An Honorable Man

Sierra grimaced and crossed her arms over her midsection. “It’s too much, isn’t it?”

“Too much for what?” Annie asked, pulling the door shut behind her.

Sierra hesitated. Annie had become her sister-in-law a few months ago when she’d married Sierra’s brother Ryan. The two women had attended high school together once upon a time but they were still working on becoming friends. “I’m meeting someone for drinks.”

“Great!” Annie patted the stray hairs the wind had blown loose from her blond ponytail back into place. Her face, devoid of makeup, glowed with natural color from the sun and the wind. “Anyone I know?”

“No.”

Annie waited a beat, but Sierra couldn’t very well tell her sister-in-law she was screwing up the courage to lose her inhibitions with a sexy stranger.

“I’m glad you’re dating again.” Annie had a sincerity about her that made everything she said appear genuine. “Really glad.”

“Thank you.” Sierra’s response sounded wooden when she’d meant to communicate how touched she was by Annie’s enthusiasm. Suppressing a sigh of frustration, she gestured toward the kitchen at the back of the town house. “Can I get you something to drink?”

“Oh, no,” Annie said. “I wouldn’t dream of keeping you, and I’m itching to get home to Ryan anyway.”

Annie was referring to Sierra’s childhood home, a large Colonial in the residential area immediately adjacent to downtown Indigo Springs. Sierra had lived in the house as an adult, too, until deciding the newlyweds should have it to themselves. Annie and Ryan wouldn’t be alone for long. At the end of the school year, the daughter they’d given up for adoption when they were teenagers and reconnected with last summer was moving in with them permanently.

“Ryan played pick-up basketball tonight, so I had dinner with my dad after I got off the river.” Annie ran a tourist-themed business with her father that offered whitewater trips and mountain bike rentals. “He texted a little while ago that he has a glass of red wine waiting for me.”

“Sounds like you deserve to relax.” Sierra shifted from high heel to high heel. She was already taller than average. In the shoes, she towered over Annie. “Ryan says you’ve been working a lot lately.”

“Spring’s our busiest season, especially when we get a lot of rain. The rafting’s terrific when the river’s high. We’re booking so many trips I won’t have time for anything but work the next couple weeks.”

“That’s good, right?”

“Good for business. Not so good for the festival, which brings me to the reason I stopped by.” Annie’s long pause was uncharacteristic. “I was hoping you’d fill in for me on the planning committee.”

“Me?” Sierra resisted the urge to take a giant step backward, away from the request.

“I know it’s a lot to ask, with Chad being a member.” Annie made a face. “I thought you might be uncomfortable around him, but Ryan says you’re made of tougher stuff than that.”

Her brother didn’t know her nearly as well as he thought he did.

Sierra pressed her lips together, so she wouldn’t give in to the temptation to refuse outright, and composed an answer. “Do I have to let you know right now?”

“Oh, no.” Annie shook her head. “Take a day to think about it. There’s a meeting Sunday afternoon and then things’ll get pretty busy, especially come festival weekend.”

Sierra nodded, hating herself for letting the thought of dealing with her ex-boyfriend stop her from agreeing to help the community. At this rate, Annie would have a hard time warming up to her.

“You’d be a great help to the committee, not to mention you’d be doing me a huge favor,” Annie said. “And who knows? After tonight, being on the committee might not seem like such a big deal.”

Sierra cocked her head. “What do you mean by after tonight?”

“You’re dating again, right?” Annie grinned at her, then let herself out of the town house. Before she pulled the door shut, she stuck her head around the frame.

“One more thing,” she said, eyes sparkling. “If you’re looking to impress that guy you’re meeting, don’t you dare change out of those clothes.”

BEN STOPPED WATCHING the entrance to the Blue Haven Pub fifteen minutes after Sierra was due to arrive. She’d stood him up, not that it came as a shock.

Sierra had been as skittish as an anonymous source when they’d met even as she tried to project a worldliness he’d seen right through. She was classy, from the toes of her low-heeled pumps to the tailored cut of her blazer to the subtle smell of her perfume. She wasn’t the type of woman who arranged dates with strange men.

