Chapter One #2
“Let’s boogie.” I peered over my shoulder at the guys crowded in the doorway. Krasinski had already left with Hayley. “Catch you later.”
She tucked herself into my arm, and as we walked to the exit, Starr and his partner, Bradford, tramped in. “Kane,” Starr grunted. “Tour ended early, or are you slacking off since Jet’s not here?”
As always, I ignored Starr and kept walking to my car. “How about I buy you that espresso martini?” I asked Daphne. I wasn’t about to take her to Sweeny’s, but there was a nice little bistro where I’d taken a few of my dates that would be appropriate.
“Sounds good to me.”
“Leave your car here and I’ll drive us, then bring you back.”
We found a little table in the corner, and she had her martini while I had a beer. I discovered that she worked in a bookstore in Harmony Rock and was saving to return to school to get her master’s degree in library science.
“If I had librarians who looked like you in high school, I would’ve studied more.”
“Why did you decide to become a sheriff? Aside from looking great in the uniform.” She twirled a long strand of blond hair around her finger. “You’re not from here, are you?”
“No, I’m from the city. I moved up here to get away from all the noise and people.
I love the peace and quiet and friendliness of a small town.
” A story I told everyone, and so far it was working.
The guys on the force didn’t bother delving into my past, and I wasn’t about to reveal anything more than the surface story of needing a change from living in the big, bad city.
“Well, you sure found it. Nothing much really happens up here.”
I smiled into her pretty eyes. “I don’t know.
Sometimes it does.” Aside from her looks, Daphne was smart and easy to talk to.
Harmony Rock was only about twenty miles away, and we could see each other on the weekends.
The dating scene in Appleton Falls wasn’t robust, and hard as I tried, I’d yet to find a woman to capture my heart.
She ducked her head, the long curtain of hair hiding her face. She tucked a shining swath behind her ear. “How about we go find someplace more private?”
I laced our fingers together. “I can make us coffee at my place.”
“Sounds perfect.” She ran the tip of her tongue across her bottom lip.
**
I watched as she slipped into her dress. “You don’t have to leave. Stay, and we can have breakfast together.”
“I can’t. I have to get home and feed my cat.”
Wow. Okay. That was a new one. The sex had been pretty good, and I thought we’d had a nice time getting to know each other.
She’d seemed interested in me, and there was never a lull in the conversation.
I’d been planning on asking her out. But with each passing moment, I could feel her withdrawal.
The total opposite of her attitude on Lookout Point.
Guess it was the uniform after all. Still, I tried one more time.
“Okay. How about Saturday night? We could do dinner, maybe a movie?”
Daphne twisted her hair into a messy bun and leaned over. “I can’t. I’m sorry.” Her warm lips brushed my cheek. “You said you’d take me back to my car?”
She stood waiting, and I sighed. “Sure. No problem.”
God, was I that much of a fool to think for once, something might click?
After dropping her off at her car, I didn’t really want to go home—I was wound up from the night and figured a stop at Sweeny’s for a beer would settle me down. It was close to eleven thirty, and the parking lot was full. I walked in and Theo waved hello.
“How’s it going, Emerson? What can I get you?”
“Just an IPA on draft.”
“You got it.”
He went to fill my glass, and I surveyed the crowd. There were some deputies I waved hello to, and a bunch of townspeople. A hell of a lot different from the clubs I’d hung out in when I lived in the city. There, I’d rarely see the same people twice.
After I joined the Academy, I decided it was the perfect time to remake my image, and I became a cop, joined a gym, and got my tattoos. I’d gone from the scrawny, lonely kid in high school, to a guy who was never without a date on a Saturday night. The women loved my look but never me.
“Here ya go.” Theo placed the cold glass of foamy beer in front of me. “How’s Jet?”
“On vacation with Harte, so I’m assuming he’s great.
” I spotted a few women I’d taken out, now with other men, enjoying themselves.
Why couldn’t I find that one person like so many others had?
I sipped my beer, wondering why I was at loose ends lately.
Times like these, I used to walk in the city and lose myself in the teeming anonymity.
Only in the city could you be shoulder to shoulder with a million people yet completely alone.
Here, in a small town, everyone knew everybody’s business. There was no place to hide.
I even missed my mom. Kind of. I loved her and we had a great relationship—except for her overprotectiveness and stubborn refusal to talk about my father as I’d grown older and begun to question why they divorced. She’d rebuffed me every time until I’d turned sixteen and demanded to know.
Amid tears, she’d told me of his drug use and arrest. How, even after he’d been released on parole, he’d been in and out of rehab for years, sometimes relapsing and living on the streets.
Afraid he’d be a bad influence, after the divorce, she’d kept me away from him.
Not that he tried to see me but I still loved him.
I’d understood her fear yet still had memories of him holding my hand when we went for pizza, and the one Yankee game he’d taken me to.
His mistakes weren’t hers, I’d tried to tell her, and I wasn’t ever going to use drugs, but my arguments would always fall on deaf ears.
She’d considered his problems her personal failure and overcompensated as a single parent.
I’d grown up smothered with love and her fear that I’d fall in with the wrong crowd.
I’d never been allowed to go to parties or sleepovers.