Stranger In His Arms Read online

  Next to the Artisans’ Hall stood the police station, and she wondered if Dylan Blackburn was working the weekend shift. She hadn’t seen or heard from him since his initial visit, which she supposed was good news. If his crime computers had spat out any surprises, surely he would have told her by now.

  She paused for a last look at the marina on the lake’s edge, where pontoons and paddle boats were moored for renting by sightseers. The morning mist steamed off the cold water, and the rising sun backlit the peaks of the surrounding mountains like a Thomas Kincaid painting. Despite her initial scare by Dylan Blackburn, she had decided Casey’s Cove was the perfect place to hide.

  With a light heart, she stepped inside Raylene’s Lakeside Café to the accompaniment of a tiny bell over the door. Ben Morgan sat at the counter, chatting with Grover, the short-order cook, and a couple of farmers from the market occupied a corner table.

  Jennifer returned Grover’s wave and slipped into a window booth with a view of the lake.

  “Morning, Jennifer. What can I getcha?”

  Raylene, the café’s owner and waitress appeared at Jennifer’s elbow. A pretty woman whose face was beginning to show its age and who walked as if her feet hurt constantly, Raylene had befriended Jennifer during her first visit a week ago. Since then, Jennifer had eaten at least one meal a day at the café, partly because of the company, but also because of the food. She didn’t know if the mountain air made everything taste better or if Grover had the talent of a gourmet chef, but she looked forward to her daily visit’s to Raylene’s.

  With her appetite piqued by her early-morning stroll, Jennifer requested a western omelet and grits and sipped coffee while Grover filled her order. In a few minutes, the waitress returned with a plate overflowing with food.

  “I should have asked for half portions.” In spite of her hunger, Jennifer observed the liberal serving with skepticism. “I’ll never eat all that.”

  Raylene grinned and patted her teased hair. “Grover’s decided he likes you. He always pads the plates of his favorite customers.”

  Jennifer knew the routine. She took a bite of the steaming omelet and nodded her approval to Grover, who waited anxiously behind the counter. “It’s delicious.”

  Satisfied with Jennifer’s praise, Grover turned back to his conversation with Ben Morgan.

  Raylene poured an extra cup of coffee from the serving table and returned to the booth. Her worried expression etched fresh, fine lines around her eyes. “Can I talk to you a minute?”

  Jennifer tensed at the seriousness in the older woman’s voice. “Please, sit.”

  The waitress had already proved an invaluable source of information about the town. Not much happened that Raylene didn’t either witness or overhear in the café, and she seemed happy to fill Jennifer in on all the latest gossip. But the waitress’s tone this morning was somber, not gossipy.

  “So—” Jennifer hoped the solemnity of Raylene’s news had nothing to do with her. “What’s up?”

  Raylene took a long sip of her coffee, set down her cup, and gave Jennifer a searching look. “Do you have a sister?”

  Jennifer shook her head. “I’m an only child. Why?”

  “There was a man in here yesterday. With a picture.”

  Sudden panic gripped her. Sweat slicked her palms, and her heart pounded so fiercely, the blood rushing in her ears momentarily blocked all other sounds.

  Dear God, had he found her?

  She took a drink of coffee while she pulled herself together. “What kind of picture?”

  “One of them studio portrait types.” Raylene assumed a pose. “You know, a glamour shot. I always meant to have mine done over in Asheville, but shoot, now I’m too damn old.”

  Jennifer gripped her coffee mug and tried to hang on to her shattered nerves. “Whose picture was it?”

  Raylene shrugged. “He said a name, but I didn’t recognize it. He wanted to know if I’d ever seen the woman.”

  Jennifer was having trouble breathing. “Had you?”

  The waitress shook her head. “Nope. But she sure did favor you. ’Cept her hair was long, straight and red and she had a ton more freckles than you do.”

  Jennifer forced herself to ask the next question. “What did you tell him?”

  “Said I’d never seen the woman.”

  Jennifer attempted to hide her relief. “Why was he looking for her?”

  “Said she was some long-lost relative his ailing grandmother wanted to see before she died—but he was lying through his teeth.”

