Heartbreak Cove (Sanctuary Island) (RE8) (18 page)

His pinched lips tightened briefly. “How admirable and hard working of you. Shall I call Wyatt Hawkins and see if he wants to run a story about how dedicated you are?”

Andie let her spine touch the back of the chair. “Don’t bother. The truth is rarely as exciting as a sensationalistic piece of … journalism.”

“Ah, but what Wyatt published was the truth as well. Or are you disputing the facts?”

She snorted. “I’m not saying Sam was never arrested or in prison—as I said to Wyatt and as he quoted me word for word, I don’t believe for a second that Sam Brennan has ever in his life been guilty of cruelty to an animal.”

“But he was convicted of that charge,” Leeds trumpeted, eyes gleaming. “Among others.”

Andie cocked her head. “I realize you’ve never worked in law enforcement yourself, Councilman Leeds, but I would think even you would be aware that occasionally a man is wrongfully imprisoned. I believe in the law with all my heart—but that doesn’t mean I’m blind to its faults. The worst of which is the fact that the law can be twisted and manipulated by those with power, causing innocent people to suffer.”

A vision of Sam’s handsome face, dark with the pain and secrets of his past, swam in front of her mind’s eye. Sam, with his passion for protecting the weak and making his own rules … She wondered if he realized how much he’d changed her?

The banked coals of anger in Leeds’ gaze flared a little hotter. “I don’t know what you’re implying—”

“I’m not implying anything.” Andie leaned forward with her hands on her knees. “I’m coming right out and asking. Did you dig up that story about Sam and feed it to Wyatt Hawkins? Did you drag a good man’s name through the mud merely to score a political point?”

The way Leeds sniffed and glanced away for an instant told Andie her instincts were dead on. “Whatever I’ve done, it was in service of giving the people of Sanctuary Island all the pertinent information to choose the best possible person as their next sheriff.”

“And you believe that if I care about a man who once had trouble with the law, that makes me a liability to the sheriff’s department in some way. Or at least, you’re hoping the voters will think that.” Andie leveled him an unimpressed glare. “We’ll see, I suppose. Personally, I think that even if people want to believe the worst of Sam, they should also keep in mind that he served his time and paid his debt to society. Which means he deserves a second chance, like everyone does.”

“A second chance to do what?” Leeds scoffed. “To con his way into the bed of one of our town’s top elected officials so he can get away with whatever crimes he’s planning? You may be a naive little girl, led by her emotions, but I’m confident the voters won’t be thinking with their hormones.”

That dart hit home, right in the part of her heart still bruised by her father’s contempt. Struggling to stay seated, Andie gripped the arms of her chair. “If that’s all you’ve got, I think it’s time for you to leave. The paperwork is piling up even as we sit here.”

The slow smile that stretched over the old man’s face was so triumphant, it made Andie’s flesh prickle with warning. “Oh, that’s not all I’ve got. I’m here to relieve you of all that dull paperwork—and every other responsibility of the position of sheriff, as well.”

Andie’s body turned to stone, a monument to shock and disbelief. “You can’t force me to resign.”

“I don’t have to.” Leeds creaked to his feet with the help of his cane and one gnarled hand on the edge of her desk. Leaning over it, he said, “You’re not being forced out of office … yet. No, you’re being put on administrative leave, effective immediately, while the Town Council investigates the situation. Once the furor dies down, and depending on how you comport yourself while on leave, you’ll be eligible for reinstatement.”

Her throat was so dry, she couldn’t swallow. “How long—”

“That depends on you, doesn’t it?” Leeds inspected the brass bulldog-shaped head of his cane with an air of satisfaction. “If nothing else comes to light that might give the council cause to doubt your suitability for the sheriff’s office, we could be talking four weeks. Maybe more, if the investigation drags on for any reason.”

And with Dabney Leeds heading the council, Andie realized with a sickening roll of her stomach, there was no way any investigation would be swift, efficient, or fair. “And the entire council voted on this?” she clarified, desperately wishing she didn’t already know the answer.

“Of course,” Leeds said, righteous as a saint at prayer. “I am merely their representative in this meeting.”