He fought back disappointment even though he couldn’t fault Sierra’s judgment. His motives weren’t exactly pure. He’d intended to subtly press her for information on the town’s inhabitants and find out what she knew about Dr. Whitmore.

Now that he wasn’t distracted by her imminent arrival, nothing was stopping him from striking up conversations with the patrons. There were plenty of them, sitting on stools around the bar, playing pool in the back room, gathered around tables hoisting mugs of beer. The pub seemed to be the town’s ultimate gathering spot, a place frequented by both locals and tourists.

He imagined his mother sitting in this same bar, perhaps at this very table, unaware she didn’t have long to live. A chill penetrated his skin, and he realized his hand had tightened around his frosted glass. He relaxed his grip. His chances of discovering the truth about how his mother had died would be greater if he could treat this like any other story.

So far he hadn’t learned much.

The teenage clerk at his hotel had recently moved to town with his family and was unfamiliar with Whitmore Family Practice. The waitress at the Thai restaurant knew only that Ryan Whitmore was a doctor.

Neither had Ben made headway on tracking down the sender of the e-mails. He’d visited the public library at five-thirty that afternoon only to find out it closed at five.

He wished he’d done more groundwork on the Whitmore family before leaving Pittsburgh. After receiving those anonymous e-mails, however, all he could think about was traveling to where the scent was strongest.

He’d counted on a quick search of the Web yielding all he needed to know. He hadn’t anticipated his hotel wouldn’t have Internet access and that the only Internet café in town wasn’t scheduled to open until next month.

He was about to leave the table and head for an old-timer bellying up to the bar when he caught sight of a woman with long, sexy brown hair at the entrance. She took off her black jacket, revealing clothes that showed off her killer body.

She scanned the interior of the bar, her posture as rigid as that of a mannequin in a store window. She looked in his general direction, and her chest expanded, as though she was sucking in a deep breath. He watched as she ventured forward, curious to see if she’d be joining a lucky guy.

Her steps faltered, but she kept coming in his general direction, navigating the labyrinth of tables, dodging a woman who abruptly stood up. She didn’t stop until she drew even with his table and slipped into the chair across from him.

“Hey,” she said. “Sorry I’m late.”

He was the lucky guy.

He blinked, then blinked again. She had the same high cheekbones, delicate chin and full mouth as the woman he’d met earlier that afternoon. While that Sierra had been pretty in an understated way, this one was a knockout.

“No apology necessary.” He kept his eyes trained on her face instead of indulging himself and letting them dip to the generous cleavage her low-cut shirt displayed. She had the bone structure of a model without the emptiness he perhaps unfairly associated with the excessively beautiful. That term didn’t exactly apply to Sierra, mostly because of the intelligence in her eyes, but partly due to a nose that wasn’t completely straight. In his opinion, that small imperfection made her more appealing. “You’re definitely worth the wait.”

“Exactly the reaction I was aiming for.” The comment should have sounded flirtatious, but her voice shook slightly, as though she was…nervous?

A middle-aged waitress in a hurry stopped by their table to take Sierra’s drink order. Sierra hesitated, then said, “Whiskey.”

“Neat?” the waitress asked.

Sierra’s eyebrows, finely arched and a shade darker than her hair, drew together. “Excuse me?”

Ben hid a grin and supplied, “Without a mixer.”

“Oh, no.” Sierra waved a hand airily, as though she ordered whiskey every day of the week. “I like it with water. On the rocks.”

Ben waited until the waitress had gone, then set about trying to put her at ease. “The B and B was booked, but I got a room at the Indigo Inn. I also took your advice about the pad thai. It was delicious.” He smiled. “The pad thai, I mean. I haven’t tasted the room.”

“I’m glad.” She fidgeted with her gold bracelet, her expression serious. His joke had been lame, but he’d at least expected her to return his smile.

One beat of silence stretched to two, then three.

“So, Sierra whatever-your-last-name-is,” he said, “what am I allowed to know about you?”

