Soft Target (17 page)

Chapter Twenty-One

The aroma of brewing coffee reached Gray’s weary brain as he climbed, shivering, from the shower. Cold showers for coffee—that was a decent trade. Especially when you threw in her whispered
goodnight, Graham
. He liked the way she said his full name, like a sigh. He’d taken his first icy shower before bed.

This morning, he’d been in his office glaring at suspects when she’d made a sneaky trek to the bathroom and started the shower. He’d had to retreat when all he could think of was her naked and soapy.

Embarrassed that he hadn’t shown her around, he scrambled for clothes. It was always awkward being somewhere new and not knowing where anything was. Had she found towels? And what about hangers? Did she need to do laundry?

He stopped. She’d selected everything in this house, probably considering each location before storing it for no one to use. She wasn’t the visitor—he was.

And she doesn’t want to be here. She’s scared, and I have her sleeping next door to all my suspects.

He refused to be happy that he’d gotten what he’d wanted. All day yesterday, working next to the guys, learning the operations and reviewing Nate’s plans, Gray had missed her—talking to her, sharing things, learning from her. Laughing. He’d become addicted to making her laugh. He’d walked into the bar, and she’d lit up. He hadn’t imagined that, had he? She’d been happy to see him, and they’d ended up screaming at each other. Again.

And, if he was being honest, separate ends of the house wasn’t exactly what he’d wanted. But at least she was under his roof. That was a start.

When he entered the kitchen, she was rifling through the refrigerator for breakfast. His gaze traveled the curves of her body from her shoulders to her ankles. When she turned, the loose hem of her shirt and low-slung waistband revealed the skin at her waist and the telltale sparkle of a navel ring.

His strangled groan distracted her from scavenging. Her smile was as shaky as his control. “Am I in the way?”

Though he could have stepped past her, he realized contact, even accidental, would be an irreversible error. “I’ll go around.”

Coming into the kitchen from the other end didn’t help. The scent of shampoo invaded the room and reminded him of Vegas, and the memories made him ache.

“Do you eat a big breakfast?” She kept her back to him while she worked. The sizzle of bacon helped him focus until she reached for something else. “Graham?”

“Sorry, what?”

“Are you hungry?”

He couldn’t stop staring at her ass. If she turned around, she’d have no doubt what he was hungry for. “Breakfast would be great.”

“What do you want to eat?”

The list ran through his head, and none of the items were food.
Oh God, this is the dumbest thing I’ve ever done.
“Anything is fine. I’ve gotten used to sitting outside before breakfast. Yell if you need... Come get...out when it’s ready.”

Ten minutes later he gulped one more breath of safe air before he helped her outside with plates and put as much table between them as possible. Awkward silence was broken by chewing and the scrape of utensils. Maggie opened negotiations.

“I won’t come into the master side of the house unless I tell you first. And the middle should be neutral. I don’t want you to be uncomfortable if I’m in there. Should we set a schedule so we don’t argue over the remote?”

She was using her chairman voice, and he hid his smile behind his coffee. “I’d win. All I have to do is hold it over my head.”

“You can ask Nate how well that works.” Her smile lifted his hopes and tightened his muscles.

My hot water tank is going to rust from disuse.

“Outside should be neutral, too,” he offered.

“I’ve always liked this yard.” She moved her chair closer. “Faye and I spent a lot of time out here when I was younger.”

“Doing what?”

“Working.”

When she didn’t elaborate, he sipped his coffee and continued negotiations.

“My office is at the end of your hall. I keep everything on you in there. I can’t give you the whole wing, but I’ll stay out of your bedroom and that bathroom.”

She nodded, and they finished breakfast in silence. When she reached for his empty plate, he kept a stubborn grip on it and followed her to the kitchen.

“It’s only fair if I clean.”

“I thought you might want to work before you have to take me to the bar.”

Have to
. He didn’t
have
to
take her anywhere.

Her hands plunged into the dishwater, and the piles of lemony suds made him think of her in the shower. He fled to his office.

Lost in the innocuous information he’d gathered, Gray forgot the time and where he was. He went from staring at lists of facts and dates to his research on what each flower signified. Maggie’s sharp inhale spun him.

