Buch lesen: «One Night in Weaver...»
“We don’t have a relationship.”
His eyes sharpened. “You sure about that?” Seth’s expression was tight. “I need to stay away from you. Until this thing with McGregor is done with. For everyone’s sake.”
She swallowed the knot in her throat. She was shaking from her head to her toes. “Then stay away.”
A muscle in his jaw flexed. “Believe me,” he said. “I have tried.” He slowly moved around the island until he stopped in front of her, trapping her in the corner where she stood near the sink.
She couldn’t seem to look away from his blue, blue eyes.
“And I can’t,” he finished in a low voice.
Her lips parted.
His head dipped toward hers, his lips grazing hers, lighter than his whisper. “Don’t trust me, Hayley. Be stronger than I am.”
A sound she didn’t recognize slid from her throat. Her hands curled into fists against the counter on one side of her and the cool edge of the old-fashioned apron sink on the other. “I’m not strong.”
* * *
Return to The Double C Under the big blue Wyoming sky, this family discovers true love
One Night in Weaver…
Allison Leigh
A frequent name on bestseller lists, ALLISON LEIGH’s high point as a writer is hearing from readers that they laughed, cried or lost sleep while reading her books. She’s blessed with an immensely patient family who doesn’t mind (much) her time spent at her computer and who gives her the kind of love she wants her readers to share in every page. Stay in touch at www.allisonleigh.com and on Twitter, @allisonleighbks.
For my family.
Contents
Cover
Introduction
Title Page
About the Author
Dedication
Prologue
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Epilogue
Extract
Copyright
Prologue
He really was exceptionally good looking.
A good six feet tall. Probably more. Dark brown hair that she suspected he kept cut short because it might have the tendency to curl into girlish prettiness if he didn’t. Bright blue eyes that seemed startling in contrast to the dark hair.
The first time she’d seen him was at least a year ago, in the Weaver Community Park. Running and looking far more natural at it than she did. After that, the chance of catching a glimpse of him provided a major incentive for Hayley to drag herself to the park a few times every week, where she would meet up with Sam Dawson, her running partner and one of her best friends.
Sam ran every day. And trained with weights. She was a fitness fiend; she claimed it was because she needed to keep up with the guys in the sheriff’s department, where she was the only female on the force. Hayley figured that even if Sam worked behind a teller’s window in a bank all day long, she’d still be in the park every morning, snow or shine, doing her thing. Hayley was thirty-five. Too old to kid herself that she ran for the pleasure of it. No. Hayley joined Sam a few times a week because she liked being able to fit into her suits and still indulge in her favorite cinnamon rolls from Ruby’s diner.
And she liked catching glimpses of him.
The man—she knew his name was Seth Banyon because she’d heard it around town—obviously subscribed to Sam’s methodology, though. The man was a walking advertisement for the benefits of physical fitness.
She’d also seen him around town. Often at Shop-World, where his grocery cart tended to be more heavily loaded than hers. He always seemed to buy the same things. A six-pack of beer. Giant loaves of bread. Steak. Bacon. Eggs. Several packaged frozen meals.
Her cart, on the other hand, contained fresh vegetables and fruit. And never a steak, despite Weaver, Wyoming, pretty much being located in the center of the beef universe. The only item their carts ever had in common was coffee. Same brand. Hers, whole bean. His, already ground.
“Bring you another cosmo, Dr. Templeton?”
Hayley gathered her wandering thoughts and blinked once, focusing on the cocktail waitress who’d stopped next to the small high-top that Hayley was hogging all to herself.
She didn’t ordinarily drink cocktails; usually she stuck with a glass of white wine, which suited the expectations the citizens of Weaver had for their local psychologist, Hayley Templeton, PhD. And she certainly never drank alone.
Nor did she ogle men bellied up to the bar of Colbys, no matter how nicely they filled the rears of their faded blue jeans and the shoulders of their long-sleeved T-shirts, or how long it had been since she’d had a man’s arms around her.
One who wasn’t related by blood, at any rate.
She pushed aside the thought of her family. They were the reason she was there in Colbys, alone, trying her hand at the age-old practice of drowning her sorrows in alcohol.
