Chapter Eleven
Duke moved forward into the room, his expression changing when he saw the blond-headed little boy in his wife’s lap.
“Hey, Trent!” he called, grinning.
“Daddy!” Trent struggled away from his mother and made a beeline to the tall man who waited, stooping, with his arms open. The child launched himself into them and hugged the man for all he was worth. “Daddy, I missed you so much!” he wept. “Why didn’t you come to see us in New York?”
Duke looked tormented. He wouldn’t meet his wife’s eyes. He kissed the little boy. “I’m glad you came to see me,” he replied, smiling at the child. He looked up, meeting Beka’s dark eyes evenly. “Hello, Beka.”
“Hello, Duke,” she replied, not quite meeting his accusing gaze.
“I’m sure you have a motel room by now, but I’d love it if you’d let Trent stay here,” he said quietly. “I have a live-in housekeeper, Mrs. Holmes, who loves children. She’s a wonderful cook.”
Beka seemed uncomfortable. “I…there aren’t…well, there isn’t a motel room vacant in Jacobsville…” She looked up at him.
“You’re welcome to stay here, too,” he replied. “I just didn’t think you’d want to,” he added bitterly.
“I can stand it if you can,” she told him. “Our suitcases are in the car. I’ll just go get them,” she said, rising.
“I’ll have one of the boys bring them in for you,” he returned curtly. “If that’s all right,” he added unexpectedly, and without antagonism.
Her thin eyebrows arched and she looked shocked. “Yes. That would be fine. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome.” He put Trent down and smiled at him. “Want to come with me? I’m going out to the corral to get one of my cowboys. He’s working a new filly on a leading rein.”
“What’s a filly, Daddy?” he asked.
“A filly is a young female horse,” he replied. “She’s an Appaloosa. She has striped hooves and spots on her back,” he added with a grin.
“I thought you sold all the Appaloosas!” Beka exclaimed.
“Not all of them,” he replied. His eyes went over her red silk blouse and down the black slacks to her small feet in high heels. “You’re welcome to join us. It’s pretty dusty out there,” he added.
She moved toward him, a little hesitantly. “Clothes can be cleaned,” she said. She took Trent’s hand. “I’d like to see her.”
Duke’s eyes softened and he smiled. “She’s a beauty.”
Beka smiled back, following the man and the boy out the door.
Violet watched them go with hopeful feelings. She knew it had been a messy divorce, because she’d been working with Blake at the time. Her personal opinion had been that Duke Wright was an overbearing, unreasonable tyrant. She had no sympathy for him at all. A woman who married a man like Duke could expect to be owned like a horse. He never asked anyone else’s opinion; he gave his. He threw out orders like a military commander, and the first day Violet met him, she’d have liked to see him upside down in a barrel of dirty water.
But he’d mellowed just recently. It was obvious that he was trying to be polite to his ex-wife, even if it was only to help his case with his son. Delene certainly seemed to like him. She grimaced. When Mrs. Wright found out who the new biologist was, she wasn’t going to be smiling. It was going to be an explosion of some magnitude…
Blake had gone home in a black mood. Mee and Yow curled up beside him in bed that night and purred while he brooded. He couldn’t get that last vision of Shannon out of his mind, lying so still and beautiful in her white coffin. All the long years, he’d wondered if he could have saved her if he’d just agreed to go to the party with her. She’d asked him to, and he’d wanted to go, because even back then he didn’t trust Julie Merrill.
But he’d had a court case the following Monday and he’d wanted time to work on his defense. While he was writing up gambits for his opening argument, Shannon was drinking a drug that worked like poison. He hadn’t known a thing about it until early the next morning, when her mother had phoned from the hospital to tell him the news.
He’d gone around in a daze for weeks afterward. He hadn’t been able to think, much less work. His reserve unit, like Cag Hart’s, had been called up in 1991 when Operation Desert Storm sent soldiers to Kuwait to liberate it from invasion. He’d volunteered without a second thought, not at all concerned that he might die.
He’d waded right in with his company, in the thick of the fighting, a captain in a forward unit. During a memorable firefight, he’d propelled a tank into the thick of an enemy position and used it like a battering ram to shut down a machine gun nest that was killing his men. He’d been awarded a Purple Heart, because he’d been wounded in the ensuing firefight, and a Silver Star for gallantry in action. Few people around here knew about it. He didn’t talk about his military service. Well, except to Cag Hart, who understood. Cash Grier was rumored to have been in Iraq during the same period, but it was a subject Cash didn’t encourage. He was even more reticent than Blake, and that was saying something.
