that he never saw her brothers’ flaws—and never forgot hers.
Not that her father didn’t have more than ample reason to distrust her judgment, she conceded reluctantly, but he bore some of the responsibility for her disastrous elopement himself. Randall Pennington had been an overprotective single dad who’d never had the first inkling about how to raise a daughter. After Jenna’s mother had died, he’d settled on boarding school and tough love for his only daughter, while his sons had stayed at home under his watchful but indulgent eye.
As a result, Jenna had abandonment issues. She also had control issues. Big ones. She’d never had to consult a shrink to figure that out. A couple of episodes of Oprah had done it.
In an act of pure rebellion—and teenage lust—she had married the most irresponsible boy on God’s green earth. To this day, he hadn’t held a job more than the six months it took for boredom to set in. She shouldn’t have been surprised that his attention span for women was no longer.
But to an eighteen-year-old girl who’d lived a sheltered boarding school life, Nick Kennedy had seemed wild and sexy and dangerous. His ability to make her father see red just by walking in the door had been one of his primary attractions.
Nick had also been a helluva kisser, which had led to her second mistake in judgment. She’d gotten pregnant so fast, it must have set some kind of a record. Her only consolation was that it had been after the wedding ceremony, not before. Nick was already straying before their daughter’s birth, which had provided Jenna with her second dose of abandonment issues.
Now she had a precocious nine-year-old who was the spitting image of her daddy in looks and temperament. If Jenna had allowed it, Darcy would be pierced and tattooed in every conceivable spot on her plump little body. Jenna shuddered at the thought of what might happen the next time Darcy went to visit Nick, whom she could twist around her little pinky. Discipline and good sense were not among Nick’s strengths. And in recent years he’d been given a tab at his neighborhood tattoo parlor.
But the final nail in her coffin as far as her father was concerned had been her divorce. He didn’t believe in divorce. Not ever. Mistresses were just fine, apparently. It was an odd set of moral values, in Jenna’s opinion, but there it was. Leaving Nick was another black mark on her record with dear old Dad, even though he hated the guy. Another incomprehensible incongruity, to Jenna’s way of thinking. Trying to keep up with all of them gave her hives, but she did try.
She could have moved out of her father’s house—where a housekeeper was now looking after Darcy—and away from Baltimore, struggled to find some kind of work for which she was qualified and probably lived happily ever after, but Jenna was stubborn. She still craved her father’s approval and her rightful share of the company. Hoping for his love after all these years was probably a wasted effort, but she even harbored hopes of that, which was why she was still living under his roof and accepting the paltry, nonliving wage he used to keep her there.
She had worked for Pennington and Sons for the last seven years, ever since her quickie divorce in Reno. She was bound and determined to make her father regret that he’d only acknowledged the existence and contributions of her two worthless brothers in naming the business. She knew more, worked harder and had more vision than Dennis and Daniel combined, but all she got was a paycheck and the occasional patronizing pat on the head when she saved their sorry butts after they’d overlooked some little detail that could have cost the company a fortune. In fact, she was just about the only person in the firm who actually seemed to read and comprehend the fine print of their contracts.
This Trinity Harbor job was her chance to prove herself creatively, and no male chauvinist jerk was going to deprive her of it. If she had to take Darcy out of her current school come September and move down here so she could get in Bobby Spencer’s face 24/7 until he caved in and gave her the deal, then that’s what she’d do.
And after seeing him on his front lawn in his boxers, his body bronzed and his brown hair bleached by the sun, a rakish diamond glittering in his ear, the prospect promised to be a whole lot more entertaining than she’d envisioned when she’d driven away from Baltimore towing that antique horse in a trailer behind her beat-up Chevy.
She’d been thinking arrogant, crotchety old man, and, instead, she was going to be going toe to toe with a body—a man— so gorgeous he could make her forget her longstanding resolution not to even think about sex again until she hit menopause. Given her history of mistakes in judgment, her luck was not necessarily taking a turn for the better.
2
B obby stared at the fancy little gift card that Tucker had brought inside. The guard had apparently handed it to him.
“’There’s more where this came from,’” he read aloud, then looked at his brother. “What does that mean?”
“I think it means you’d better keep an eye on the front lawn or you’ll wind up with a whole amusement park out there,” Tucker said. “Won’t be any need to develop the boardwalk. You can just invite folks over here, put a few burgers on the grill and make a fortune without ever leaving the house. There won’t be another town in the entire state that can compete with that kind of down-home atmosphere. They’ll be writing this place up in Southern Living. ”
Bobby shot a sour look at him. “The card’s not signed,” he noted.
“I imagine that’s to keep you guessing,” Walker chimed in with another of those annoying grins.
“Looks to me like a woman’s handwriting,” Tucker added. “Thought I smelled a trace of perfume, too.”
“Is that the kind of top-notch investigative work the people of this county can expect from the sheriff?” Bobby inquired. “I could figure out that much.”
“Any time you want to sign up to be a deputy, let me know,” Tucker retorted.
Bobby scowled at him. “Didn’t the guard have any idea who’d hired him?”
“As a matter of fact, he did, but he wasn’t inclined to share it,” Tucker said, snatching Bobby’s cooling food from in front of him and shoveling it down.
“Hey,” Bobby protested, “what do you think you’re doing?”
“Having breakfast,” Tucker said blandly. “The mayor rousted me out of bed, and I’m starved. Besides, you weren’t eating it. This is the least you can do after spoiling my day off.”
“I’m not the one who called, and I was going to eat that myself,” Bobby countered.
Tucker shrugged. “It would have been too cold. Fix yourself something else. Last I heard you were a professional cook.”
“I’m a chef, dammit, and that’s not the point.” Bobby sighed heavily. “Aren’t the two of you on duty? Isn’t it your job to find the woman who sent this card?”
“Actually, I’m not officially on duty. As for the rest, sometimes the smartest, most efficient thing a cop can do is nothing. I’m thinking the woman behind all this will find you,” Tucker said. “Got any bacon? I’m in the mood for some nice, crisp bacon.”
“Fix it yourself,” Bobby said, then looked toward his brother-in-law. “Since my brother is more interested in filling his stomach than using his brain, what about you? Do you have any bright ideas about this?”
“Tucker’s
