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The mayor was nothing if not the town’s salesman. “Don’t judge so quickly. How many towns can boast affordable living, a winery and views like this.” He pointed to a fog-shrouded mountain towering over the trees.
“I’m sure it’s beautiful when the fog burns off,” Julie allowed, lacing her fingers together.
The mayor pointed at her with both index fingers and backed away. “I won’t give up on you.”
“I can respect that.” Julie fought off the sudden need to yawn.
She couldn’t see Nate inside. She couldn’t see a waitress with a carafe of coffee. She was out of her element here and in her own skin. Her head felt heavy enough from lack of sleep to fall off her shoulders and there was a knot tightening beneath her right shoulder blade, about the place where Nate had stabbed her in the back years ago.
When they were rookies on the Sacramento police force, Julie had had to prove she was tough enough to fit in. Nate fit in just by putting on the uniform. They’d been working the same shift when they’d received a domestic abuse call. Julie pulled up to the house just after Nate did. It was the first time they’d responded to a call together. The first time Julie had been on a domestic abuse call.
The call looked bad from the get-go. Rundown neighborhood. Dingy white house. Dirt where a lawn should be. The crack by the front door handle indicated it’d been kicked in at least once before. It wasn’t the kind of place you sent a patrol officer alone.
“I’ll take point.” Nate’s hand was on his holster as he knocked on the front door. “Police! Open up!”
Inside the house, a gun went off. A woman screamed.
Nate drew his gun and kicked down the door before Julie could report shots fired and request backup. And then she drew her weapon and followed.
“Landry!” Julie tried to control the slight shake to her hands.
There were sounds of a scuffle deep inside the house. At the end of the hall, a woman appeared.
Julie flinched, nearly shooting her.
The woman was unarmed, her face bruised and bloodied. She carried a toddler with a red welt on his cheek. They were both crying.
Crap. Julie’s legs had felt as if she’d run the police academy obstacle course one too many times. She’d trained for worst-case scenarios, but Julie had never been in a situation like this before. “Get out,” Julie ordered the woman, keeping her weapon and her eyes trained on the end of the hallway as the woman escaped past her. “Landry! Answer me.”
Something hit a wall, shaking the entire house. And then there was a thud.
Julie turned the corner of the hall and looked into the master bedroom.
Nate sat on top of a panting shirtless man, cuffing his hands behind his back. He stared up at Julie, breathing heavily, one eye swelling and his lip bloody. Two handguns were on the carpet near the door. “Read him his rights.”
Later, as they’d worked on the report at the station, Julie put a hand on Nate’s arm. “That was stupid, running in there like that. He had a gun. He could’ve—”
“His wife didn’t think it was stupid since he was pistol-whipping her.” There was a dangerous edge to Nate’s voice that Julie had never heard before.
“Do you know them?” He hadn’t put that in the report. “Is this personal?”
“I’ve seen abuse before.” Nate’s jaw ticked. “It’s worth taking a bullet to save someone. He hit that woman and—” his voice roughened “—that little boy.” Nate stared at her, but he didn’t seem to see Julie.
She’d wanted him to. She wanted him to confide in her.
“Do you know what it’s like to feel helpless and trapped?” He did see her then. And behind his gaze was something so bleak, Julie almost couldn’t bear it. “Your options are taken away. Your spontaneity... Your personality... You can’t show anything. And your freedom...” His gaze turned distant again. “It’s like a storm comes in with dark, heavy clouds, and you have no shelter, no choice but to weather the storm.”
“Nate... I’m so sorry.” Was this why he never talked about his family? Because he’d been abused?
“Sorry?” Nate had sat back in his chair, suddenly completely in the present and completely angry. “I was talking about the victims.” He stood and went to get a cup of coffee.
She hadn’t believed him. But what she did believe was that Nate took his work to heart. And she’d respected him for that. Heck, she’d practically worshipped the ground he walked on.
Inside El Rosal, a waiter entered the main dining room through the swinging kitchen door. He held the door for Nate, who carried Duke and a large mug of steaming coffee. Duke clutched a piece of bacon in each hand.
The waiter opened the main restaurant door for Nate, and then followed him to the table. He had a swarthy complexion, thick black hair and a killer smile that probably netted him lots of tips. If he’d brought a coffeepot, Julie might have tipped him well, too.
Instead, she sighed and held up the sippy cup. First things first.
