The Spring At Moss Hill

Kylie felt heat rise in her face. “Well, enjoy the rest of the day.”

“I will, thanks. Knock on my door if you think of anything else that could help unravel what’s going on with these rumors.” He reached into his jacket and withdrew a card, handing it to her. “Or call or text.”

“Sure thing.”

Kylie took the card and slipped it into her pocket, eager to get back to her worktable.

Time to disappear.

She waited for Russ to go into the main building before she headed inside, her pace picking up the closer she got to her apartment and a locked door between her and her temporary neighbor. She wasn’t afraid of him. She just didn’t want him prying into her life.

And it was tough to be neutral about him. He was physical, intelligent and always on alert. No question about that.

Also, sexy.

No question about that, either.

Kylie dove into her apartment, breathing deeply as the door shut behind her. Her reaction to him wasn’t going to get her anywhere but into deep trouble.

Time to calm down and get to work.

* * *

She made tea. She sharpened pencils. She cleaned erasers. She sorted crayons, dusted her scanner, changed the batteries in her wireless keyboard and checked three times to see if the ducks had returned to the river, but they hadn’t.

Finally, Kylie approached her worktable as if it held classified information.

Imagine the field day Russ Colton would have if he knew about Morwenna Mills.

She frowned at Sherlock Badger. “Where were you today at lunch when I needed you?”

A little stuffed badger wouldn’t have helped her case with a real investigator.

She didn’t sit. She stared out at the river, concentrating on the shadows and the green of the fields rising up across from Moss Hill. But her mind didn’t clear. It was cluttered with images of lunch, Ruby’s fears, Mark’s firm denials of problems at Moss Hill, Jess’s quiet concern and Russ—questioning, suspicious and thoroughly confident.

And so damn sexy. The dark blue eyes, the tawny hair, the broad shoulders, the easy smile.

None of that was helping, either.

Kylie had to adjust her thinking, since she’d expected Julius Hartley, the investigator who’d escorted Daphne Stewart to Knights Bridge last summer. He was a good-looking man, but in his fifties and clearly out of his element in the small, rural town. Russ was closer to her age and struck her as a man who made a point of not being out of his element anywhere.

She picked a random blue crayon out of a basket on her worktable. Some days she thought she should have a studio separate from her home. She could go to work like “normal people,” as her sister would say, then insist she’d been joking. But ever since Kylie had entered art school, friends, family, professors and strangers had cautioned her about the chronic uncertainties of being a freelance illustrator, especially of children’s books. Even working illustrators with longtime careers had cautioned her.

By and large, people meant well. They didn’t want to see her broke or hurt by rejection and the unpredictable nature of her chosen profession.

That was fine. She didn’t want to see herself broke or hurt either.

From the time she was a little girl scribbling on her bedroom walls, she’d envisioned herself taking a pseudonym, but she’d started her career working under her own name. Now Morwenna Mills was her public face—the author and illustrator who had created the Badger family, newcomers to a little town not unlike Knights Bridge.

Kylie had never written her own children’s book. She’d recognized that being both writer and illustrator might not work out and hadn’t shown her project to anyone until it was finished. It could have gone right into the trash heap, but it hadn’t. Her agent had loved the writing and the illustrations, and so had publishers.

Taking a pseudonym hadn’t been required, but it had made sense. At first, she’d continued to take on work as Kylie Shaw. Now she only worked as Morwenna.

For better or worse, she thought, picturing the California investigator across the hall. Had he already guessed she was hiding something?

She could swear him to secrecy and tell him about Morwenna.

But why tell him if she hadn’t told her parents and sister and her closest friends? Why open that can of worms? Why take the chance? She was deep into her series of fairy tales. It didn’t have the same pressures as her recent Badger deadlines, but she was absorbed in the work.

Always her excuses for keeping Morwenna to herself.

She didn’t intend to keep her secret forever, but right now Ava and Ruby O’Dunn, two popular young local women, were excited about having a Hollywood costume designer come to town. They didn’t need the distraction of her alter ego this week.

Kylie sat at her worktable and opened her sketch pad to her maple tree.

Right tree. Wrong location.

It was progress, enough to get her back to work.

Seven (#ulink_ff9ea03e-2c6d-5a4e-b9da-988526f612e3)

“Ruby shouldn’t have said anything,” Christopher Sloan said as he, Mark Flanagan and Russ stood on the balcony outside the meeting room, above the Moss Hill dam. “Her mother hears all the town gossip. It’s the nature of her job, and she likes it—likes being in the know. Ruby should be used to it by now. It’s easy for idle talk to get turned into something it shouldn’t.”

Mark didn’t look convinced. He and Christopher had finished their look at the renovated mill and hadn’t found anything amiss. It was midafternoon, cooler by the river. Russ had settled into his apartment after he’d had his own look around the property. Not a peep from Kylie Shaw. She was hiding something, no question, but he doubted whatever it was had anything to do with fire codes or corners cut during the refurbishment of the old hat factory.

Russ sensed that he and the two local men were on the same wavelength. He hadn’t expected to feel comfortable with the two New Englanders right from the start, but he could see they, too, weren’t concerned about actual problems with the mill but instead with the potential effect of the nebulous rumors.

“Why would there be idle talk about this place?” Mark asked. “And why now?”

“Because a Hollywood type is on her way to town. Doesn’t matter that she lived here forty years ago. She’s dressed movie stars.” Christopher nodded to Russ. “And there’s our PI here. Ruby told everyone you were on the way, Russ. That had to stoke the fires.”

“Drama,” Mark said tightly, clearly disgusted.

Christopher shrugged. “Sometimes people talk out of their hats and don’t realize they’re stirring up trouble.”

“They should be more careful.” Mark stared down at the water flowing steadily over the dam, as it had since the mid-nineteenth century. “I don’t need rumors going around that I did anything but a damn good job on this place. If I find out who said anything...”

“You’ll tell Eric or me,” Christopher Sloan said, then turned to Russ. “Eric is my oldest brother. He’s a police officer in town.”

Russ said nothing. He could see how frustrated and disturbed Mark was by this development.

“This will die down once Saturday’s event passes without a hitch,” Christopher added.

Mark continued to stare at the water. “I hope so.”

Russ leaned against the rail. If the two men were lying and the place was riddled with safety issues, then the rail could give way and land him in the river. But he didn’t believe the rail was anything but solid. “Mark, is there anyone with a grudge against you—anyone who’d want to make your life miserable?”

“I’ve fired people, if that’s what you’re asking. So have the Sloans and other contractors who worked on renovating this place. I can’t think of anyone who’s been a real problem.”