A Time to Keep (20 page)

“Okay,” she said in a quiet voice.

“Willie Ray Benton will never step foot inside a prison.”

Her lips parting in surprise, Gwen stared at the deputy. “Why would you say that? After all, he's responsible for killing four people. And if Sheriff Harper hadn't delivered Mrs. Edmondson's baby, the count would be five. Didn't you say he tested positive for alcohol and meth?”

“The facts are inconclusive as to whether he was drinking and using drugs, but Bram Benton wields a lot of political power in Louisiana. Last year he was responsible for pork
barrel appropriations totaling more than a billion dollars. There aren't too many folk willing to incur Abraham Benton's wrath or the loss of funds he throws their way if they send his boy to prison.”

Jury tampering.
The two words jarred Gwen with the same intensity as a sharp instrument colliding with the soft tissue under her fingernail. If Jimmie Jameson suspected what she thought, then it would be up to the district attorney's office to request a change of venue to a district where most of the citizens weren't aware of Benton's political influence. But where, she wondered.

Gathering her large leather handbag, she stood up. “I'll think about what you've just told me off the record.”

Jimmie pushed back his chair, his expression tight, solemn. “I'll walk you out.”

Gwen offered him her hand. “Thank you, Deputy Jameson.”

A hint of a smile softened his firm mouth. “You're welcome, Miss Taylor.”

He walked her through the station house, ignoring the curious stares from those who made up the SMPD and several civilian employees. Gwendolyn Taylor was new to the parish, but after her byline appeared in the
Tribune
everyone would come to know her as the paper's crime reporter and the current owner of
Bon Temps.

Gwen walked to her car in the parking lot adjacent to the building housing the SMPD, and using a remote device unlocked the doors. She slipped behind the wheel, but did not turn on the ignition. She had to make two calls and two visits before returning to the newspaper office.

Retrieving her cell phone, she scrolled through the directory for the number she'd programmed before leaving the
Tribune.
She pushed the talk button, then waited.

“St. Martin Parish District Attorney's office.”

She smiled when she heard the slight inflection peculiar to the region. Even though it had been more than two hundred years since the Acadians were exiled to southern Louisiana, when they said
about
it sounded like
a boot.

“I'm Gwendolyn Taylor, and I'd like to speak to A.D.A. Nichols.”

“I'm sorry, Miss Taylor, but Mr. Nichols is in court.”

“May I leave a message for him?”

“Yes. I'll put you through to his voice mail.”

Gwen left her name, cell phone number and the reason for her call. She pressed the End button, then dialed Shiloh's cell phone. She smiled as she waited for him to answer.

He'd left
Bon Temps
Sunday afternoon then called her from his brother's house that evening. He said he preferred staying with Ian and Natalee because Moriah tended to treat his injury as if he were an ICU patient.

Monday was the official observation of Memorial Day, and Natalee invited her to celebrate the holiday with the Harpers, but she'd declined. It was the first time since relocating that she felt like an alien in her own country. She was fifteen hundred miles away from her family and she missed her mother, father and her cousins. It took her a while to diagnose the feeling of abandonment and isolation as homesickness.

A telephone call from her mother had become the highlight of the day. They'd talked for hours, Gwen disclosing what she'd uncovered about her mother's favorite aunt. Paulette Taylor confessed that she'd wanted to become an actress like her aunt. However, Gwendolyn Pickering had strongly cautioned her niece about the pitfalls of the profession, and suggested the young girl consider a career in education. Now, at sixty-three, Paulette Taylor had two more years before she retired as a high school principal.

Shiloh's drawling voice coming through the tiny earpiece captured her attention. “Harper. Leave a message.”

Gwen lifted her eyebrows. His voice mail message was so impersonal. “Sheriff Harper, this is Gwendolyn Taylor, from the
Tribune.
Please call me when you get this message. I'd like to interview you for this week's Blotter. Thank you.”

* * *

Shiloh left the doctor's office and activated his cell phone. The nurse had applied a soothing salve and covered his forearm with a breathable bandage. His prognosis was good: he could expect to return to full duty in two to three weeks.

