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The dog whined again.
“Lovely girl, I’m sorry. I’ve been going on and on about me, when you have much more to be sad about.” She squatted as much as her skirt would allow and petted Harley through the kennel.
The handsome face of the knight was one she recognized. Though his dark brown hair had been cropped close to his head, it was those dark brown, almost-black eyes she couldn’t forget. The marine, who’d been captured in Afghanistan, had returned home. She’d been headed to the welcome-home party to cover it for the newspaper. That wasn’t the kind of thing publishers did at larger papers, but this was a small town. Darla, the reporter assigned to the story, had to pick her kid up from school and take him to the dentist. And the other two reporters had the flu.
Thinking that it would be a quick in-and-out, Macy had decided to cover the party.
Well, until she found Harley soaked to the skin.
She loved animals. They weren’t as judgmental as humans. Since she was sixteen, she’d been volunteering at various shelters around the world. Every time she took a new job, that was one of the first things she did. Well, except for when she was in the Middle East. She didn’t have time to breathe then, let alone help anyone else.
In the newspaper business, one had to move a lot. There was constant downsizing and she had to go where the jobs were. That was how she’d landed in Boston—until the fiasco that was her almost-fiancе throwing their comfortable life into the proverbial toilet.
Harley nudged her.
“I promise as soon as the fence guy gets done, you are moving in with me. If this rain would stop, they could finish.” This was the first pet she’d ever adopted. The old girl had one green and one blue eye. The sorrow in them tore at Macy’s heart. She was an orphan, too, and she’d bonded with the dog ever since she’d caught her trying to get back home the first time.
Her great-uncle Todd, who had been Macy’s only remaining relative, had willed her the town’s newspaper. For months she’d been trying to sell it with no luck. When she walked in on her ex and his meaningless plaything, she decided moving to a small locale wasn’t such a bad idea. Along with the paper, her uncle had left her a beautiful house overlooking White’s Lake. She’d decided to put an eight-foot fence along two of the four-acres of the property so Harley would have a place to roam.
“Great Danes need a lot of space.” She smiled and scratched the dog’s ears.
“Hey, I thought you went to the party,” said Josh from the door as he slipped booties over his shoes for sanitary purposes. He was the local veterinarian who donated his services to the shelter.
“I was on my way, but Miss Harley got out again. I caught up with her on the highway.”
Josh tickled the dog under her chin, his fingers poking through the cage. It was a large eight-by-eight-foot space, but it wasn’t big enough for the hundred-and-seventy-five-pound dog.
“Nice knot with the wiring there. Do you sail?” He pointed to the impenetrable knot she’d devised to keep Harley in.
She shrugged. “Something I picked up from my dad. In the summer we’d go sailing.” Those weeks were some of the happiest of her life. Her parents were journalists, so it was in her blood, but it meant they traveled the far ends of the earth, leaving Macy at home.
“So are you heading over to the hero party?”
Feeling as if she’d stood in a rainstorm for an hour, which she did, she decided she’d be better off going home. “No, I’m heading back to my place to change.”
She noticed Josh wasn’t meeting her eyes. He did everything he could not to look at her.
She glanced down. Her white blouse was completely sheer and she was cold.
Great. Wonderful. Lovely.
“Well, Cecil is up at the front, so I guess I’ll be going,” she said as she made a quick exit.
Josh was a nice guy. They’d even tried to date once. But discovered there was absolutely no chemistry, which was probably why he was doing his best not to look at her nipples protruding through the sheer fabric of her shirt and nude-colored bra.
Unless she wanted to be the fodder for more town gossip, there would be no party in her future.
The lovely scent of wet dog pervaded her senses as she made the short drive home.
Five minutes later, she turned on the fireplace in the main family area. The front of the place had a Gothic Revival exterior. The back was full of windows. She loved the water. Living near it made her feel close to her dad.
After constantly chasing the next big story, the pace of Tranquil Waters nearly killed her at first. But she’d grown accustomed to the quiet. Her whole life she’d heard Texans were incredibly kind, and they were— However, the ones here didn’t trust outsiders, especially Yankees, of which she was one, having spent most of her formative years in the Northeast.
A hot shower was in order. Then she’d bundle up and see what Mrs. Links, the housekeeper who worried that Macy was wasting away, left in the fridge for dinner. The housekeeper came in three times a week, even though Macy was perfectly capable of cleaning up after herself.
Mrs. Links was another part of her strange inheritance from Uncle Todd. He’d provided for her weekly allowance until the time she no longer needed employment.
Macy didn’t have the heart to ask the nearly seventy-five-year-old woman when that might be. For someone who made a living by asking the tough questions, Macy had a soft spot when it came to animals and her elders.
