Beth laughed out loud…and was shocked by the sound. She couldn’t remember having heard it before. Couldn’t remember anything before waking up in that motel room in Snowflake, Arizona, with bruises and a child who called her Mama crying on the bed beside her.
“If you’re sure you wouldn’t mind, I could sure use the help,” she said, all laughter gone. She had no business even thinking about flirting with the county sheriff, but she and Ryan needed those appliances. And she couldn’t get them to the duplex alone.
“What time?”
“Tonight? After dinner?”
“Sure we couldn’t do it before dinner and just happen to eat while we’re at it?”
“I’m sure.”
Beth hated the conflicting emotions she felt when he gave in with no further cajoling and agreed to pick her up at six-thirty that evening for the ten-minute drive out to the Andersons’. They were remodeling the one-room apartment over their garage and no longer needed the appliances, which, while five years old, had hardly been used.
Conflicting emotions—one of the few experiences Beth knew intimately. Intermittent relief. Disappointment. Resignation. Fear.
Peace. That was, and had to be, her only goal. Peace for her. And health, safety and happiness for Ryan.
Nothing else mattered.
CHAPTER TWO
HE’D SEEN HER DOWNTOWN, coming out of Weber’s Department Store, at the grocery store, the gas station, and in the park just beyond Samuel Montford’s statue. Seen her at Little Spirits once or twice when he’d stopped in to visit Bonnie or spring Katie. According to his sister, Beth Allen never left her son at the day care, but she volunteered once a week so he could have some playtime with the other kids.
He’d seen her at the drugstore once, and at Shelter Valley’s annual Fourth of July celebration.
But he’d never seen her at home.
The duplex was not far from Zack and Randi Foster’s place. But it didn’t resemble that couple’s home with its garden and white-picket fence. Her place was very small. One bedroom—the door was shut—a full bath squished into a half-bath space, a living room with a kitchen on the other end. And a closet that would fit either coats or the stackable laundry unit Beth had purchased. But not both.
The closet had washer-dryer hook-ups, and a clothes bar and single door, both of which had to be removed to fit the washer and dryer. The door he could rehang. The clothes bar’s removal would be permanent for as long as the closet remained a laundry room.
The entire house was meticulous.
“Where’d you say you lived before coming to Shelter Valley?” Greg asked as, pliers in hand, he attached a dryer vent to the opening on the back of the appliance.
“I didn’t say.”
“That?” Beth’s two-year-old son was standing beside Greg’s toolbox.
“It’s a hammer,” Beth said.
“That?”
“A level.”
“That?”
“A screwdriver.”
Glancing between the top rack of the toolbox and the little boy, Greg frowned. “How do you know which tool he’s referring to?”
Ryan hadn’t pointed at anything. His index finger had been in his mouth ever since Greg had collected Beth and her son more than an hour before.
She shrugged, hoisting Ryan onto her hip. “I could see where he was looking,” she said.
“You don’t have to hold him.” Greg returned to the metal ring he was tightening on the outside of the vent. “He’s welcome to help.”
She held the boy, anyway, as defensive about her son as she was about herself.
Greg still liked her.
“Here, Ryan,” he said, standing to give the little boy his wrench. “Can you hang on to this and give it to me when I ask for it?”
After a very long, silent stare, the toddler finally nodded and took the tool. He needed both hands to handle the weight of it, meaning that finger finally came out of his mouth—but he didn’t seem to mind the sacrifice.
“You changed.”
Beth’s words threw him. “Changed?” he asked. “How?”
“Out of your uniform.”
“I’m off duty.”
“I’ve never seen you out of uniform.”
He hadn’t thought about that, but supposed she was right. He’d been on duty the Fourth of July. And just coming off duty each time he’d stopped in at Little Spirits. She hadn’t been there the afternoon he’d spent building the sandbox on the patio of the day care.
“You look different.”
Giving the dryer vent a tug, satisfied that it was securely in place, Greg moved down to the washer. “Good different?” he asked. The jeans were his favorite, washed so many times they were faded and malleable, just the way he liked them.
“Less…official.”
He screwed the washer tubing to the cold-water spigot. “So, you going to tell me where you’re from?”
“You going to tell me why you’re so nosy?”
“I’m a cop. It’s my job to be nosy.”
“I thought you were off duty.”
“Touché.” Leaning around the edge of the washer, he grinned at her.
Beth wasn’t grinning back. Her expression showed both anger and hurt. And defensiveness—again. She hugged Ryan closer, almost knocking the wrench out of the little guy’s hands, but the boy didn’t complain. He just held on tighter.
Ryan Allen was one of the quietest toddlers Greg had ever met.
“You think I’m some kind of threat to the people of Shelter Valley?” she asked.
“Of course not!” Greg would’ve laughed out loud if he wasn’t so surprised by the tension that had suddenly entered the room. “I’m interested, okay?” he said, eager to clarify himself before the evening dived into dismal failure. “As a guy, not as a cop.”
“Interested.” Her hold on the boy loosened, but not much.
“Yeah, you know, interested.” He went back to the job at hand, thinking it was probably his safest move. “Men do that,” he grunted. He could tell the water spigots hadn’t been used in a while. If ever. He was having one helluva time persuading the faucet to turn. “They get interested in women who attract them.”
“I attract you?”
An entirely different note had entered her voice. Though the sound of battle hadn’t left, he was no longer sure he was the target.
“I haven’t made that perfectly obvious by now?”
The room had gone too still. Greg glanced around the washer once more, half thinking he might find he was alone, and his gaze locked with Beth’s.
“I need to be more obvious?” he asked. He’d never worked so hard for a woman in his life. Not that he’d had that many. His life had taken unexpected turns, been filled with unexpected responsibilities, but when he’d wanted a woman, he hadn’t had to work at it.
“No,” she said, looking down. From his silent vantage point, Ryan stared up at her, as though following the conversation with interest. “I, um…guess—” her eyes returned to his “—you have to be looking to see