A Soft Kiss in Summer (Silver Falls #3)

Chapter 1

Chapter One

It wasn’t often someone got the jump on Josiah Lincoln, but he nearly came out of his skin when the door to his office flew open with such force, it banged against the wall.

He sprang from his chair and reached for his gun, pulling it from the holster as Violet Campbell ran into the building and slammed the door shut, leaning against it while panting for breath.

His heart took several long moments to return to a normal beat. He holstered his revolver and sat back down, staring at her as if he’d never seen her before. The woman had always been peculiar. Beautiful, but peculiar. Her behavior now only confirmed it.

Her eyes were a bit too wide as she started laughing, but the look on her face told him she didn’t find whatever she was laughing at funny.

She leaned over and looked out the window beside his desk. When she straightened and slumped against the door, he glanced out the window to see what she’d been looking at but saw nothing unusual.

After several long moments of silence, he tilted his head to look at her. “Violet….care to tell me what’s going on?”

“Nothing much,” she said. “Just hiding.”

“From who?”

She laughed again. “My worst nightmare!”

Her hair was in a riot of russet curls today and her cheeks were stained a bright pink. She’d closed her eyes, her long lashes laying against the freckles he knew dotted her cheeks, and for once, he stared at her like she used to stare at him.

He’d lost count of how often he’d caught her peeking around corners at him or staring over at the jail when he’d first taken the job as Marshall in Silver Falls. Her attention to him was so obvious that he’d thought she was hiding some crime he should know about.

He’d found her behavior odd until some lonely voice in the back of his head started whispering that maybe she was staring because she was interested.

In him.

Romantically.

He shut that line of thought down quick-like and ignored the voice whenever it popped into his head but seeing her now, looking like a vision in pale green, her hair wild and her face flushed a pretty pink, some secret part of him mourned the loss of her attention.

He didn’t find her staring at him like he used to and there were days he was so bored, he’d been tempted to ask her why.

Tilting the chair to balance on the back legs, he glanced out the window again toward the mercantile her family-owned. He didn’t see anyone, but Violet was no doubt hiding from someone.

When she sighed, his attention was drawn back to her. He noticed her full bottom lip as she worried it with her teeth, and he admired her in a way he probably shouldn’t have. Of the three Campbell sisters, Violet was by far the most alluring.

Daisy was quiet and barely looked at anyone, let alone spoke to them. She was nearly deaf, always shy, and so introverted she tried to blend into her environment without being seen.

Rose, on the other hand, was loud, prickly as a grizzly bear, and mean to boot. Despite her flaws, she’d married Graham Hart, a man she’d seemed to loathe on sight, as he did her. But they made it work. Somehow.

But Violet…she’d always been soft-spoken, or she had been whenever he saw her around others. He’d thought of her as a sweet little flower, one that drew his gaze more often than not.

Her dark auburn hair, which she had left down today, hung in soft curls clear to her waist, and he knew it flamed red when the sun hit it.

Her vibrant blue eyes seemed to take in everything around her, even him. Or they used to, but not so much anymore, and he tried to tell himself he wasn’t disappointed by the fact.

When she continued to do nothing but stand there, he asked, “What’s wrong, Violet?”

She made a sound that he’d almost say was a whine before she made a face that told him she was disgusted about something. “Oh, nothing much,” she said, throwing her hands into the air and rolling her eyes. “Except for life as I know it is coming to an end.”

He couldn’t help it. She was being so dramatic, he laughed.

“It’s not funny.” She did whine pitifully then. “I’m in serious trouble here, Josiah.”

He couldn’t remember if he’d ever heard her say his name quite like that before. It was soft and raspy and way too pleasing.

He’d lived in Silver Falls for nearly two years now and he talked to almost everyone anytime he saw them, but for some reason, he and Violet didn’t cross paths much, so hearing his name from her lips was always oddly pleasing.

He leaned forward and crossed his arms in front of him on the desk. “Come sit down and tell me what’s wrong.”

She glanced back out the window again before bypassing the chair in front of his desk and hurrying across the jail to the cell, walking inside to sit on the cot.

He turned in his chair and leaned over, putting his elbows on his knees, and watched her with a raised brow, his amusement growing by the second. “Well?”

