Talk Me Down

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But she would realize her ignorance soon enough. Her female instincts would try to warn her, niggling at the edges of her consciousness. Fear would worm its way into her head, but there’d be no proof of anything, no implication that her terror was well-founded.

She’d be afraid. She’d feel confused. Soon enough, paranoia would set in. And then she would move away from Tumble Creek and back to Denver where she belonged.

CHAPTER FIVE (#ulink_10228c08-93a9-5db2-ae70-d344dd9c5a00)

ONLINE SEX PERFORMER.

“Jesus,” Ben sighed into his hands.

It was a good possibility. Better than the first two had been. It wasn’t illegal, she could work from home, and she could make a heck of a lot of money doing it. And how the hell was he supposed to rule it in or out?

The background report glowed on his computer screen, bathing him in its censuring light. Nothing. Not even a traffic violation. Molly Jennings was a good girl, at least as far as the system was concerned. As far as Ben was concerned, she was fascinatingly bad. But just how bad, he didn’t yet know.

When she’d had the wi-fi antenna attached to her roof the day after she’d moved in, he hadn’t thought much about it, but he was thinking now. Was it just about a city girl’s love for speedy Internet connections or did she need to upload huge amounts of information?

A few days ago he wouldn’t have been able to imagine her doing sex shows for money, but now he could picture it all too well. She was…easy to watch. Even easier to listen to, and holy hell, what if that was how she’d learned how to turn him on like a goddamn switch?

“Please, no,” he whispered to the computer. The vast universe of online sex loomed on Ben’s horizon, glittering and ominous and writhing with danger. He’d never find her in there, even if he searched for weeks. Which brought up the question of how he was supposed to search anyway. He was on dial-up at home, and he could just imagine trying to explain to the mayor why he’d visited hundreds of online sex sites on his office computer, stalking a female citizen who hadn’t broken any laws.

Nice. Just the kind of behavior Ben had been aiming for his whole life.

He reached for his cold coffee that was sitting on top of the latest Tumble Creek Tribune. “Tribune, my ass,” he growled into the mug. “More like the Tattler.”

He’d called Molly on Friday morning to apologize and warn her what was coming—she’d seemed fairly unconcerned—and his gut had been churning the rest of the weekend. But when he’d found the paper on his porch this morning, the column had been only slightly enraging.

I’m officially declaring our esteemed Chief Lawson a workaholic. You may remember that last week he greeted our newest citizen, Molly Jennings, with unexpected enthusiasm. This week he’s become a one-man fire brigade, putting out fires at the Jennings home in the darkest night. It’s all on the up and up, though. He even used a siren to announce his late-night arrival.

As for Ms. Jennings, she’s presenting a bit of a mystery. Her very own brother has confirmed that she keeps her work life a secret…even from her family! Check back on Thursday for more details.

So no one had seen Molly half-naked in his truck—or no one had reported it to Miles—but that bastard had finally sniffed out the really important question. Who was Molly Jennings? No doubt he’d hang on like a pit bull for months, trying to shake out the truth. Ben just had to be sure he found out before Miles did.

There was nothing scandalous about the chief of police dating a single young woman. People might smile as they read the details, they might talk it over with their friends, but it wasn’t a scandal. Ben had seen a true scandal, and he knew the difference.

He’d seen people stop their errands to stare at his family. He’d watched friends’ parents snatch their children back before they could approach. He’d seen hateful joy on faces he’d known his whole life. And pity. And disgust. Hostility. Mocking laughter. Superiority. Delight. Sorrow.

Everything he’d ever known about himself had cracked and crumbled when his father had slept with a girl only one year older than Ben. Lucky for all of them she’d been eighteen at the time. Unluckily, she’d still been in high school. There had been the initial denials, then the small irrefutable details, then admissions and confessions and apologies. There’d been police investigations, emergency school board meetings, dismissal, serious money problems. The townspeople’s outrage, his mother’s horror and grief, Ben’s own confusion and anger. Tales of his father’s sex life. Divorce. Bankruptcy. And all of it reported in loving detail in Miles’s paper.

So, yes, Ben knew the difference between harmless gossip and true scandal. And true scandal would be Tumble Creek’s chief of police dating a prostitute or a porn star. Miles would love it. And Ben would be a pitiful echo of his father.

He could not date Molly Jennings until he found out the truth, even if he had spent the past days thinking incessantly that he should have taken her into the house and done things right.

“Happy Halloween, Fire Chief!” his second in command called as he walked by. He waved the paper as he passed, just in case Ben failed to get the joke.

“Kiss my ass, Frank,” Ben called back in a cheerful tone.

Brenda appeared almost immediately in his doorway, shooting a disapproving look at Frank’s back. “I’m sorry, Chief. You shouldn’t have to put up with this nonsense.”

“It’s fine, Brenda. Honestly.”

“Miles Webster should be shot.”

“He’s just doing his job.” The words stuck in his throat, but he got them out.

“Job,” Brenda spat, her face turning red with anger.