He tossed and turned all night, finally giving in around daylight. He got up and made coffee and toast and brooded at the table. Shannon, the war, all that was in the past. He couldn’t go back. For all the wonder he’d felt with her, there had never been the spontaneous rush of passion that he felt when he was with Violet. He and Shannon had loved one another, but with a quieter, less tempestuous love. What he felt with Violet was something else again, a whirlpool of delights that left him breathless even in memory.
He thought about the baby. He wondered if it would look like him or like Violet, if it would be a boy or a girl. He could picture himself with a little girl on his lap, reading her bedtime stories, or with a little boy, showing him the telescope and distant planets, and teaching him about rocks. He loved rocks even more than astronomy. He had samples of crystals and meteorites and fossils and all sorts of minerals. He had a [ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ]l detector, and in his spare time he loved wandering around the property with it, looking for [ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ]llic meteorites. He’d found several over the years. He’d never told Violet about this odd hobby. He wondered if she liked rocks, too.
He finished his coffee and stretched. The cats sat watching him, puzzled at his change of routine.
“I couldn’t sleep. Don’t you have bad nights?” he asked them.
They blinked. For all the world, they seemed to be listening. Of course, they seemed to watch television, too. Obviously, his lack of sleep was playing tricks on his mind.
“I’m going to marry Violet,” he told them. “And there’s going to be a little tiny human being here in a few months. You’ll both have to adapt.”
They blinked again. But this time they looked at each other and then back at him.
He shook his head. He was doing it again, talking to the cats. Violet and the baby would be good for his mental health. Any day now, he was going to think the cats actually understood him.
He got up and went to the sink. Just as he put his coffee cup and plate under the running water, separate sets of teeth dug into separate ankles.
“Eyoowch!” he burst out, and started cursing.
The two cats moved quickly away, in different directions, with their ears back and their tails as rigid as flags. He rubbed the marks, glaring after them.
“I said, you’ll have to adapt and I meant it!” he yelled after them.
They walked faster.
He wasn’t going to tell Violet about this, he decided as he doctored the small incisions. She’d have him locked up before the wedding!
When Blake went to pick Violet up at Duke’s house for lunch, neither Duke nor his wife and son were around.
“Has she left?” he asked Violet covertly.
She shook her head. “They were stiff and polite at first. Now, they’re walking around each other like wrestlers looking for a good hold.”
He sighed as he tucked her hand into his and they headed toward his car. “I was afraid it might go like that. People don’t really change, you know,” he added thoughtfully. “They hide traits that bother potential mates, but bad habits always show up eventually.”
She stopped walking and looked up at him with twinkling eyes. “Do tell? And what hideous traits are you hiding from me?”
His own eyes twinkled. He bent down. “I’m a rock fanatic.”
Her eyebrows levered up. “You like rock music?”
He shook his head. “I like rocks. Meteorites. Fossils. Crystals. Right now, I’m keen on iron meteorites. I go out looking for them with a [ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ]l detector on weekends.”
She began to smile. “I’ve got a box of projectile points in my closet,” she said. “I picked them up on my grandfather’s farm when I was a little girl. Some are big and some are little. I don’t even know much about them, but I treasure them just the same. And I’ve got quartz crystals of all sorts, from amethyst to rose quartz…!”
He hugged her close, laughing. “Of all the coincidences,” he burst out.
She hugged him back. “I can see us now, hiking up a mountain with the baby in a backpack and a [ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ]l detector,” she chuckled.
He drew away so that he could see her face. “We’ll take turns carrying him,” he mused. “Or her.”
“He feels like a boy,” she said. “I don’t know why.”
He bent and kissed her nose tenderly. “We’ll love whatever we get. Maybe he’ll like rocks, too. And astronomy.”
He took her hand again and led her toward the car. He favored his left leg a little and winced as he moved.
“What’s wrong?” she asked immediately. “Did you hurt yourself?”
He paused by the passenger door of his car and studied her.
“Don’t you want to tell me?” she persisted when he hesitated.
“You might want me locked up when I tell you,” he mused.
“Be daring.”
