid. Think one of your Houston Astros would talk
to his manager that way and finish out the game?”

  Kevin’s head drooped, and one of his sneakers scuffed against the floor.

  “Listen to your mom. It’s starting to storm out there, and she wants you inside.”

  “Aw…” After heaving a huge sigh, he started trudging toward the corner of the store. “Mom never lets me do anything.”

  “Kevin Lindstrom!”

  Without looking back at her, he ran up the stairs.

  Blinking hard, she stared at the pile of books in front of her.

  “Sarah.” Tanner reached over to cover her hand with his. “Don’t let that backtalk rattle you. He’s just a kid. He’ll get over it. Someday.”

  But would she?

  What was wrong with her?

  She pulled her hand free. “I…need to go up to him,” she said stiffly. “I’ll see you at the meeting tonight.”

  He nodded and left the bookstore, accompanied by another twin punch of thunder and lightning.

  Tears prickled behind her eyes. What kind of mother was she? Instead of worrying this week about her mixed-up emotions, instead of letting the past overtake her, she should have focused her attention on her son.

  The son she felt slipping slowly away from her.

  Not only had she stood there nearly speechless when he sassed her openly in front of Tanner, she had held back and let the man discipline her son.

  Maybe she’d been shocked, because Kevin’s behavior had seemed so improved lately. Did she have Tanner’s influence to thank for that?

  Just moments ago, Kevin had listened to Tanner, had accepted the man’s lecture almost without fuss. Yet, when she had called after him, he had ignored her. Had run away from her.

  Like father, like son?

  She had lost Tanner long ago.

  She had already lost Kevin, too, in one sense, with his change from the sweet, innocent child she had raised.

  Was she now about to lose him entirely to Tanner?

  Chapter Ten

  A burst of lightning lit up the meeting room at Town Hall. The threatened storm had hit full force, sending down buckets of windswept rain that rattled the windows and door.

  Tanner looked at his watch for the nine-hundredth time since he’d had to start the meeting without Sarah.

  What the hell had happened to her?

  He went over to where Doc and Mrs. G sat at the head table.

  “Doesn’t she have a cellphone?” he asked.

  “Nope,” Doc said. “You’ll find them out on the ranches often enough nowadays, but a lot of folks living in town don’t have them. Wherever they go, there’s a phone within reach.”

  Mrs. G nodded. “Sarah makes sure she and Kevin know each other’s whereabouts. She always says she doesn’t need a cellphone.”

  And, he’d bet, couldn’t afford one.

  Doc looked calm as ever, but Tanner knew the man well. The way he worried the chain of his pocket watch told the true story. And with her narrowed eyes and pinched lips, Mrs. G didn’t bother to hide her concern. Even Logan, who’d come up to join them, looked puzzled.

  Mrs. G glanced at the two men, then stared at Tanner again.

  He got the hint. “Think you can wrap up this meeting without me?”

  His old platoon sergeant couldn’t have been any better at urging him into motion. And he couldn’t have followed orders with any less speed.

  Something—call it intuition, premonition, nerves…hell, call it plain old-fashioned horse sense—told him Sarah would never have bailed out on the meeting without letting someone know.

  Unless she’d run into a problem.

  Out in the County car, he slung his dripping Stetson onto the floor and cranked the engine. He grabbed for the radio, same time as he shifted into gear. If Dispatch had nothing, he’d start with her house, move on to the rest of the property and then widen his search to the general area.

  He’d barely pulled away from Town Hall when the report came back to him. No emergency calls from anywhere in Dillon.

  No one answered the doorbell at The Book Cellar. The building sat locked up tight, front and back. The water-soaked plywood nailed across the front window held up to his inspection. Windows all secure.

  An uneasy feeling ran through him. Same actions, different evening. Monday night, after he’d seen that broken window and gone through these same motions, Sarah had come strolling along Main Street. He doubted she would tonight. Nobody in their right mind would be out walking on a night like this.

  Besides, looked like wherever she’d gone, she’d taken the old station wagon. Usually, she parked it in the narrow unpaved alley beside the bookstore. The driving rain had already churned the bare ground there into a mud puddle. No way of telling how long the spot had sat empty.

  His weatherproofed uniform jacket kept the cold rain from seeping inside it, but a chill worked its way through.

  Where the hell was she? Had she taken Kevin with her?

  Frowning, he tramped back to the cruiser, oblivious to deep, muddy puddles.