  “How could you tell?”

  “Honey, I’ve spent my whole life around men. I can spot a liar a mile off.” Raylene swirled coffee in her cup. “He was hard-looking, big and tough, with a face that never smiled. Looked like he’d as soon spit on you as speak. That kinda man don’t do no favor for his old grandma.”

  “Did he show anyone else the picture?”

  Raylene shook her head. “I told him I saw everyone who came and went in Casey’s Cove. If I hadn’t seen her, nobody had. He just climbed in his big ol’ black SUV and hauled buggy.”

  Jennifer couldn’t swallow. Grover’s tasty omelet had turned to ashes in her mouth. She pushed her plate away.

  “That wasn’t you, was it?” Raylene eyed the barely touched food, then focused on Jennifer, her heavily mascaraed eyes filled with concern. “You’re not in some kind of trouble, are you, hon?”

  Jennifer pulled the plate back, picked up her fork, and compelled herself to smile. “Not me. You can ask Officer Dylan Blackburn. He ran all kinds of background checks on me when Miss Bessie hired me.”

  Raylene leaned back in the booth with a sigh of relief, apparently satisfied with the explanation. She grinned. “So you’ve met our Dylan?”

  Jennifer breathed easier with the change of subject. “The day I arrived.”

  Raylene pursed her lips and shook her head. “He’s a heartbreaker, that one. He’s got every unmarried woman in the cove making cow-eyes over him.”

  “I’m surprised a man that good-looking isn’t already taken,” Jennifer said.

  “Dylan’s a real straight arrow,” Raylene said in the conspiratorial voice she used when imparting her juiciest gossip. “Has zero tolerance for liars, cheats and lawbreakers.”

  Jennifer winced inwardly. Raylene’s comment hit home. “That must make him a good cop.”

  “Casey’s Cove is lucky to have him, but his strong moral principles make him tough to live up to. A woman would have to be a saint to meet Dylan’s criteria, and we’ve got more sinners than saints in this valley.”

  “You make him sound harsh.” Jennifer remembered his attention to duty and detail when he interviewed her the previous week, but he’d seemed friendly enough.

  Raylene shook her head. “Not harsh. Dylan has a deep love for the people he protects, and as for his strict code, he’s toughest on himself. When he finally finds the right woman, she’s going to be a very lucky girl.”

  Jennifer had been impressed with the officer, had admired his good looks and friendly nature. She was grateful for the information from Raylene—but she’d keep her distance from the appealing officer with the strict moral values.

  Even if she was interested in Dylan Blackburn, she was no saint. Not by a long shot. The lies she’d told would fill a bushel basket. Not to mention the laws she’d broken.

  “For the last two years,” Raylene continued, “Grover’s been running a pool, and the locals are placing their bets on who’ll be the lucky woman to haul Dylan to the altar.”

  Jennifer dragged her attention from her guilty thoughts to Raylene’s comments. “Any odds-on favorites?”

  “Nope.” Raylene pushed to her feet as the bell jingled over the door signaling another customer. She leaned toward Jennifer and winked. “The field’s wide-open if you’re interested. I can have Grover add your name to the pool.”

  Before Jennifer could decline, Raylene turned her attention to her newcomer. Jennifer gripped her coffee mug
to keep her hands from trembling. The discussion of Dylan, interesting as it was, hadn’t made her forget that a menacing stranger had recently appeared in the small hamlet of Casey’s Cove searching for a woman who looked like her.

  Coincidence?

  She didn’t think so. But how on earth had he managed to find her in this backwoods? And, even more important, was he still out there, looking for her? Or had Raylene convinced him the woman he searched for wasn’t in the area?

  She was so lost in thought, she didn’t hear the jingling bell announce another arrival, didn’t notice his approach until his tall, vast shadow fell across the table of the booth where she sat.

  “Mind if I join you?”

  She jumped at the question, sloshing coffee from her tightly clenched mug onto the tabletop. Fearing the worst and tensing her muscles to flee, she glanced up.

  Dylan Blackburn stared down at her, looking more incredibly handsome and alarmingly dangerous than he had on his first visit several days ago.

