A Touch of Scarlet

It was a question. “No. I’m originally from Houston.”

“You don’t sound like you’re from Houston.”

He leaned forward and clasped his hands. He was accustomed to questions. Everyone in Oak Stand wanted to know who your mama and daddy were. And where you attended church. But he hated answering questions about his past. “I went to prep school on the East Coast. They force Texas twang out, much like I’m sure you did when you trained as an actress. You don’t sound Texan.”

“I’m not a Texan. I’m from everywhere.” The mood shifted. No more lightness. Something darker had awakened in her. For a moment she didn’t speak, seemed caught in her thoughts. Then she looked up at him. “You know, I have some wicked fantasies about prep-school boys in stuffy oxford shirts and sweater cardigans. About getting them out of those khaki pants.”

It was off-kilter. Almost sarcastic. She vamped him and his blood responded, heating like lava, making him forget who he was. Her gaze narrowed to smolder and her pink tongue appeared at the corner of her plump lips, throwing gunpowder onto the fire.

He couldn’t stop himself. He dragged his gaze over her fantasy of a body. The tank top was tight and outlined what he wanted to see. Even her blue-green nail polish looked provocative. He knew it was wrong. He knew he’d poured his own fuel onto the fire that blazed between them. “I had some pretty wicked fantasies myself. The best one involved a smart-mouthed redhead with long legs and big—”

“Are you flirting with me?”

Her words were like ice water, dousing the flickering flames within him. What in the hell had he been thinking playing with her like that?

“Are you flirting with me?” he countered with a deadpan expression.

He found his cool. No need to let her know how much he wanted to handcuff her in a very unprofessional way. No need to let her see the weakness he held when it came to women like her.

She leaped to her feet. “No.”

She walked toward the front door, not bothering to glance back at him.

His body bade him to follow her, to find out how it would feel to have her perfect white teeth nipping his earlobe, to have her abundant flesh filling his hands. To discover the way she’d feel beneath him, on top of him, around him.

But Adam didn’t move. He was no slave to desire. Not anymore. So instead of watching Scarlet walk away—which he knew had to be a great view—he focused on a moth fluttering above some flowering bushes ringing the porch.

Brother, you’ve lost your mind. Don’t forget who you are in this town. You are the law. And you are currently on duty. No indulging in witty repartee with a bold strawberry tart who broke the law less than an hour ago. Get a grip.

He rose and straightened, donning his resolve and doffing his uniform hat.

Then he traced Scarlet’s steps into the inn.

The parlor was crowded, so he didn’t see where Scarlet headed. A few familiar faces met his gaze. The hardware-store owner shook his hand, the mayor slapped his back and he was certain Betty Monk had copped a feel of his butt. It was either her or Grace Lewis. And neither of those ladies had seen their natural hair color in thirty years.

“Adam,” the bride said, pulling her dress hem from under the heavy foot of Bubba Malone. “I’m so glad you made the reception. Have you had a piece of cake yet?”

Leave it to Rayne to try and feed him the minute he stepped inside. He shook his head. “Not yet. Sorry I had to miss the ceremony, but someone had to keep thieves and murderers from crashing the wedding.”

Along with sexy sisters on a mission to destroy wedded bliss.

But he didn’t add that fact.

Bubba shoved the last of his cake into his mouth and mumbled, “I’da liked to see ’em try to crash that wedding. Heads would have rolled, by God.”

Rayne laughed. “It’s too bad you didn’t pull my baby sister over. She almost made it in time to cause even more of a sensation than she did.”

“Actually—” Adam said, only to close his mouth when Bubba made the kill slash across his own throat.

“Actually what?” Rayne said, her brow furrowed.

He stared at Rayne for a moment, not sure how to get out of admitting he’d ticketed her sister and did what she’d suggested—held Scarlet up long enough to keep her from crashing the ceremony. He could almost visualize Scarlet blazing into the church and stalking up the aisle with her vibrant hair flaming around her. Rayne was pretty with an angelic face framed by wild red corkscrew curls. But she was nothing compared to the siren who had bent over the back of her car and dared him to frisk her. No comparison whatsoever.

“Nothing,” Adam said, looking at Bubba, who looked alarmed. Scarlet’s antics must be a touchy subject.

