hour later, Caroline was long gone, off to corner some other poor schmuck and badger him into making a fool of himself on the bachelor auction block. Seth was still in his office reviewing last month’s budget overages, with the jail’s operations report still to get through.
But enough. He was done for the day.
The budget and the reports could wait until tomorrow. After being bested by that Carruthers woman, he needed a fat, juicy steak and a twice-baked potato, and he knew where to get them.
The Sylvan Inn sat in a small wooded glen a few miles outside of town. At four thirty in the afternoon on a weekday, the parking lot had one row of cars in it—the row closest to the front entrance. Seth pulled in at the end of that row.
Inside, the hostess led him straight to a deuce by a window that looked out on a shaded patio. Perfect. He felt the cares of the day melting away.
Caroline Carruthers?
Never heard of her.
His waitress, Monique Hightower, appeared. Seth had known Monique for a good twenty years, at least. They’d attended Justice Creek High about the same time, with him graduating a couple of years ahead of her. She’d been working here at the Inn for a decade, maybe more.
“Hey, Seth. You’re earlier than usual for a weekday.” Monique refilled the water glass he’d already emptied and set the bread basket in front of him. “Everything okay?” Monique was a good waitress, but she talked too much. And she had a rep for being overly interested in other people’s business.
He replied, “Everything is just fine, thanks,” in a tone that discouraged further conversation. “I’ll have the house salad with blue cheese, a Porterhouse, bloody, and a fully loaded potato.” A beer would really hit the spot, but he was still in uniform. “And bring me a nice, big Coke.”
Monique jotted down his order. “Be right back with your drink and that salad.” She trotted off, blond corkscrew curls bouncing in her high ponytail.
She was as good as her word, too, bouncing right back over with a tall, fizzy Coca-Cola and a plateful of greens.
Seth buttered a hunk of hot bread and got down to the business of enjoying his meal. By the time the steak and potato arrived, he felt better about everything. The auction was almost six weeks away. He’d put it on his calendar, and he’d promised Caroline he would pose for a picture and work up a bio that would make the women of Justice Creek eager to bid on him. He wasn’t looking forward to either activity, but as soon as they were accomplished, he could forget about the whole thing until he had to show up at the park the last Saturday in May.
“All done?” Monique stood at his elbow.
“Yeah. It was terrific, as always.”
She took his plate. “Wait till you see the dessert cart. On the house for you, Seth.”
“Thanks, Monique. Just the check.”
And off she went, returning in no time with the bill. He gave her his credit card. Not three minutes after that, she set down the leather check folder on the white tablecloth. He put his card away and picked up the pen.
“So. Jody seems to be doing great, don’t you think, all round and rosy?” It was Monique. For some reason, she’d remained standing right behind him.
He added the tip and scratched in his signature. “Jody?”
Monique leaned a little closer and spoke very softly. “Jody Bravo.”
He remembered then. Jody Bravo. Pretty brunette. Daughter of Frank Bravo, deceased, and Frank’s second wife, Willow Mooney Bravo. Willow Bravo was a piece of work. She’d carried on a decades-long affair with Frank while his rich first wife, Sondra, was still alive. Sondra had given Frank four children. Pretty much simultaneously, Willow had given him five. Including Jody, who owned a flower shop on Central.
Jody and Nick had been friends there for a while, at the end.
Monique said, “She’s due next month, right?”
This was getting weird. “Due to...?”
“Have the baby, of course.”
Evidently, Jody Bravo was pregnant. Given that she’d been a friend of Nicky’s, he probably should have known that.
But why, exactly, did Monique Hightower think she ought to bring it up to him?
He dropped the pen on the open check folder. “Monique.”
“Yeah?”
“Come on around here where I can see you.”
She sidled into his line of sight looking uncomfortable now, giving him big eyes and a sweet never-mind of a smile. “So. Can I get you anything else?”
He hit her with his lawman’s stare, dead-on with zero humor. “You went this far. Better finish it, whatever it is.”
“Ahem.” She slid a glance toward the kitchen, scoping out the location of her boss, no doubt. “I...thought you knew, that’s all.”
“Knew what?”
“Well, I mean that the baby Jody’s having...” The sentence wandered off into nowhere.
“Go on.”
“Well, Seth. It’s, um, Nick’s baby.”
Nick’s baby.
Seth heard a strange roaring in his ears, as though the ocean were right outside the window, giant waves beating on that pretty shaded patio. “Did you just say that Jody Bravo is having Nick’s baby?”
Monique’s curly knot of hair bobbed frantically with her nod. She leaned close and whispered, “I can’t believe you haven’t heard. I mean, I know he was your stepbrother, but you two were closer than most blood-related brothers. And it’s not as if Jody’s been keeping it a secret. Everybody knows that baby is Nick’s, that it’s a girl, due at the end of May.”
The roaring of the invisible ocean got louder.
...it’s a girl. Everybody knows...
Everybody but him.
Come to think of it, Nicky’d had a crush on that Bravo woman, hadn’t he?
That was back in the late summer and fall, not long before Nick died. Nick had told Seth he had a thing for Jody, but that Jody didn’t feel the same, so they were “just friends.”
Just friends. That had pissed Seth off. He’d wondered if that Bravo woman was leading his little brother on. After all, she had to be, what, eight or nine years older than Nick?
And Nicky had always been too easy, too tender and open, his big heart just begging for someone to break it. Maybe Jody Bravo had some idea that Nick wasn’t good enough for her because he was a simple guy, happy to work the family ranch for a living, a guy who hadn’t been to some fancy college.
If so, she was a fool. There was