  A sigh of relief that he wasn’t Raylene’s menacing stranger whooshed involuntarily from her lungs, while her heart raced with residual fear. Afraid to speak lest fright show in her voice, she nodded and waved him to the seat Raylene had vacated.

  He was staring at her too intently with that eagle-sharp gaze of his, and she wondered how many lawbreakers had cracked and confessed under that look.

  “Sorry if I startled you,” he said.

  “My fault. I was daydreaming.” She sopped the spilled liquid with her napkin, glad for an excuse to temporarily avoid his laser gaze. “Is this an official visit? More background checks?”

  He smiled then, a slow, easy grin that warmed her insides and made her instantly understand why the cove’s single women looked at him cow-eyed.

  “It’s my day off,” he said. “I’m out of uniform.”

  “You were out of uniform at my place last week,” she quipped with a wobbly smile, vividly recalling his naked torso. “Didn’t stop you from asking questions then.”

  “No questions, but I do have a warning.”

  “A warning?” Her guilty conscience slammed into overdrive.

  “We’ve had several break-ins and some vandalism in the cove this past week. Be sure to keep your doors well-locked, even in the daytime.”

  “I always do. Force of habit for a city girl.” She wondered if the recent break-ins had anything to do with the stranger Raylene had seen in town. “Any idea who’s behind the trouble?”

  When Dylan shrugged, she noted how broad his shoulders looked in the beige fisherman’s sweater he wore over a dark brown turtleneck that matched his eyes and burnished hair, so thick she longed to run her fingers through it.

  She mentally brought herself up short. She would not join the herd of besotted ladies of Casey’s Cove, no matter how attractive Dylan Blackburn was. Besides, according to Raylene, with Jennifer’s checkered past she definitely wasn’t his type.

  “Could be teenagers doing the break-ins,” he said. “Or addicts looking for valuables to sell for drug money. Whoever it was wore gloves, so we haven’t found any prints.”

  Dylan’s news, coming on top of Raylene’s information about the curious stranger, made Jennifer shiver. “I thought Casey’s Cove was famous for its lack of crime.”

  “A string of incidents like these is unusual—” his grin widened “—but, hey, if we had no crime at all, I’d be out of a job.”

  Raylene had appeared at Dylan’s elbow with a mug and a coffeepot, poured Dylan a cup and was filling Jennifer’s empty one.

  “You could always help out Jarrett,” the waitress said, apparently unembarrassed at eavesdropping. When Dylan declined to order, she moved to the next table.

  “Jarrett?” Jennifer asked.

  “My older brother. He inherited the family farm. It’s about five miles up the valley.”

  “What does he raise?”

  “Christmas trees.”

  Dylan sipped his coffee, and she couldn’t help noticing the attractiveness of his long, slender fingers and spanking clean nails gripping the mug, making it seem small in his huge hands, hands that had her imagination spinning before she applied the brakes to her daydreams.

  “Christmas trees are big business in this part of the state,” he explained. “Would you like to see how they’re grown?”

  She couldn’t risk spending too much time around Mr. Law-and-Order. “Maybe sometime—”

  “How about today?”

  “I can’t. I promised Millie McGinnis I’d watch Sissy while Millie visits her sister at the hospital.”

  “We’ll take Sissy, too. She’ll enjoy the ride.”

  Jennifer waffled, knowing how much the little girl needed her thoughts diverted from her troubles. “I don’t know—”

  “Afterwards we’ll drive out to Jack the Dipper’s,” Dylan said.

  “Jack who?”

  “It’s the best ice-cream shop for fifty miles. Every little girl loves ice cream.”

  Jennifer felt herself weakening. She knew Sissy needed distracting from her mother’s illness, and she feared bringing suspicion on herself if she made too big a point of evading the lawman’s company.

  “Christmas trees and ice cream,” she acquiesced with a grin, hoping she wouldn’t be sorry. “You sure know the way to a girl’s heart.”

  “I have a couple of errands to run here in town, but they won’t take long. Then we’ll pick up Sissy.”

  “Sounds good.” Once she had made up her mind to accept Dylan’s offer, she was looking forward to it. Anything to keep from brooding over the stranger on her trail.

