Chapter 14 #2
It wasn’t a tentative kiss. It wasn’t a question. They’d already figured out the answer and had both been waiting for a chance to share it.
She tasted like coffee with cream and sugar and a hint of salt that he understood, with a small ache, was probably the last of her tears.
When they pulled apart, his hand stayed at her jaw and she gripped his shirt a beat longer than they needed to.
“Oh my,” she said softly.
“Yeah.”
She let out a small, breathless laugh. “I was not expecting this to be how my morning went.”
“Same.”
She let go of his shirt and smoothed the wrinkles she’d made with both hands, lightly stroking his chest. She didn’t step back. He didn’t either.
“You’re not going to apologize for that, right?” she asked carefully.
“No, ma’am. Are you?”
“Nope.”
“All right then.”
“All right.”
He gazed into her eyes and she gazed right back.
He didn’t see the slightest hint of regret, and relief flooded him, not only because she was glad they’d kissed, but also because he wasn’t as broken and unlovable as he’d thought.
A tiny bubble of elation started to build at the base of his ribcage, expanding tentatively as he realized having a life partner and a family might just be attainable after all.
His phone buzzed in his pocket. He ignored it. It buzzed again to announce another message, and a third time.
On the fourth buzz, Tessa said, “I think you need to check your messages.”
“I’m not ruining a relationship again by prioritizing my work to the exclusion of the person I—” he broke off, stopping himself from uttering the L word. It was too soon for that. “The person I care about,” he finished lamely.
A startled look entered her eyes. She obviously knew what he’d stopped himself from blurting out. But then she smiled gently. “I admire the work you do and your dedication to it. I want you to help animals who are suffering and in pain, Dillon. Please answer your phone. For me.”
Shocked, he said bluntly, “Are you just saying that to be nice?”
“No. I’m not. I’m saying it because I remember how panicked I was the first time I called you and asked for help. I desperately needed you to come save me and to save Fern’s animals from me.”
“You would’ve figured it out eventually on your own, and the critters would’ve been none the worse for it.”
“Still, when a pet owner or rancher calls you, they need you. Of course, you have to drop whatever else you’re doing and go to them.
It doesn’t bother me now, and I can’t imagine it bothering me a year from now or ten years from now.
” She added tartly, “Which is a nice way of me saying I’m not your former wife and I have no intention of becoming her. ”
“Thank God for that.”
His phone buzzed yet again.
He sighed and pulled it out, scanning his voicemails.
Bonnie Watson needed him to swing by. The puppy was scratching at its ear again.
Pete Maddox reported that Hope was gaining weight and mama was fine.
Reno texted, Somewhere outside Idaho Falls, the desk clerk has a rooster in the lobby, send help.
Then Reno again. Am told it’s just a chicken. Is that better?
He scrubbed a hand over his face.
“Any emergencies?” Tessa asked calmly, as if it wouldn’t faze her if there was one and it called him away.
“No emergencies. Just my brother being . . . himself.”
“The corporate-attorney-turned-clown brother?”
“That’s the one. He’s coming to Cobbler Cove today, actually. To look at the alleged letter from Fern. Should be at my place by three.”
“You called him?”
“I told you I would. I talked with him the same day you found out about the challenge to Fern’s will and the fake letter. He said it sounded like you needed a good lawyer and he’d get here as soon as possible.”
She nodded slowly, taking that in.
He should leave. He had a full schedule of animals to see today. Supplies and medications to restock. Any last minute emergencies to squeeze in.
He didn’t move.
“Dillon,” Tessa said gently, “go take care of your day. Whatever this is—” she gestured at the small gap between them, “we don’t have to figure it out before lunch. We’ve got time. I’ll come over to your place tonight and we can all talk about the will and letter from the oil company then.”
He let out the breath he didn’t realize he’d been holding. “Yeah. Okay.”
“Okay.”
She smiled then. A real one that communicated her total lack of problem with him going forth and doing his job.
He did what he always did when he left her: he tipped his hat to her.
But this time, before he turned away, he brushed his fingers across her cheek, tracing the line of her jaw.
The gesture was light and brief, but she closed her eyes, obviously relishing the contact.
He nearly kissed her again. But duty called. And they were both adults. They could be patient and take whatever was happening between them slow and easy.
He made it almost a mile down the road from her house before he had to pull over onto the shoulder. He sat with his hands on the wheel, and leaned forward, pressing his forehead against his knuckles.
