Rumour Has It

Her fingers tightened on her wineglass. “Then maybe you shouldn’t have come into the diner this morning.”

“Maybe,” he muttered and stuffed both hands into the pockets of his jeans. “But I needed some decent coffee.”

She hadn’t expected that. But he looked so disgusted, so…frustrated, Amanda laughed. His head snapped up, his gaze boring into hers.

“I’m sorry,” she said, shaking her head as another laugh bubbled out. “But really? Coffee is what finally brought you in?”

“I’ve been getting mine at the gas station.”

“Poor guy,” she said, and he frowned at the humor in her voice.

“You can laugh. But I don’t think Charlie’s so much as rinsed out that coffeepot of his in twenty years.” He grimaced at the thought and made Amanda smile again.

Shaking his head, he nodded at the wine in her hand. “You have any more of that?”

“I do. Also have beer, if you’d rather.”

“Yeah, that’d be good.” Some of the tension left his shoulders and one corner of his mouth tilted up into what might have been a half smile if it hadn’t disappeared so fast.

She walked to the kitchen, opened the fridge and pulled out a beer. Amanda paused for a second to get her bearings. The moment she’d been dreading for years was finally here. Nathan and her were together again. Alone. And there was just no telling what might happen next. But whatever it was, she thought, at least it would be something. Better than the vacuum they’d been in for the last few years. Better than the rigid silence that had stretched between them since she came back to Royal.

With that thought in mind, she walked to the living room, handed him the cold bottle, then took a seat on the couch. Mainly because her knees felt a little wobbly.

Looking up at him, she watched as he opened the beer and took a drink. He looked so good it was irritating. His skin was tanned and there was a slightly paler line across the top of his forehead where his hat usually rested. His brown eyes were watchful as he glanced around the apartment, no doubt taking in everything in that all-encompassing sweep. She wondered if he was remembering all the nights they’d been together, here in this room. Could he still hear the whispered words between them? Probably not, she thought. Nathan wouldn’t want to be reminded of a past that had no bearing on his life anymore.

She studied him as he studied the apartment. He wore scuffed brown boots, blue jeans and a short-sleeved, dark green T-shirt with Battlelands Ranch emblazoned on the shirt pocket. He stood stiff and straight as if awaiting a military inspection.

He was off-duty and yet everything about him screamed police. Nathan was just that kind of man. Devoted to duty, he preferred order to chaos, rules to confusion. He would take a road trip and stay on the highway, where Amanda would prefer the back roads, stopping at everything interesting along the way. No wonder they had clashed.

And even knowing all of that, she still felt the rush of attraction that she couldn’t deny. She wanted to be immune to him and, clearly, she wasn’t.

But this was exactly why she needed to be here. Because until she was immune to Nathan Battle, she’d never be able to move on. Instead, she’d go on being haunted by memories, by thoughts of what might have been.

He took another drink of his beer and looked down at the bottle in his hand. “I was sorry about your dad.”

She blinked against the sudden sting of tears. The one thing she hadn’t expected from Nathan was kindness. It was…disarming. “Thanks. I miss him.”

“Yeah, he was a good man.”

“He was.” Safe ground. Talk about their families. Don’t mention the tension coiled so tightly between them.

“Why did you come back?”

And there was the Nathan she knew best. So much for the pleasantries—it was on to Round One. “Excuse me?”

“Well, hell, Amanda.” He frowned down at her and looked a little surprised that she didn’t seem affected by his displeasure. “You were gone for years. Why come back at all?”

“Are you in charge of Royal’s borders now, Sheriff?” she asked. “Do people have to check in with you before they move in?”

“I didn’t say that.”

She pushed to her feet. Even though she stood five foot ten, she was forced to tip her head back to meet his gaze, but she did it. “Royal’s my home as much as it is yours, Nathan Battle.”

“Couldn’t tell from how you acted,” he said, completely ignoring the hard glare she fired at him.

“I seem to recall you living in Houston for quite a while. Were you interrogated when you moved back home?”

“I’m not interrogating you, Amanda,” he countered. “I’m just asking a damn question.”

“That you already know the answer to,” she shot back. “Pam needed help with the diner. I came home. That’s the story. None of this concerns you, Nathan. This is my business.”

“Damn straight it is, but now that you’re back, it’s my business, too.” He stood as still and cold as a statue.

“How do you figure?”

“I’m the sheriff here. This is where I live. For you to come back now and start stirring things—”

“What am I stirring, Nathan?” she interrupted, and saw with a jolt of glee that he still hated being cut off. It infuriated her to remember that in the old days. She’d have shut her mouth so he could keep talking. Well, that time was gone. “I’m working at my family’s diner.”

“And getting tongues wagging again,” he pointed out.

“Please. People in Royal gossip about everything. I didn’t have to be here to have them talk about me.”

“They’re not talking about you,” he elaborated grimly. “They’re talking about us.”

“There is no us,” she said flatly, and was surprised by the twinge of pain that clutched at her heart.

“I know that and you know that, but the folks in town—”

“Forget about them,” she interrupted again.

He took a long deep breath from between clenched teeth. “Easy for you to say. But as sheriff, I need to have the respect of the people I’m protecting. I don’t like being the subject of gossip.”

“Then tell them that. Why tell me?”

“Because if you leave, it’ll stop.”

She set her wineglass down before she was tempted to throw it at his rock-hard head. “I’m not leaving. And, it’ll never stop, Nathan.”

That statement hit him hard. She saw the proof of it flicker in his eyes. But she wasn’t finished.

“Until we’re ninety, people around here will be speculating and remembering.…”

“Damn it, Amanda, I want you out of town.”

“And I want you to stop caring what other people think,” she snapped. “I guess we’re both doomed to disappointment.”

He set his beer bottle on the table beside her glass and moved in on her. He was so tall, he didn’t have to put much effort into looming. She supposed it just came naturally to a man used to having his own way. A man accustomed to telling people what to do and having them do it.