The Lucky Charm (The Portland Pioneers) (46 page)

But to Noah Fox’s credit, he didn’t ask any of those questions. “I’m looking for Tabitha,” he said carefully.

“Is she missing?” Maggie asked, leaning against one of the spotless stainless steel work counters that lined one side of the kitchen.

“I take it you know where she is.” He didn’t sound very happy about that, Maggie thought, and begrudgingly gave him a little more credit. But then, he’d still come here, and that was more than any man had done so far.

“I might know where she is,” she said, “but if she doesn’t want to talk to you, I can’t help you with that.” Maggie tried to imagine what her older sister might have done to deserve a man literally tracking her down to her childhood town, and came up blank. This was Tabitha, after all. She might, in all truth, do just about
anything
.

“Is she here?”

The man was hot, Maggie thought, but that didn’t make him the brightest bulb in the universe. “You
think Tabitha is here? In Sand Point?” she asked incredulously. “You must not know her as well as I thought you did.”

Noah shoved a hand through his thick, dark hair and left most of it standing straight up, altering him from insanely hot to merely very good looking. “Believe me, I wouldn’t be here if I had other options. But I need to talk to her.”

“Well, she’s not here,” Maggie said matter-of-factly. “And I can’t imagine she’ll be coming back to Sand Point anytime soon.”

He gave her a surprised look. “But it’s almost Thanksgiving.”

“Again,” Maggie said with exaggerated patience, “you must not know Tabitha very well.”

“Pretty well,” he said and that careful edge was back in his voice. “I had a feeling this might be a wild goose chase.”

“I’m sorry I couldn’t be more help,” Maggie said, letting him know that he’d gotten everything he was going to out of her—which was nothing.

“Can you at least let her know I stopped by? Maybe she’d be okay with you providing a way to contact her.”

Maggie shot him another incredulous look. “I don’t think so.”

His handsome face changed almost in an instant, morphing from confidently charming to abruptly lost, and Maggie reeled a little bit. Where had he been hiding all this sadness? She was usually better at reading people.

“Please,” he said. “All I ask is that you call her and tell her that I’m here and I want to talk to her.”

In her twenty seven years, Maggie had had a lot of experience with the aftermath of Tabitha. All through junior high and high school, she’d seen the walking wounded who’d been chased, used and left by her beautiful and precocious sister who never seemed to know what she really wanted. Maggie remembered the devastation in so many of those boys’ faces, and their confusion at why Tabitha’s ardent affection had abruptly vanished. So she should have been immune to that pleading look on Noah Fox’s face, but apparently she wasn’t.

“Fine. Will you be staying in town a few days?”

“It’ll take that long?” he asked.

“Despite what you may think you know about family, and especially about sisters,” Maggie drawled, “
my
sister doesn’t always answer my phone calls or return my texts right away.”

“Right,” Noah said, and for the first time, Maggie could see he wasn’t surprised. Maybe he wasn’t under Tabby’s spell as much as she’d thought he was. But then what was he so sad about? Maggie wished he’d never shown up here tonight, because now she was curious and like most nosy people, she knew she’d probably never find a satisfactory answer.

He reached into his back pocket, and pulled out his wallet, the leather the same shade as an expensive Cognac. He handed over a business card, and she took it, surprised again at the symbol embossed into the thick cardstock. “The Portland Pioneers? The baseball team?”

He grinned. “Obviously, not a baseball fan.”

“Am I supposed to recognize you or something?” Because she didn’t. But then she didn’t really follow baseball—or any other sport, for that matter.

“Again,” he merely shrugged, “you’re clearly not a baseball fan.”

“Not exactly,” Maggie retorted. “Plus I’ve been a little busy the last few years, running this cafe.”

“I play for the Pioneers,” he said casually, but the shuttered expression on his face told some other story. Maggie made a mental note to definitely google him when she got home. If he was a famous baseball player, then she might be able to figure out why he wanted to talk to her sister so much. And Maggie much preferred to start with some kind of advantage when dealing with Tabitha, even if the advantage was only information.

“Ah.”

“Well, thanks for your help.”

It was wrong but Maggie waited a split second after he departed the kitchen to turn off the light. After all, a butt that excellent deserved an audience, even if it was only her and the grill.