He laughed. “I told the cats we were getting married and expecting an addition to the family. They looked at each other, and at me. One got on either side of me and they bit both ankles at once and flounced off in a huff.”
She didn’t say anything. She gave him an odd look.
He shrugged. “I told you you’d want me locked up.”
“Do they like tuna?”
He shook his head. “Salmon. They’re crazy for it.”
“I know where we can get some fresh salmon,” she murmured dryly.
He pursed his lips thoughtfully. “It might just work.”
“Let’s see!”
“First thing after lunch,” he promised, putting her in the car.
Chief Grier was in Barbara’s Café when they got there, sitting with a somber Leo Hart. They both looked up when Kemp walked in. Grier motioned to him. He left Violet in line to keep his place and paused by their booth.
“Something’s going on, I gather?” he asked.
“Something big,” Grier agreed. “Leo’s brother Simon got some news about Julie Merrill. Remember the drug lord who tried to set up shop here before I came to work on the force?”
“I do,” Blake replied. “He was bad news.”
“Well, a female drug lord has replaced him, and we think Julie Merrill is her lieutenant. I’ve been watching a house out of town on the Victoria road where drug smugglers had a hideout that the DEA busted. There’s some new activity. I think Julie’s involved, along with some prominent local politicians.”
Kemp whistled. “Got her in custody?”
“Chance would be a fine thing,” Grier replied. “She made bail and got out, but a couple of days later, she made bush bond.” In other words, Blake translated, she skipped town.
“If you need help tracking her down, I know a good P.I.”
Grier grinned. “Thanks. But I think my contacts are even better than yours. What I’d like to know from you is something that may be painful,” he added, and the smile faded.
“You want to know about Shannon Culbertson,” Blake said perceptibly. “Julie put something in her drink and she died. But I could never prove it. I tried, believe me!”
“If you have any notes on the case, I’d appreciate a look at them, if it isn’t a confidentiality matter,” he added.
“Not at this late date,” Blake replied solemnly. “Drop by my office in the morning and I’ll have them for you. I’d love nothing better than to see Julie Merrill in stripes.”
“That makes two of us,” Grier agreed. He glanced at Violet, who was looking at Blake with wide, soft, loving eyes. He grinned. “You’ve got good taste in women, I might say,” he told the other man.
“I do, don’t I?” Blake said complacently, smiling at Violet, who blushed.
“I hear she’s taking prenatal vitamins,” Grier murmured wickedly.
Blake didn’t fire from the hip. He actually laughed. “Abundantly,” he agreed, “or she goes to sleep in her plate.” He glanced from Grier to Leo Hart, who was also grinning. “You can both come to the wedding, if you’d like. We decided on the Methodist church. We’re announcing it in the paper. No time for invitations. Mrs. Hardy has loaded her shotgun and made significant threats.”
“As if that would matter to you,” Leo chuckled.
Blake smiled. “I never thought I’d get married, much less be a parent. But it all seems to be falling into place naturally.” He eyed Grier. “I hear you’re already taking Tippy’s brother fishing with you.”
“He’s quite a boy, Rory is,” Grier agreed. “I like having him around. I like having her around, too.”
“So?” Blake prompted.
Grier just shrugged. “We’re waiting for a major complication to resolve itself.”
“I heard the kidnapper was still on the loose,” Blake told him. “You don’t think he’d be crazy enough to show up here in town?”
Grier met his eyes evenly. “Without Tippy, there’s no case. Kidnapping is a federal offense. It means hard time. The guy is a professional contract killer. I don’t have any illusions about Tippy being safe just because she’s in my house. I sleep light these days.”
Blake nodded. “I hope it works out.”
“It will, one way or another,” Grier said grimly.
“What about your cats?” Leo asked curiously.
Blake blinked. “What?”
“We’ve heard some strange stories from people who visited you at home,” Leo replied with a chuckle. “They say most all of them came out running.”
“And bleeding,” Grier added wickedly.
“A few scratches here and there, that’s all.”
“Yes, but Violet will be living with them.”
“She has some ideas that involve fresh salmon,” Blake replied, grinning. “They do take bribes.”
“Good luck,” Grier said.
“Amen,” Leo added.
Blake just smiled and went back to Violet.
He told her on the way out of town about Julie Merrill jumping bail, and about the evidence Grier wanted to see.