He said out loud, to the dashboard and the empty cab and Lexi’s voice in his head and the good Lord if He was listening, “I am in so much trouble.”
Reno was on Dillon’s front porch when he pulled into the driveway just after three o’clock.
His brother looked the way he always looked these days, which was nothing like the goofy kid Dillon had grown up with in Texas and or the sharp attorney he’d become.
Reno wore jeans, a faded red T-shirt, and a straw cowboy hat that looked like more than a few bulls had stomped on it.
Reno’s duffel bag was at his feet beside a battered nylon computer bag that looked like it had been through a serious shipping mishap.
“You look like death warmed over,” Reno said by way of greeting. “What did you do last night?”
“Nothing.” Spend it thinking about a girl and her horse and all the fun they’re going to have over the next half-dozen years. “Thanks for coming, Reno.”
“Seriously. What did you do?” Reno repeated. He was using his lawyer voice now — quiet, sympathetic, faintly amused, the kind of voice that made witnesses tell on themselves before they realized what they were doing.
“Seriously. Nothing.”
Reno tipped his coffee cup at him. “You’re doing that thing with your jaw.”
“What thing?”
“The Steele-men-do-not-feel-feelings thing. The thing you’ve done constantly since Lexi left.”
“Reno—”
“I know. Let it go.” Reno stood up and stretched his back. “I’m hungry, and a lawyer should never bring up his client’s love life on an empty stomach. But fair warning, brother. Eventually we are going to talk about whatever this is.”
“There is no this.”
“Mm-hm.”
“There isn’t.”
“Sure. Whatever you say. Get me some food and then I want to hear all about Tessa.”
Reno transformed at Dillon’s kitchen table.
He didn’t put on a different shirt or change his accent.
He sat there with the will and the challenge documents from the court spread out in front of him, along with a pen and a yellow legal pad.
Somewhere in the middle of his second pass through the documents, the rodeo clown went underground, and a man Dillon hadn’t seen in three years rose up to take his place.
Reno’s jaw did that other Steele men thing where it went tight and hard, indicating that he was angry.
And, like all Steele men, it took a lot to anger him.
As Reno made a third pass through the documents and started taking notes on his legal pad, he started looking like a man planning the demise of his worst enemy and grimly savoring every second of it.
Tessa had come over after work with every piece of paperwork the oil company’s lawyer had sent to Lincoln Sutter and which he’d forwarded to her. She’d also brought over Fern’s world famous meatloaf, which was delicious.
“Tell me again how you got this photocopy of Fern’s alleged letter,” Reno said without looking up.
“The oil company’s attorney give it to me in person as proof of standing to challenge the will,” Tessa said. “He said she intended to sell to the oil company and that her will is inconsistent with her stated intent.”
Reno tapped the photocopy of the handwritten letter with his pen.
“The body of the letter doesn’t matter. For all we know, someone else could’ve written it for her as she dictated it.
What matters legally is the signature. Fern had to sign it herself for this document to be considered valid.
It’s not a half-bad facsimile of her real signature, particularly if she was known to sign her name in different ways sometimes. ”
Tessa’s face fell, and Reno added hastily, “Don’t get me wrong. I agree with you that the whole letter—its timing, its content, it convenience—is highly suspect. But we need to deal in facts, here. Not speculation.”
“You’ll take my case then?”
“I will.” A pause. “On one condition.”
“What’s that?” Tessa asked quickly.
“You can’t tell anyone—and I mean anyone—that I’m an attorney. I left that part of my life behind a long time ago and I’m never looking back. Do we have a deal?”
Tessa nodded firmly. “What else do you need from me?” she asked with admirable calm. Dillon never failed to be impressed at how well she kept her cool in the most stressful situations.
Reno said briskly, “Get me every sample of Fern’s handwriting you can find.
Letters, emails, notes scribbled on the backs of grocery receipts, I don’t care.
The more samples I have, the easier it will be to get a handwriting expert to verify that the signature isn’t hers.
Also, the more sample my guy has, the more credible his testimony will be. ”
“How soon do you need the samples?”
“By Sunday. I’m working in Bozeman all weekend, but then I’ll have to hit the road. I’ll stay in close touch with you and the court, though.”
Tessa nodded. Then, tentatively, “Mr. Steele—”