The Sheriff's Surrender (13 page)

For the first time in nearly a week, for a time he felt like a perfectly normal man doing perfectly normal chores.

A cooling breeze out of the west brought clouds that turned the sky dark. They might bring rain or might not—might be accompanied by thunder and a little heat lightning, or might break up and disappear under the sun's blazing glare. June in Oklahoma was a good time for anything to happen.

Weather-wise,
any
month was a good time for anything. He'd seen snow in April, 80-degree temperatures in December, flooding and drought in the same place in the same month. He'd gone to a Christmas parade in shorts and T-shirt and shivered under a quilt at the Fourth of July fireworks a few years back. Hell, in one day he'd watched it change from high eighties and sunshine to low thirties and snow in less than six hours.

It was a good thing he liked change.

Then he thought of Neely and his grin faded. Some change, at least. There were a few things he'd wanted to stay the same forever.

He'd finished the front yard and the side across the driveway before he finally gave up and traded the antique for the shiny new lawn tractor. It made short work of the back yard and the other side, and required his attention so he couldn't spare more than a glance when he passed the guest room windows.

The weather still hadn't decided what to do by the time he returned the tractor to the barn. When the sun shone, it was brilliant and hot, the air seemed unusually clear, and everything was still. Then the wind picked up, blowing the clouds in again, sending huge shadows creeping across the land. The temperature dropped a degree or two, the humidity went up a percent or two, and the air turned heavy. He figured they would have a storm before the day was over, maybe even a tornado. With heat like this, who knew?

The house was still when he went inside, with only the air
conditioner breaking the silence. He went to the master bath, took a quick shower and shaved, then put on a pair of jeans as the phone rang.

“Hey, Reese, it's Brady. You busy?”

Brady Marshall was the undersheriff for Canyon County. He took over when Reese was off, and the two of them traded off weekends so the deputies couldn't complain. He was a good officer, had a mind that worked like a master criminal's, and kept pretty much to himself. As far as Reese knew, he had no family in the area and, although he had the respect of virtually everyone who knew him, no friends, either. He was a loner, and the best undersheriff Reese could ask for. “What's up, Brady?”

“We've got an injury accident out on the highway about halfway between Heartbreak and Buffalo Plains, involving one of our vehicles. I'm headed that way and thought you might want to come, too.”

“Who is it?”

“Tommy Lee, and the injuries are minor. Apparently his girlfriend was driving the patrol unit and she lost control.”

Reese swore hotly. “I'll meet you there. And don't let Tommy Lee leave the scene before I get there.” He hung up and swore again as he finished dressing, this time a string of virtually every obscenity he knew.

But, some small desperate part of him thought, at least he had someplace to go and something to do besides hang out here with Neely.

On his way out, he detoured past her bedroom. Her door was ajar a few inches, and it swung wide when he laid his palm against it. She was lying on her side in bed, her back to him, her knees drawn up. Her skirt lay discarded at the foot of the bed, and though she still wore her top, under the best of circumstances, it barely reached her waist.

He knew he should retreat, out of respect for her privacy as well as for his own safety, but his brain couldn't give the command and his body, he was fairly sure, wouldn't obey.

Her skin was pale, creamy, and looked soft and warm. It
molded over delicate bones and incredible curves, disappearing under the scrap of peach satin masquerading as underwear before stretching over long muscles in her thighs and calves. She looked amazing. Designed to torment.

Exhaling heavily, Reese let his head fall forward until his forehead bumped the door frame. He needed a date. It had been too long, and he was only human. Maybe on the way back into town, he could stop by Callie's place to see if Isabella was interested in a
real
riding lesson. Maybe she could help him control these reactions to Neely.

He didn't wake her, though that had been his original plan. Even half asleep, she would see…would know… Instead he left the room as quietly as he'd come, went to the kitchen and followed what was becoming a routine—left her a note, slid under her glasses on the table.