She looked at him with soft compassion. “It’s hard for you to look back, isn’t it?” she asked gently. “Shannon meant a lot to you.”
He nodded solemnly. “She did.” His head turned toward her. “But the past is gone, Violet. I’ve made mistakes, trying to live in it. She was a kind woman. She wouldn’t have wanted me to be bitter.”
She smiled. “You were just hurt,” she said. “It takes a lot of time to get over losing people. I know. I still miss Daddy.”
“I miss both of my parents,” he said unexpectedly. “My father died when I was little. I took care of my mother all the way through school. She died of a stroke the week after I graduated from law school. Shannon was there, with food and comfort, kindness. I was almost out of my mind with grief already. Then, just a few months later, I lost Shannon, too.” He glanced at Violet. “I’ve been hiding, I suppose.”
“It isn’t hard to see why.” She leaned back against the seat. “Leo looks different.”
“He’s married,” he said, laughing. “He’s definitely mellowed. All the Hart boys have. It’s just amazing. I’d have bet real money that they’d end up crusty old bachelors.”
“They said the same thing about the Tremayne brothers,” she pointed out. “And look at them!”
He smiled. “Marc Brannon, Judd Dunn, there are two other bachelors I’d have bet on staying single.” He shook his head. “Now Cash Grier’s about to fall.”
“You think Tippy could settle down in a small town?” she asked, aghast.
“You’ve seen them together. What do you think?”
She sighed. “I think they’re crazy about each other, but neither of them is willing to admit it. She’s been through a lot, including the miscarriage. That must have been tough. What if the tabloids find out she’s here and start on her again?”
His eyes twinkled. “Oh, I think Cash can handle the press.”
“Matt Caldwell certainly did, they say, when a reporter targeted his Leslie some years ago, before they were married.”
“This is not a good place for outsiders if they ruffle feelings,” Blake reminded her.
“I’m glad. I like living here.” She sighed worriedly. “Blake, they won’t try to make some big news story out of Janet Collins when her trial comes up, will they? She poisoned Daddy and was suspected in still another murder in a nursing home. There aren’t that many women serial killers. What if the press comes in here and starts making snacks out of me and Mama?”
“Not a chance,” he promised.
His tone was curious. She glanced up at him. “Do you know something I don’t?” she asked slowly.
“Let’s just say, I’m working on something,” he replied. He stopped at the town’s only fish market and parked the car. “Fresh salmon,”
he said as he turned off the engine with a grin. “Let’s hope they take bribes!”
The cats were both sitting in the front window when the car drove up.
“That’s odd,” Blake remarked. “They never wait for me like that unless it’s grocery day.”
“Maybe they smell the salmon!” she teased.
He made a face. “Fat chance.”
Violet picked up the fish and they both went in the front door together.
“Hi, guys,” Violet said, wafting the brown-wrapped fish above their heads. “Hungry?”
They both started yowling, sounding for all the world like crying babies as they stood on their hind legs trying to swat the package out of her hands.
“That has to be a good sign,” Violet told him.
“We’ll see. Come on, girls,” he called to them, leading Violet through the living room and into the spacious kitchen. “I’ll get their bowls.”
He pulled them out of the dishwasher and settled them on the counter. Violet opened the brown package and split the salmon down the middle. The cats were all but climbing the cabinet.
“Here you go, babies,” she said softly, and put the fish down.
They both glanced at her with big blue eyes, but only for a minute. They started eating and growling at the same time, determined that each was going to get her own fair share without having her bowl raided.
Blake and Violet moved away while they ate, watching them. It didn’t take long. The cats licked their bowls clean and then started bathing themselves. They ignored the humans completely.
“Ungrateful wretches.” Blake laughed. He picked up the bowls and put them in the sink, shaking his head.
But Violet had more confidence than before, and she squatted down next to them on the floor. “Beautiful babies,” she said softly, smiling. “I’ll make sure you have salmon any time you want it.”
They stopped bathing and looked at her with those piercing blue eyes.
“Honest,” she added.
Mee called to her, got up, and rubbed against her knees. Yow blinked, hesitated, then moved closer, too, but stopped at one brief head-butt against her thigh.
She looked up at Blake. “It’s a start,” she said optimistically.
He grinned from ear to ear.
They went together to Libby Collins’s wedding. She married Jordan Powell in a beautiful church service, with most of the leading citizens of Jacobsville for witnesses. As her brother Curt led her down the aisle, she glanced at Violet, sitting so close beside Blake Kemp, and grinned. They grinned back.