  Dylan nodded at her barely-touched plate. “Finish your breakfast and I’ll be right back.”

  Jennifer watched him cross the street to the police station, but she didn’t touch her food. She doubted her appetite would revive any time soon. While she waited for Dylan to come back, she kept an eye on the street, on guard against the return of the black sport utility vehicle and the stranger with a picture that looked like her.

  DYLAN LEANED BACK on the picnic bench, crossed his legs at the ankles, and watched Jennifer push Sissy on the park swing.

  They’d had a busy day. First a visit with Jarrett at the farm, where she’d fueled Jarrett’s ego and earned his older brother’s admiration with her questions about the Christmas tree business.

  “What kinds of trees do you grow?” she’d asked.

  “Scotch and Virginia pine and Leyland cypress.” Jarrett pointed out examples of each species. “The cypress does best for us.”

  Jennifer inspected a tree carefully. “Do you have to shape them?”

  Jarrett nodded. “We prune once or twice a year, depending on the species.”

  She eyed a tree that had grown to two feet above her head. “How old’s this one?”

  “Six years. It’s ready for harvest.”

  She continued with more questions about fertilizers and irrigation. Jarrett was obviously impressed, and Dylan fleetingly wondered how a girl who’d lived all her life in the city of Memphis knew so much about farming.

  When Jennifer had exhausted her questions and she and Sissy were gathering wildflowers between rows of immature trees, Jarrett grilled him about Jennifer.

  “You serious about this one, little brother?”

  Dylan reacted with surprise. “I barely know the woman.”

  Jarrett raised his eyebrows and cracked a grin. “And you’re already bringing her home to meet the family? Sounds serious to me.”

  Dylan slugged Jarrett playfully on the shoulder. “You wouldn’t know serious if it bit you. When’s the last time you had a date?”

  Jarrett shrugged. “You know how it is with farming—early to bed, early to rise and no let-up in between. Doesn’t leave much time for a social life. However, if I’d met a girl like your Jennifer—”

  “She’s not my Jennifer.”

  “—I’d sure make the time. Don’t let this one get away, bubba.”

  Unable to keep his
older brother from jumping to conclusions, Dylan had simply shaken his head at his teasing.

  After touring the farm, Dylan had taken Jennifer and Sissy to lunch in Sylva, followed by ice cream at Jack the Dipper’s.

  Now, in the late-afternoon sunshine, Sissy played happily at the park by the river, halfway home to Casey’s Cove. The little girl shrieked with delight as Jennifer pushed the swing higher, and Jennifer’s own merry laughter blended with the child’s in a sound as pleasant as the river bubbling over its rocky bed.

  Try as he might, Dylan couldn’t reconcile the woman with whom he’d spent the day with the Jenny Thacker of his childhood memories. The young Jenny had been shy, reserved and aloof. Stuck-up, Tommy Bennett had called her. Maybe her inhibitions had been caused by the influence of the elderly aunt who had kept the girl under her thumb.

  But this Jennifer was almost an exact opposite. As they’d tramped among the Scotch pines at the farm today, Dylan had found her outgoing, talkative, with an unlimited curiosity and a mischievous streak he would have never guessed resided in Jenny Thacker.

  The girl and the woman she’d become were as opposite as ice and fire.

  He watched as Jennifer grabbed Sissy out of the swing, whirled her around in her arms, then set her on her feet for a race to the riverbank. The two tossed stones at a quiet pool near the center of the river in the lee of a great boulder, and he noticed how Jennifer purposely shortened her throws so Sissy could win.

  The woman was a miracle worker with children. He’d heard Miss Bessie lament that Sissy hadn’t smiled since her mother entered the hospital, but today the girl had seemed genuinely happy in “Miss Jenny’s” company and had laughed often.

  As he observed the pair, Jennifer glanced toward the highway, visible from the park, and tensed as an oversized SUV sped past. He’d noticed her react that way several times that day to dark SUVs and wondered what she feared. In spite of her carefree attitude with Sissy, he caught an expression in her eyes every now and then when she didn’t know he was watching, and he’d seen that look before.