told Slade it had everything he and Annie could need, including a small TV that had been hooked up to cable. The kitchen was well stocked with dishes and pots and pans. Fortunately, the refrigerator had a good-size freezer, big enough to accommodate all the prepared meals he and Annie were likely to consume. His cooking skills ran to cold cereal and boiled eggs.
The closets revealed a supply of linens for the beds, a small one in what would be Annie’s room, and a big brass bed with a feather mattress in what was clearly the master bedroom. Staring at that mattress was disconcerting. All sorts of wicked images came to mind, images of being tangled up with a woman again. One particular woman, he conceded with some dismay. He could all but feel her breath on his chest and sense the weight of her head tucked under his chin. It had been a long time since he’d allowed himself to indulge in the fantasy, much less the reality.
“Quite a bed, isn’t it?” an all-too-familiar voice inquired with a seductive purr.
Slade scowled at the intrusion by the pesky woman whose image had just flitted through his mind. “You ever heard of knocking?” he asked.
Val didn’t flinch at his impatient tone. “I wasn’t sure anyone was in here. Nobody’s been living here and the front door was standing open. I was afraid someone had broken in.”
Slade regarded her incredulously. “So you decided to do what—wander in and talk them to death? Didn’t it occur to you that if a robber was in here, you could get hurt?”
She grinned, looking smug. “Worried about me, cowboy? That’s progress.”
She slipped past him into the room, leaving a cloud of perfume in her wake. Slade tried not to let the scent stir him the way it usually did. Sometimes he thought he smelled that soft, flowery aroma in the middle of the night. Those were the nights he tossed and turned till dawn and cursed the day Val had come to live at White Pines and taken an interest in him.
“Nice view,” she observed, gazing out at the creek. “What are you doing here, by the way?”
“Moving in,” he said, backing out of the room before his body could get any ideas about tossing her onto that feather mattress to see if it—and she—were as soft as he imagined.
She turned slowly. “Alone?”
“No.”
Something that might have been disappointment flared briefly in her eyes. “I see.”
Guilt over that look had him admitting the truth. “My daughter’s coming to stay with me.” He tested the words aloud and found they didn’t cause quite so much panic since his talk with Cody. Knowing he’d have backup had eased his mind. Maybe Annie could survive having a father as inept as him, after all.
Val’s expression brightened with curiosity. She seized on the tidbit as if he’d tossed her the hottest piece of gossip since the world had discovered that singer Laurie Jensen had a secret baby by the man who was now her husband.
“You have a daughter?” she asked. “How old? What’s she like? Where’s she been all this time? What about her mother?”
Slade grinned despite himself. “You care to try those one at a time?”
“Oh, just tell me everything and save us both the aggravation,” she retorted. “I wouldn’t have to pester you so if you’d open up in the first place.”
“Is that so? And here I thought you enjoyed pestering me.”
“Getting you to talk is a challenge,” she admitted. “And you know how we women react to a challenge.”
He regarded her intently. “So, if I just blab away, you’ll go away eventually?”
She grinned. “Maybe. Try it and see.”
“Sorry. I’m too busy right now. Maybe another time.”
The dismissal didn’t even faze her. “Busy doing what? Looked to me like you were daydreaming when I came in.”
“Which is why it’s all the more important for me to get started with the work around here now,” he said, and headed for the kitchen again. He’d seen cleaning supplies in there on his first stop. He snatched up a broom, a vacuum, dust cloths and furniture polish. He figured he could give the place a decent once-over in an hour and be back on the job before noon.
Val reached for the broom. “Give me that. I’ll help.”
Slade held tight. “There’s no need. You’ll ruin your clothes.”
The woman always dressed as if she were about to meet with the press or go out for cocktails. He doubted she owned a pair of jeans or sneakers, much less boots. In fact, today was one of the rare occasions when she wasn’t wearing those ridiculous high heels she paraded around in. He had to admit those shoes did a lot for her legs. It was almost a disappointment when she traded them for flats, as she had today.
In flats, she barely came up to his chin, reminding him of just how fragile and utterly feminine a creature she was. It brought out the protective instincts in him, despite the fact that there wasn’t a doubt in his mind that Val Harding could look out for herself. Heaven knew, she protected Laurie with a ferocity that was daunting. No one got anywhere close to the singer without Val’s approval. Slade secretly admired that kind of loyalty. Too bad Suzanne hadn’t possessed even a quarter as much. They might have stayed married.
“Oh, for heaven’s sakes, give me the broom,” Val said. “A little dust never hurt anything. You’ll get finished that much sooner if you let me help. Otherwise, I’ll just trail around after you asking more questions you don’t want to answer.”
She had a point about that. It wasn’t likely she’d respond to his dismissal and just go away. Reluctantly, Slade relinquished the broom and watched as she went to work with a vengeance on the wide-plank oak floors in the living room. She attacked the job with the same cheerfulness and efficiency with which she ran Laurie’s professional life.
When she glanced up and caught Slade staring at her, she grinned. “Get to work. I said I’d help, not do the whole job.”
“Yes, ma’am,” he said at once, and turned on the vacuum. As he ran it over the carpet in the bedrooms, he could hear her singing with wildly off-key enthusiasm. He wondered if Laurie had ever heard one of her country music hits murdered quite the way Val was doing it.
With her help, he had the house tidied up in no time. Fresh air was drifting through the rooms and filling them with the sweet scent of recently cut grass and a hint of Janet’s roses from the gardens at the main house.
An odd sensation came over him as he stood in the living room and gazed about, listening to Val stirring around in the kitchen. The place felt like home, like some place a man could put down roots. For a man who’d spent most of his adult life on the road, it was a terrifying sensation.
* * *
Slade Sutton was the most exasperating, frustrating man on the face of the earth. Val watched him take off without so much as a thank-you. He looked as if he were being chased by demons as he fled the house. The limp from his accident was more exaggerated as he tried to move quickly. She knew his expression, if she’d been able to see his face, would be filled with annoyance over his ungainly gait and, most of all, over her.
Of