The dermatologist had offered to write another prescription for pain because the one he'd been taking elicited hallucinations despite not being a hallucinogenic. The opiate-derivative induced dreams filled with images of Gwen and babies. He didn't want another prescription; he just didn't want to experience the disturbing images.

He had two voice-mail messages. The first was from Jimmie who informed him that the DEA agent was in place at the Outlaw, and that he could expect a call from a very pretty reporter from the
Tribune.

Shiloh smiled when he recognized the number of the second caller. His smile vanished quickly when he heard her voice with the distinctive Bostonian intonation. She'd identified herself as Gwendolyn Taylor. She'd reverted to being Miss Taylor, the haughty young woman who'd refused to get out of her car because she feared becoming gator bait.

He planned to return Miss Taylor's call, but only after he filed the prescription for the soothing salve that would speed the burn's healing process.

It was apparent she wanted to talk business, and what he wanted to talk to her about was anything but business.

* * *

Gwen slowed and stopped at the gatehouse to the private community. A uniformed guard slid back the window to his air-cooled space. She smiled. “Gwendolyn Taylor. Mr. Harper is expecting me.”

The guard typed her name into an electronic device, waiting until her name appeared on a monitor. He pressed a button, and a wooden arm lifted. “Stay to your right, Miss Taylor. Mr. Harper's residence is the last on the right.”

She nodded. “Thank you.”

Gwen wanted to tell the man that she knew where she was going. It hadn't been two weeks since Shiloh brought her to his home yet it seemed more time had passed. So much had happened since the fateful night he'd come to her rescue when she'd driven into the ditch.

She wanted Shiloh not only to want her, but also to need her for more than a slacking of sexual frustration. He'd promised her honesty, respect and trust. What he hadn't promised was love. At thirty-four she'd been engaged, had more than her share of blind dates, and the two physical liaisons she preferred to forget. However, none of the men in her past elicited the physical longing she felt whenever she and Shiloh Harper occupied the same space.

Although gentle and soft-spoken, he oozed the coiled menace of a panther, and she'd come to believe she was attracted to him because of the latent danger. Why was it that most good girls found themselves drawn to bad boys?

The very object of her erotic musings stood on the porch waiting for her. He wore a black tank top and pair of faded, tattered jeans that rode low on his slim hips, jeans that should've been discarded a long time ago. The dressing on his left arm was clearly visible as he crossed his arms over his chest.

Gwen  forced  a  smile  as  her  pulse  quickened.  He
appeared taller, more muscled, and virile, and the stubble on his jaw made her breath catch in her chest. Had she made a mistake, she asked herself, coming to his house to interview him when she should've asked him to come to the newspaper's office?

Pull it together, girl,
she told herself as she parked behind Shiloh's Mustang and cut off the engine. She couldn't afford to fall apart because he looked good enough to eat. By the time she removed the key he'd moved off the porch and come over to open her door.

Wrapping his uninjured arm around her waist, Shiloh pulled Gwen close to his chest. “Hey, you.”

She smiled up at him. “Hey, yourself.”

Lowering his head, he kissed her. He increased the pressure until her lips parted under his tender onslaught. “I've missed you.”

A warming snaked through Gwen, settling in her middle. “Don't be silly, Shiloh. It's only been two days.”

His gold-green eyes searched her face. “That's two days too long.” His fingers tightened at her waist. “Come in out of the heat.” It wasn't officially summer, but the heat, coupled with the humidity was oppressive.

Gwen followed Shiloh up the back twin staircase and into the kitchen. The air coming from strategically placed vents quickly cooled her fevered body. He led her down the two steps into the dining area and through the open space to the family room. A tray on a beveled glass-topped rattan table held a glass pitcher filled with iced tea and lemon slices, and a plate with twisted dough sprinkled with chopped nuts.

“Oh, my goodness. You cooked.”

“Very funny,” Shiloh drawled, as he seated Gwen on a love seat covered in an off-white Haitian cotton fabric. “I asked Ian
to make them for the Memorial Day gathering.” He sat down next to her. “I was disappointed when you didn't come.”