As the warm water sluiced across Macy’s body, her mind drifted to the marine. Those biceps under her hands were of a man who wasn’t afraid of hard labor. Marines had to stay fit, and she had a feeling he’d have washboard abs, as well.
Men with great abs were her weakness.
You swore off men.
The smell of his fresh, masculine scent. Those hard muscles, the warm smile, even after all he’d been through.
The blood thrummed through her body.
She hadn’t been with a man in what felt like forever. That was all. He was hot, and any other woman would feel the same way after looking into those sweet chocolate-brown eyes.
Turning down the water’s temperature to cool her body, she wondered how long she’d be able to resist the marine.
2
VIOLENT THOUGHTS CROSSED Blake’s mind as Mr. Clooney’s rooster crowed, waking half the town—so much for the extra rest. Shoving the pillow over his head, he closed his eyes and willed himself back to the dream about the woman in the red heels. The rooster crowed again.
“I’ll kill that bird some day,” he growled as he rolled out of bed. Too many years in the military had him up, showered and sipping coffee ten minutes later.
His mother had taped a note to the fridge that said, “Muffins are in the warming drawer. Love, Mom.”
At five in the morning, she’d probably already been at the feed store for at least an hour. She liked to get the paperwork done before the place opened. Even though she didn’t need to be there anymore, she’d insisted on keeping the books and visiting with customers when they came in. She’d built the business from the ground up while his father traveled the world with the military. She believed in having roots and wasn’t much for leaving the town she’d been born in. Their relationship worked, because when they were together, they treated each other as if no one else existed in the world. Well, except for Blake and his brother.
Their parents made certain their boys had an idyllic childhood in the town centered between two lakes. They lived on the edge of town, which had exactly four stoplights, a couple of grocery stores and various shops on the rectangle, as they liked to call it. When the town was first built, there was no real plan. When they finally decided they needed a courthouse it was built in the heart of the rectangle of shops and businesses.
But Tranquil Waters had changed while he was deployed. He remembered laughing about the letters from his mom talking about how the town council had decided that they could have a Dairy Queen and a McDonald’s on the same side of the highway.
They also—thanks to the lakes and artists and writers who populated the town—had a good tourist industry year-round. It was almost Halloween and he hadn’t seen a house yet that hadn’t been decorated. There were several haunted B and B’s and even a large corn maze on the Carins’ pumpkin farm.
Everything seemed so simple in a small town. It didn’t take a CIA spook to find out that the woman he’d run into on the highway was the new publisher of the town newspaper.
“That Yankee girl just doesn’t understand our ways,” complained Mrs. Lawton. “She reported that old Mr. Gunther was thrown in jail Saturday night. Well, everyone knows he’s spent every weekend in that jail cell for the last twenty years. Ever since his sweetheart of a wife, Pearl, passed—God rest her soul—he’s just been longing for her. Poor man. What he needs is a new woman, a younger one to keep his mind off his troubles.”
While she had glanced around at the other women in her circle, Blake had a feeling she wanted to be the new woman to occupy Mr. G’s thoughts. Blake grinned as he sipped his punch. Didn’t matter that she’d just turned eighty-five and Mr. G had to be nearing a hundred.
“She has that huge house, darn near a mansion,” Lady Smith chimed in. Her name was Lady, and for some reason everyone in town called her Lady Smith. Out of respect, and the fact that she was a friend of his mother’s, Blake had once called her Mrs. Smith when he was about ten. She’d scolded him and told him she was a Lady, and he’d do well to remember that in the future.
The town was full of oddballs, and he’d been one of them. As a kid, he’d run around dressed like Davy Crockett for two years and no one had said a word. Apart from his brother, who was more a Spider-Man fan.
“She’s got more money than she knows what to do with. Imagine, putting the paper on the inter—whatever those kids use nowadays,” Lady had complained. “People here like to hold a newspaper in their hands. And she doesn’t seem to understand that there are some stories that just aren’t fit to tell. I’ve written countless letters to the editor, but she never prints or listens to them.” Lady waved her hand in the air dismissively.
“Darn Yankee.”
How dare she tell the truth about Tranquil Waters. The nerve of the woman. Blake found himself chuckling as he rinsed his cup in the sink.
His mother probably didn’t need his help at the feed store. But he didn’t want to sit around stewing. It almost always sent him in the wrong direction.
He wondered where Macy—he’d finally learned her name—might be. Likely still in bed, if she were smart. Any sane person would be at this hour of the morning. Pulling the truck out of the drive, he saw something run past.
Blake blinked a few times and followed the blur.
“It can’t be.”