It was a nice ceremony, brief but poignant, and a reception was held afterwards in Barbara’s Café. Tippy and Cash waved to them from across the room. So did the Ballengers. Calhoun was euphoric after having soundly beaten old Senator Merrill for the Democratic nomination for state senate in his district. His wife, Abby, was there, too, clinging to her husband’s arm. After three children, all boys, they were still very close. Justin Ballenger attended as well, with his [ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ]by. Like Calhoun and Abby, they had three sons of their own. [ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ][ãÍÐæÝ]by was a direct descendant of Big John Jacobs, who’d founded Jacobsville and Jacobs County.
Violet had felt uncomfortable around all the bigwigs at first, but she learned very quickly that they were just ordinary people, and they didn’t put on airs. She liked them. It wasn’t going to be hard to fit in here.
But she worried about the case against Janet Collins. There was DNA evidence, of course, but there were ways a good defense attorney could twist the truth. She didn’t want the woman to get away with what she’d done to Violet’s father.
Blake noticed her distracted expression. “Cheer up,” he whispered. “People will think it’s a wake instead of a wedding!”
She moved, and smiled up at him, clutching her small cup of punch. “Sorry. I was thinking about Mrs. Collins.”
He moved closer, tilting her chin up to his blue gray eyes. “Let me worry about it,” he said softly. “I promise you, she’s not going to get away with it.”
She sighed. “Okay, boss man,” she said. She stood on tiptoe and touched her lips to his hard mouth. “Whatever you say.”
He smiled, pulling her close to kiss her back, very emphatically. When he drew away he was aware of a faint silence around them.
He looked around and discovered that everyone was watching them instead of the newlyweds.
“Better get a ring on her finger by sundown,” Cash Grier whispered as he walked by. “Or you may be the next tabloid centerpiece.”
Blake grinned at him. “The wedding’s next week,” he told the police chief. “You’re invited.”
“I’ll bring my whole department,” Cash promised.
Blake’s eyebrows arched. “All of it?”
Cash nodded thoughtfully. “And I’ll have something very nice planned for your wedding day,” he added.
Marc Brannon overheard him and drew his very pregnant wife, Josie, closer. “Run for the border,” he advised Blake and Violet. “He was waiting for us at my ranch after our wedding, with half the county law enforcement personnel, and I had to threaten him with a shotgun to get rid of him!”
Grier glared at him. “I did not have half of them.” He shifted. “Some people I called refused to come. They didn’t want to impose on newlyweds, can you believe that?”
“We’re leaving town right after our wedding,” Blake promised Violet at once.
Grier really glared then, at Blake and the Brannons. “Hmmmph!” he muttered. “Some people have no sense of humor.”
“Some people have no sense of privacy,” Marc shot right back.
Grier glanced at Josie and grinned. “Didn’t I warn you about him?” he pointed at Marc. “And you didn’t listen!”
Josie leaned closer to her husband’s tall frame. “Oh, he’s not so bad,” she said complacently. “In fact, neither are you,” she added to Cash, “despite your far-reaching reputation.”
“What reputation?” Tippy Moore asked with a soft laugh as she walked to Cash and was gathered against him gently. “He’s as pure as the driven snow,” she drawled with a mischievous flash of green eyes.
Cash bent and kissed the tip of her nose. “Pest.”
She smiled back at him and it was like fireworks. “And I planned to make you beef Stroganoff tonight,” she said. “But here you are calling me names…”
“Nice pest,” Cash qualified.
She shrugged. “Okay. I guess I can live with that. Good to see you,” she added to the others as she let Cash lead her away to the punch. She still had plenty of cuts on her pretty face, and some bruises, and she was a little shaky. But what she’d lived through in New York had gained her a lot of sympathy around Jacobsville. It was pretty much an open secret how Cash felt about her, and vice versa.
“There goes a prospective bride and groom, or I miss my guess,” Marc Brannon mused.
“Same here,” Blake replied. He curled Violet’s fingers into his. “I suppose it’s contagious,” he added, looking warmly into her eyes.
“What about your cat harem?” Marc asked.
“They take bribes,” Violet said before Blake could speak. “Fresh salmon.”
“Way to go, Violet,” Josie chuckled. “Leave it to a woman to find a way around a difficult situation.”