“I couldn't because I was expecting telephone calls from home.” She hadn't known her mother was going to call, so what she'd told Shiloh wasn't entirely untrue.

He studied her delicate profile. Soft black curls framed her face and grazed the nape of her neck. “I was under the impression that St. Martin Parish was home.”

Shifting slightly, Gwen stared at Shiloh. She'd committed the slant of his luminous eyes, shape of his strong mouth, sweeping curve of his black eyebrows, and the slightly flaring nostrils of his nose to memory, but each time she came face-to-face with him she never failed to marvel at how much he affected her.

“It is,” she said in a quiet tone, “but it's going to take me a while to think of it as home.”

“How long, darling?”

Gwen held his gaze. “How long what?”

He leaned closer. “Will it take you to think of…to…” His words halted as he placed light kisses along the column of her neck.

Closing her eyes, she slumped weakly against him. “Don't, Shiloh,” she pleaded without conviction. “I came here to interview you.”

“You want to know about the accident?”

“Yes-s-s.” She'd slurred the word. She couldn't think straight with his mouth mapping the nape of her neck.

Easing back, Shiloh smiled. “Do you have a tape recorder?”

Gwen opened her eyes. “Yes. Why?”

He extended his hand. “Give it to me, Miss Taylor, and I'll tell you what you want to know.”

Reaching for her handbag, she took out the palm-sized instrument and handed it to him. Shiloh pushed the record
button. “Hey,” Gwen said, trying to take the recorder from him. “I need to ask you some pertinent questions,” she said when he cleared his voice.

He held it out of her reach. “Let me interview myself. If there's anything else you need to know, then I'll answer your pertinent questions.”

He was the sheriff of St. Martin Parish and she was the crime reporter for the
Teche Tribune.
And because she needed his eyewitness account of the traffic accident that was on the lips of every parish resident, she decided to capitulate.

Gwen's head went up and down like a bobble head doll. His unwillingness to let her direct the interview told her more about Shiloh Harper than he'd disclosed during their prior encounters. He was used to being in control.

Just this one time, darling,
she mused, flashing a wry smile.

Settling back against the plump pillow, she listened as Shiloh spoke into the tiny microphone. It took less than five minutes for him to answer all of her questions and those she hadn't thought of asking.

She closed her eyes, listening to the hoarse quality of his voice when he told of pulling the tiny burned bodies of the little girls from the van, then their father, and finally the pregnant woman. It changed to a tremulous whisper when he recounted how he'd delivered the tiny baby boy and wrapped it in his soot-covered shirt. It changed again, hardening ruthlessly once he retold how Willie Ray Benton, in a drug-crazed rampage, tried to escape.

Shiloh paused. “Jimmie arrived along with three other deputies and the EMTs. I rode along in the ambulance with the baby, who was later airlifted to a neonatal unit of a Baton Rouge children's hospital. Willie Ray was read his rights and hauled off to jail.” His gaze widened as it fused with Gwen's, and the beginning of a smile tipped the corners of his mouth.
“That's it, Miss Taylor. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.”

Gwen held out her hand for the recorder, and she wasn't disappointed when he turned it off and placed it on her outstretched palm. “Thank you, Sheriff Harper.”

Bracing his left arm over the back of the love seat, Shiloh smiled at her. “You're welcome. Now, can I stop being Sheriff Harper, Miss Gwendolyn Taylor?”

She lifted an eyebrow. “Is there a difference?”

He leaned closer. “Of course. As Sheriff Harper I wouldn't be able to do this.” Placing his right hand against her waist, he drew her to him, lowered his head, and slanted his mouth over hers.

Gwen jumped, as if she'd been jolted with a bolt of electricity. The mere touch of his hand burned her flesh through the fabric of her blouse. The heat spread, moving lower and even lower, until the area between her legs ignited in a throbbing that craved to be assuaged.

Her fingers unclenched, the recorder falling between the seat cushions, as she reached up and cradled Shiloh's bearded face. She felt his warmth, inhaled his scent, and luxuriated in the strength of his solid body. One hand moved up to his shoulder, and higher still where her fingertips grazed the soft strands on the nape of his strong neck.