The monster dog he’d recently stuffed into a car sat on the porch of a white-framed house with a for-sale sign in the yard. The spot was about five blocks from his mom’s house.
The way Harley stared at the door, as if willing it to open, broke his heart. Blake had seen a lot of awful things through the years, but kids and animals in distress were his weaknesses. He’d do anything to protect them.
Macy was right. Unlike a human, the dog couldn’t understand her master was gone.
Exiting the truck slowly, he stepped up the stone path. She glanced back at him, with the saddest puppy eyes. One of the eyes was blue, the other green.
He hadn’t seen her eyes when he’d been dealing with the hindquarters.
“Hey, pretty girl, what’s up?”
He held out his hand, but she turned away from him. Lifting a large paw, she hit the doorknob.
Damn dog. His heart lurched. Not sure what he should do, he sat down on the top step next to her. He could drag her to the truck, but he didn’t have the nerve. If he gained her trust, maybe she’d go willingly. He had a feeling being at the house was about more than just returning to where she felt safe.
“I’ll sit here with you until you decide what you want to do next,” he said softly. He didn’t have anything better to do.
The dog pawed at the door again and growled.
Blake leaned back against the railing. He could have sworn the dog said, “Let me in.”
I am losing it. Now dogs are talking to me.
“Did you just say, let me in?”
The dog pawed his shoulder.
Yep, he was crazy.
“Oh, girl, sorry, I don’t have a key. I’d let you in if I could, but I don’t have one. And I have a code I live by. Breaking and entering isn’t an option.”
She barked and then leaped off the porch.
As quick as his sore leg allowed him, he got up and followed her around the side of the house.
When they reached the back porch, she pawed at the door handle and attempted to open it with her mouth. She snarled when it didn’t budge.
“Well, we tried,” he said.
She cocked her head, and he swore she rolled her eyes.
Taking off to a chipped birdbath in the middle of the lawn, covered with dirt, she pawed the rocks surrounding the base of the concrete fixture and barked. Blake limped out to the fountain, more to appease her than anything.
There on the ground was a key.
“Okay, dog. Now you’re freaking me out.” If she had had two legs instead of four, she could pass for human. And she had to be one brilliant pup to relate the key to the door.
As he unlocked the door, he noticed someone peeking over the fence.
He pointed an accusatory finger at the dog. “Fine, but if we get arrested you’re taking the rap.” He patted her on the head. Before he could turn the knob and open the door himself, she nosed it open and stood in the small kitchen, as if waiting for him to come inside. Once he was in, she closed the door with her nose.
Blake had never seen such a thing. The few dogs he’d had when he was a boy could sit and lie down, but that was about it.
Harley woofed and trotted to the living room, where she sat in front of a wingback chair. She nodded at him, as if she wanted him to sit down in it. More out of curiosity than anything, he did. A paw shot out and pushed so hard on the chair he worried he’d go head over heels.
But he didn’t fall.
The dog ducked beneath the chair and tossed out several stuffed animals, a ball and chew bones that had seen better days. Once she had her stash from under the chair, she moved the items one at a time to the charcoal-gray sofa. The booty soon became a pillow as she lay atop her toys, sighing as if she’d been on a long journey.
“Poor girl,” Blake whispered. The sight of her relaxing choked him up.
“That’s the first time I’ve seen her sleep since he passed,” a feminine voice whispered.
Head snapping around, he took in Macy Reynolds’s tight jeans, pink hoodie and those furry boots women wore when the thermometer dipped below seventy. The town was having an unusually cool October, and the temperature hung around the fifty-degree mark. A sleepy angel with no makeup, and more beautiful than she’d been the day before.
“I saw her running past my mom’s house when I left this morning and I decided to follow.” He held up a hand. “I swear she made me unlock the door. She showed me where the key was.”
“I believe it. Evidently the drama was about her missing toys. I don’t blame her,” Macy continued to whisper. “I’m kind of fond of my stuff. I don’t have that much, but what I do have is precious to me.”
Odd since he’d learned she inherited her uncle’s house. He assumed she had tons of stuff.
“What?” She checked her clothing as if she might have missed a button.
“Nothing. I...heard last night that you inherited your uncle’s new mansion.”
She scrunched her face. “Yes, he— Yes.”
“For the record, I haven’t been stalking you. Some of the gossips at the party were talking about it.”
She smirked and moved to the sofa to sit beside Harley.
“Is there an expiration date or something on being the subject of town gossip? I’ve never lived in a place where other people were so in your business. Usually, as a reporter, I’m the nosy one. It’s disconcerting. And I don’t think they like me very much, although I’m doing my best to turn their local into a paper that resembles more than tractor reports.”
He laughed, and the dog opened an eye and glared at him.