“Did you have a message for me?” Ben asked quickly.

The blood began to fade from her cheeks. She shook her head, setting her graying hair bouncing. “No, but you wanted me to remind you to check the mine gates before tonight.”

The chair squeaked as he leaned back with a sigh. “Right. I got to three of them yesterday, but I’ve still got to check the one up on the ridge. Everything looks fine so far.”

“Be careful if you’re going up there. You seem a little tired.”

“Nah, I’m fine.”

“Oh, I almost forgot.” She held up a plastic bowl and stepped in to set it on his desk.

Ben couldn’t help but smile as the aroma of spices and tomatoes filled the small room. His stomach growled. “Chili?”

“Yes, sir.” Her eyes sparkled with satisfaction and her cheeks balled up into rosy globes when she smiled. She really did look just like her mother.

“Thanks, Brenda. This’ll get me through a long evening.”

“You work too hard,” she sighed, shaking her head as she left. “And try to stay out of trouble, will you?”

Ben didn’t answer. He couldn’t. Because all he really wanted to do was get into trouble. Deep into it. As if he’d never learned anything from his father at all.

“LOVE’S GARAGE.”

“Lori, it’s Molly. Can I ask you a favor?”

“It doesn’t involve martinis does it? I think I’m still hungover.”

Molly laughed. “We need to get you out more often.”

“I…Really? All right, I’m in. Training, right? Practice makes perfect.”

“We’ll start tomorrow. But first…Listen, we’re supposed to get snow this weekend, and I need a favor. If I get stuck in the snow, will you pull me out and—here’s the important part—not tell Ben about it?”

“Well, I rarely report back to him anyway, so no problem. But if you’re that worried, why don’t you get a truck?”

“I had one all picked out in Denver, but they wouldn’t give me the deal I wanted. I’m just driving the Mini until I can wear them down. I think they’re close to breaking.”

“I think you’re close to breaking your ass in that tiny car.”

“Eh. I’ll be fine. And I’m having fun scaring the hell out of Ben in the meantime.”

They were both still laughing when Molly hung up, but her humor faded the longer she held her new cordless phone in her hand. She was going to have to call Cameron, because she was starting to get that feeling again. That feeling she’d had in Denver. Of being watched, of little things being out of place.

First, the noises on her walk down to The Bar, then afterwards, the front door had been unlocked. She’d thought she’d forgotten, but she’d woken the next morning with the thought still on her mind…I could’ve sworn I’d locked it. But maybe she hadn’t, or maybe it was hard to lock. She didn’t know this house yet, didn’t know its quirks. And that was a problem, too, all the shifts and sighs of the house as it cooled at night.

In her paranoia, she’d even let Mrs. Gibson’s latest nasty e-mail get to her. Maybe the old lady wasn’t so harmless. Maybe she was more like Kathy Bates in Misery than an eccentric grandma. But when she’d done a Google search for Mrs. Gibson’s name and address, all the hits had pointed directly to an eighty-year-old woman who lived in a Long Island nursing home and wrote frequent letters to the editor of the local newspaper. Mrs. Gibson wasn’t only outraged by erotic fiction; she was equally upset by liberal school boards and unfair sales taxes.

All of that pretty much eliminated her as a stalking suspect, which left only Cameron.

It occurred to Molly that she should consider getting a gun, just so she could sleep soundly. Or a dog. “Probably a dog,” she said to the phone.

When the doorbell rang, Molly jumped about a foot and her new phone arced through the air. It clattered against the countertop, slid two feet to the sink and dropped in with a hollow clunk. No harm done.

“Coming!” she yelled, grabbing her bowl of candy on the way. The kids here didn’t have many houses to visit, so she’d filled the bowl with full-size candy bars and packs of bubble gum and had received squeals of approval from all her visitors so far.

“Trick or treat!” the little girl chirped from behind her scarf as her mom offered a wave from the bottom of the steps.

Molly grinned down at the girl in her bulky parka and white sweatpants. A pink tutu stuck out between the layers and a sparkly crown perched on top of her knit cap.

“What a beautiful, beautiful princess you are!” she gushed as she dropped a big chocolate bar in the girl’s bag. The girl’s eyes bulged. Oh, yeah, Molly thought, I’m a rock star in this town. “All princesses deserve chocolate.”

The big eyes sparkled, warming Molly’s heart. She loved this small-town thing—

“I’m not a princess!”

Oops. That didn’t sound like delight. “Oh! Sorry, I’m…”

Big fat tears began to drop from her eyelashes to the scarf. Molly threw a desperate glance to the mother, but she just stood there cringing.

“I’m not a princess!” the girl screamed, waving a previously unnoticed wand. “I’m a fairy. I’m a fairy!”

The mom reached up. “Kaelin, let’s just go, hon—”

“I don’t wanna wear my stupid coat. No one can see my w-w-wings!” She crumpled into a little sobbing mound of down and waterproof nylon. “I told you no one would see my wings!”