“Yes, please.” She offered up the two glasses that she’d already emptied, surreptitiously steadying her hands by propping her elbows on the tabletop. If she’d had anywhere else to go to wallow in her liquor-glazed misery, she would have.
But tonight, Colbys was going to have to suffice.
All around her, people were knotted together in clusters, still celebrating the passing of the old year and the arrival of the new, even though New Year’s Eve was two evenings past.
She’d expected to still be celebrating, too. At home in Braden, some thirty miles away, with her family.
Celebrating not just the fresh new year. But a fresh, new beginning for the Templeton family.
The entire Templeton family.
She was a good therapist. But obviously not good enough to heal the rift in her own family. A rift that—according to her father—she was actually causing by continuing to harbor the enemy. His words.
She sighed and let her gaze drift back to Seth Banyon. One foot was propped casually on the metal rod that ran the length of the bar near the floor. He was leaning on his forearms, which rested atop the glossy wooden surface.
Unlike ninety percent of the men—and women—in here, who wore cowboy boots on their feet and cowboy hats on their heads, his head was bare and he wore sturdy black work boots. They weren’t exactly shined.
But they weren’t covered in the ranch dust that was typical of the boots around Weaver, either. He was a security guard out at Cee-Vid, the consumer electronics and video gaming company located on the edge of town. She knew that about him only because her other best friend, Jane Cohen, had once mentioned it.
The waitress set Hayley’s fresh cocktail on the table, nearly making her jump. Fortunately, the girl—Hayley knew her name, but she was having the hardest time remembering it—didn’t seem to notice. Instead, she just hovered there for a moment, asking if Hayley was sure she didn’t want to order some food.
Hayley knew Colbys’ menu like the back of her hand because Jane owned the place. And just to keep Olive—that was her name!—from asking this same question for a sixth time, Hayley ordered a grilled chicken sandwich even though the thought of food on top of all the alcohol was vaguely nauseating.
But Olive beamed, obviously satisfied that she’d done her part to keep the good town therapist supplied in food as well as drink, and headed back behind the busy bar, where she punched in Hayley’s order.
Hayley’s gaze drifted back to Seth. He’d turned around so that he was no longer leaning over the bar but leaning back against it and facing her.
And his blue, blue gaze collided with hers.
Flushing a little, she quickly looked down at her drink. She took too hasty a sip and couldn’t stifle the choking cough that resulted.
She recovered quickly enough but felt her cheeks grow even warmer at the sight of the faint smile hovering around Seth’s lips. Obviously, he’d seen.
She was glad when Olive returned with her sandwich and a glass of water, and Hayley had a valid reason to stare down at her table; she felt as if she was still an awkward sixteen-year-old in the Braden High School cafeteria, where she’d always been too shy to do anything else. Such as participate in an actual conversation with those around her.
She cut the thick sandwich in half and took a bite, chewing determinedly even though her stomach rolled dangerously as she swallowed.
She definitely should have stuck to wine.
She set the sandwich back on the thick white plate and reached for her water glass, only to knock her knuckles into it and send it teetering. Stifling an oath, she tried to right the cup but only succeeded in finishing the job of tipping it on its side, sending ten ounces of water and ice right into her lap.
“Sugarnuts,” she hissed under her breath as she grabbed napkins from the dispenser on the table and swabbed futilely at the cascade.
“Here.” A white bar towel appeared in her peripheral vision. She glanced at the long-fingered, square hand holding it and, realizing who’d come to her rescue, reluctantly looked up.
Wanting to sink through the floor, she avoided Seth’s gaze, snatched the towel from him and sopped up the water in her lap. It was dripping off the padded chair onto the scuffed, wooden floor and he smoothly dropped a handful of paper napkins on the puddle before it spread any farther.
“Thanks,” she muttered.
Without invitation, he pulled out the other chair tucked against the small table and sat, placing his beer bottle next to her cosmo. “You going to eat all those?”
He had a drawl that wasn’t from Wyoming. And while she was busy noticing that, he’d already dived in to her French fries.
“Help yourself,” she said in a dry tone.
His lips tilted and his gaze drifted over her face as he reached for another sliver of crispy, fried potato. “Thanks. You’re not usually here by yourself.”