“She’d know,” Marc replied, smiling at his wife. “She’s just joined the local D.A.’s office as a prosecutor. After the baby comes, that is.”
“What do you want?” Blake asked curiously.
“Well, we already have a little boy. I’d love a daughter next. But we’ll settle for whatever we get,” Josie said warmly, smiling up at her husband, who readily agreed. “I can hardly wait.”
Blake looked down at Violet with a softness in his eyes that made her heart float. “Neither can I,” he said gently.
Violet blushed scarlet and nuzzled her cheek against his chest.
“We’re expecting, too,” Blake told the Brannons with a quiet smile. “It’s going to be a wonderful year.”
“You can say that again,” Marc replied. “Congratulations.”
“You, too.”
Violet closed her eyes as the conversation drifted away. She wondered if she could die of happiness.
Twelve
Violet was nervously waiting in the hall for the organ to sound. Her mother was in the front pew. Half of Jacobsville was seated in the rest of the pews. She noticed that big Cag Hart was acting as best man for her husband-to-be. She had nobody to give her away. But it was something of an archaic custom, she tried to remind herself. She wasn’t being given or sold to any man, regardless of how much she loved him.
She plucked nervously at the waistline of her beautiful white satin gown, hoping the slight swell didn’t show too much. It wouldn’t matter a lot. Most people already knew she was pregnant. She smiled. She and Blake would love their child. She had no more doubts about him, or herself. It would work out.
The organ sounded and she jerked her mind back to the occasion, tightening her grip on her bouquet of baby’s breath, white roses, and lily of the valley. She took a deep breath and stepped out on her right foot, just as a big, gentle hand caught her left hand and tucked it into his elbow.
She looked up, startled, into twinkling green eyes.
“I’m not quite old enough to be your father,” Cy Parks said in a loud whisper, “but Blake said you wouldn’t mind.”
She grinned up at him. “I won’t mind at all, Mr. Parks. Thank you!”
“That’s okay. You can do the same for me one day,” he said, tongue-in-cheek.
She started giggling and only stopped when “The Wedding March” was belted out on the piano.
“Straight faces, now,” Cy murmured.
“You bet!” she agreed.
They walked down the aisle, to where Blake was waiting with his heart in his eyes when he saw Violet in that vision of white lace and satin, the veil delicately covering her pretty face. He thought his heart might burst.
The ceremony was brief, poignant, and unforgettable. Blake lifted the veil to kiss his bride, and Violet’s blue eyes brimmed over with tears as she returned the kiss with pure joy.
They walked out of the church into a soft rain of congratulations, confetti and rice.
“The rice is for fertility,” Libby Collins whispered loudly.
“It worked!” Blake exclaimed in a stage whisper, with wicked eyes.
Violet whacked him with her bouquet and winked at Libby.
They climbed into the waiting limousine and sped away to Blake’s house, to change clothes before the reception.
“What a good thing the reception isn’t for another hour,” Blake groaned as he kissed Violet hungrily in the big king-size bed.
“And you think we’ll still make it in time? Optimist!” Violet panted, lifting up to the hard, measured thrust of his body.
He laughed, but the sensations caught him unaware and he arched, groaning with pleasure so deep it felt like pain.
Violet went with him, flying up into the sky like a rocket, exploding in sudden, fierce delight.
He increased the rhythm, and the pressure, and seconds later, he was right there with her, burning up in a fiery satisfaction that was vaguely shocking in its length. It seemed to go on forever.
When he was finally able to breathe again, he was wet with sweat and shaking all over. So was Violet.
“Wow,” she whispered reverently as she met his eyes.
He nodded, bending to kiss her delicately. “See what a week of abstinence does to a normal man?” he murmured against her swollen lips.
“Want me to lock the bedroom door for a week to make it better…?” She jumped and cried out as he pinched her bottom.
He wrinkled his nose at her. “You lock it, I’ll break it down,” he challenged. “I hate abstinence!”
She wreathed her arms around his neck and smiled *******edly, although her heartbeat was still shaking her. She was wet with sweat, too, and working just to breathe.
“It’s better every time,” she said, dazed.
“I improve with practice,” he informed her.
She grinned and slid her legs around his. “Do you, really? Let’s see…!”
