Colton's Deadly Engagement

“I told you the other day. I stayed in that night. Penny and I are still acclimating to each other and I had hopes a quiet night in would help cement our new relationship.”

And, she added silently to herself, I have no money to go out so it was easy to pick a dog over my social life.

“Can anyone prove that?”

“I spoke with my friend Karen around eight. You’re welcome to call her and confirm.”

“I did.”

“And?”

“And she said the two of you spoke. But you could have called her from anywhere.”

Darby fought the urge to roll her eyes and pointed in the direction of the living room toward the couch instead. “I was sitting right there all evening.”

“Which can’t be proven.”

“It was about fifteen degrees on Friday night. I was bundled up in flannel pajamas, thick wool socks and that blanket right there.”

Finn turned, his gaze settling on the area she’d pointed out. His deep voice grew husky, the tones low, as if he were talking to himself. “You could have snuck out. It would be easy enough to bundle up, drive across town, shoot Michael Hayden in the chest, then drive back here and fall right back into that cozy spot on the couch. It wasn’t a big secret that he smoked. As a waitress in town, you’d know all about those secret habits Red Ridge’s citizen’s engage in. It would be easy enough to wait him out. Wait for his next nicotine hit.”

The image that he painted so casually—like he saw it all in his mind’s eye—had that ball of fear rising from her stomach to crawl up her throat. “What are you talking about?”

“Michael Hayden. Your ex-husband, Bo. Bo, I understand. Killing him gave you all this.” He stuck out a hand to gesture toward the room at large before whirling around to stare her down. “But what about Hayden? Did you enjoy your first kill so much you had to go back for more?”

* * *

Demi Colton reached for the small tube of travel toothpaste off the bathroom sink and coated her toothbrush, then added a second swipe for good measure. She scrubbed at the layer of fuzz on her teeth, desperate to remove the sour, sick taste that had been a part of nearly every morning for the past four months.

Four months.

She stared at herself in the mirror as she brushed, still barely able to believe the truth. She was going to be a mother.

To a tiny, helpless baby who was going to be born fatherless.

The panic that had accompanied her at the news she was unexpectedly pregnant with Bo Gage’s child had changed to fierce protection when it became evident Bo wasn’t fit to be a parent. Heck, the man was barely fit to be an adult. His ethics were beyond shaky—a fact she’d discovered a few days before she was going to tell him about the baby. Instead of sharing the joyful news, they’d had a wicked fight that had driven Bo into Hayley Patton’s arms.

Or, at least, that’s what the town thought.

If anyone had bothered to ask her—and no one had since they were all too busy thinking she’d gone and offed the jerk—they’d have known that Bo had already spent more than a few evenings in Hayley’s bed. All while Demi had still blithely believed them to be a couple.

The lightest flutter rumbled in her belly and she pressed a hand there, amazed by the feeling.

Life.

Bo’s child.

Her child.

This baby was hers and there wasn’t anything she wouldn’t do to protect him or her.

Which meant she had to stay on the run, continue to lie low and figure out how to get away from the roving eye of the law long enough to find out who really had it in for Bo. Because the roving eye of the law—one serious blue eye, in particular—certainly had it in for her.

Chief Finn Colton.

She’d always had a strained relationship with the various branches of her family. Her father, Rusty, wasn’t particularly tight with his two cousins, Fenwick and Judson, but they’d all seen to it that the Colton family populated Red Ridge in prolific fashion. Their grudging acceptance of each other had further ensured that their children hadn’t formed particularly close attachments to their cousins.

But even with that distance, it still hurt that Finn had zeroed in on her as one of his prime suspects.

Yes, the evidence looked bad. And, yes, she did have motive against Bo if you counted the jilted-lover routine. And she’d even accept that her experience as a bounty hunter gave her exposure to some of the more unsavory ways to live a life.

But, damn it, she didn’t kill Bo. Only now it was up to her to determine who did.

And why.

* * *

Finn Colton wasn’t a man who intimidated women. But in that moment, the color leeching from Darby Gage’s face as her blue eyes grew bigger and bigger, Finn knew he’d overstepped.

“You not only think I killed someone, but you think I enjoyed it? Enjoyed it so much I killed someone else?” Disbelief and a solid veneer of horror coated Darby’s words, reinforcing what a bastard he was.

But what about that bleach? And the fact that she’d inherited Bo’s home and business? She had no alibi he could verify for either murder and even less reason for inheriting the business.

None of which gave him the right to come into her home and intimidate her.

The near-empty container of bleach still hung from his fingers and he settled the bottle on a small end table at the edge of the couch. His gaze caught on Lotte’s when he did and he could have sworn he saw serious disappointment in her eyes.

Which was ridiculous.

The last time he checked, all his knowledge of canine learning and understanding did not extend to castigating humans for unspoken thoughts.

He could manage that damn well all by himself.

“It’s my job to consider all the angles.”

“You call stomping in here and accusing me of unspeakable things angles?” Where he’d expected her to rant and rail, the stiff shoulders and steady voice suggested something else.

Darby Gage was a woman who could handle crisis. More, she’d obviously had to somewhere in her past. “Chief Colton, am I under suspicion for murder?”

“Do you want the truth?”

“Of course.” Even though the color hadn’t returned to her features, her voice was pure steel.

“You are a suspect in the murders of Bo Gage and Michael Hayden.”

“Because I was in a will I had no clue I was a part of? And because I bought some cleaning supplies.”

“You had motive.”