could hear the woman’s sigh of relief, even through a screen mashed with Kentucky flies and a trace of dandelion down.
The sheriff and his boots thumped their way up the stairs, onto the porch. “You put that firearm away, Emma?”
A heavy clicking sound from behind the older woman’s door made Ashlyn start from her hiding place. Was Emma Trainor cocking the gun?
Ashlyn jolted backward and smashed right into the new sheriff, his chest as broad and as hard as a wall. Not literally, but it felt like so many hard bricks piled together—enough to make her see stars.
She turned to him, blinking, the towering shadow of the sheriff’s body eclipsing the moonlight with a heavy jacket. The stars blurring her sight settled into one dull glint on his broad chest. A lifeless, silvery badge.
Fleeting images of Sheriff Carson, the old law of Kane’s Crossing, flashed through her mind. He’d liked to give her a hard time for the way she’d run around town, getting into her share of mischief. And her father had paid the sheriff well to keep his daughter in line.
But Sheriff Carson had passed away a short time ago, and a new lawman had taken his place just last month. A man who’d been appointed by the prominent citizens of Kane’s Crossing.
Sam Reno had returned to town. The same man who’d been the object of Ashlyn’s star-in-the-eyes fantasies, her Teen Beat dreams.
She gulped and subtly tried to stand behind him, just in case Emma was aiming in her direction.
The other woman stepped onto the porch, and Ashlyn felt her face heat up when she realized that the “click” had merely been the screened door opening.
Emma nodded to the sheriff. “Thanks for answering so fast. I heard an intruder out here and found Ashlyn Spencer lurking around my door.”
Ashlyn hid her hands behind her back, hoping no one had seen the money, hoping no one would suspect that she was up to good for a change.
Sheriff Reno placed his hands on his lean hips, his silhouette dark against the moon’s silver light. “You’re going to get someone killed with your weaponry, Emma. Now, I know better than anyone that you want your protection, but pumping bullets into the town socialite won’t rid the world of evil. I’d hate to take you in for that.”
Ashlyn felt the sheriff shoot her a glance, but she bit her tongue, determined to let them think what they would about her reasons for being here.
Emma stuck her fists into the pockets of her oversize jeans. “Sorry, Sam. I didn’t even have a gun. Had to use a fire poker. The girl scared me, sneaking around like she was, creaking my porch boards.”
Truth be told, Ashlyn wished she hadn’t frightened Mrs. Trainor. The woman had suffered enough pain in her life, what, with her husband dying in the same factory accident that had killed Sam Reno’s own father. And she felt partly responsible, too, because it was her family’s factory. Her family’s responsibility—one that they’d never owned up to.
Sheriff Reno took a step forward into the faint porch light, affording Ashlyn a better vantage point.
He had the corded strength of a Remington sculpture, all rough edges and darkness. His clipped brown hair barely brushed his jacket collar, and it was longer on top, falling to just above his stern brow. The fullness of his lower lip gave her heart a lurch, and it wasn’t because he was frowning.
He shook his head, his voice as low and as dry as an endless stretch of desert road. “Well, I guess you can’t do a whole lot of damage with a phantom arsenal.”
A few more steps brought him closer to Emma. Softly, he asked, “How’re you doing?”
The older woman’s lips trembled, and Ashlyn had to avert her glance.
“As well as can be expected. Janey’s still in the hospital, for as long as the money’ll keep her there.”
Ashlyn tightened her grip on the hundred-dollar bills and looked up.
Sam Reno cupped his long fingers under the woman’s jaw, making Ashlyn’s throat ache. His touch was so gentle, so sympathetic, like a physical connection between two survivors who’d lost everything.
She felt invisible, surrounded by the darkness of cave walls, blocking her from the rest of humanity. Dank, lonely, so dark…
Ashlyn washed her mind of those thoughts. She needed to forget about the cave, about the scared seven-year-old girl who’d lived under the banner of town disapproval for so long.
But how could she forget that her family had caused such pain?
Unthinkingly, she cleared her throat, wanting to slap herself when it broke the moment between Emma and the sheriff. He turned to her, a glower of displeasure clearly marking his face.
“What the hell were you doing creeping around here in the dead of night?” he asked.
She tried to shine her most innocent smile, but it didn’t quite hold. “I’ll have to plead the Fifth on that.”
His gaze had focused on her hands, folded behind her back very suspiciously. “Drop it.”
That voice—so low, so cold, so deadly serious.
Maybe he thought she was packing her own heat. Heck, if one-hundred-dollar bills were bullets, she’d be absolutely riddled with holes.
She’d give anything for nobody to know what she’d intended to do with the money. Nobody had the right to know.
However, the sheriff’s fingers had tensed near his holster, the one with the gun in it.
Ashlyn dropped the wad of money and held her hands in the air, shrugging as she did so. “Whoops.”
“Yeah, whoops.”
He stepped near her, brushing her sweater with his jacket. As he retrieved the bundle of bills, she shivered, probably because the April night had a sudden warm thrill to it.
He moved in front of her and held up the money. “This should be an interesting explanation.”
Emma Trainor’s jaw almost hit the floorboards. Why was she so shocked? Was it so unthinkable that Ashlyn would want to help someone in their time of need?
Well, now she’d have to explain. Unless, of course, she desired an all-expense-paid trip to the sheriff’s office.
Actually, she thought, if Sheriff Sam was doing the driving, it didn’t sound all that bad.
Ashlyn sighed, donning her “bad girl” facade, planting a hand on her hip, quirking her mouth into a carefree grin. The town expected her to be contrary, running around causing her share of tongue clucking, so why not oblige them?
Her stance hardly reflected the hurt inside. Hurt caused by years of hiding in shadows.
“It’d probably be easier for all of us if I accepted blame and said that this is pocket money. That I was just about to vandalize the Trainor property with some April Fool’s flair.”
She’d