“Ummm...no.” The bite of chicken sandwich sat heavily somewhere in the middle of her chest. Because the contents of her water glass were soaking through her jeans and the pile of napkins on the floor, she reached for the cosmopolitan again, even though her head was already swimming.
She didn’t dare make too much of his observation about her being here tonight. Sooner or later, everyone came through Colbys. It was a mainstay in Weaver. Just because he happened to notice something about her didn’t mean diddly.
He studied her for a moment. Then he swallowed another one of her French fries, wiped his salty fingers on his jeans and reached across the table, his hand extended. “Seth Banyon.”
She automatically shook his hand. “I know.” The admission escaped and her face turned hotter than ever. She pulled her hand quickly away from his and managed not to rub her palm on her own jeans even though the temptation was strong. “Hayley Templeton,” she said abruptly.
Why was it that she only felt truly confident with strangers when they were her patients? If she were her patient, she’d assign herself some homework about that. Small steps designed to increase her comfort in an area always outside her comfort zone.
“I know. Dr. Hayley Templeton.” He wrapped his long fingers around his beer bottle and tilted it to his lips. “The shrink,” he added when he set the bottle down again.
“The psychologist,” she corrected.
If anything, he looked even more amused, a faint dimple appearing in his lean cheek, though he managed not to smile outright. “Heard Jane was off visitin’ someone for the holidays, but where’s your other friend? The blonde without a lick o’ Christmas spirit who gave me a ticket the other day?”
Despite her woozy head, she instantly knew who he was talking about. “Sam has plenty of Christmas spirit,” she countered defensively.
“Well, Sam still wrote me a speeding ticket on Christmas Eve. Probably gonna cost me a couple hundred bucks.”
“Probably because you shouldn’t have been speeding.”
His lips twitched slightly. If he was concerned over the ticket or the ensuing cost, he didn’t particularly look it.
He knew Hayley’s name but not Sam’s? Being the only female deputy sheriff around, she stood out even more than Hayley, the psychologist.
She pushed aside the thought and picked up her sandwich, only to set it back down again. She plucked a French fry from the pile and nibbled on the end instead. They were crispy. Salty. Still hot and exactly the way she liked them. But her stomach still didn’t seem thrilled at the prospect of food. She forced down the rest of the fry anyway and wiped her fingers on a fresh napkin. It was the last one in the dispenser. The rest were on the floor performing sop-up duty.
When a burst of laughter came from one of the nearby tables, she made herself meet Seth’s eyes because she was a grown woman and no longer a socially awkward teen. “What are you doing in here alone?” Unfortunately, the question came out more blunt than flirtatious, and she wished the floor would just swallow her whole.
He didn’t answer. Merely lifted his beer bottle and finished off the contents. Then he set the bottle back down alongside her cosmo, and his knuckles grazed hers. She went hot in spots that didn’t show from the outside and was glad for that. He reached for his wallet, pulled out a few dollars and left them on the table and filched several more French fries, which he ate in one gulp as he stood.
Maybe if she’d spent more time developing a social life instead of her career, she wouldn’t get all hot and bothered by the briefest, most unintentional contact imaginable.
“You have someone to drive you home?” he asked in his deep voice. Drive sounded more like drahve. He was looking at her cocktail glass.
She managed, somehow, to loosen her tight fingers from around the stem and blood reentered her fingertips. “I’m walking.” She lifted the sandwich again, but her roiling stomach kept her from taking the charade of hunger any further.
“It’s snowin’ outside.”
“It often does around here this time of year,” she said with such blitheness she was actually impressed with herself.
“I’ll drive you.” He lifted the sandwich out of her suddenly lax fingers and set it on the plate. Before she could gather her wits, he’d grabbed the towel from her lap and cupped his hand around her elbow. “Come on.”
She stood, because, well, what else could she do considering the way he was tugging her off the barstool? “I don’t want to go home,” she blurted, the fake blitheness beyond her reach again. Her grandmother, Vivian, was staying with her. And facing her would mean admitting what a disaster Hayley’s latest attempt to visit her parents had been. Avoiding that embarrassment was the very reason why Hayley had been warming the barstool in Colbys in the first place.
Seth dropped the towel on the table. “Then we’ll go to my place.”