Nate set the steaming mug in front of Julie and sat down across from her, lifting a happy Duke in his lap. Julie’s lap felt empty. It was small consolation that Nate suddenly looked as if he’d been taken over by aliens and was just now realizing he had a small boy with him.
“Truck.” Duke grinned, pointing at Nate’s Ford.
“Truck,” Nate echoed.
The waiter leaned both hands on the edge of the table and beamed at Julie. He’d pinned his name tag—Arturo—upside down. “Sheriff Nate wanted to order you the empanada, which he mistakenly calls an apple fritter. He also wants to order pancakes and eggs for his little sidekick.” Arturo’s gently rolling consonants fell out of his smiling mouth like the cheery notes of a pop song’s chorus. “But my mama won’t accept the order until you confirm it. She says we don’t know you, but we know how bossy Sheriff Nate is.” He plucked the sippy cup from her hand. “Milk or juice?”
“Milk. And just this once we’ll go with the sheriff’s order.” She gave Nate a stern look and then mainlined the coffee.
“I know the difference between an apple fritter and an empanada,” Nate grumbled.
“The key to happiness is to establish expectations.” Arturo moved to a stack of wooden high chairs. “Both in dining and in relationships.” He carried one to the table, and then left them.
“Pay no attention to the talking fortune cookie.” Nate deposited Duke in the high chair like a pro. At Julie’s questioning glance, he gave her the tight half smile. “My sister has a twenty-month-old little girl and I’m one of the few people trusted to babysit Camille.”
Deep down, something inside Julie gave a plaintive cry of foul. She wanted Nate to be all thumbs with Duke, to generate disinterest and temper tantrums. Nothing was going right in Harmony Valley.
Arturo returned with the sippy cup, placing it in front of Duke. “Milk.”
“Milk.” Duke dropped bacon bits on the table and reached for the cup, only to stop midgrab and stare at his hands, flexing his fingers. “I dirty.”
Before Julie could set her coffee down, Nate was wiping her nephew’s hands with a napkin.
“Okay, I get it,” Julie groused. “You have experience with little kids.” Drat and darn. “Why didn’t you tell me last night?”
Nate met her gaze squarely. “Why didn’t you tell me you’d been shot?”
She sat back, resisting the urge to touch her shoulder. He must have called someone from the force. “Why would I? We don’t work together. We’re not partners, friends or in-laws.”
He ignored her boundary setting. In fact, he steamrolled over her defenses. “You look like hell. I thought you were dying of cancer.”
Julie clung to her coffee cup and held her tongue.
“You’re not taking time off to grieve. You’re taking time off to heal and awaiting an internal investigation into the shooting.” Something passed over Nate’s face, a bleakness so fleeting, she couldn’t catch its meaning. “I heard it was your first.”
Her first kill, he meant.
Sweat traced the band of her bra. Only because the fleece of her hoodie was too thick and the heater above her too warm. Her toes were still cold.
“Don’t talk about it as if I was hunting deer.” Julie stared into her mug while Duke slurped his milk and black birds twittered and the morning fog dissipated and life went on happily for other people.
CHAPTER FIVE
JULIE WASN’T DYING.
The relief when Nate had received the return text message this morning from Captain Bradford at Sacramento PD had lifted a weight off his shoulders. He hadn’t realized how stressed-out he’d been until he’d nearly run out to meet her in front of El Rosal. Only her scowl had slowed his steps and kept him from wrapping his arms around her. Only her scowl and April’s assumption on their wedding day that he’d loved Julie more than he’d loved his bride-to-be.
Love Julie? He didn’t know how to love someone. That was something you learned by example from your parents.
And so, he’d brushed aside foolish emotions, stopped in his tracks and looked at Julie closely. Blood loss and trauma from being shot took a toll on a body. He’d expected Julie to look rested this morning. But this... She looked worse. Pasty complexion. Dark circles under her eyes. Mouth thinned with tension.
Perhaps his son was partly to blame. Nate’s niece was a good sleeper, but that didn’t mean Duke was. He knew from his sister that being a sole caregiver was draining. Julie didn’t have much energy left to drain. So he’d plucked Duke from the stroller and taken him to the kitchen to give Julie some relief. But when he’d returned, Julie had looked more haunted than before.
The midweek breakfast crowd at El Rosal was at its peak. People were starting their days with a hearty meal. Nate had a long to-do list, rounds to make, people to check up on. It would all have to wait. Unless there was an emergency, Julie was his priority, along with Duke.
