James had discovered when he moved to Hidden Falls that his regular squash games were part of his past. The closest squash court was fifty miles away. So, he took out his frustrations and kept himself in shape by running. He didn’t like running, but, besides the obvious attraction of keeping up his fitness, pounding the pavement provided a street-eye view of his community, which was a real bonus to a small town sheriff.
He knew which dogs were all bark and no bite and which ones would rather take a chunk out of a person than issue a warning first. He carried bear spray in a canister swinging from his belt, though he’d only had to use it once. Not on a bear, but on a dog who apparently equated a lone jogger to an attack.
James considered it a win of diplomacy that he was able to convince the owners to keep the dog restrained when they weren’t home instead of leaving a bored canine trained to defend its property out in the yard all day. They hadn’t realized the dog could jump the fence, or so they claimed when he paid an official visit. Today, he jogged past, bear spray at the ready, but all he heard was the faint aggression from inside the house. Good.
He knew who took pride in their properties and who didn’t. He kept a casual eye out for the kind of dangers that could cause trouble in a community. Not only dogs, but poorly stored machinery, anything flammable or sharp that could be misused in the wrong hands.
He jogged on. As they’d prearranged, Geoff McLeod was waiting at the corner near the home he shared with Iris. He was stretching his calves against a street lamp and when he spotted James, he broke into a jog and they headed out together. He liked Geoff. The local high school English teacher was not only his brother-in-law but a genuinely good guy.
“Wasn’t sure you’d make it today,” he said by way of a greeting.
“After the scare I had last night, I need to get some of this adrenalin out of my system.”
“How’s Iris?” He’d never forget seeing his sister lying on the floor of her café, pale and obviously in pain. He was glad they’d saved the babies, but in truth, all he’d cared about was his sister.
“She’s blaming herself. She should have rested more, shouldn’t have done this or that. But the truth is, her cervix just wasn’t strong enough to hold the babies in. At least, that’s what I think the doc said.
This was way more information about his sister’s insides than he wanted. “When’s she coming home?”
“They said in a few days. Daphne’s great, she’s already cooking up a load of casseroles to put in the freezer. She’s given me some names of people who can come in to clean and do the housekeeping until I get off school for the summer.”
“Good. That’s good.”
“And Kimberly is amazing. I don’t know what we’d do without her. Well, I do, we’d have to close Sunflower and that would stress Iris out almost as much as worrying about the babies.”
“Yeah, Kimberly is fantastic.” He felt the words grate across his throat. He hadn’t been able to stop thinking about that kiss, which should have been the least exciting kiss in history since it had happened in a hospital waiting room while his beloved sister was in the ER. Instead, it was up there with the most exciting moments he’d experienced in his life. He’d lived through entire relationships that didn’t contain a single second as exquisite as that moment when he’d felt her give, felt her respond to him with every bit of pent up passion in her. And she had a lot of pent up passion.
He couldn’t share with Geoff what he’d discovered, but he wished he could. He’d entered Kimberly’s name into a National Crime Information Centre database almost on a whim and had been surprised when he got some pings back from Canada. Kimberly was a known associate of a drug dealer in Nelson, British Columbia. Back in his days as a Seattle cop, he’d dealt with plenty of drug crimes. He’d been part of a JFO, a joint forces operation, with the RCMP in Canada and, knowing he wouldn’t rest until he knew more, had called a guy he’d worked with from Vancouver, Corporal Doug Ng. Doug knew the guy in Nelson and came back with the information that Kim was part of the Parker family.
“Nelson’s pretty much the marijuana capital of Canada,” Doug had informed him. “Frank Parker was a draft dodger, came up here and settled. He’s been growing and dealing pot for years. Him and a bunch of his buddies. They live like a commune. Sticking together, working together, protecting each other. Course, he could see the writing on the wall that marijuana would end up legalized, so he branched out.”
“Into what?”
“Crystal meth. Maybe cocaine.”
Damn it. “Is the daughter dealing?” He knew that however much he was drawn to Kim, he couldn’t stand by while a known drug dealer moved into his town. Even if she did have the prettiest blue eyes he’d ever seen and kissed like an angel.
“No proof of that. She’s never been busted.”
“Thanks.”
“Hey, if you know anything, you’ll share, right?”
Knowing that Doug had the same instincts as the vicious attack dog where drug dealers were concerned, he gave the truth. “She hasn’t done anything illegal. My sister hired her and I did a NCIC check, that’s the only reason I was looking at her.”
