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“How do you know that?”
“Janey told me.” She smiled. “I asked where her good-looking friend from the wedding had got to.”
She’d been interested in him. She’d been too young, though. She wasn’t too young now. She was beautiful, with a woman’s body and knowing gaze.
He was interested, all right.
He tucked his gun back into his waistband and she put hers away in her purse.
Cash leaned against the doorjamb and crossed his arms. “You wanna tell me why you’re really here?”
She raised one blond eyebrow.
He waited her out.
“Fine. I’ll tell you the truth, but first I need a coffee.”
She brushed past him and that great-smelling perfume followed her out of the room. So did Cash, like a bird dog on the trail.
Vanilla. She smelled like sugar cookies.
Cash’s hand touched that stuffed animal on the stair rail again and his gaze fell on the sway of Shannon’s hips. She had great hips.
Downstairs, she turned on lights as she went.
She took her time making a pot of coffee, not once looking at him.
He sat at the table in silence, enjoying the elegance and efficiency of her movements. A couple of minutes later she put coffee mugs on the table, along with the box of donuts, and sat across from him. She pulled something out of her back pocket—a black leather badge holder like his—and slid it over to him. He opened it. DEA. Special Agent Wilson.
Stunned, his gaze flew to hers.
“Janey never said you were a cop.” It put her off-limits. Damn.
Unlike his father, he didn’t fool around with co-workers, even if she didn’t work in Ordinary. He didn’t want to have anything to do with female cops. His dad had screwed everything with breasts, no matter her age or her occupation, from female cops to hookers.
He’d cost one cop her job. It had been the end of his career, too.
“Why didn’t you just tell me you were DEA?”
“Because I didn’t want anyone here to know.”
She bit into a donut and a dot of jelly ended up on her lower lip. He tried not to imagine himself licking it off.
“What’s the case? You’ve got to be here for a reason.”
“I’m on vacation.”
He ignored that. “Is it centered in Ordinary?”
She sighed and nodded. “I think it might originate with the bikers in the next county, though. I’m here to see what I can learn.”
“About what?”
“Someone in the area is cooking crystal meth.”
“How do you know? I haven’t heard a thing about it.”
“It’s happening.”
“Why are you so sure it’s here?”
“My brother visited last weekend and stayed with Janey.”
“Tom? The one who lost his family to a drunk driver?”
She nodded.
“I met him. Nice guy, but messed up. No wonder. What about him?”
“He brought meth home with him. Said he got it in Ordinary.”
Cash’s mind raced. Where in Ordinary? From whom?
“So the DEA sent you here to investigate? Why didn’t they contact me?”
“A cop in Billings called your office and was told there were definitely no drugs here and that you wouldn’t investigate.”
“I didn’t talk to anyone. Must have been my deputy.” Wade should have brought that info to him, but his deputy was still fairly new. There were a lot of things Cash still had to explain to him. “I’ll call the DEA and let them know I’ll cooperate.”
She raised a staying hand. “I’m not here officially.”
“What?”
“I really am supposed to be on vacation, but I can’t let this go.”
“Why not? You have no jurisdiction here.”
She put her donut down on a paper napkin, carefully, and he had the sense that she was trying to hold herself together. “It’s important to me. Tom overdosed.” She looked like she might break down but then sucked it up. As he’d thought upstairs, she was tough. Strong.
“He’s in a coma,” she said.
“Is he going to live?”
“I don’t know.” She wrapped her hands around her mug.
“You need to take a giant step away from this.”
She shook her head. Those full lips thinned to a determined line, her chin took on a mulish jut and those pretty green eyes suddenly became cop eyes—hard-edged and suspicious.
“I spoke to the domestic field division in Denver and they have their hands full right now. There are meth labs everywhere these days.”
“Then wait.”
“I can’t.”
“I’ll call your bosses.”
“I’ve done nothing wrong. I’m on vacation. My sister will be home soon and I’ll visit with her.”
“Who are you kidding? My guess is you won’t sit still while you think there are drugs in the county.” It wouldn’t be the first time a cop went rogue for a family member in trouble.
She shrugged, admitting nothing. Distrust radiated from her. She didn’t have faith in the local law enforcement—and that included him.
She likely thought he didn’t have the goods to do the job, that he was a country hick who couldn’t deal with anything more serious than speeding tickets.
