Chapter 6
Chapter Six
Lily stepped out of the bathroom, still giving herself a pep talk, and gripped the flannel shirt close to her chest. Totally normal to be wearing Sheriff Callahan’s jammies. Totally fine.
She didn’t need to look down to know the soft material molded to her without the buffer of a bra. Great. She could only imagine the show she was going to give him.
Oh well. There was nothing she could do about it now. She pasted a bright smile on her face and looked around.
A warning growl rumbled through the dark cabin, stopping her cold. Red eyes glowed from the shadows, and she caught sight of dark ears pricked forward. She swallowed hard, resisting the urge to squeak.
Of course his dog is terrifying.
“Riggs, quiet.”
The command snapped through the air like a whip, making her jump to attention. Fresh embarrassment burned her cheeks. Between the two of them, the dog and his owner, these were going to be a long few days.
“I don’t think your dog likes me,” she said nervously, edging toward the fire where Callahan kneeled. “Which is weird. Animals usually love me.”
She held her hands closer to the stove and kept a wary eye on Cujo. All that dark fur made him look as muscular and menacing as the horror-movie dog. She exhaled slowly—still lake—and all that.
It’s fine. Just a dog. A very large, mean-looking dog. Would it kill him to wag his tail?
“My sister Allie has a golden retriever named Walter. He’s a very good boy. And Amber has a rescue dog named Puddin’ that loves to cuddle. They adore me.” She shot Cujo a wounded look.
The dog stared her down… and won.
Dammit.
“Riggs is a retired service dog,” Callahan said dryly. “Belgian Malinois. He’s not exactly a cuddler.”
Shocker. Neither is his owner.
“What kind of service?”
“Military. He was a working dog in my unit.” Callahan glanced down at Riggs, his expression unreadable. “Explosives detection, tracking, and perimeter security. He’s trained to guard and protect. Saved my ass more times than I can count.”
Okay, well, that was sweet. Her heart pinched a bit thinking about the sheriff not leaving his dog behind. She looked at Riggs again, this time with fresh eyes. “And now he spends his time intimidating women in wedding dresses?”
“Sounds about right,” he drawled, and Lily noticed a trace of a Southern drawl slipping into his voice, warm and smooth, making her pulse skip unexpectedly.
She ignored it and crouched to get on Riggs’s level. “Listen, Cujo, I respect your service, but I’d appreciate it if you could dial down the murdery vibes. Just a little?”
Riggs didn’t move, just leveled her with the same unblinking stare.
Tough crowd.
“Like I said, he’s not a cuddler.”
Lily shot them both a skeptical look. “What’s he like with people he actually likes?”
“Tolerant.”
“That’s it?”
Callahan shrugged, his mouth twitching. “He doesn’t let just anyone pet him. And he sure as hell doesn’t cuddle.”
“I’m starting to think that’s a house rule,” Lily muttered.
Callahan’s eyes flicked to hers then back to the fire. Oops, she hadn’t meant to say that out loud. But now that it was out, she found herself idly wondering if there was anyone the sheriff did cuddle with…
Shaking off the silly thought, she turned back to Riggs. “Fine. I’ll win you over eventually.”
Callahan laughed. The sound was rough and did something strange to her insides. “Good luck.”
She watched him feed another log into the wood-burning stove.
The cabin seemed to shrink when he stood.
His damp hair was still pushed back from the shower.
He wore another soft-looking flannel, and worn jeans clung to his long legs.
The flannel pulled snug over his shoulders when he reached for the poker.
Her eyes drifted lower, catching on his hands again.
Those scraped knuckles she’d noticed earlier gripping the steering wheel flexed as he used a poker to shift a log.
The sight sent a little warning pulse through her.
What had happened? Had he gotten into a fight?
Northfield wasn’t exactly crime-filled. It was the kind of town where people left their doors unlocked and the biggest scandal involved missing library books.
So who was Sheriff Callahan fighting?
She shouldn’t ask. It wasn’t her business. But something about his quiet, controlled energy made her feel like there was a storm brewing just under the surface. And that storm felt… intensely, powerfully male. Incredibly sexual in a way her body apparently responded to in a big way.
Nope. Not going to think about that. Not thinking about his muscular arms and shoulders and how they flexed when he ran the towel over his face.
Lily shot a quick look at him, and the sheriff’s usual impassive expression made her exhale in relief.
So they were going to ignore the shower interlude.