“Which I’m sure you were happy to volunteer for,” Andie snapped, surging to her feet. “Fine, I’ll go. But I want to officially state, for the record, that this is a travesty and I plan to appeal the council’s decision and be reinstated as soon as possible.”

“Noted. In the meantime, Deputy Stanz has been appointed to take charge in your absence. I assume he’s up to date on all your current, pending, and ongoing investigations?”

Andie held in a hysterical laugh. Deputy Fred was up to date on today’s special flavor of pie at the Firefly Caf
é
. That was about it. “Probably not, but Ivy Dawson, my dispatcher, can help get him up to speed.”

Through the closed door came a muffled squawk of outrage. “She will do no such thing!”

Andie ripped open the door, and Ivy all but fell into the office. She tottered a little on her red-patent stilettos but caught her balance with the grace of a woman who wore four-inch heels to the post office and grocery store. “If you think I’m sticking around and working here without you,” Ivy said defiantly, her eyes bright with unshed tears of anger, “you’re crazier than that old goat.”

“I never! If this is the way you run your department,” Leeds started, hobbling around the desk furiously.

“It’s not my department for the next few weeks,” Andie said, feeling the crevasse open up in her heart as she said the words aloud for the first time. Putting her hands on Ivy’s shoulders, Andie looked at her gravely. “I can’t make you do anything, and I don’t want you to act against your conscience—but in all honesty, I’d appreciate it if you held down the fort here while I’m gone. You’re already the one in the office that everyone goes to for gossip and updates. Really, no one will even notice I’m gone, probably, but if you stop showing up at the dispatcher desk … chaos!”

Ivy sniffed, the corners of her red lips turned down. “That’s true. And lord knows that idiot, Deputy Fred, will need my help. I guess I’ll stay.”

“I’m sure we’re all very relieved,” Leeds snapped. “Now if you’ll come along with me, Miss Shepard, I’m to escort you out.”

Under her hands, Ivy stiffened all over again at the implication that Andie needed to be watched and prevented from absconding with office supplies or something. Andie felt the grate of humiliation across her raw nerves, but she mustered up a smile for Ivy. “Thanks for staying. Call me anytime, for any reason. Even if it’s just to have lunch at the Firefly.”

Ivy nodded, squaring her shoulders, and stepped back through the door to let Leeds and Andie by. “I’ll make sure the office is still here waiting for you when this stupid leave of absence is over,” she promised.

Andie held onto that vow as she walked down the corridor of desks toward the door. Most of her deputies and the admin assistants found busy work to look at, papers to shuffle—Roberta Andrews hastily picked up her silent, unringing desk phone as Andie passed by and said “Sheriff’s Department” into the receiver. But Deputy Fred met her eyes squarely and stood up from his chair. With military precision, he brought his hand to his forehead and saluted Andie. She was the one who had to break eye contact or risk breaking down in tears in the middle of the office. She paused by his desk long enough to unhook the five-pointed star from her belt. The badge was cool and heavy in her palm, weighted with the responsibilities and cares of the office, and when Andie placed it gently on Fred’s desk and walked away, she felt a hundred pounds lighter. As light and insubstantial as the apple blossoms showering from the trees lining Main Street, as if a gust of wind could sweep her up and swirl her away at any moment.

For a woman who defined her life and her self by her dedication to duty, it wasn’t a pleasant feeling.

Chapter Seventeen

By the time Sam pounded on Andie’s front door, he was cursing himself for not just driving straight to the sheriff’s department. That’s where she was likely to be by now, but he couldn’t help hoping she had the afternoon shift today so they could have privacy for what he needed to say.

Not that he knew what he was going to say. Not that it mattered, since her SUV wasn’t parked in the driveway, so she wasn’t here anyway.

Sam clenched his fists in his pockets. He didn’t want to do this over the phone. He needed to see Andie’s face, to be there with her to read her emotions and reactions. He was so engrossed in imagining how it might go down that he didn’t hear the engine behind him, at first. The slam of a car door made him turn around, and there she was.