“Okay.” Then they’d chatted for a few minutes about how the laws regarding marijuana had changed and how it would change their respective jobs. Seemed like the Parker family was staying firmly in the more lucrative black market even if it meant changing the drugs they peddled.
Of all the people he could have fallen for, did he have to lose his heart to a woman from a drug dealing family?
Could she be planning to bring drugs into Hidden Falls? Was that why she moved so often? Why she looked guilty whenever she saw him? He decided that keeping a close eye on Kimberly Parker would be a very good idea.
“I am so glad to see you!” Iris exclaimed as Kim slipped into her room, keeping her footfalls soft in case Iris was sleeping. Iris wasn’t sleeping, she was holding a book called Baby’s First Month in her hand, but her gaze seemed to be focused on the window, where a maple tree made patterns against the sky.
“Daphne said I should come on up, but I wasn’t sure if you’d be sleeping.”
“No. I’m not sleeping. I’m not sick. I’m pregnant. And when you’re not sick, staying in bed all the time is intensely uninteresting.” She sounded petulant which Kim took as a good sign that she was feeling better.
“The babies are okay?”
“Babies are fine. So long as I don’t do anything but lie here, the odds are good that we’ll get pretty close to full term.”
Kim searched her face but Iris looked much better than she had the last week before she’d collapsed. She might feel bored, but it was obvious the rest was good for her as well as the babies. “I’m so glad.”
Iris smiled her wide smile. “Me, too. Bored is good. I don’t know what would have happened if you hadn’t been there, but I’m really glad you were. Thank you.”
“All I did was call 911. Anyone would have.”
She shook her head. “You caught me when I fell, you talked to me so I wasn’t scared. You made a terrifying experience a lot less terrifying, so thank you.” Her eyes began to swim and she shook her head to clear them. “Damn hormones. I cry every time I think of how close I came to losing the babies. Sit down, will you? Tell me about Sunflower and take my mind off me.”
She was happy to oblige. She sat in the chair set up beside the bed that someone had positioned so Iris could talk to her visitor without having to move. The bedroom was a bright, happy space. Painted yellow, the room boasted a huge sleigh bed covered in a quilt with all the colors of a summer garden. Her dressing table was covered with photographs of her family and friends. Kim felt a pang of envy. She couldn’t imagine being proud enough of anyone in her family that she’d want photographic evidence. She loved her family, but her feelings were always conflicted by guilt and shame.
She shifted her attention to her carry bag. She drew out a bakery box that would be very familiar to Iris. “I brought you a few things to try.” In fact, she’d brought one of everything that she’d baked this morning. Even though she was using Iris’s recipes and doing the baking in Iris’s kitchen she wanted to make certain that the goods all tasted the same as what Iris was used to.
“Oh, you sweetheart!” Iris exclaimed. “I feel so much better knowing Sunflower is in good hands.” She reached for a brownie and bit into it. Not in a critical way as Kim had expected, as though she were a judge in a baking contest, but as someone enjoying a treat. “Oh, yum. You know I’m going to devour every one of these. You can’t tell Mom or she’ll demand I share.”
“I can bring some more,” she said, feeling she’d screwed up already.
“I’m joking. I’ll share these. But sure, if you come back, bring a few more things. I’m getting so many visitors it will be good to have something to give them.”
She hadn’t even made one critical comment. Kim couldn’t believe it.
“How’s it going at Sunflower?” Iris asked.
Kim pulled out the bank receipts she’d been saving. “Here are the deposit slips from the past few days,” she said. “I asked Geoff and he told me just to take the money to the bank at the end of each day.” She’d been terrified she’d get mugged on the short journey to the bank on the corner but miraculously she’d deposited the day’s take without any other incident than being serenaded by a street musician. He wasn’t very good, but she put a dollar in his flute case anyway. And got the flute version of a wolf whistle as thanks.
Iris took the receipts and barely glanced at them. “I’m really sorry all this got dumped on you so suddenly. Are you okay? As soon as school’s finished Geoff can help out in the bakery and, of course, the high school kids who help out will be available all day. But that’s two months from now.”
“I’m managing fine, honestly, and everyone in town knows you’re on bed rest, so business is booming. They come in to find out how you are and then, of course, feel like they have to buy something. Customers have been so patient about waiting an extra couple of minutes if they need to.”
“Good. I talked to Dosana. She’ll come when she can get away from the other bakery to lend a hand.”
“Great.”