She stared at him. She couldn’t help it. “And do what?”
His gaze drifted over her face. “I think we can find something to entertain us. Don’t you?”
Her belly lurched. There was no mistaking his meaning.
His lips twitched slightly as he looked pointedly at the table. “You going to pay your check? Or does your friend let you eat and drink for free?”
Truth be told, Jane never wanted Hayley to pay for anything in Colbys, but Hayley always insisted. Flushing darker than ever, she snatched her purse from the back of the barstool and left a wad of cash on the table to cover her tab plus a tip.
“All right, then.” His faint smile widened a bit as he held out her coat for her.
Swallowing hard, Hayley slid her arms into the sleeves. Seth’s hands lingered on her shoulders for a moment. Something was going wrong with her breathing. “My jeans are wet,” she said stupidly.
His smile widened. His teeth were white and very straight, except for the faintest gap between his two front teeth.
“I think we can do something about that, too,” he said leaning forward near her ear.
Then he spread his palm across the small of her back and nudged her gently toward the door.
Head spinning, not knowing what else to do and not wanting to do anything else anyway, Hayley mindlessly put one foot in front of the other and walked out of the bar with him.
Chapter One
Three months later
His jaw going so tight that it actually ached, Seth stared at the other man. “You have got to be kidding me.”
Tristan Clay’s calm expression didn’t change; his light blue eyes looked glacial. “Do I look like I’m joking?”
Seth clenched his teeth to keep from spitting out an oath. There was a time and a place for that, and here in his boss’s home while Tristan and his wife hosted a joint wedding shower for their nephew and his fiancée was definitely not it.
Fortunately, the honorees, Casey Clay and Jane Cohen, were on the far side of the room and were the focus of everyone else’s attention. But Seth still kept his voice down. “I don’t believe you’ve fallen for this—” he hesitated, revising the words he wanted to say “—story that Jason McGregor has amnesia.”
“That’ll be up to Dr. Templeton to determine,” Tristan said smoothly. “She’ll be the one treating him. But the condition does occur. My own brother dealt with it once upon a time.” He smiled suddenly and lifted his beer mug in salute when he overheard Casey say something about him hosting the party. “Thank my wife, Hope,” Tristan announced loudly to the assembled guests. “Everyone knows she’s the brains behind this gig.”
Laughter and smiles followed as Hope Clay, easily as beautiful as women half her age, rolled her eyes and continued nudging wrapped gifts toward Casey and Jane.
Seth’s contribution to the effort had been a case of microbrew from some dinky little startup out in Arizona that Casey had a liking for. The fact that his coworker was marrying the owner of a bar and could get all the beer he wanted had already been laughed about.
“Whatever happened with your brother is one thing. But McGregor should be facing murder charges,” Seth told Tristan, not for the first time. “Not your hired shrink’s couch.”
His boss didn’t blink. On the surface, Tristan Clay was the brilliant mind that had started Cee-Vid as a little video gaming company several decades ago and built it into a hugely successful player in the world of consumer electronics and gaming. But more important, behind the company’s front, he was the number-two guy at Hollins-Winword, a secret organization with an even longer history of black ops and international security.
Cee-Vid, where Seth and Casey ostensibly worked, was pretty much a household name.
Hollins-Winword, though, was a closely guarded secret that not even the real employees of Cee-Vid knew about.
“Dr. Templeton isn’t my shrink,” Tristan said in a low voice. “She’s an impartial professional whose expertise and discretion were good enough to get this whole operation approved in the first place. She knows only what she needs to know about HW in order to do her job well.”
Seth’s fists curled, frustration ticking like a bomb inside his gut. “And how’s that supposed to help Jon and Manny?” They’d been McGregor’s partners up until the point when their bodies had been discovered in a Honduran hut six months ago. McGregor had been nowhere to be found until a few months later, and only then because he’d been picked up in Mississippi on some traffic stop. The Hollins-Winword agent had been using one of his known aliases.
It was the one kernel that kept sticking in Seth’s teeth. If McGregor hadn’t been using the alias, he would likely still be in the wind. And the field agent had never been a stupid man, even if Seth did consider him guilty of murdering his partners. “You think that’s going to help their grieving families? Knowing the person responsible is getting counseling?”