“I saw someone who should not be here.” She laughed again, shaking her head before burying her face in her hands. “My life is over!”

“And who did you see?”

“Edwin Wright.”

“And who is Edwin Wright?”

Her face scrunched in misery. “His family owns the mercantile over in Elkin.”

When she said nothing else, he twirled his finger in the air and said, “Go on. I know there’s more.”

She heaved a deep breath and blew it out before turning to lie on the cot, throwing one arm over her head as if she were in a full dramatic swoon over something.

“When my parents were alive, my pa used to take me with him to Elkin to get the supplies he ordered when they’d come in. Well, Edwin was always there and my ma said it was rude to ignore people trying to talk to you so, I always sat and talked to him while my pa was loading the wagon.”

She sat up and leaned back against the wall. “Well, the foolish boy took a liking to me and used to say he was going to marry me one day, and doing what my ma said, I played nice and just smiled at him whenever he said it and now he’s here.”

“Okay. What makes you think he’s here for you?”

“Because he yelled my name when the stagecoach came through.”

“Maybe he was just being friendly.”

She laughed again. “No, he wasn’t. He has no reason to even be here other than for me.”

“How do you know?”

“Because he’s never stepped foot in Silver Falls as far as I know and he always said, the moment he was ready to marry, he’d come for me.”

He sat back and crossed his feet at the ankles. “Well, he could be coming to pick your brain on how to run his mercantile.”

“He knows how to run one. He’s been helping his pa since he was old enough to pick up a broom.”

“Well, maybe he has business elsewhere and is just passing through.”

“I couldn’t get so lucky.”

He laughed and turned his head to look out the window. A few people were milling around in front of the mercantile now. “What does he look like?”

“Skinny as a stick with an enormous head.”

He grinned. “Well, there is a tall fellow over at the mercantile by the door.”

He heard the sound of her feet shuffling across the floor before he felt the heat of her body and the brush of her hair against the side of his face.

She was leaning over him, bent down to look out the window. “Yep, that’s him,” she said as the man stepped inside the building.

Josiah turned his head and was surrounded by wildflowers. Her hair covered his face now. He inhaled deeply and was disappointed when she straightened and stepped away from him.

“What am I supposed to do?”

Their eyes locked, and for a brief moment, he couldn’t get his tongue to work. She really was too beautiful for words. He cleared his throat and looked back out the window to distract himself. “You asking for advice or just talking it out to yourself?”

She scowled at him.

“What? I’m just trying to clarify your statement.”

She glared at him a moment before looking back outside. “I’m asking.”

“Okay. Well, what do you want to do?”

“I want to run him out of town.” Her eyes brightened. “Hey. Go make him leave. You can do that, right? You’re the town Marshall, so everyone has to do what you say and since he’s here, he has to listen.”

He watched her chew on her bottom lip until it was red and puffy and the moment he wondered what it would taste like, he turned to the window again, putting her at his back.

“I can’t run him out of town for no reason, so I don’t know what to tell you, Violet. You’re going to have to go out there and see why he’s here.”

He heard her sigh and long minutes later, she walked to the door. “You’ve been no help at all, Josiah.”

He grinned. “My apologies, Violet.”

She gave him another scowl and left. He watched as she stood on the small porch in front of the jail, but instead of crossing the street like he thought she would, she turned and started walking in the direction of her house.

She couldn’t have taken more than three steps when Rose stepped out of the store and yelled her name.

Through the open window, he heard Violet spit out a string of curse words he wasn’t even aware she knew and grinned, watching as she stomped across the road, her steps slow, her back stiff. She looked as if she were marching to the gallows.

He supposed if some man she didn’t even like was waiting inside that store thinking he was coming to fetch his bride, then that’s probably exactly how Violet felt at the moment.

He knew that trapped feeling all too well, so Violet asking him to run some random man out of town made him want to do it for no other reason than he knew how she felt but, it wasn’t his business so he’d stay out of it unless someone broke the law.

Standing, he grabbed his hat from the nail by the door and stepped outside, resisting the urge to cross the street to the mercantile to meet the fellow Violet claimed was here to marry her and ignored the fact the thought of it made him angsty for reasons he didn’t want to examine.

He looked for her through the windows instead and stilled when he saw her. She was staring right at him.