She stopped playing with the bracelet and clasped her hands primly in her lap, the kind of reaction he might have expected if he’d asked for the pin number of her ATM card.

“I’m not all that interesting,” she said.

The understatement of the year, and Ben’s years were packed with intriguing things. “Let me be the judge of that.”

The waitress saved her from replying by returning with her whiskey, which she set in front of Sierra with a plop before bustling away. Sierra picked up the glass and took a large swallow. Her lips curled and her eyes watered.

Those damp eyes zeroed in on him. “Can we not do this?”

“Do what?”

She waved a slim, pretty hand. Her nails were unpainted. “Pretend to be interested in each other’s lives. We both know why we got together tonight.”

They did? She shifted in her chair, as though waiting for him to say something. For the life of him, he didn’t know what. He wasn’t ready to confess his hope that she could tell him about Dr. Whitmore.

“Mutual attraction,” she whispered. A blush stained her smooth alabaster skin, and he would have bet his laptop computer she’d never come on to a stranger before.

“I’m definitely attracted.” He was intrigued, too, and determined to get to the bottom of the puzzle she presented. “Except I’d love some conversation. For me, there’s got to be more than lust at first sight.”

The pinkish color on her cheeks deepened to a deep rose before she tossed her hair back and met his eyes. She held his gaze, it looked like with an effort. “Then tell me about yourself.”

“What do you want to know?”

Her delicate shoulders rose, then fell. “What are you doing in Indigo Springs?”

“Reliving memories.” He’d eventually tell her he was an investigative reporter, but the moment wasn’t right. “I was here one time as a child. It seemed past time I came back.” Something stopped him from revealing his grandparents had once been residents of Indigo Springs. “How about you? Have you lived here long?”

“All my life.” She fidgeted and snuck a not-so-covert glance at the people around them. She’d been doing that a lot since she arrived.

“Something wrong?” he asked.

She didn’t answer immediately, then finally whispered, “People are staring at us.”

“They’re staring at you,” he corrected.

She crossed her arms over her chest and ran her hands up and down the bare skin of her upper arms. “Because they’ve never seen me dressed like this.”

“Because you look fantastic,” he countered.

She shook her head, uncrossed her arms, ran a hand over her mouth, then lowered her voice another half octave. “I don’t know what I was thinking, coming here tonight.”

“I’m not sure what you mean,” he said. “We’re just two people having a drink together.”

“It’s more than that.” She leaned forward so only he could hear. He could smell something light and flowery. Not perfume, like he’d thought earlier today. Scented shampoo. “I was going to try to get you to invite me back to your room.”

His heartbeat sped up to a gallop. “You wouldn’t have to try very hard.”

“Except I changed my mind.” The corners of her mouth drooped. “It’s pretty clear I’m not cut out for one-night stands.”

The gallop slowed to a trot. He blew out a breath, fighting the compulsion to disagree. “Why did you think you were?”

“It’s a long story.”

“I’ve got all night.” Pumping her for information about Dr. Whitmore could wait. He looked around for their waitress, didn’t find her and nodded at her barely touched whiskey. “I’m having another beer. Want me to get you something else?”

“A diet soda, please,” she said primly.

“Coming right up.” Pretending he didn’t feel as though he’d just lost a jackpot, he maneuvered through a maze of tables to the bar and placed his order.

The bartender was an attractive woman with curly black hair, huge, dark eyes and a warm smile. She could have been anywhere from twenty-five to thirty-five. With quick efficiency, she poured the soda, refilled his beer and set the drinks in front of him. “So how do you know the doc?”

“What doc?” Ryan asked.

She gestured to Sierra with her index finger, the funky bracelets she wore jangling together. “Dr. Whitmore. She looks fantastic tonight, not that she doesn’t usually. I just never saw her dress like that before.”

Shock momentarily squeezed Ben’s windpipe. He hid his astonishment the best he could, swallowed, then muttered the blandest response he could think of. “Mutual friends.”