He was slightly more than halfway to Buffalo Plains when he saw the flashing lights of several sheriff's vehicles, a highway patrol car, an ambulance and a tow truck ahead on the shoulder. He parked at the end of the line, then got out and swore again when he saw Tommy Lee's patrol car on its roof in some farmer's cornfield.

The clouds that had only threatened rain over at his place had delivered here. The air was unbearably muggy, steam rose from the pavement, and the normally empty ditch he had to cross was overflowing with runoff.

Tommy Lee Curtis sat in the shade of a scrub oak, holding a square of gauze pads to his temple. His uniform was torn and dirty, his grin was dim-witted, and the glazing of his eyes had nothing to do with the accident, Reese would bet, and everything with what he'd had for lunch. “He-ey! Reese.” He tried to stand, but Brady pushed him down again. “I thought this was your weekend off.”

“Give me your badge and commission, Tommy Lee.”

It took the kid a moment to process the information and another several moments to get it off. “Well, sure, but…yours is a whole lot cooler.”

Reese slid the badge into his pocket, then held out his hand once more. “And your weapon.”

“Sheriff, I can't be working without a weapon,” Tommy Lee said in all seriousness.

“You can't be carrying this weapon when you've been fired.”

He grinned again. “True. But I'm not— You're
firing
me? For
what?
I didn't do nothin'! I wasn't even driving!”

“You didn't do nothin'?” Reese repeated. “Drunk on duty. Dereliction of duty. Misuse of a county vehicle. And that's just off the top of my head.”

“I'm not drunk,” Tommy Lee said with great astonishment.

“And I
wasn't driving!
You can't fire me 'cause she's a bad driver!”

“Tommy Lee, every deputy in the state of Oklahoma serves at the pleasure of the sheriff. Your sheriff is damned displeased, and you're fired. No hearing, no appeal.” Reese bent forward and removed the pistol from its holster, then shifted his attention to Brady again. “Tell the doctors over at the hospital that I want him tested for drugs and alcohol. And then I want him charged with everything you can come up with. Where's the girl?”

Brady gestured a few yards away where another deputy and the trooper waited with a sniffling redhead. “Selena Hampton. Is your mama ever gonna be mad at you.” Trudie Hampton owned one of only two insurance agencies in Heartbreak. She'd been a housewife until her worthless ex-husband ran off and left her with five kids to feed. She hadn't even known how to type when she got her first job, and now she owned the whole shootin' match. She had no patience for imprudence and recklessness, especially from clients or family.

Selena burst into tears. “It wasn't my fault! It was raining, and the road was slick, and it—it just happened!”

“Near as we can tell,” the trooper said, “she was doing about seventy coming into the curve. But that wasn't her fault, either.”

“What were you doing driving one of my department
cars?” Reese asked, rubbing the ache that was settling at the back of his neck.

“Tommy Lee came over for lunch,” she replied, “and time got away from us, and he was going to be late getting back, but he wasn't in any condition to drive, so I did.”

“Why didn't you just call in and tell the dispatcher he wasn't in any condition to drive?”

“I didn't think about it,” she said with a pout. “Besides, you probably would have fired him. You're always picking on him.”

Reese looked at the two officers who were shaking their heads. “And I was actually looking for a reason to get out of the house. Gee, what was I thinking?”

“Can I go home now?” Selena asked, getting unsteadily to her feet. “I don't feel so hot.”

“You're going to the hospital to get checked out,” Reese said harshly. “Then you're going to jail until your mother sees fit to get you out.” If she were his daughter, that would probably be a week—or three. Of course, if she were his daughter, she never would have been foolish enough to get behind the wheel. Whatever faults he and Neely had, neither of them were stupid, and their children wouldn't be, either.

“You can't arrest me!” she cried, slapping one hand against his chest. “I was just trying to help Tommy Lee 'cause you're out to get him! You can't take me to jail!”

The trooper pulled her back and fastened his handcuffs around her wrists. “I'll charge her with unauthorized use of a county vehicle and reckless driving. That'll give her something to think about for a while.”