“Oh.” Rayne spun around and her hair nearly landed in Bubba’s punch glass. “My sister is around here somewhere. I’d like you to meet her. You might want to go ahead and introduce yourself. If she stays any longer than a day or two, you’ll run into her. She draws trouble like roadkill draws flies.” Rayne laughed as if she’d cracked a joke, but there was an edge in her voice.

As if he didn’t already know.

As if Scarlet’s naughtiness wasn’t exactly what drew him to her. That and her playground of a body.

His mouth watered at the thought of taking a ride on Scarlet.

“She done slipped out the back. Or maybe up the stairs,” Bubba said, rotating his large head like a periscope. “All I know is she ain’t feeling herself or she’d be down here regalin’ us.”

Rayne sighed. “True. She’s hurt. And angry.”

“You know, Hinton, I’ve been thinking of taking up law enforcement. You got room on that huge force for a man of my statue?”

Bubba’s intent was obvious to Adam. He wanted to change the subject. For what reason, Adam hadn’t a clue. And he wasn’t sure about Bubba being a statue. “I might indeed.”

Bubba actually brightened at his words. “Heck, I may take you up on it. Jack’s pretty sweet on me, but he may let me try my hand at knockin’ heads and cuffin’ drunks.”

Jack Darby, Bubba’s boss and a local rancher, evidently heard his words. “I’m not that damn sweet on you. Go ahead, though they better get a tent maker busy on sewing a uniform for you.”

Adam moved along as the two men jokingly sparred about Bubba’s chances at fitting in a police cruiser. Might not be a bad idea to recruit the big man as a reserve officer. The police force had been shorthanded ever since Sherwood McCann married and moved to Mesquite. Bubba Malone was an established member of the town. Everyone knew the easygoing, loyal-as-a-hound redneck. He’d be a good man to have when the chips were down.

The crowd didn’t lighten as he neared the back of the house. Left and right, people nodded at him or threw a wave of acknowledgment as he approached the porch. But he didn’t fool himself. People were friendly to him for good reason. Being Police Chief of Oak Stand may have been a lateral move for him, but it was top dog as far as law enforcement was concerned for the people of the community.

They didn’t trust him yet. Didn’t know him well enough to call him one of their own. But they respected him well enough. For the moment that was all he needed. One day he hoped to feel at home in Oak Stand, but until then, he did his best to be the man he expected himself to be. Focused, progressive and fair.

And he knew his weakness for women like Scarlet would chip away at any respectability he’d built within the hardworking, traditional-values community. He needed to stay away from her and those like her. He needed to make a date with the mayor’s daughter, the perfectly respectable one who had recently moved home to teach kindergarten at Oak Stand Elementary. What was her name? He couldn’t remember.

The back lawn was as crowded as the house, and he briefly thought about grabbing a piece of cake and returning to the vacant front porch. But there would be no sexy redhead to keep him company. He couldn’t help scanning the crowd for her, even though seconds before he’d told himself to forget about her.

He didn’t find Scarlet, but he did find the irascible city councilman, Harvey Primm. Unfortunately.

“Hinton, we need to talk about this upcoming hoopla at the library. We need a plan for how to handle the riffraff that’s going to show up.”

“Not today, Harvey. Come by my office and we’ll talk about it.”

“You know they’re planning a protest, don’t you? Gosh danged liberals. As if we don’t have bigger things to worry about in this country. Misguided fools, the whole pack of them.” The councilman shook his head, disgust plainly etched across his weathered brow.

Harvey Primm served on the city council as he had for the past twenty-odd years. He was a self-proclaimed pillar of the community. Once a tire salesman, he now worked from home, producing a questionable piece of journalism called the Howard County Examiner, which unleashed gossip about his neighbors. Ironically, he also served as a deacon in a nondenominational church on the outskirts of Oak Stand. Adam found the man to be overbearing, insufferable and a little cracked. Supposedly, Harvey had grown increasingly obsessed with stopping evil in all forms ever since his wife had been killed by a drunk driver several years before. Harvey’s feverish climb onto his soapbox had him extolling his views on everything from prohibiting the sale of alcohol to this newest cause—the removal of a children’s book containing witchcraft from the county library. Adam tired of the man shadowing his doorstep nearly once a week.

“I’m aware, but this is neither the time nor the place. Come by and we’ll talk,” Adam said, trying to slide past Harvey.

The man’s hand clamped down on his arm. “There is no better time than the present. The library board voted. It’s done and all the protestors in the state of Texas can’t stop us from removing that filth from the shelves of our library. Away from the hands of our innocent children.”