Perfect. That would certainly make the next day or so less awkward, to forget that she’d practically been riding his thigh like a rodeo queen.
Best to forget that little lapse in judgment.
Cheered up, she looked around the cabin.
The spark of optimism flickered.
The cabin was small—really small, as in a one-room A-frame. With the stove door open and firelight illuminating the space, the details sharpened, and she looked around with interest. Rustic was the kindest way to describe it.
A two-seater leather couch slumped in the center, across from the stove.
Along one wall, the kitchen amounted to a sink, an avocado-green fridge and stove straight out of the seventies, and a butcher-block table with two chairs crammed into the galley-style setup.
Opposite that, against the wall, was a single bed neatly made with a faded quilt and two pillows.
Her pulse skipped then thudded hard in her chest.
One bed. Of course there was only one.
The entire space couldn’t have been more than eight hundred feet, and not a single thing in sight suggested a woman had ever stepped foot inside. No curtains, a plain old-fashioned braided rug, no decor, just pure function and about as welcoming as the sheriff himself.
“Thanks again for letting me crash in your cabin,” Lily said, flashing Rush a tiny smile. “And for…” She waved vaguely toward the bathroom, feeling her cheeks heat. “You know. Everything,” she finished awkwardly.
Sheriff Callahan let out something between a laugh and a snort. He didn’t sound all that amused, so Lily ignored it.
“So, home sweet home for the next couple of days, then,” Lily said, injecting as much optimism into her voice as she could. She was excellent at finding silver linings. It was practically her superpower.
“Looks like it,” he said, not turning around. “We’ll get through it.”
“I’ll take the couch,” she blurted, a little too quickly. “It looks… cozy,” she added, taking in the two sagging cushions that suggested otherwise.
His head turned just enough for her to catch a glint of humor softening the firm line of his mouth, putting her more at ease. They’d make the best of it. What other choice did they have?
He opened the backpack he’d carried in from the truck and started unpacking with the methodical efficiency he seemed to apply to everything. Spare clothes, a battered first aid kit, another flashlight. Then a menacing black gun, followed by the glint of silver cuffs he set on the table.
Lily swallowed hard. Of course he had a gun. He was a sheriff. No reason to be silly about it. Still, the sight made her skin prickle.
She turned away, taking in the pine walls and heavy, exposed beams of the ceiling. The cabin should have felt dark, but with the fire flickering cheerfully, it was unexpectedly cozy.
“Actually, this cabin has good energy,” she mused, turning in a circle to take it all in.
Callahan shot her another of those unreadable looks, but she dismissed it. Not everyone could pick up on those things.
“Good energy?” he repeated, not even trying to hide the skepticism in his voice.
“Mm-hmm.” She walked toward the stove with her hands extended to soak up the warmth.
“It feels settled, like there are good memories here.” She glanced over her shoulder, feeling the weight of his stare.
Half curiosity, half disbelief. Clearly, he fell into the Tucker camp when it came to things like this. “This was your family’s cabin, right?”
“My grandfather’s. I spent every summer here as a kid.”
“That’s nice. Was it just the two of you?” She was angling for information and hoped it wasn’t too obvious. She tried to remember what else she knew about the sheriff. He wasn’t from Northfield, that much she knew.
“No, it was my gran before she died, and my two sisters and me,” he said, but his voice had that clipped, matter-of-fact tone that discouraged more sharing.
She ignored it. “You mentioned your grandparents,” she prompted. “What about your parents?”
Callahan hesitated, his expression tightening for a moment before easing.
“My mom died when I was twelve. Dad was never around. We lived in Texas, but we came up here to New York to live with Gran and Pop after Mom passed.” He shot her a look, his mouth twitching slightly.
“This cabin was our escape from Sarah and Rachel, my sisters. They were a pain in the ass, so Pop and I came up to hunt and fish and hide out for a couple weeks at a time from the girls.”
She smiled at that. Of course. That explained the faint hint of a drawl in his voice. And no wonder the cabin had such a steady, grounded masculine energy. Places soaked up energy from the people who passed through them. She could almost see—
She looked up. And froze.
Staring her dead in the eye from the angled ceiling was a hulking deer’s head, its enormous rack of antlers casting long, jagged shadows on the wall. Slowly, she slid her eyes to the glassy, vacant ones staring back at her in silent condemnation to the rifle hung just under it.
So much for peaceful energy.