Nate’s glance fell on his son. The boy had felt right in his arms when he’d carried him back to the kitchen. Long ago he’d decided not to be a father. Fatherhood should be a choice. Last night, he’d vowed to explain to Julie why he couldn’t be a father, without explaining anything at all. But first, he had to ease Julie’s suffering.
“You aren’t sleeping.” Nate could relate. He hadn’t slept much last night either. “You have to talk to someone about the shooting.” Taking a life was taboo. Breaking a taboo could rattle even the strongest person.
“I sleep fine.” Julie scowled, but the effect was ruined by the light breeze pushing wisps of blond hair across vacant eyes.
“You can talk to me,” Nate persisted. “Just like you used to.” When they’d worked together, she’d unloaded emotions with him like she unloaded bullets at the shooting range. It was part of her venting process. She’d talk and he’d listen.
Today, she let silence be her answer.
Nate wanted to lean across the narrow table, slip his hand to the nape of her neck and make her stop hiding, stop bottling up her emotions and tell him about it. About April. About the shooting. About her feelings for him.
Nate rocked back in his seat. Julie was as off-limits as fatherhood.
“Ba-con.” Duke picked up another piece, grinning at Julie.
She stopped glaring at Nate and grinned back at Duke.
He’d seen a grin similar to hers often on his sister’s face when she gazed at Camille. “You want to keep him.”
“Anyone with a heart would.” Julie lifted her chin, daring him to admit he didn’t have a heart.
She didn’t understand his childhood hadn’t been carefree and loving, as hers had been. He enjoyed children, but he was satisfied enjoying other people’s children. And yet, if he admitted that...if he signed over rights to Duke, Julie would leave town. She’d go home and pretend to be fine when the life she’d taken would be eating her inside.
Flynn entered the patio wearing faded blue jeans and a ratty T-shirt. He was a dot-com millionaire who dressed like a construction worker. Since he’d become a father, he’d been dressing like an out-of-work construction worker. He’d worn that same ratty T-shirt two days ago. Flynn didn’t quite meet Nate’s gaze. “Do you have something for me?”
Nate handed a thick envelope that had been sitting on the chair to Flynn. “Those are all the citations for the past six months.” Flynn had requested them last night. He was helping the town council investigate Nate’s job performance.
Flynn nodded his thanks and wove his way between tables to where the mayor sat in the corner.
Mayor Larry wore black yoga pants, an oversize sweatshirt and the false smile of a lifelong politician. He held Nate’s future in his hands. And not in a tight clasp either.
Would the mayor back him in the race? The breeze shifted, blowing cold air in Nate’s face.
“They’ll be talking about you.” Julie set down her mug, restored enough with caffeine and a change in topic to take a poke at him.
It was a weak poke. “I’m a sheriff, not an administrator.” He might be powerless about his career, but he could do something to help Julie’s.
“Sheriff Nate.” It was Agnes. The short town councilwoman carried a coffee cup from Martin’s and a pastry bag that Julie eyed with envy. “I meant to ask for an introduction last night. Who’s your friend?”
Nate introduced Julie and Duke. He was going to stop at names, but impulsively, he added, “Duke is my son.”
“I Duke,” the boy said proudly scratching his head and dragging his hair over the Landry ears. “You Nay.” He pointed at Nate.
Unexpectedly, happiness buoyed Nate’s cheeks, trying to lift them into a smile.
Duke’s words seemed to have the opposite effect on Julie. She was frowning.
“I see the resemblance now. He’s adorable.” Agnes gave Julie a kind, if shrewd, look. “Sheriff, I hadn’t realized you’d been married before.”
“He wasn’t. He knocked up my sister and jilted her.” The frown vanished and Julie’s face bloomed with color.
That color, that spark in her eyes. It almost made the awkwardness of his past worth telling.
“To be fair,” Nate said flatly, the way he gave testimony on the witness stand. “April didn’t tell me she was pregnant.” And didn’t that still sting.
“Do you mind if I use the town phone tree to spread the word?” Agnes tapped Julie’s shoulder with the back of her hand as if sharing a joke. “I’d like to say I’m pulling your leg, but we love gossip as much as we love our sheriff.” She gave Nate a fond smile. “Well, off to my meeting.” She joined Flynn and the mayor, but fiddled with her phone before engaging in conversation.