Andie. The woman who’d defended him.

She looked as exhausted as he’d felt waking up on the barn floor, but the sight of her gave Sam a second wind. She stopped in her tracks, blinking as if she didn’t believe her eyes.

“You’re here,” she said, taking a step toward him.

Sam’s throat closed. “If you want me to leave—”

“No.” Andie shook her head and trudged up the steps past her tiny side yard garden until she stood directly in front of him. “I definitely don’t want you to leave.”

She was only inches away, but it might as well have been miles. Sam curled and straightened his fingers restlessly, aching to touch her, to hold her, but until he knew where her head was at … “I’ll stay as long as you want,” he told her, and even he didn’t know what he meant by that. He’d stay today? Or forever?

When Andie shut her eyes and tears leaked from the corners to track down her smiling cheeks, forever didn’t seem like such a crazy idea. She blinked her eyes open and said, “Come inside, Sam.”

What could he do but follow her? And when the door shut behind them and the close, intimate silence of the house echoed in their ears and Andie whirled to press herself full length against Sam, what could he do but gather her in close and open her lips with a deep, searching kiss?

His hands closed on her hips, dragging her into his body as his back slammed against the door. Andie’s fingers were in his hair, clutching hard enough to pull, hard enough to sting, hard enough to make Sam gasp with the sharp pleasure of it.

“I know we need to talk,” Andie panted in between tiny, biting nips at his jaw and throat. “But right now, all I want is this. All I want is you, right here, with me.”

Whatever was between them—Sam’s past and his secrets and Andie’s decision to stick up for him—everything faded out of existence except for the solid, undeniable reality of Andie’s warm skin beneath his fingertips. The slim, lithe clasp of her thighs around his hips when he lifted her into his arms and turned so that she was the one with her back to the wall.

It wasn’t how he’d pictured their first time together—and yeah, Sam had absolutely pictured it. In detail. But as eager fingers shoved clothes aside, delving for skin and sending shocks of pleasure zinging back and forth between them like heat lightning, Sam had no regrets.

Pinned to the wall, yielding to Sam’s thrusts and welcoming him in, Andie had never seemed stronger or more sure of what she wanted. Sam couldn’t stop kissing her, hips rocking and arms holding tight, until she cried out. Only when she convulsed around him did Sam allow himself to follow her into mindless pleasure.

When the strongest climax of his life finally let him go, Sam gasped back to consciousness with Andie’s head on his shoulder and his muscles locked where he’d lifted her against the door.

That couldn’t be comfortable, he thought muzzily, straining his sore shoulders to lift her higher against his chest. She laughed into his neck when he nearly slipped on the condom wrapper, then murmured something as he carried her to the bedroom, soft words he couldn’t make out through the haze of afterglow.

Maybe words were irrelevant in that moment. Sam certainly couldn’t think of any that were worth breaking the warm, connected silence they settled into as he undressed her, then himself, and slid into the rumpled bed beside her.

When he opened his eyes again, the shadows on the wall had moved. The light streaming over the bed from the window was buttery and soft, afternoon sunshine that picked out strands of platinum and copper in Andie’s red-gold hair. He blinked again, and so did she, long eyelashes fluttering over her ocean-wave eyes. She was awake.

“Hi there,” Andie whispered, tucking both hands under her pillow and staring at him.

“You’re so beautiful, it’s like looking into the sun,” Sam said, squeezing his eyes closed again and opening them to the dazzle of Andie’s languid smile.

“Is that why you had your eyes closed for the last four hours?” she teased.

Sam winced. “That long, huh? Sorry I passed out. I was awake all night with Queenie, walking her through a stomach upset.”

Andie went up on one elbow. “Is she okay?”

Sam nodded, struck momentarily speechless by the way the sheet had slipped down to expose the taut, round curves of her breasts. He couldn’t believe they’d had sex standing up, clothes askew, without him ever catching a glimpse of this creamy flesh, without touching the tightly furled buds of her little pink … wait. Snapping his gaze back up to her face, he said, “Are you okay? We went at it pretty rough back there.”

