Wild Iris Ridge. RaeAnne Thayne

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      “Sorry I called you an idiot,” he muttered.

      “Sorry you said it or sorry I happened to walk in just in time to overhear you?”

      “Does it matter?”

      To his surprise, she smiled a little, though she still had that unsettled, restless look in her eyes. “Not really, I suppose. Nicely done, Chief Caine.”

      Even big, dumb jocks could use good manners at times, especially when their Pop was standing close enough for a good whack on the knuckles with a wooden spoon.

      “So. This is how the fire chief unwinds after an exciting night of serving and protecting the good people of Hope’s Crossing.”

      “Sometimes. It’s been a long shift and I’m starving. I didn’t feel like cooking breakfast for myself or pouring a bowl of cereal. Since I already missed seeing the kids off to school this morning, I figured, why not?”

      He wondered, not for the first time, why he always felt compelled to defend his actions around her.

      “If I had a father like yours, I would come here every morning for breakfast.”

      He didn’t miss the slightly wistful tone in her voice. Her home life hadn’t been great, he knew, though only secondhand. Jess hadn’t shared too many details but he knew Lucy’s parents divorced when she was a girl, and she hadn’t had a good relationship with her father’s second wife.

      “How is Iris House?” Lucy asked now. “Do you think it’s safe for me to return?”

      Though she spoke casually, he sensed an undercurrent of urgency that gave him pause. What was the big rush? She had spent the four months since Annabelle died basically ignoring her legacy. Why was she in a hurry now to stay there? First she showed up after midnight to a dark, cold, locked house when any logical person would have gone to a hotel, now she was trying to hurry along the investigation.

      Some tiny part of him was tempted to drag the investigation out as long as possible in the hopes that any further complication would make her turn around and head back to Seattle, but that would have been petty and small.

      “You should be fine. We’ve had our inspector go through it from top to bottom and everything appears in order. All the chimneys could use a thorough scrubbing before you use them. I can get you the name of a couple of chimney sweeps in town.”

      “That would be good. Thanks.”

      “I relit the pilot light, so you ought to have no trouble running the furnace at this point. You’ll want to keep the windows open throughout the day to vent any lingering smoke. Should be a nice, sunny day for it.”

      “I’ll do that.”

      “Most of the smoke damage seemed to be centered in that den area. You may want to have a cleaning company come in to do a professional job. Sometimes the smell can linger for a long time. I can get you a few of those numbers, too.”

      She wore an expression of vague surprise, as if she hadn’t expected him to be helpful. “Again. Thank you.”

      “You’re welcome.”

      They lapsed into an awkward sort of silence and he wondered once more why she had come back to town. This close, he could see a return of that fine-edged tension in the set of her mouth and the way she clasped a napkin tightly, as if to keep it from wriggling away.

      “How long are you staying in Hope’s Crossing?” he finally asked. “I’ve had a half-dozen people ask me that already, including Pop.”

      “Why would people automatically assume you know anything about my plans?”

      “The very question I have asked myself numerous times, believe me.”

      Her mouth lifted a little at the corner and he almost thought she wanted to smile but she only picked up her coffee again.

      “So?” he pressed.

      “I...haven’t decided.”

      He leaned back on the stool. “Now that doesn’t sound like the Lucy Drake we all know. You’re the woman with the plan, right? Always looking for the best angle, the next big thing.”

      Her fingers tightened around that recalcitrant napkin. “Not always,” she muttered.

      Yeah. Something was definitely up. He remembered that strange impression of the night before, that she was lost and even a little frightened.

      He didn’t like the sudden urge washing over him to wrap a comforting arm around her shoulder and tell her everything would be okay. That was more Dermot’s venue, not his. He was just the dumb jock who was once married to her cousin.

      And who had once shared a couple pretty heated kisses with Lucy, long before he ever started dating Jess.

      He pushed that memory back into the deep recesses of his brain, right where it belonged. He had done his best for more than a decade to forget about that night.

      “I thought NexGen couldn’t get along without their hotshot marketing director. You don’t have some kind of vitally important meeting to get back to in a day or two?”

      She was now not so much fidgeting with her napkin as mangling it beyond recognition. “NexGen and I have...parted ways. I’m taking a small vacation to consider my options. A few weeks. A month. I haven’t decided.”

      “Here?”

      It was a stupid question, but he was so shocked that he couldn’t think what else to say.

      He figured when it came to jobs, people fell into four basic categories. Some hated them vehemently, others tolerated them, still others found great satisfaction in what they did. And then there was the fourth category, those passionate few who were basically defined by their vocation.

      That was Lucy—and as a result, she had been amazingly successful for someone just barely on the north side of thirty.

      Jessica used to always talk about what Lucy had achieved, her awards and honors and status. Sometimes his wife would glow with pride when she talked about Lucy. Other times she would be terse and moody after hearing about how far and how high Lucy had climbed in such a short time.

      During those dark times, he wondered if she regretted her decision to marry him just a few years out of college and to give up her teaching career temporarily while the kids were young.

      He hoped not. For the rest of their lives, his children would be without their mother. He would always be deeply grateful they had those first uninterrupted years with her.

      “I needed a change of scenery,” Lucy answered. “And since I’ve been putting off dealing with the house, I figured now was a good time.”

      He might not like Lucy much, given their complicated history, but he knew a little about loss. Leaving the job she had loved must be very difficult for her.

      “Are you...doing okay?”

      “You mean, am I going to be forced to live out of a grocery cart and a refrigerator box? СКАЧАТЬ