A fine she couldn't afford and possibly a year in jail, to say nothing of the fact that what the county couldn't collect from her insurance for the damage to the patrol car, they'd take from her… Reese grimly shook his head. That was enough for
anyone
to think about for a while.

Selena was wailing too hard to walk so one of his deputies had to help the trooper get her across the ditch to the shoulder of the road. Ten feet away, Tommy Lee was alternating claims
of innocence with every obscenity Reese had run through that morning. Reese's head was already aching from the voices when one more joined in from the cornfield.

“Your boy done knocked down my fence and damaged my corn crop, Reese,” Bill Taylor said in his thin, ninety-some-year-old voice. “And now they're plannin' to cut down more fence so's they can git that car outta here. Who's gonna put the barbed wire back like it was? Who's gonna clean up the mess left behind? Who's gonna reimburse me for my loss? Don't be shy, son. What do you have to say for yourself?”

Reese raised his gaze to the sky, turned dark and leaden. Of course it was going to rain again. How could it not, when he was standing out there without a slicker? When thirty-five thousand dollars of his department's assets was lying battered and pretty much totaled in a cornfield? When Bill Taylor was five feet behind him and feeling particularly cantankerous? When he did his best to avoid Bill, cantankerous or not?

He had only one thing to say for himself as the sky opened up with a ground-pounding torrent.

“I want to go home.”

 

He didn't get his wish for another two hours. That was how long it took to wait out the rain, retrieve the patrol car and persuade Bill that it was safe to leave the fence down until Monday morning. It wasn't as if anyone would come in and steal the rest of his unripe crop, and, even up and intact, the fence wouldn't stop anyone determined to get into the field. Climbing over or through barbed-wire fences was a skill they all learned before they started school.

Finally, though, everyone was gone except him and Brady. They were both soaked and muddy. “Firing Tommy Lee will leave you shorthanded tomorrow,” Reese remarked.

“We'll get by. If I need extra help, I'll call the sheriff,” Brady replied with a rare grin.

“Guess we'd better get the word out that we're looking for a replacement. Don't suppose you've got a kid brother that's the spittin' image of you and is looking for work, do you?”

The distance that came into Brady's expression was familiar—and puzzling. “No, 'fraid not. I'd better get changed and get back into the office.”

“Call me if you need anything.” Reese climbed into his truck, watched Brady drive away, then made a U-turn and headed back toward Heartbreak. If he hadn't had a more pressing concern on his mind, he would have spent a few miles wondering about the undersheriff and the mysteries in his life. But that would have to wait awhile.

Back there when he'd been talking to Selena, he'd thought no daughter of his would pull such a stunt, and he'd made the automatic assumption that any children of his would also be Neely's. For one short year, that had been a perfectly reasonable expectation. For the nine long years since, it had been out of the question. Utterly impossible. So why had he thought it today?

Because he'd intruded on her privacy and seen her half-naked just before leaving the house? Because it had been a compelling reminder that he hadn't had sex in a very long time? Because a man could go only so long before he started getting tempted by the most inappropriate women at some damned inappropriate times?

Or, maybe, because there'd been a time when marrying Neely and raising a family with her had been the one thing he'd wanted most in his life.

About a mile outside Heartbreak was the turnoff to Callie's house. He debated making the turn and following the dirt-and-gravel road two-and-a-half miles back through the woods. He always carried a change of clothes in the truck, and Callie wouldn't think twice about giving him the use of her shower. Hell, he might even convince Isabella to wash his back for him, along with anything else that caught her attention.

Despite the temptation, he didn't slow down. Using one woman to forget another was cold, and wasn't fair to either of them. Maybe he and Neely didn't deserve better, but Isabella did.

Once he got home, he left his shoes and socks in the garage,
then went into the kitchen. Neely, standing at the counter, looked his way, then burst into laughter. “Where did you find mud to roll in?”

“In Bill Taylor's cornfield.”