kindness and caring. She took a deep breath and swallowed against the lump in her throat. She didn’t have time for tears.
“Thank you, Bertram, but I’ll be fine. I plan on visiting Bill Yucton afterward.”
“See if you can’t convince the old rascal to avail himself of my services, would you? He’s yet to hire himself proper counsel and time is running out.”
“I will. Good night, Bertram.”
She entered the room and listened as Bertram’s heavy footfalls disappeared down the hallway. The room left her awestruck. In all her years living in Salvation Falls, she had never even set foot inside the Klein’s lobby, though she’d peered inside the doors while running errands for her mother and one day dreamed of seeing the rooms upstairs.
She was not disappointed. Her suite was separated by an archway allowing for a sitting room in front and a bedroom in back. She could see the bed from where she stood. A colorful quilt in burgundy, white and green covered the thick feathered mattress, and Meredith longed to sink into it. A bell pull hung near the bed, and another one in the sitting room. She had only to give them a yank and one of the hotel staff would arrive to see to her requests.
What would the townspeople think to see Abbott Connolly’s daughter living high on the hog in her luxurious hotel room wearing the height of Paris fashions? That she was someone to be noticed? Listened to? She hoped so. Because they certainly hadn’t listened to poor little Meredith Connolly, the girl who wore charity cast-offs and whose family struggled to put food on the table. She’d learned the hard way if she was going to accomplish what she had come home to do then she needed to set herself up as someone of account, even if it meant using up the nest egg Aunt Erma had left her.
She crossed to the bedroom window and pulled back the heavy brocade curtain, letting in what little light remained in the evening. The sunlight was beginning to fade and the moon had yet to make an appearance, leaving the main thoroughfare ensconced in a shadowy haze. Outside, activity was minimal—that much hadn’t changed. Salvation Falls, despite its growth, was still a family town, settled and well-lived. This was the time of day when people went home to their families. In another hour, those without such ties would begin to crop up to take the night air, visit the saloons, maybe find themselves some companionship paid for by hard-earned or ill-gotten coin. The town had two faces in that respect and once the night encroached, the town changed hands. She’d always liked that part of the day, watching the two sides ebb and flow. They rarely seemed to butt up against each other, and in the bright light of the sun they existed amiably enough.
Her traitorous gaze wandered to the jailhouse, but Hunter was no longer there.
Had he gone home? Did he have a family now? The thought cut into her, slicing through the well-constructed walls she’d built. How close she had come to that being her life. How quickly it had been torn away.
Part of her had hoped Hunter would have pulled up stakes and moved on, but she hadn’t put much stock in it. He lived and breathed this town and its people. It ran in his blood, flowed through his veins and beat in his heart. He would never leave until they put him in the ground, just as they had the sheriff before him. Even then, he would likely still linger like a ghostly specter refusing to leave. The way he had haunted her.
The rebellious thought wound its way loose from her subconscious. She tried to tamp it down, but once free, it demanded attention. Her heart raced and her pulse jumped. Even in thought, her body’s response to him belied the number of years since she’d last laid eyes on him.
She shook her head. It was strange to be back, to be a stranger in a town so familiar she could envision every inch of it by simply closing her eyes. It smelled and sounded the same, as if nothing had changed. And yet everything had.
She had.
Meredith let the curtain drop and turned away from the window, wishing she could shut out his memory with as much ease, but she knew from experience that would not happen. And sooner or later, she would have to deal with him in the flesh. There was no way around it if she wanted to see Bill.
She reached into the sewn-in pocket of her traveling dress and retrieved the wire Bertram had sent her the day before she left Boston.
Bill Yucton in custody. Stop. Wishes to see you upon arrival. Stop. Best regards. BT. Stop.
She refolded the message with her fingers and slipped it back into her pocket. She hadn’t seen Bill in forever. Why did he want to meet with her now? And what in Heaven’s name had possessed him to return to Salvation Falls?
A knock sounded at her door. Meredith left the bedroom and crossed through the sitting room, happy to finally have her trunks arrive. She wanted nothing more right now than to rest her weary head on the soft, feathered mattress.
She opened the door wide and swept her arm toward the far wall. “You can put the trunks right over here.”
But it wasn’t her trunks waiting for her on the other side.
It was her past come to call.
Meredith was saying something as the door opened but the words died on her tongue. Not that it mattered. Hunter’s brain had stopped working the moment he laid eyes on her up close. It simply fizzled out and rolled over like a possum playing dead.
She looked different. Poised and sophisticated in her fancy green dress that reminded him of spring leaves newly budded.
Lord. Was he really going to wax poetic about her dress? Focus man!
A feat much easier said than done.
Surprise brightened her eyes, which were far bluer than he remembered, but she schooled her features quickly, and in a blink of her eyes it disappeared until he wondered if he had seen it at all. His own recovery proved slower coming. His tongue remained tangled behind his teeth and all he could do was stand there and stare like a first-rate idiot. She was the one who finally broke the growing silence.
“Can I be of some service to you, Sheriff?”
He didn’t miss the way she stressed the sheriff bit, cutting it off sharply at the end. He’d been newly appointed shortly before her departure. He remembered how it had filled her with hope, as if it would somehow change things, make them better. And he remembered how he’d taken that hope and crushed it. Guilt clawed at his insides.
“I saw you arrive. Figured you’d come to see your pa.”
“Did you?”
It wasn’t much as far as conversations went. She’d yet to fully open the door and the way she had one hand on the doorframe and the other one on the inside doorknob, it didn’t appear she was interested in having an extended chat.
He tried again. “I thought I’d come over and pay my respects.”
One blond eyebrow arched upward. The hat she’d worn earlier with the strange feather thing jutting out was gone, but the wild mane of wheat-blond hair that