“I didn’t want to shut the door, but if it bothers you...”

“Suspects,” she whispered as she walked farther into the room. “Why is Nate up there?”

“Because you have money of your own, and Nate is your heir. Driving you out of town would let him run the company the way he wanted. And—” he felt slimy saying it “—asking me to come here would be the perfect alibi.”

“I think you watch too much TV. The cousins from Florida are obvious choices.” She looked at the names he saw when he closed his eyes—Rhett Maxwell, J.R. Fitzsimmons, Barry Stanley, Bill Granger, Carl Griffin, Max Caldwell, Rex Simon the surgeon, Rick Marcus from the truck stop diner, and Tom Tyler Jr., the almost-divorced attorney. “Why these?”

“They bid on you and/or danced with you at the auction.”

“I can save you one suspect. It isn’t Carl.”

He plucked the eraser from her fingers. “Why not? He danced with you, and he bid on you several times. I didn’t think he had that much money.”

“He doesn’t.” She was captivated by the rug at her feet.

He stared at her candy apple-red toenails. “Why should I take him off the list?”

“I paid him to bid on me.” The rushed admission was almost unintelligible.

He glued his lips in a line to keep from laughing.

“I told him not to go over one thousand dollars, because that’s what it always took for Nate to win.”

“You went on a date with your brother?” he sputtered.

“No, I just didn’t go on a date with anyone else.” Her words bumped together as her explanation gained speed. “This year he couldn’t bid so I asked Carl.”

“Why didn’t you ask me?” The question was out before he could stop it.

“It sounded pathetic.”

“So you ran the price up on me?” He surrendered to his laughter.

“Didn’t Nate pay you back?”

He grasped her free hand. “I wanted to go out with you. It wasn’t a reimbursable expense.”

She pulled away. “Are these all your suspects?”

She’s never going to believe me again, is she?
“These are the primary ones. He could’ve mentioned the dance just to scare you.”

“But you don’t think so.” She moved to the scroll of butcher paper and his mishmash of notes. “What’s this?”

“A time line of events I can verify and the flowers that came the next Monday.”

“Why ‘yellow’ on this Sunday?”

“You wore a yellow dress the Sunday before the daffodils came. The week before it was black—”

She shivered. “Those were creepy. It’s based on what I wear?”

“He never sends red or pink flowers. Do you wear those colors?”

She shook her head. “They don’t look good on me.”

“And then there’s the Monday after the auction. That Sunday you wore green, but he sent white flowers. They were also the first ones. Is there a significance?”

“White oriental lilies are my favorites.”

“Who would know that?”

“Everyone in town.” A shadow flitted across her face before she turned back to the board. “What did you—do you—do at the FBI?”

“White-collar crime.”

“And now you spend your days analyzing my fashion choices and the language of flowers, following me around. Wouldn’t you rather be at the police station?”

“That isn’t how it works. It’s Glen’s case. My responsibility is you.” He pointed at the notes. “Finding a pattern, learning behavior, watching who watches you.”

She picked up a marker. “Can I write on this?”

“Sure. Just don’t erase anything.”

For the next hour, Gray sat behind her, watching her work and answering her questions. Soon he was next to her with another marker, asking his own questions and jotting down her answers. Draining the last of his coffee, he stepped back and looked at the results, at her precise print next to his scrawl.

“I’ll get a refill. Want one?”

Maggie looked at her watch. “I have to call the glass company. We should go.”

Gray shoved his disappointment aside. “Yeah, guess we should.”

They rode into town without speaking, the silence broken only by her chirping phone and then the echo of his. Calendar reminders.

And she only smiled at other people as they passed. Gray watched her from the corner of his eye. The smile came on, she lifted her hand and waited until they were gone. Then she dropped her hand, and the smile vanished. She did it again when he dropped her at work, and when he looked in his rearview mirror at the battered bar, she had vanished, too.

Nate was waiting on him in the gravel quarry yard. As with past disagreements, the stress of the last few days was brushed away.

He tapped a hard finger on Gray’s ring. “Take that off,” he yelled over the roar of the machinery and the rattle of the conveyor. “It’s dangerous.”