  He started with the streets of Dillon proper, but found no sign of the station wagon pulled into a driveway, parked in a lot or left on a street.

  Broadening his search area, he started cruising the roads to the outlying ranches, pushed by the desire to find her. To talk to her. To settle his uneasy conscience.

  Since Monday night, seeing her bills, putting the evidence of her financial struggles together, he’d felt weighed down by a heavy load of guilt.

  How could he explain to Sarah what had come over him all those years ago? And tell her in a way that would make her forgive him? If she ever could…

  Near the outskirts of town, he reached an especially rough stretch of unpaved road. Straining to follow his headlights through the sluicing rain, he steered slowly around a pothole big enough to swallow a calf. With luck, all the free-roaming animals in the area would have sense enough to go around it, too.

  His thoughts went back to Sarah. And Kevin.

  She sure as hell didn’t like the way her boy had taken to him.

  His own reaction to that had come as a surprise. Before he’d realized it, the kid had grown on him. He liked the snaggle-toothed grin. The dogged way the boy practiced to get those swings and pitches where he wanted them. Even the way he swallowed his pride after his mom or Tanner had to bring him down a peg or two.

  Kevin could so easily be his and Sarah’s.

  A crazy idea? Or just wishful thinking again?

  A few hundred yards along, he swung around another pothole, and his headlights picked out a moving figure ahead. He squinted through the rain, trying to make it out. Not a calf. Not a pet. But a person.

  Sarah.

  He shoved the gearshift into Park, threw open the door and jumped from the car. The deluge that instantly drenched him might have been a light mist compared to the relief washing over him.

  She squinted at the glare of the headlights. Rain ran from the tip of her braided hair, dripped from the hem of her dress.

  Two more strides through the mud, and he’d reached her.

  Without thinking, without stopping to reason, without giving a damn about how she’d react, he threw his arms around her. When she shivered against him, he tightened his hold. The wide brim of his Stetson shielded her head from the rain.

  She lifted her face up to his. “Oh, Tanner!”

  If she’d planned to say more, he’d never know it. The sight of her wide eyes, pale face and trembling lips did him in. All he could think about was warming her mouth. And what better way, than with his?

  He lowered his head and found her lips, cool and wet and slick with rain. A shiver went through him now, and he molded his body to hers. He groaned, already hard. Her answering moan got him harder. He pulled her closer still, wanting her to feel what she had done to him.

  “Tan-ner…” As he rocked her hips with his, the whispered name ended in a growl.

  He slid his hands around and up, wedging them between their bodies to cup h
er breasts. Dress and bra, wet as they were, might have been gone altogether when he brushed against her nipples.

  She gasped. “Tanner…what…are you doing?”

  “You don’t know yet?” He smiled against her mouth. “Maybe I need to do more.”

  Hell, he wanted to peel off all their wet clothes and have his girl, here. And now.

  A violent tremor went through her. Gasping, she pulled away, her teeth chattering. “N-no. The party’s over, Tanner. I’ve g-got to get out of this rain.”

  Unwilling to let Sarah go, he wrapped his arm around her and turned her toward the cruiser.

  STILL SHIVERING, SARAH stood beside the car as Tanner swung open the rear door.

  “Here, climb in. I’ve got some extra clothes in the trunk.”

  “I d-don’t need them.”

  “Sure, you do. You don’t want to catch your death in those wet things, do you?”

  And need an appointment with Doc? “N-no.” Teeth still chattering, she slid into the rear seat and slammed the door closed behind her. Though Tanner had left the car’s engine running, he must not have had the heater on, and she felt even more chilled now.

  Had she been warmer out in the rain because of his arms around her? Because of what he had done to her? What she had let him do to her?

  As she shivered again, a tear trickled from the corner of her eye. She brushed at her face. The tear blended with the raindrops, as shame mixed with longing inside her.

  Her hand strayed to her lips, still tender from Tanner’s kisses.

  He slammed the trunk closed. She jumped.

  The rear door opened, and he dropped a pile of clothing on the seat beside her before shutting the door again. A nice, warm, thick sweatshirt sat on top of the heap. She might as well change clothes. She couldn’t afford a bout with pneumonia.

  As she reached for the top button on her dress, the driver’s door opened, and the overhead light came on. Tanner slid onto the seat.

  She dropped her hands to her lap. “What are you doing?”

  He looked over his shoulder, his brows raised. “Sitting here.”

  “I’m changing clothes.”

  “No kidding. Doesn’t mean I should stay out in the rain.”