Silent Night in Dry Creek

Silent Night in Dry Creek
Janet Tronstad

For private investigator Wade Sutton, the town holds too many memories–none of them fond– of his childhood.Yet he can't say no when the sheriff asks him to secretly watch over a woman who might be in danger. "Helping" lovely Jasmine Hunter with the church's Christmas celebration does more for his bruised heart than he wants to admit.As does being back on his family's farm. But he can't stay in Dry Creek. Unless…Jasmine gives him a reason to call it home again.

“Do you always loom over your prisoners like this?” Jasmine asked.

Wade was standing so close she could count the whiskers on his chin. He stepped back in surprise. “You’re not my prisoner. I’m protecting you.”

She stepped to the refrigerator and opened the door. “I don’t think anyone camps out in freezing temperatures because they’re protecting someone.”

“I do,” Wade said quietly.

“Yeah, well, Lonnie isn’t coming here. He doesn’t even know how to get here.” She saw the doubt race across his face. “I know I could have told him how to find me, but I didn’t. You’re just going to have to trust me on that.”

Jasmine wasn’t looking at Wade, but she knew if she looked up she would see an expression of incredulity on his face. A lawman could never trust an ex-con, not entirely….

JANET TRONSTAD

grew up on a small farm in Montana that had a barn, even if it wasn’t big enough for an angel to swing from the rafters. Maybe that’s why Dry Creek has a barn big enough so the angel can really fly. Janet has always loved a story that’s better than life. Today, she lives in Pasadena, California, where she works as a full-time writer.

Silent Night in Dry Creek

Janet Tronstad

For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord.

—Luke 2:11

I have been blessed in my life to have some

warm, wonderful aunts (my mother’s sisters).

This book is dedicated to them:

Wilma A (deceased now but I think of her often),

Grace L, Alice N, Mary M and Gladys B.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Chapter Eleven

Chapter Twelve

Chapter Thirteen

Chapter Fourteen

Chapter Fifteen

Chapter Sixteen

Chapter Seventeen

Chapter Eighteen

Epilogue

Questions for Discussion

Chapter One

“You want me to keep an eye on her?” Wade Sutton pushed the café curtain aside and looked through the window to the only street in Dry Creek, Montana. Clumps of melting snow lined the rough asphalt road and the one vehicle in sight was an old motorcycle leaning against the corner of the hardware store. A tall, red-haired woman was walking toward that store right now, swinging her arms as if she was on some mission from God.

Wade grinned slightly as the edge of his hand pressed against the cold window. It was a cloudy December day and seeing the woman in her bulky, gray sweater and faded dress made his heart beat faster. He liked a strong woman and he could tell by the way she walked that she was a fine one.

Suddenly, a gust of wind blew the woman’s skirt up to her knees. She caught the material before it could go any higher. Now, that was the problem with all the piety in this small town, he thought. What was the point of a woman wearing a dress if she didn’t show more leg than that?

Wade leaned forward to see if the wind would blow again.

“Nice looking, isn’t she?” Sheriff Carl Wall said, moving the toothpick in his mouth. The two men were sitting in the café with their empty breakfast plates on the table in front of them. It was ten o’clock in the morning and the waitress was back in the kitchen. No one else was around.

“She’s a regular movie star.” Wade let the curtain fall into place and turned his attention to the other man. He knew the woman couldn’t be as pious as she looked. Not if the sheriff had asked him to come up from Idaho Falls to watch her. “What’s her thing? Stolen property? Blackmail? Arson?”

Wade was ready to sink his teeth into a surveillance job. Until six months ago, when he’d injured his leg while taking down some drug dealers, he’d been the busiest independent private investigator in the Rocky Mountain area. Now, no one except his old friend here was willing to defy the doctors and consider hiring him while he was still in physical therapy.

“Jasmine Hunter hasn’t done anything,” the sheriff said as he leaned back. “In fact, she even agreed to be the angel in the Christmas pageant this year, so she’s real popular around here.”

Wade remembered those pageants. “Then she’s just plain nuts.”