Tristan’s lips thinned. He took his responsibilities—both public and private—very seriously. “Their families will never know the entire truth about their deaths, whether or not Jason was responsible,” he said flatly. “And you know it. That’s a price everyone who signs on with us pays. Whether someone dies as a hero or not, the complete truth stays unsung. If it didn’t, we would’ve been out of business before you were a spark in your daddy’s eyes.”
Seth’s jaw went even tighter because he did know that. “When I signed on with the agency, there weren’t any people in my life to worry about me. Any people to lie to.” So that decision had been easy.
Jon, Manny and Jason, though, all had family. Parents. Siblings. And all of them believed the cover story. That their sons and brothers had been ex-pats cranking out a meager living as farmers in a tiny corner of Central America. They didn’t know they’d really been there to feed intel to the authorities about a local drug king who’d branched out into human trafficking. Not even Hollins-Winword’s considerable resources had been able to prove that their covers had been blown, a circumstance that would have laid their murders squarely on the drug king’s doorstep.
Instead, the entire situation was still surrounded with question marks even all these months later. The recent discovery that the drug king had also been funding suspected terrorists had only upped the stakes where McGregor was concerned.
“If your father hadn’t been killed when you were a pup, you wouldn’t have signed on with us?” Tristan’s gaze was steady. “You honestly believe that?”
Seth grimaced. His father’s unavenged death when he was eighteen still haunted him, though after twenty years, he mostly managed not to think about it.
Thankfully, Tristan left the subject of Seth’s dad alone. “We have bullets recovered from their bodies that we haven’t been able to trace back to a specific weapon, much less Jason’s. That’s it. That leaves us with his memories. Locked up in his head or willfully hidden away. When that question is resolved, then we’ll take our next step. In the meantime, we got him back from the Feds only by calling in a boatload of favors. I don’t want anything screwing it up or he’ll get yanked back under government detention for God knows how long while they figure out what to do with him, and we’ll lose any chance we’ve ever had of learning the truth of what really happened in Central America.”
“Maybe that’s where he belongs,” Seth said under his breath. “Whatever he ended up doing down there, he started out with two partners who were killed. And you’re harboring him in a comfy little safe house right here in Weaver.”
“You were friends with Jon and Manny—”
“Were being the operative word.”
Tristan set his mug on the chest-high fireplace mantel behind them, clamped his hand over Seth’s shoulder and guided him out of the room and to the front door. “Go home,” he advised quietly. “Get your head back on straight. The likelihood of there ever being a public court case about this situation is slim to none.” The federal government would never allow some things—such as their off-the-books arrangement with Hollins-Winword to handle some of their dirty work—to see the light of day.
“So he just walks,” Seth said between his teeth.
Tristan’s grip hardened. He was a good twenty-five years older than Seth, but there was little doubt the man could have taken Seth—former US Army Ranger or not—right to the ground if he so chose. At least, he could have done a good job trying. “If he’s innocent, yes.” Tristan lowered his hand. “You’ve got the choice, Seth. You want to leave the organization, say the word.”
“I could take everything I know to the media.”
Tristan snorted, his eyes filling with honest-to-God mirth. “Honor runs thicker in your veins than blood does, kid. Why else do you think I recruited you out of the Rangers?”
“There’s no honor in letting a man get away with murder.”
“He hasn’t gotten away with it yet, has he?” Tristan’s voice was smooth. “Until I got him transferred here to my watch, he was wearing leg irons in a military prison. But that cozy safe house you’re all pissed off about now still doesn’t unlock from the inside.” He pulled open the door.
The soft, feminine gasp that greeted them didn’t stump the older man for even a second as his face creased into a wide, welcoming smile. “Dr. Templeton. My wife was just wondering when you’d be arriving.” He stepped back, his arm wide in invitation. “Come in. Can’t have the maid of honor standing out on the front porch.”
Hayley Templeton stared back at them above the large gift-wrapped box she was holding, her dark brown eyes looking like melted chocolate in the dwindling sunset. But her gaze instantly flicked away from Seth’s like a skittish firefly.
It had been that way ever since that night at Colbys several months ago.