“I’m fine,” Andie said, lying back down. One side of mouth kicked up. “Or couldn’t you tell?”

But Sam was lost in a memory of how hard he’d pushed her against that door, the rough, unyielding wood against her soft, soft skin. With a jerk, he pulled the sheets down and clenched his jaw at the finger-shaped bruises on her pale hips. He was an animal. What had he been thinking, treating her that way?

“I lost control,” he rasped, his throat raw and tight. Sam traced one blooming finger mark with his thumb, covering the rest with his palm, but nothing could hide his shame. “I’m sorry.”

Andie stretched lazily, almost purring. “You should be. That was just the worst. I can’t remember the last time something so awful happened to me. I’d arrest you, but I’m going to want you to return to the scene of the crime later tonight.”

Relief and something dangerously close to happiness swelled in Sam’s chest. “Sweetheart, I’m not going to need that long to recover.”

“Mmm. Me neither. But check the time.”

Time. It was daytime. Sam sat bolt upright and grabbed for his phone in the pile of clothes beside the bed. “It’s two o’clock!”

“Yes. I need to leave to pick Caitlin up from school in a bit.”

“How can you be here in the middle of the day? Don’t you have a shift?”

“Oh yeah,” Andie said, rolling onto her back to stare up at the ceiling. “
That’s
the last time something awful happened—I got suspended this morning.”

Sam went still. “Because of me.”

“No, because of Dabney Leeds and his willingness to do whatever it takes to get me thrown out of office and to have his grandson installed in my place.”

Rage tightened Sam’s hands into fists. Another rich man, using his money and power and influence to get what he wanted, and damn everyone else. Sam clenched his jaw. “But if I hadn’t been here to give him the perfect ammunition against you—”

“He would’ve dug up something else,” Andie finished firmly. “I have zero doubts about that. Trust me, Sam, this is not your fault. This is about me, and the choices I made.”

The back of Sam’s throat felt raw and tight. “The newspaper article.”

There it was, suddenly, like a third person in the bed with them. The bulk of Sam’s past mistakes and his current secrets was enough to push him off the mattress. Tugging on his jeans, Sam started to pace.

Andie sat up and rested her crossed arms on her sheet-covered knees, her russet hair cascading over one bare, freckled shoulder. “I could have chosen to protect myself by telling them we weren’t together, that you were nothing but a casual acquaintance, someone I barely knew.”

“That’s exactly what you should have done.” The words tore from Sam’s chest, taking bits of himself along with them.

“It would have been a lie.”

When he paused in his restless pacing to stare at her, Andie was calm, her beautiful face a picture of serene acceptance. He shook his head in disbelief. “Are you that much of a girl scout? So what if it’s a lie, it would have protected you.”

Never mind that the best protection for Andie would have been if Sam stayed far the hell away from her. He hated himself, in that moment, as he’d never hated anyone or anything.

“I made my choice,” she told him gently. “Instead of protection—safety—I chose you.”

Gutted, Sam laced his fingers behind his neck and squeezed his eyes shut, straining against the impossibilities. It was the worst choice Andie could have made. It was a choice she’d made with incomplete information, a choice she’d never make if she knew the full extent of Sam’s crimes.

This choice would probably ruin her life, which was already starting to unravel. But Sam was weak. He wanted this to be real so badly, he couldn’t force himself to say the words that would convince Andie to reconsider. Because if Andie meant what she said, even after finding out about his past … maybe Sam had a chance at a future with her.

Spearing her with a look, he grated out the question that burned in his chest. “Why?”

Incredibly, even after all they’d shared, Andie blushed. The pretty pink flush spread over her cheeks and, for the first time, Sam knew that it went all the way down her chest too. “Not everything in life is a choice,” she answered slowly, hesitant for the first time since Sam woke up in her arms. “For instance…”

His heart kicked in his chest like a fractious colt. “Yeah?”

Andie met the challenge in Sam’s voice by raising her stormy ocean eyes to his. “For instance, I didn’t choose to fall in love with you. But I did, and there’s nothing anyone can do or say to change that now.”