Gray tugged his glove over the ring.

Nate persisted. “It’ll get hung, and you won’t have a finger to put it on.” He held up his bare finger. “Look, I
love
my wife, and my ring is in my glove box.”

Gray looked around to see who might be in earshot.

“Relax,” Nate said. “No one can hear over this racket, and everyone thinks you’re nuts about each other. Or almost everyone. Kate in the treasurer’s office has started a pool, selling chances on when you’ll leave.”

“
What?
”

“I’m stopping it, don’t worry.” Nate climbed the steps to his favorite perch.

Before he followed, Gray put his ring in his pocket and retrieved his aspirin. His head was pounding.

The ache worsened throughout the day as every man stopped to offer their congratulations and tease him about marrying the boss. He prided himself on keeping his smile, but as soon as Nate quit talking about his expansion plans, Gray loped to his truck and tossed his notes into the passenger seat as he left for town.

It wasn’t Nate’s job to protect
his
wife.

He stalked into the treasurer’s office, and the clerk’s predatory assessment took in everything from his Mathis cap to his weathered work boots. “Can I help you?”

“I was told to see Kate about a chance in the divorce pool.”

“Sure thing, handsome. What date?”

Gray put his two dollars on the counter. “Can I write it myself? For luck?”

“Sure.”

He stared at the board, shocked by how many names he recognized from balance sheets, payroll records, Maggie’s HR list in the board meeting, appalled by how many of these people had smiled and congratulated them. He picked a bright red marker from the tray and slashed his name across the first blank spot he saw. Then he spun on his heel. He was late for happy hour.

At Orrin’s, the upper windows and the first two lower ones had been repaired. The rest remained covered in plywood. Plastered holes dotted the walls. The guys acted like nothing was wrong until Maggie wasn’t looking. Then they glared at him.

Gray took the beer Maggie offered. “Remind me to call you if I need a mountain moved.”

“We still need to paint, and I’m lucky the guys prefer longnecks to drafts. The furniture repair guy and the security company are coming tomorrow. Max will be here tonight.”

“Will he?” Gray clung to his grudge.

“Don’t blame the man for having to pee.”

He choked on his beer. “How did you—”

“He’s apologized since he got here. I gave him a key so we won’t have that issue again.”

He stared across the bar, and she stared back.

“He has ample chances to get to me every afternoon. It’s not him, Graham.” She turned on her megawatt smile and kept drying the same spot in the bar. “I wasn’t sure if you’d have a chance to eat. There’s a plate upstairs in the kitchen.”

She’d worked all day to get ready to open and still made dinner for him—to eat alone upstairs, so she could work alone down here. She’d never sent him away before, never treated him like an employee before.

He hated it. And he hated that he hated it.

“Can I see you for a minute?” He nodded toward his office and walked away. She was still frowning when he closed the door behind them.

“Don’t walk away from me and expect me to follow you like a puppy,” she snarled.

“Don’t cook for me,” he snapped. “I can take care of myself.”

“I didn’t cook
for
you. I had leftovers. If you don’t want it, don’t eat it.” She yanked the door open and stalked away.

When he walked into the room a few minutes later, she was behind the bar with her plastic smile. Several glares from the crowd morphed into knowing grins and winks.

Great. They think I’m a horny newlywed. She thinks I’m a pain in the ass.

He joined Max at the back of the room. When his stomach growled, he checked his watch. Herb’s was already closed and the diner would be packed with noisy—happy—families.

“Where’s the nearest drive-thru?”

“Baxter,” Max said.

An hour, one way, for a generic burger?

When Maggie went to the supply closet, Gray slipped upstairs.

The last time he’d been up here, he’d been too worried to pay attention. Now he wandered through the homey, Bohemian chaos, reading book titles, looking at the photo history of the Mathis family and their friends and smiling when he spotted himself in a few group shots.

Traversing the living room led to the kitchen. If he stretched, he could touch the opposing walls. Another photo rested on the Spartan counter space. Anne Mathis stared back at him from Nate’s kitchen, wearing a crisper version of the apron Maggie had worn at his first Sunday dinner.