“You know what I miss? All the little dramas and short stories that are played out every day in Sunflower. Tell me what’s going on.”
Kim wished someone from Iris’s creative writing circle was here. No doubt they could make the everyday incidents exciting, but she thought hard and did her best to pick a couple of stories that Iris would find entertaining.
“I think the older gentleman, Harold, who comes in every day, might be interested in Edna May Tittlebury,” she said at last.
“What?” Iris’s eyes lit up and she snuggled against her pillows obviously ready for a good gossip. “Harold Biedleman?”
“I could be wrong, but he’s started coming in right around the same time she does. He always pretends that it’s a coincidence and then they end up sitting together. Today he bought her a lemon dream bar.”
“Oh, my God, I can’t believe I’m missing this. That’s adorable. Of course, Edna May is the worst gossip in all of Hidden Falls. Oregon probably, so how perfect that she’s now the subject of gossip. I love it! What else?”
Soon she was launched into a story about Eric, the young screenwriter. “He says he’s started a new screenplay. He was asking my advice.”
“Your advice? Do you love horror? Because that’s what he writes.”
She shook her head, trying to keep the grin off her face. “After you collapsed in the bakery, he realized that true drama isn’t the Zombie Apocalypse, it’s the stuff that happens every day.”
Iris groaned. “I forgot he was there that day. How embarrassing that he saw me pass out.”
She shook her head. “He didn’t see anything. He was too busy working on his computer and he had headphones on so he never noticed anything until I asked him to scoop up an older gentleman who’d fallen asleep and get them both out of there. He was so sweet when he realized you weren’t feeling well. He hustled the old guy out and even put up the Closed sign.”
“Well, that was nice of him.”
“And now he wants to write a screenplay where you are the heroine.”
Iris made a face. “I think he should stick to zombies.”
“In his words, ‘True horror is when bad things happen to good people.’”
Because they were both laughing, she didn’t hear James come in, but suddenly, she felt his presence and glanced up to find his gaze on her. He looked so good in his uniform. Fit and gorgeous and impossible. How she wished he’d never kissed her at the hospital. She kept reliving the moment, wishing she could fall for him all the way.
Iris said, “James, Hi. Did you come to take pity on your poor bedbound sister and bring her community gossip? Or can’t you break sheriff/perp confidentiality?”
“I’ve got nothing as exciting as what happens in the bakery. It’s where I go to find out what’s happening in town.”
He stepped over and kissed his sister on the cheek. Then gently patted the mound of her belly that was getting bigger every day. “How are my nieces and nephews?”
“I’m not sure whether they’re going to be twin gymnasts, twin ice skaters or boxers.” She took the heel of her hand and pushed against her belly. “Make that kick boxers.”
“It’s good that they’re active, right?” he asked. Kim thought the look of concern on his face was adorable. And sexy.
“Very good. But sometimes they kick so hard they wake Geoff up in the night.”
Kim stood up, vacating the visitor chair. “I’ll head out now. Here, James, take the chair.”
“No. It’s fine. I can go help Mom in the kitchen while you finish your visit.”
“I’m all out of gossip. It’s your turn.”
“But you’ll come back tomorrow, right?” Iris asked.
“Of course.”
As she walked past James on her way out of Iris’s bedroom, she caught his gaze on her and his eyes crinkled in a very disturbing way.
She wasn’t very surprised when, the next day, the second she walked into Iris’s bedroom, Iris said, “So, what’s going on with you and my brother?”
“Really? Shouldn’t you be asking how many brownies I sold today and whether Harold and Edna May had coffee together?”
“I am much more interested in what’s going on with you and Sheriff Chance.”
Kim shook her head but felt herself blushing.
“Come on. I saw you two making googly eyes at each other yesterday. Something’s happened. I have nothing to do all day but lie here. Give me something, anything.”
“Mind your own business.”
“I am minding my own business, which is lying here, growing babies. You have to take pity on me. I need gossip, I need intrigue, I need news. And not the kind I can get from CNN!”
And, since she spent so much time with Iris, and considered her a friend as well as her boss, she tried to give her some part of the truth, at least as well as she understood it herself. She sighed, sank into the chair and said, “As I believe I have mentioned, I had a bit of a crush on James when I met him.”
“You want my opinion, I’d say the crush is mutual.”
“Well, for right now that’s all it is. But he comes in every day for coffee.” She shifted to get comfortable and grinned. “And, second only to my time here with you, it’s the highlight of my day.”