*   *   *

Andie held her breath. Across the bedroom, it looked as if Sam might be doing the same. He didn’t move, but a hundred emotions seemed to flash through his eyes so fast, Andie couldn’t get a read on which emotion might be in the lead.

I’m on your side,
she pleaded silently.
You’re not alone anymore.

“How can you say that?” His voice was a ragged, broken thing with edges sharp enough to cut her if she wasn’t careful. “When you know what I did, where I’ve been…”

Andie tightened her arms around her upraised knees and kept herself on the bed by force of will. “I know why you might think I’d look down on you for having been in prison. I’m sorry it happened, sorry you went through it, but Sam, it doesn’t make me feel any differently about you.”

He shook his head again and turned away, as if he couldn’t bear to believe her. Struggling for a way to make him understand, Andie said, “The law is black and white—that’s what makes it comforting. But I know that people who commit crimes are
people
. And there’s a reason we stopped making people wear the mark of their crimes for the rest of their lives. Whatever happened back then, it’s over now, and you have moved on with your life in such an amazing way. If anything, I admire you more, knowing what you’ve overcome.”

“If you knew the whole story,” Sam rasped, the indentation of his spine ramrod straight between the hard, tensed muscles of his shoulders and back.

“It wouldn’t change anything.” Andie believed that with her whole heart, but she knew Sam didn’t. He couldn’t. Frustration welled up, tightening her fingers where she’d tangled them in the sheets. “Fine. So tell me the whole story, then, and I’ll prove it to you.”

Silence filled the room, squeezing the oxygen out and making it hard for Andie to breathe. Maybe she’d pushed too hard and Sam would just walk out of her life, away from Sanctuary Island.

“I was nineteen when it happened,” Sam said abruptly without turning to face her. “I’d been on my own, out of the foster system for a couple of years, and I thought I was tough. Thought I knew how the world worked. But I had no idea.”

Nineteen
, Andie thought, gut clenching.
Old enough to be tried as an adult instead of a minor, but still so terribly, vulnerably young.

Bitterness roughened his voice as he began to pace again. “I’d gone out to California to look for work, got hired on as a groom by a guy who ran a boarding and training barn. People would send these crazy expensive show horses and racehorses to my boss—Arabians, Tennessee Walkers, Thoroughbreds, Friesians. Beautiful horses, and it was my job to take care of them when they weren’t out on the circuit. Some of these horses were big-time winners, insured for more money than the whole barn made in a year. I bet I know what you’re thinking.”

“I bet you don’t.”

Sam finally turned his head, just far enough to shoot her a hard stare over his shoulder. “You’re thinking I got greedy, stole a big purse-winner and tried to ransom him back to his owner.”

That would fit with the charges Wyatt had read her … but it didn’t fit with what she knew of Sam Brennan.

Andie tilted her head as her brain leaped from clue to clue, making connections and spinning theories. “What I’m thinking is … I wonder which of those horses was being mistreated by its owner.”

Sam reacted as though she’d zapped him with her Taser. Reeling around, he stared at her with his hard jaw clenched and his eyes blazing with some emotion she couldn’t name. “How did you—?”

“It wasn’t that big a leap.” Andie smoothed the edge of the sheet, satisfaction pouring through her belly like warm honey. “I told you, Sam. I know you.”

“It was one of the Arabians,” Sam said, eyes riveted on her face. “Sultan’s Dream, handsomest chestnut stallion you ever saw. Light step, gorgeous head … and heart. He’d run himself to death if you asked him, pour every ounce of himself out onto the track and leave it all behind.”

“You loved him,” Andie said without thinking, and wished she could take it back when Sam’s face immediately shuttered.

“When Sultan first came to us, he was … look, Arabians have a well deserved rep for nerviness. They’re often high strung, and Sultan definitely fit that mold. But the difference I saw when he came home after his first race with his new owner was a huge red flag. Sultan went from being this sweet-tempered, intense guy who’d eat sugar lumps out of my hand to jumping at his own shadow, kicking out in his stall, and running from me when I’d come to catch him in the turn-out pasture. Something was wrong, and I knew who to blame.”