He’d been raised in San Francisco. By a cop. He understood exactly what human beings were capable of, and he knew how to deal with it. All of it.
He walked to the sink and rinsed his mug.
“I’m taking care of C.J.’s horses while he’s away. Mornings and evenings I’ll be around. I’ll also be investigating drugs in the area.” He pointed a finger at her. “You stay out of it. Got it?”
She nodded, but she was lying again.
“I mean it.” Cash left the house.
He walked to the corral to gather in C.J.’s horses and his own, Victor, who Cash boarded here on the Wright land.
Wind whistled through the tops of the poplars lining the driveway. Their few remaining leaves chattered like a bunch of old women, sending him confusing messages about his dad and families and model-beautiful tall blonde women.
She was a grown-up now, no longer a kid who was off-limits.
He was angry with her because she’d come into his jurisdiction to investigate a crime she had no right to look into. She was too close to the victim, and needed to keep out of it.
His body, though, and some part of his mind or his heart, wondered: What if he gave it a shot? What if he asked her out?
She was gorgeous, and she’d thought about him over the years. She’d asked Janey about him whenever she visited Ordinary, hadn’t she?
He’d seen the look in her eyes. She still found him attractive. He certainly found her attractive. How could he not?
Cash put away the horses for the night and got into his truck to drive home, his thoughts drifting to Shannon.
His house sat between Ordinary and Haven and it wasn’t a long trip. He turned down a driveway nearly hidden from the road that ran half a mile through a tunnel of trees.
The house was pretty in the moonlight with its purple gingerbread trim—too pretty for a man. He’d bought the two-bedroom from Timm Franck’s sister, Sara. It sat on a piece of land that would allow for a sizable addition later, when he started his family.
As he stepped out of the truck and stared at his house, his stubborn mind returned to thoughts of Shannon. Again.
Forget it, buddy.
Why?
Because she’s a cop.
Yeah. She is. So what?
How important was that, really? They worked for different jurisdictions. Hell, different levels of government even.
He knew she was off-limits. At least, his rational mind did, but she’d kick-started both his libido and his crazy need to move forward on that family.
Maybe her being a cop could work in his favor. She would have the same values and morals as he. She would understand that the job got crazy, that sometimes the hours were long and dangerous.
And she was hot. She drew him in like no one had in a long, long time. How insanely perfect was that?
Hope sent that feeling of holding his breath, of waiting for something to happen in his life, to change and move forward, scurrying off into the night.
A sigh gusted out of him and he stared at his dark house, unable to resist a couple of “What ifs?” What if Shannon were waiting inside for him? What if she were his and they could start on that family he wanted so badly. How good would that feel?
What was that old saying? If wishes were horses, beggars would ride? Hope did that to a person—made a beggar believe he could be a wealthy man.
The only ones waiting inside for him were Paddy and Danny.
Cash opened the front door. The dogs bounded out and circled the bushes that would one day be replaced by a stable. He left them to their business.
He stepped inside and turned on the living room light. Empty. What if it weren’t?
Cash went straight to his computer. He had a buddy he’d studied with, Denny O’Doyle, who’d ended up working in Washington. Cash emailed for info about Special Agent Shannon Wilson of the DEA.
What kind of woman was she?
An hour later, he got his response. Shannon Wilson was on the fast track to the top. She was smart, independent and…ambitious. The DEA had big hopes for her. Huge hopes. She was going places.
Cash’s heart sank. Great. An ambitious cop. Wasn’t that just the kiss of death? After Dad, Cash had had a bellyful of cops with ambition.
She was DEA, she likely investigated drug problems in every part of the country. Probably thought Ordinary was a hick town compared to the places she’d been.
He wandered to the living room and stared at the empty furniture. Shit. For a few minutes there, he’d had this incredible dream.
He went to the front door to call in the dogs but his voice caught in his throat. Disillusionment and disappointment weighed on him. That feeling of being stuck in life slunk back in from the shadows of the yard and settled in his chest.
No way would Shannon settle in a place like Ordinary, Montana, and no way would Cash leave, not when he had a great job, amazing friends and this house.
He knew what life in the big city was like, chock full of temptations to distract a man from what was really important—family—and Cash wanted no part of those distractions.
* * *
EARLY THE FOLLOWING morning Cash returned to the Wright ranch, his nerves humming.
He thought of the woman in the house.