Her soft lips stretched into a smile that wasn’t entirely steady. “Mr. Clay,” she greeted. “I’m so sorry I’m late.” Her gaze flicked to Seth’s again. “I, was, um, was tied up with a new patient.”
“It’s Tristan, Hayley. I’ve told you that before. And patients come first. We all certainly understand that.” He looked over his shoulder for a moment when his wife called his name. He lifted his hand in acknowledgment before turning back to Hayley. His gaze took in Seth, as well. “Seth, before you head out, help the doctor here with that gift of hers and make sure she has a drink, would you?” Then he excused himself, his easy smile still in place.
Hayley’s, though, turned even more ragged at the edges and her eyes still wouldn’t meet Seth’s for more than a nanosecond. “I’m a big girl,” she said quickly. “I don’t need help with the gift.”
“Much less getting a drink.”
Her cheeks turned pink. “A gentleman wouldn’t remind me of that.”
“I never said I was a gentleman.” But his father hadn’t raised him to be a complete cretin, either, despite their male-only household. “Don’t worry so much, Doc. You had a few too many that night,” he said with a shrug. “Plenty of us have done the same at one time or another.” Without waiting for permission, he lifted the box out of her hands and turned to carry it inside.
“Well, I don’t make a habit of it,” she muttered as she closed the door and hurried to keep up with him. “Not drinking too much and certainly not going home with strange men.”
“Never said you did.” He glanced at her. “If you had bothered to return either of the messages I left you after that night, I might have had a chance to reassure you of that.” He entered the crowded living room, set the box on the floor next to the other gifts that overflowed from the low table in front of the couch where Jane and Casey were seated and edged back out of the room.
Hayley was waiting where he’d left her on the perimeter of the room. Nobody else seemed to have noticed her arrival, but he was still more than a little surprised when she turned and trotted after him as he headed back to the foyer and the front door. “Seth, wait.”
He stopped, turned and raised his brows.
She looked pained. “I should have.” Her lips pressed together for a moment. “Returned your message.” She quickly looked over her shoulder. “Could we take this outside, at least?”
“Don’t want the masses to know you socialize with a lowly security guard?”
She gave him a look. “Don’t be ridiculous.”
“Then what’s your problem, Doc? You hightailed it out of my place before the sun came up the next morning.”
“I was embarrassed!” Her voice had risen a bit and she looked annoyed again. She ran her hand over her head, smoothing back her ponytail even though it already looked perfectly smooth to him.
Irritatingly, his memory filled in just how silky it was.
Then she caught his sleeve and pulled him out the front door and onto the porch. She closed the door behind them and immediately let go to move several feet away, where she crossed her arms.
No point in remembering how silky her hair was when she wanted nothing to do with him.
Even though they were outside, she still lowered her voice. “I was embarrassed,” she said again. “I’ve never found myself in...in that position before, and I handled it poorly. And I, well, I apologize for that. I meant no offense.”
He hadn’t been offended.
Disappointed a little. Maybe more than a little.
But he was thirty-eight years old and he told himself he was too jaded to get upset over a woman. Particularly one as beautiful and out-of-reach as Dr. Hayley Templeton. He shrugged again. “No sweat. The only reason I left those messages in the first place was to make sure you were okay.” That was true enough.
She blinked. Whatever she’d expected him to say, it was obviously not that. “Um...okay, then. So, we can just forget it ever happened?”
“Yup.” He started down the wide, shallow porch steps but looked back at her. She was wearing a pale gray pencil skirt that ended just below her knees and a white long-sleeved blouse that was buttoned to just below the hollow of her slender throat.
Aside from her tall, shocking-pink high heels, she looked prim and proper as if she’d just come from a session with a patient, even though it was eight o’clock on a Saturday evening. All he could think about was how fun it would be to get her all mussed up. To finish what they’d never gotten to start the night she’d gone home with him.
But she’d already made it clear that she wanted nothing to do with him. She was not interested. And now, according to Tristan, her latest patient was one Jason McGregor.
He ruthlessly uprooted the idea germinating in the back of his mind. She had a spotless reputation around town. And she had to be exceptionally good at what she did to earn Tristan Clay’s confidence. She would never betray a patient’s confidentiality to Seth, even if he could get into her confidence. Which, considering everything, was unlikely.
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