Hank scowled. “That bar is no place for a woman to go by herself. Why don’t I tag along with you?”
“I can’t ask you to do that,” she replied.
“You didn’t ask. I offered.”
Once again she stared at him for a long moment. He’d thought her eyes were a clear, sharp blue like Lainie’s, but he realized now they were deeper, darker and far more enigmatic than her sister’s.
“I was planning on going tonight,” she finally said.
He nodded. “Maddie can stay at my mother’s.”
“How do I know I can trust you?” she asked. Some of the fervor left her eyes and she suddenly looked small and vulnerable.
“You know any of the West family?” he asked.
“I know them on sight and by reputation. I know they work in the bodyguard business. Why?”
“Dalton West is an old friend of mine. One of the reasons I decided to make the move from Texas to Cotter Creek was so I could go to work for them. At the moment I’m waiting to be assigned to my first job with them.”
Maybe four months of boredom was getting to him, or maybe he was jumping into her drama because he had genuinely grown to care for Lainie. “Maybe we could help each other,” he continued. “It sounds to me like you intend to talk to people and go places that might put a single, attractive woman at risk. You could use a bodyguard, and I could use some practice at being a bodyguard.”
“So, you want to be my bodyguard in training?” A small smile curved her lips.
He returned her smile. “Something like that.”
Once again she wrapped her fingers around her coffee cup and eyed him soberly. “I’ll think about it,” she said finally.
He nodded and told himself it really didn’t matter to him whether she took his offer of help or not. Eventually the killer would be caught and Melody Thompson would return to her life in Chicago.
And he’d keep putting one foot in front of the other and try to figure out how to keep going when the only woman he’d ever loved was gone.
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