… great. Just what he needed. The whole county was going to hell. “You’ll have to describe what was stolen.”
“Everything.” She took a quick breath. “My luggage, laptop, purse … oh, God, my iPhone and wallet. Everything.” She briefly closed her eyes, her long dark lashes sweeping the tops of her pale cheeks.
Noah took in her tailored, navy blue slacks, the expensive-looking blazer over a cream-colored blouse buttoned clear up to her throat. “You staying at the Sundance?”
“The what?” She gave her head a small shake. “The Sundance … yes, but I haven’t checked in yet. I only just arrived in town.”
She wasn’t the typical Sundance guest. In fact, she didn’t seem the type interested in staying at a dude ranch. More the high-powered, corner-office type used to getting what she wanted. The kind of domineering woman he’d quickly tired of in Chicago.
Her tongue darted out to moisten her pale pink lips, and she looked helplessly toward the door. By the time she turned to him again, she was back in control and glaring. “Why are you just standing there?”
“Look, I know you’re upset, but I need more information. Why don’t you have a seat?” He pulled out the worn black vinyl chair, and she eyed it as though it might bite her in the ass. “Have a cup of coffee while I take down some—”
“Listen, Sheriff, I’m not trying to tell you how to do your job, but—”
“Glad we understand each other.” He sat in his own chair, behind his desk, and wasn’t surprised when he met her eyes and found they were shooting daggers. “Where did the theft occur?”
She had a wide, generous mouth, which pulled thin with annoyance. “Near the bar,” she said tightly.
“Were you inside?”
“No, I haven’t been drinking,” she said, her hoity-toity tone indicating she wouldn’t step foot in a place like Sadie’s.
“Ma’am, that wasn’t the question. You could be hiding a flask under that jacket for all I care.”
Her lips parted and she blinked. Then she startled him by grabbing her lapels and pulling open her blazer. “No flask, no nothing. That’s my point. Everything. Is. Gone.”
He wouldn’t say “nothing.” She had a nice rack. Noah cleared his throat, forced his gaze away from her breasts and back to the blank incident report he’d pulled out of his desk drawer. “Please describe for me what happened.”
She heaved an annoyed sigh, and he couldn’t help but glance surreptitiously at her chest again. Her blouse was made out of some kind of light silk and he saw that her bra was lacy…. “I was on my way here, rolling my luggage behind me, and just after I passed the bar—”
“Let’s back up. You were on your way here, to my office?”
“Yes, I, um …” She flushed slightly, started to avert her gaze, then lifted her chin and looked at him dead-on. “I was coming to find out how I could get to the Sundance.”
He frowned. She could’ve asked anyone for directions. “Why take your luggage out of the car?”
“I don’t have a car. My ride left me at the edge of town.”
That made no sense. “Why didn’t you go straight to the Sundance?”
“What does that have to do with anything? I was robbed on your main street. You think I stole my own property?”
“No, ma’am, I don’t. Just trying to get a clear picture.” He offered her a conciliatory smile. It appeared she really was a victim, and he’d jumped to the wrong conclusion the moment she’d walked in. He’d gotten too used to the flimsy excuses the Sundance ladies had been throwing his way, trying to get his attention. “I haven’t asked your name.”
“Alana.”
He waited for her last name.
“Look, Sheriff, I don’t understand how this could’ve happened in broad daylight. I only looked away for a moment. In New York I wouldn’t dare, but I figured in a small town like this …” She shrugged her slim shoulders, then slumped back with a sigh. “I understand it was my error. I should’ve been more careful.”
“You’re from New York, then?”
She hesitated, a flicker of alarm in her eyes that also made no sense. “Yes.”
“I didn’t catch your last name.”
There it was again—that same wariness that had her shoulders tensing and straightening. After a long pause she said, “Richardson.”
He slowly printed her name on the report, his cop’s sixth sense on full alert. “How did you hear about the Sundance?”
She leaned forward. “Could it be someone playing a prank? I saw kids on the street earlier. Crime can’t be much of a problem around here.”
“You said you passed the Watering Hole?”
“That’s right.”
“Today is payday for most of the ranch hands. They were swarming outside the place, last I saw.”
“Yes, there were quite a few cowboys hanging around.”
Noah stopped writing and stared at her. “And that’s where your things disappeared?”
She nodded. “An older gentleman stopped me, and it happened while I was talking to him. That’s why I looked away.”
“Did you get his name?”
“Gunderson.”
Noah threw down his pen and leaned back. “What did Gunderson want with you?”
“He asked if I was staying at the Sundance. And then …” She made a face, appeared to reconsider what she’d been about to say. “I think he was just being nosy.”
Noah reckoned she was probably right about that. Gunderson had always had it in for the McAllisters, but since they’d opened the dude ranch and were raking in money, he’d been especially ill-tempered. Their success meant they were unlikely to sell him that strip of land he wanted so badly.
“All those men out there … they would’ve noticed you,” Noah said. “Someone had to have seen something.”
“They were too busy to notice me,” she said quietly.
“I doubt that.”
Her startled expression and piercing stare made him reexamine his words. No, he hadn’t said anything wrong, but maybe his tone could’ve been more professional. Hell, he hadn’t consciously been thinking about what he’d glimpsed hiding behind that jacket…. But the notion that he might’ve blurred the line between the office and his personal feelings didn’t sit well.
“Trust me,” she said finally, her lips lifting in a faint smile. “There were three women who