The phone tree. Julie had no idea what she was in for.
Nate felt compelled to warn her. “By midafternoon, everyone will know your name. But half the population will have gotten the story wrong. They’ll say I jilted you, and that Duke is our son.”
Our son. His gaze stuck on Julie’s gray eyes.
“I’ll gladly correct them.” Julie beamed.
She hadn’t smiled at him like that in years. A feeling long buried in his chest climbed into his throat. He didn’t have a word for that feeling. April had tried to call it love. But... Love for Julie? Love for her mercurial moods and her broad smile? For her dedication to her career, her need for justice and her bighearted, slightly naive view of the world? He appreciated all those things about her. He’d missed all those things about her. But love? If he truly loved her, how could he have lived without her for more than two years?
Arturo appeared with Duke’s sippy cup refill and three plates of food.
“Ooh.” Duke clapped his hands when he saw his pancake and eggs.
Arturo set Julie’s plate down last. “I had the kitchen add cinnamon glaze to your empanada.”
Julie’s eyes lit up. “Arturo, your wife is one lucky woman.”
“I’m not married.” Arturo clucked his tongue and gave her an appreciative once-over. “And neither are you.”
“She’s not interested,” Nate growled, feeling proprietary. He buttered Duke’s pancakes to keep from growling further at his friend.
“Who says I’m not interested?” Julie gave Arturo a calculated smile.
“This is why I’m single. Too many arguments.” Arturo laughed and moved to the next table.
“That’s not why he’s single.” Nate narrowed his eyes. “He thinks of himself as a ladies’ man.”
“The ladies love me,” Arturo tossed over his shoulder.
“Ladies over sixty-five,” Nate said, qualifying and loading his fork. “Ladies who tip well.”
Julie said nothing. Her attention had dropped to her plate. She’d never been much good at multitasking.
There was a lull in both conversation and argument while they dug into their food. Several minutes later, Duke was slowing down on his pancake, eating with his fingers and getting nearly as much in his mouth as on his face, hands and sweatshirt.
Julie was perking up. The empanada was nearly gone. Her coffee cup had been refilled again. But sugar and caffeine couldn’t erase the look of exhaustion on her face. She needed someone to care for her. Fat chance of her letting it be him.
Nate cleared his throat. “What was April’s criteria for my gaining custody?”
Julie pinned him with an intense gaze. “She called it the Daddy Test.”
Just hearing the name made him uneasy. “I take it April made the test up.”
“She did.” Julie nodded, a mix of superiority and satisfaction in her eyes. She didn’t expect him to pass.
The quickest way out of fatherhood was to fail. Little Duke was awesome and deserved a loving home with someone who knew how to provide it for him. Julie had already offered. She’d do an excellent job. So it made no sense that he said, “Your test won’t hold up in a court of law.”
“I know.” Color appeared in her cheeks. Arguing with him seemed to do that to her. “But I also know you won’t push the issue. We were friends once. You’ll wait to hear my evaluation.”
He shouldn’t. And he wouldn’t have. Except, the longer it took Julie to assess him, the longer she’d stay in Harmony Valley. Worst case, she’d have a chance to find some peace from the shooting. “If I agree, you have to stay for a month.”
She frowned. “I don’t have to agree to anything.”
“You can stay until the doctor clears you for duty.” He could make amends to April if he helped her get through this. Troubled and injured as she was, she couldn’t properly care for Duke or herself.
“The doctor will clear me for a desk job sooner if I pass my psych eval.” Her frown deepened to a scowl. She knew she wouldn’t pass anytime soon. “Besides, I can’t afford to stay here a month.”
“You could stay with me for free.” Before she made a decision, Nate’s phone chirped and vibrated.
In the distance, a siren split the spring air.
“I have to go.” Nate stood, hesitating as he looked down at his son, suddenly loathe to leave. He stroked Duke’s unruly black curls and said, “Be good.” And then Nate looked at Julie. “You, too.”
She scoffed.
Men and women of all ages were coming out of Martin’s and El Rosal. The volunteer firefighters were mobilizing, as were the lookie-loos. Nate needed to lead the pack, not trail behind.
“We’ll talk later,” he said to Julie, who looked like she was eager to join in on a good emergency call.
If it was excitement she was missing, she wouldn’t find it in Harmony Valley.
