better figure on at least a hundred,” Kendra said. “Probably more.”
By then, heading for the inside door, she had her back to Joslyn and probably thought her friend hadn’t seen her swipe at both cheeks with the heels of her palms as she dashed out of the kitchen.
* * *
SHOPPING WAS NOT Slade’s favorite way to spend his time off.
He and his newest deputy, Jasper, were on their way home from the big discount store that morning, in Slade’s pickup, when Layne called him on his cell phone.
“I think I’m insulted,” Layne said without preamble, as usual. “Shea wants to leave for your place by yesterday, at the latest. She’s all packed and every five minutes she wants to know if I’ve bought the tickets yet.”
Slade chuckled, though he had a sinking feeling in the pit of his stomach, too. He loved Shea, no question about it, but he wasn’t set up to give her a proper home, not yet, at least.
“You’re putting her on a plane, then?”
“Yes,” Layne replied. “If you’re still up for this, that is. Believe me, Slade, if you want to back out, I’ll understand.”
“We’ll make it work somehow,” he said.
“If you don’t mind, I’ll come along with Shea. Just to help her settle in and everything.”
Layne would probably take one look at his bachelor’s quarters and hustle her daughter straight back to the airport in Missoula and onto the first outward-bound plane, no matter where it was headed.
“Okay,” Slade said. He had to talk to Kendra, pronto, he decided. Even if he bought the Kingman place that day, which he didn’t intend to do, the deal wouldn’t close for at least a month. Maybe he could make arrangements to rent the house until he’d made up his mind about accepting Hutch’s offer to buy out his share of Whisper Creek, though.
“Try to contain your enthusiasm,” Layne teased. “I’ll only be in Parable for a couple of days, and your virtue is safe, cowboy. I’m madly in love with another man.”
Slade waited for the pang of regret Layne’s statement should have caused him—he’d loved her, once—but it didn’t come. He did wish he could have responded that he was “madly in love” with some hot woman, though.
One like Joslyn Kirk, say. He felt a stirring that did not bode well for getting out of the truck anytime soon, at least, not in the middle of town, where there were so many people around.
“I’ll reserve you a room at the Best Western hotel,” he said. “When are you planning on getting here?”
“Day after tomorrow?” Layne said, making it sound like a question.
Slade suppressed a sigh. “Shall I pick you up at the airport in Missoula?”
“Definitely not,” Layne answered happily. “We’ll rent a car.”
“Fine,” Slade replied. “I’ll make the room reservation. Text me your ETA when you can.”
“Will do,” Layne said.
Slade was about to say goodbye and hang up when she murmured his name.
“Yeah?” he asked.
“Thanks,” Layne answered. “I’ve been at my wits’ end over Shea.”
Slade wasn’t a glib man. He was intelligent, and he was educated, but folks said he was as stingy with words as a miser was with money, and he couldn’t refute that. “Everything will be all right,” he said.
The call ended, and he headed for Kendra’s place.
Once there, he parked alongside the mansion in the blindingly white driveway and spoke to Jasper.
“I won’t be long,” he said. “Mind your manners until I get back.”
Jasper merely sighed.
Inside the big house, Slade found Kendra’s office empty.
“Hello?” he called, just to be sure.
A woman’s voice answered, from a distance, though it wasn’t Kendra’s.
“In the kitchen!” someone sang out.
Joslyn Kirk?
Oh, hell, Slade thought. It hadn’t occurred to him that he might run into her, though he supposed it should have, since she lived on the property and she and Kendra were good friends. He cleared his throat, debating between sticking around and beating it.
Before he’d decided either way—he’d been leaning toward the first option because the second seemed pretty chickenshit—Joslyn appeared in the big arched doorway joining the office area to the formal dining room.
She had flour in her hair. Slade’s heart did a weird little jig and then seized up briefly.
“Oh,” Joslyn said, her eyes widening slightly and a blush climbing her cheeks. “It’s you.”
Slade gave a raspy chuckle. “It’s me, all right,” he agreed. “Is Kendra around?”
Joslyn shook her head, and her soft brown hair seemed to dance around her oval face. Her eyes were wide-set, her mouth full....
Why was he thinking about her mouth?
“She finally sold the chicken farm,” Joslyn said. “She’s off delivering contracts.” She hesitated, moistened her lips briefly before going on and thus ignited an achy flame in Slade. “Is there something I can help you with?”
Oh, yeah, Slade thought, grimly wry. But it probably isn’t the kind of help you have in mind.
“I wanted to talk to her about the Kingman place—see if she’d get in touch with the owners and ask them about renting the house to me. I’ll catch up with her later.”
Joslyn swallowed, nodded. He wanted to touch his lips to the pulse leaping at the base of her throat.
Glad he’d brought his hat with him instead of leaving it in the truck, Slade held it in both hands at belt-buckle level. He hoped the move seemed casual.
“I’ll tell her you stopped in,” Joslyn said.
He took some consolation in the fairly obvious fact that he wasn’t the only nervous person around.
“That would be great,” he said. It was the perfect time to leave, but, probably for the same reason he was holding his hat in a strategic position, he didn’t.
Joslyn dusted her hands together. “I don’t know how to contact the owners,” she said, “but if you want another look at the ranch house, I’m sure the lockbox keys are around here somewhere. I could get them and let you inside.”
In the next moment, she looked confounded, as though she hadn’t planned
