Charlotte Douglas - Stranger In His Arms

Dylan knocked again and shouted his presence, but the high-pitched roar of the outmoded vacuum cleaner drowned all other sounds.

He watched for a moment, intrigued by the sight of the small, rounded derriere, nicely shaped and smoothly covered by tightly-stretched denim, bobbing in mesmerizing rhythm with the woman’s sweeping movements as she cleaned.

Then, feeling shamefully like a voyeur, he remembered his business, dragged his gaze from the enticing spectacle, and stepped inside.

“Hello,” he bellowed, but he couldn’t raise his voice above the noise. The woman remained unaware of his presence. Resigned, he strode across the room and tapped her on the shoulder.

With a piercing shriek that overpowered the Hoover’s mechanical growl, she leapt upright and straightened in panic. He reacted quickly, but not fast enough. The crown of her head slammed into his nose. The room dimmed, and he stumbled backwards.

“Careful!” he heard her warn after shutting off the raucous vacuum, her voice honeyed and soft, even when startled.

His vision still clouded, he felt her grab him by the biceps and guide him toward a chair. Sinking gratefully into its depths, he shook his head, attempting to restore his sight and quell his dizziness.

“Stop,” she commanded sharply. “Sit still!”

Too dazed to argue, he complied. Her footsteps retreated. By the time she returned, his vertigo remained, but his sight was restored.

He focused on the woman in front of him, and her enchanting appearance hit him like a kick to the gut. The pretty twelve-year-old of that long ago summer had grown up. And how. Slender with curves in all the right places, she had the greenest eyes he’d ever seen, the color of spring leaves on the mountainside. They matched the green of the long-sleeved shirt she wore, untucked and knotted at her narrow waist, its snug fit accentuating small, firm breasts. Her golden hair was pulled back and tied by a scarf, but rebellious curls fell over her forehead and around her ears. Her pixie-shaped face would have been beautiful under different circumstances, but it now wore a look of absolute horror.

“You’re bleeding all over yourself and my living room.” She thrust a cold damp towel into his hands.

A downward glance revealed she was right. Her head-butt to his nose had created a gusher that had spattered his white uniform shirt with blood.

“Sorry,” he mumbled into the towel he pressed to his nose.

“A bloody nose is no more than you deserve.” She sounded winded as well as angry, as if she hadn’t recovered from the fright he’d given her. “Even if you are a cop, you have no right barging in and scaring a body to death in her own home.”

“I knocked. Several times.”

As if unsatisfied with the job he was doing, she took the towel from him and dabbed at his nose. Even over the coppery smell of blood, he could detect the delectable scent of honeysuckle and sunshine. She smelled as good as she looked.

She stopped wiping his face and stepped back, evidently confident his bleeding had ceased. “Take off your shirt,” she ordered.

“What?”

“Bloodstains. If I don’t rinse them in cold water now, they’ll never come out.”

His uniforms weren’t cheap, so he didn’t have to be persuaded to do as she asked. With a few swift movements, he unbuttoned his shirt, shucked it off and handed it to her.

“T-shirt, too.”

He yanked the bloodstained garment over his head and tossed it to her.

“I’ll be right back,” she said in her take-charge fashion. “Light the fire, so you don’t get cold. Or I can bring you a blanket.”

“No, thanks. I’m fine.”

After his unusual confrontation with the most attractive and unnerving female he’d ever met, cold was the last thing he felt. However, he obligingly knelt by the fireplace and touched a match to the ready-laid logs and kindling. He could hear water running in the adjacent kitchen and the clink of dishes.

He returned to his chair, and she re-entered the room with a tray. “Thought you might like some coffee to warm you up. It’s a fresh pot.”

He took the mug she offered and declined a cookie from the plate she passed.

“They’re ambrosia cookies. Made them myself. Unless you’d prefer some of Miss Bessie’s cinnamon buns—” Her amazing green eyes twinkled with mischief.

“Cookies are fine, but I’m really not hungry,” he said hastily.

She smiled, an expression of such unparalleled beauty it almost took his breath away. “I see you’re acquainted with Miss Bessie’s specialty.”

He returned her grin. “I keep a large bottle of Maalox in my patrol car for my visits to her house. Only time I ever had a worse bellyache was from eating too many green apples when I was a kid.”

She took her own mug and curled long, slender legs into the corner of the sofa nearest him, graceful as a feline. “Is this an official visit, Officer—?”

“Blackburn.” He silently cursed his own thick-headedness. What kind of cop was he that the sight of a pretty woman could make him forget his duty? “Dylan Blackburn.”

He watched for a sign of recognition at the mention of his name, but none registered on her pretty face. Evidently he hadn’t made the impression on her that she had on him that summer long ago.

“And you’re Jennifer Thacker.”

As if he’d startled her again, her head snapped up in alarm, and he was glad this time his battered nose was well out of range.

“Jennifer Reid. Thacker’s my maiden name. How do you know that?”

“Miss Bessie gave me a copy of your employment application.”

“Why?” Her eyes had taken on a hunted look, like those of a wild nocturnal animal caught in a sudden light.

