The Sheriff's Runaway Bride

Copying Reverend West, Zach bent his head to her in an attempt to provide some privacy. “I beg your pardon?”

“Mrs. Rader.”

“Ah. I thought that was her.”

“She’s concerned about her granddaughter. Seems Sherilyn didn’t come home last night.”

“I see.” He glanced at the elderly woman. “Maybe I should introduce myself.”

Kylie shrugged. “If you’re going to search for Sherilyn, start at Vincent’s.”

“Vincent’s?”

“She was in the car with him yesterday.” Turning to gaze out over the parking lot, Kylie nodded. “Right over there.”

“She’s the one you caught him with,” Zach surmised quietly.

“Yep.” Kylie moved toward the steps, and he ambled up beside her.

“Miss Jones.”

“Hm?” Kylie asked.

“About what I said last night … I didn’t mean that as an insult. I spoke without thinking.”

She glanced at him, nodded and dropped her chin. “I know.”

“I didn’t mean to imply that you aren’t … Weren’t …”

“In my right mind,” she supplied helpfully, stepping down.

“It’s just that I spent my entire childhood around Vincent,” he said, keeping up with her, “and I’ve seen some things beneath his charming exterior that …” He broke off, realizing with some puzzlement that he had said more than he normally would have. Feeling oddly exposed, he pulled his sunshades from his coat pocket and slid them on.

She sent a look up at him from beneath the thick sweep of her lashes. “You were right,” she said quietly. “I was foolish and desperate.”

Uncertain what to say to that, he simply stared at her until she stepped down onto the ground and walked toward his sister’s party. Zach followed, automatically reconnoitering the area, noting who got into which car and who stood and gabbed with whom. Brooke and Gabe now chatted with a thin redhead and a little girl, maybe nine or ten years of age, wearing pink eyeglasses. As Kylie approached, the woman and child turned to greet her. The woman looked older than he’d first assumed her to be and seemed conspicuously frail. The child resembled a blond, blue-eyed doll.

“Do you know the Perrys?” Kylie asked. Zach shook his head as Brooke made the introductions.

“This is Darlene and her daughter, Macy.”

“Hello.”

“My brother, Zach.”

“Oh, you’re the new deputy sheriff,” Darlene said. “Nice to meet you.”

“Likewise.”

The girl shaded her eyes with a hand and looked up at him shyly. “You’re tall.”

“Mmm-hmm, and you’re pretty.”

She gave him a tiny smile and then ducked her head bashfully. Suddenly recognition hit him square in the chest. He looked at his sister then at Gabe and Kylie, but obviously none of them saw it. They wouldn’t, of course. How could they know that Macy Perry, with that long blond hair, bright blue eyes and single dimple in her left cheek, looked exactly like Brooke at the same age? Or did his mind play tricks on him? Maybe being at home again had colored his perceptions, but his cop sense told him otherwise.

Talk turned to the Independence Day picnic. Kylie said something about having to serve food, but Zach listened with just half an ear while trying not to stare at Macy Perry. It wasn’t unusual for two unrelated people to look alike, of course, but in a town filled with Claytons, such resemblance did not seem random. Who, he wondered, glancing around at the thinning crowd, was Macy Perry’s father?

Shoving the flimsy, disposable aluminum pan back into Kylie’s hands, Jerome shook his head. “That’s perfectly good meat. Serve it.”

“It’s all fat!” Kylie protested.

Unlike Gerald, his happy-go-lucky, roly-poly brother, Jerome was tall, rail thin and as cheap as chewing gum. Both were excellent cooks. Neither, however, could make beef fat palatable.

Erin Fields, the owner of the Cowboy Café and their boss, breezed by, her long, copper-red ponytail flashing out behind her. Snatching the pan from Kylie’s hands, she carried it away, saying, “You’re just cooking the meat, Jerome, not paying for it. We’ll make this pan an Independence Day treat for the local dogs.” With that, she hurried toward the serving tables being set up on the green.

Jerome rolled his eyes disapprovingly and turned back to the enormous wheeled grill. Built into a trailer frame, it had been towed to the edge of the street in front of the diner for easy access. The huge chunks of beef, donated by one of the local ranchers, had been smoking on the grill since six o’clock the previous evening, making dogs howl all over town. Erin and her employees had volunteered to serve it.

Kylie moved to the steel worktable that had been moved out of the kitchen and set up beneath a bright blue canopy tent. Humming, Gerald busily sliced smoked meat with an enormous knife and mechanical precision, piling the slices into a series of disposable pans. Kylie covered one with tin foil and carried it across the street toward the serving tables. Ahead of her, Vincent sauntered by with Sherilyn Rader on his arm.

They’d been burning up the edge of the green nearest the diner all afternoon, strolling back and forth, over and over again. Apparently, Vincent found it necessary to flaunt his girlfriend in public to save face. At first, Kylie hadn’t recognized Sherilyn because the silly thing had dyed her streaky chestnut hair an unnatural black. Despite studiously refusing to acknowledge the pair’s existence, Kylie couldn’t help noticing that Sherilyn wore next to nothing. Her outfit seemed to consist of flip-flops, a white sports bra and denim short shorts. She made Kylie feel positively overdressed in her usual work clothes: athletic shoes, jeans and a T-shirt, red in honor of the holiday. She’d wisely added a white visor, which meant that she could avoid looking at Vincent by just dipping her head slightly.

The next couple hours passed in a flurry of activity as Kylie and her coworkers laded the tables and served hundreds of pounds of mouth-watering, slow-cooked beef, which the diners carried back to their picnic spots and augmented with their side dishes of choice. Many of them actually carried the meat home with them and ate it there, several of them admitting that they’d be back to watch the fireworks being readied over at the football field. Zach came through near the end of the line, smiling behind his sunshades and carrying two large disposable platters.

He lifted the one on his right and said, “For me, Brooke, Gabe and A.J.” Shoving forward the platter atop his left palm, he explained, “This one’s for Arabella and her crew.”

Arabella Michaels was another Clayton cousin. The divorced mother of triplets baked for the diner, and everyone greatly appreciated her offerings. Kylie started piling on the meat.

“Is Jasmine with Arabella?”

“Yep.”

In addition to her own three kids, Arabella had taken in a teen abandoned by her drunk of a father. Jasmine Turner, who had recently become engaged to marry Cade Clayton, a first cousin to Vincent. Neither side of the family seemed thrilled by that relationship, but wherever Jasmine could be found, Cade would likely be, so Kylie kept piling on the meat until Zach chuckled and moved the first platter out of her reach.

“Enjoying yourself?” she asked idly, filling the second platter while she eyed his dark green uniform shirt, which he wore today with blue jeans and boots.

“Sure. How about you?”

“Too busy. I’ll enjoy myself after the meat’s all gone.”

“Pity,” he said.

“Aw, I don’t mind.” She could’ve let him go then but found that she didn’t really want to. Despite what he’d said on Saturday night, she liked this gorgeous man. Not only had he been in church on Sunday, he’d apologized for his remark and then he’d stood around worrying about poor old Mrs. Rader. Besides, something about his smile made her smile, so she asked, “Are you working, too?”

He dipped his chin in a nod. “I am.”

“Wasn’t sure. I mean, you’re wearing the shirt but not the rest of the uniform, and you’re not carrying your gun.”

Leaning forward, he confessed, “Frankly, I’m not keen on the uniform. Too many years in plain clothes, I guess.” He looked at her over the rim of his shades, his dark-blue eyes gleaming, and quietly added, “As for the gun, it’s a law that a peace officer has to go armed in public at all times. Just because you don’t see a firearm, darlin’, doesn’t mean I’m not packing one.”