They knew the party was already underway before they got out of the shower. They dressed quickly in the clothing they’d laid out for the reception, a lacy pink dress for Violet and slacks with a white shirt, tie, and sports coat for Blake.
They were barely dressed, still smiling at each other in a daze of pleasure, when there was a loud rap on the front door.
They stared at each other. “Are we expecting anybody?” Blake asked curiously.
“I don’t think so.”
They went together to the front door and opened it.
Outside was most of the Jacobsville Police Department, with Chief Cash Grier, in uniform, leading the rest. He had a paper in his hand and he was grinning mischievously.
“Lady and gentleman,” he began, “your friends in the Jacobsville Police Department would like to congratulate you on your recent nuptials and remind you that if you are ever in need of assistance, we are only as far away as your telephone. We have…”
“I’ll call the governor!” Blake began, interrupting the speech.
Grier glared at him. “I have six pages to go.”
“I have ten pages,” Assistant Chief Judd Dunn announced, displaying them.
“I have a loaded shotgun,” Blake told him.
Judd and Cash looked at each other speculatively. “How many years could he get if he pointed it at us?” Judd wondered aloud.
“That wouldn’t be nice, on his wedding day,” Cash agreed, but he gave Blake a rakish grin.
Blake’s eyes narrowed. “Trespassing on private property,” he began, “creating a public nuisance, terroristic threats and acts…”
“I am not a terrorist!” Cash informed him.
“But you are a public nuisance,” Judd told Cash.
“Me?” Cash exclaimed.
Officer Dana Hall cleared her throat and elbowed both superior officers out of her way. She was holding a cake.
“This is the wedding cake from the reception,” she told them, giving it to Violet. “I’m really sorry, but it was all we were able to save.”
Violet was staring at her blankly.
Officer Hall cleared her throat. “Somebody spiked the punch. Harden and Evan Tremayne drank it before they realized. One of the local cattlemen also drank some and made a very loud, unpleasant remark about lunatics who raised organic cattle just as Cy Parks walked in with J. D. Langley.”
Cash cleared his throat. “Judd and I had to, sort of, shut down your wedding reception and lock up a few of your guests. But we saved your cake. There was some punch, too, but Officer Palmer there,” he noted a tall, handsome blond officer with odd-colored highlights in his hair, “is wearing it.”
Blake burst out laughing. Only in Jacobsville, he was thinking.
“Anyway, you’re leaving right away on your honeymoon, right?” Judd asked them. “So you can get all the sandwiches and punch you want where you’re going.”
“Your jail is full, I guess?” Violet teased.
“Uh, yes it is, and he—” Cash indicated Blake “—represents Cy Parks and the Tremaynes. They want him to come down and get them out.”
“That explains the cake,” Blake told Violet.
She grinned at him. “We can detour through town on the way to the airport, can’t we? After all, Mr. Parks did give me away.”
“Good point.” He sighed. “Okay, tell them I’m on the way. And, thanks for the cake.”
“And the punch,” Violet said with a glance at Palmer, who grinned back.
The police force got into its cars and left. Violet put the cake in the freezer. The house was quiet without Mee and Yow, who were being boarded for the honeymoon. Mrs. Hardy was staying at her house with a nurse.
“Would you like your wedding present now?” Blake asked as they were turning off the lights.
She turned and looked at him. “What is it?” she asked, surprised.
He pulled her close and kissed her. “Janet Collins cut a deal with the San Antonio D.A. She pled guilty for a reduced sentence, so there won’t be a trial. You and your mother won’t have the stress of a court trial.”
“Oh, Blake!” She kissed him hungrily. “You had something to do with that, didn’t you?”
He nodded, smiling. “I’ve been working on it for two weeks. It came through yesterday. I saved the news for today.”
“Thank you,” she said, and meant it fervently. She’d dreaded the idea of dredging the painful episode in public.
“I have to take care of my best girl,” he whispered. “And the mother of my child.” His big hand rested softly on her slightly swollen belly. “You were the most beautiful bride who ever walked down an aisle.”
“And you were the handsomest groom.” She kissed him back. “Well, shall we go and rescue some prominent local citizens on our way out of town?”
“Works for me,” he chuckled.
They walked to the car hand in hand.
“Today is the first day of the rest of our lives,” Blake mused.
“The rest of those days will be wonderful,” she said softly.
They were.
THE END!!
30-08-07, 07:34 AM
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