“Just routine. As Miss Bessie’s assistant, you’ll be helping out occasionally at the day-care center she sponsors. Our department runs background checks on everyone who works with children in this town. Just a precaution.”

“What kind of background check? I already gave Miss Bessie references.”

“We run a search of state and national computers to see if you’ve ever served time or have an outstanding warrant.”

She relaxed at his explanation, but not much, and he wondered if she had something to hide.

“The stains should be out by now.” She jumped to her feet and rushed back to the kitchen as if happy to end the conversation. Again he heard water running, the slam of a door and the sound of a clothes dryer. She returned with the coffeepot and topped up his mug.

Gazing at her up close, he had a hard time reconciling the vivacious woman before him with the image of his summer sweetheart from the year he turned twelve. Young Jennifer Thacker had been cool and distant. In retrospect, he suspected her attitude had been the result of extreme shyness. But there was nothing shy about Jennifer Reid, the widow Miss Bessie had recently hired.

“You don’t remember me, do you?” he asked.

Her hand shook slightly as she filled her own mug, and she seemed to avoid his gaze on purpose. “Should I?”

“Maybe it wasn’t as big a deal for you as it was for me.”

“It?”

“You were the first girl I ever kissed.”

She retreated to her corner of the sofa. “You’re kidding.”

“Nope. I was twelve years old and thought you were the prettiest girl I’d ever seen. Especially since you wouldn’t have anything to do with us locals.”

“Aunt Emily was very strict. I wasn’t allowed much latitude. How did you manage to kiss me?”

For a fleeting second, he wondered why she hadn’t remembered. Her forgetting what, to him, had been a momentous event, tweaked his ego. He leaned back in the chair, enjoying his recollection. With logs popping and hissing in the fireplace, the aroma of coffee filling the air, the spectacular fall colors visible through the bay window, he couldn’t remember a more perfect day—except the one that long-ago summer when he’d kissed little Jenny Thacker.

“You used to sunbathe on the dock of the place where you stayed down by the lake,” he said. “Like clockwork. I knew exactly when you’d be there.”

“And you just ran up and kissed me?” She raised her feathery eyebrows.

He couldn’t judge whether her expression was astonishment or amusement, but the delectable curve of her lip made him long to kiss her again. A kiss she would remember this time. Realizing he was still on duty, he squashed the urge. “I was only a kid, remember? And besides, Tommy Bennett bet me a dollar I was too chicken to try.”

“You kissed me on a bet?” Laughter tugged at the corners of her luscious mouth, and again he experienced the irrepressible desire to kiss her. “I should have pushed you in the lake.”

“You just sat there, stunned. Didn’t say a word.”

“And you?”

“I took off. But I bought you candy with my winnings. Left it on your doorstep the next day. Then I learned you’d gone home to Memphis that morning. You never came back to Casey Cove. Until now.”

She shook her head sadly. “Aunt Emily—my great-aunt actually—couldn’t stand the trip from Memphis after that. Her arthritis crippled her toward the end.”

“Why did you come back now?”

“This was her favorite spot.”

“Whose?”

Jennifer seemed flustered, and what looked like fear flickered briefly in her eyes. “Aunt Emily’s, of course. We had many happy times here, so naturally I wanted to return.”

His policeman’s instincts went on alert. Something about her answer rang off-key, but he couldn’t put his finger on it. Besides, why would anyone lie about something as innocuous as why she chose to live in a certain place?

Unless she had something to hide.

Dylan pushed the suspicion from his mind. Maybe the blow to his nose had scrambled his brains. He sensed nothing sinister about the delectable Jennifer Reid. Quite the contrary.

“I have a few more questions,” he said, “then I can let you get back to your cleaning.”

She scrunched her face in a charming grimace. “It’s a nasty job, but somebody has to do it.”

“The inquiry or the cleaning?”

“Both.” She laughed with a rich throaty sound and seemed to truly relax for the first time since his arrival. “Fire away, Officer Blackburn.”

Dylan had left her employment form on the clipboard in his car, but he recalled all the pertinent details.

“You stated that you’re a widow?”

She nodded. “My husband died almost a year ago.”

She exhibited a significant lack of grief. Maybe her marriage hadn’t been a happy one. “Is that when you left Memphis?”

“There were too many details to take care of right after he died. But by June I had settled his estate, and I wanted to get away to escape the memories.”

He wondered briefly whether those memories had been good ones and why she had omitted saying so. “You mentioned references earlier. Why no references from Memphis?”

The glimmer of alarm returned to her eyes, and she clinched her well-manicured hands tightly in her lap. “I have no living relatives. And I was never employed until after I left Memphis. If you have Miss Bessie’s form, you have the name of my employer in Nashville.”

“Why Nashville?” His question was more personal curiosity than official. The grown-up Jennifer interested him even more than she had as a pre-teen.

She shrugged. “It was close. And I love people and country music, so it seemed like a good choice.”

“You worked as a waitress at the Grand Ole Opry resort?”

“I married right out of high school and never learned a profession or trade.”