Nate checked his phone for the address, but it was just as easy to follow the volunteers and spectators up the switchbacks to the top of Parish Hill. Having arrived at a thinly graveled, rutted driveway belonging to a crotchety old man, some turned around when they saw the sign—Trespassers Will Be Shot. Rutgar wasn’t known for exaggeration.
Nate parked his truck along the two-lane road. He walked to the rear of the property with Gage, the town vet.
“What’s this I hear about you being a dad?” Gage wasn’t as tall as Nate, but they had the same long-legged stride.
Nate knew gossip in Harmony Valley traveled fast. But this was light speed. “Just found out he existed last night. He’s two.”
“That must have been a shock.” Gage spared Nate a searching glance. “And here I was telling Doc not to spread rumors.”
Nate fought the urge to smile, to preen, to high-five. Those were the responses of a proud and loving dad. Still, he wouldn’t lie about being a father. “Let Doc run with the news. It’s true.”
“Congratulations. I think I’ve still got some cigars from when Mae was born.” Gage slapped Nate soundly on the back. “While I’ve got you here... I’m still learning the emergency codes. What are we responding to? I don’t see smoke.”
“Injury.”
The closest thing they had to a doctor in town was Patti, a retired nurse practitioner. She was currently enjoying an Alaskan cruise. The first responders would stabilize and arrange transport to medical services in nearby Cloverdale, if necessary.
Nate and Gage reached the end of the driveway and a two-story house sitting on stilts. It was painted a dirty brown and surrounded by towering pines that had probably been saplings when it was built. The town’s fire engine was parked in front of the steps leading to the porch, where the home’s owner sat and howled his displeasure.
“No! The last time someone wanted me to be seen by a doctor, I spent days in the hospital.” Rutgar was a bear of a man, with gray-blond hair that swept past his shoulders and a long gray-blond beard that swept up dinner crumbs. His gaze roved around the gathered emergency workers. “Where’s Gage? He can look at my ankle.”
“Although you’re bullheaded, you aren’t a bull.” Gage wound his way through the crowd, followed by Nate, until they reached the two uniformed fire personnel. “And I prefer patients who don’t talk back.”
“What happened?” Nate asked Ben, the fire captain.
“Rutgar missed the top step, fell and slid to the bottom. Tried to catch himself with his foot on the post down here.” Ben turned his back to Rutgar and lowered his voice, although the gathered volunteers had no qualms closing ranks to hear better. “He needs an X-ray of his ankle. He says his head hurts and when Mandy tried to get him to stand, he vomited. He might have a concussion.”
“I’ll take him to the hospital,” Nate offered, despite wanting to get back to Julie and Duke.
“I can drive him.” Flynn joined them. “I know you’ve got things to do.” The new dad raised an eyebrow, daring Nate to contradict him.
Nate did nonetheless. “Are you sure? What about Becca and Ian?”
“How long can it take?” Flynn shrugged.
Hours, but Nate wasn’t going to look a gift horse in the mouth. Rutgar was more demanding than a toddler in the terrible-two stage. “I’ll send folks back down the hill so you can get your truck in.”
Nate walked toward the road, stopping at each car to convey the basics—that Rutgar had fallen and needed nonemergency medical care. Slowly, cars began to wend their way back downhill.
A classic blue Cadillac convertible swung wide around the switchback, nearly driving the faded green Buick that carried the town council off the road.
Nate flagged down the Caddy driver, who nearly ran him over before stopping in the middle of Rutgar’s driveway. “Lilac, you aren’t supposed to be behind the wheel.”
Lilac blinked behind her large tortoiseshell sunglasses and flung the end of her maroon paisley scarf over one shoulder before answering coyly, “Is that you, Sheriff?”
“If you can’t tell it’s me,” Nate said stiffly, “you shouldn’t be driving.”
“Pfft.” Lilac waved a beringed hand. “No one has twenty-twenty vision anymore.”
“Just those who drive legally,” Nate muttered. And then he added in a loud voice in case Lilac hadn’t put in her hearing aids, “There’s nothing to see here. Go home and park your car in the driveway.” Where he could see it on his rounds and know she wasn’t being a menace on the roads.
Lilac lifted her nose in the air. “Doris says I should be able to drive wherever and whenever I want.”
Annoyance pounded in his temples and threatened to flatten what little patience he had left. “The agreement you made after nearly killing Chad Healy was you’d only drive in an emergency.”