He picked up his beer mug, his brain whirring. It seemed a fantastic coincidence until he noted he’d run across Sierra in the same block as Whitmore Family Practice. The office had been closed, but she must have been returning to the office, perhaps to finish up some work.

He examined her with new eyes en route to the table, putting her age at around thirty, probably just a little younger than he was. She could be Dr. Ryan Whitmore’s youthful wife, except she’d claimed not to be married. Was she his daughter?

Excitement flared. No matter how it had happened, he’d stumbled across a delicious opportunity to fill in the many blanks he had about Dr. Ryan Whitmore.

He closed in on Sierra, then noticed her face go white. He followed the direction of her gaze to the bar entrance. A slender man about his age of average height with blond hair receding at the temples nodded in Sierra’s direction. She inclined her head slightly, then gazed down at the table.

Her eyes didn’t raise until Ben took a seat across from her. They looked big and sad. He cursed inwardly, and the flame of exhilaration he felt when he discovered her last name extinguished.

He was not about to interrogate a woman as fragile as this one about Dr. Ryan Whitmore until he got some other questions answered.

“That long story you were going to tell me, does it have anything to do with that guy?” Ben indicated the new arrival with a slight jerk of his head.

She started. “How did you know that?”

“Lucky guess,” Ben said, although his deduction had more to do with powers of observation. “Here’s another. He’s the ex-boyfriend.”

Her chin trembled, and she nodded. “He called it off last month.”

“That’s rough,” he said. “Were you together long?”

“We’ve known each other since high school, but didn’t start dating until I was out of college.”

“Sounds serious.”

She snuck a look at her ex, then spoke in a voice so soft it was hard to hear. “Everybody thought we’d get married. My father treated him like a son.”

“So you were in love with him?”

She didn’t answer for so long he thought she regretted what she’d already revealed. Then, finally, she spoke. “I thought so. Now I’m not so sure. He’s solid and dependable, but set in his ways.”

“Ah,” Ben said as understanding dawned. “Is one of his routines coming to the Blue Haven on Friday nights?”

Guilt flitted across her face. “He’s here on Tuesdays and on Fridays, never for longer than an hour. He always orders mineral water with a twist of lime.”

“Sounds boring.”

“Funny you should use that word. He broke up with me because he said I was boring.” She crossed her arms over her midsection. “He may be right, too. I just proved it all over again with you.”

“Because you’re passing up that chance to have your way with me?” He made his eyebrows dance, coaxing the hint of a grin from her pretty bowed lips.

“Yes.” She cast another surreptitious glance at her ex-boyfriend, and the partial grin vanished. “No offense, but I’m calling it a night. Please don’t feel like you have to leave, too.”

“I can at least walk you out.” No way would he let her face her ex alone and vulnerable if he could help it. He pushed back from the table, then waited for her to precede him.

She put on her jacket and kept her eyes forward as they moved together toward the exit. The other man sat in a booth beside a window that afforded a view of the street. He stared at them intently, his gaze following them even after they were outside in the cool night air.

Ben stopped on the sidewalk and faced Sierra, careful to stay in her ex-boyfriend’s sight line. “I take it you met me tonight so your ex could see us together?”

She grimaced, her slightly crooked nose crinkling. “Partly. And partly to prove to myself I could be unpredictable.” She gazed heavenward, then down again. “Except neither of those worked out so well.”

“They could,” he said. “Your ex is awfully interested in what we’re doing out here.”

“We’re not doing anything,” she said.

“We will be.” He advanced a step and gathered her into his arms. Before she could stiffen, he whispered, “Relax or it won’t look realistic.”

She blinked up at him. “What won’t look realistic?”

“The show we’re going to give him.”

He half expected her to yank out of his arms, but she surprised him, relaxing her body so she appeared less tense than at any other time tonight. He could smell the light floral scent he now knew was her shampoo mixed with the warmth of her skin as her soft curves molded against him. A glint of mischievousness appeared in her eyes. “Do you think we can pull it off?”

“Oh, yeah.” He winked at her, then dipped his head.

Her lips molded to his in the sweetest of kisses, her arms twining around his neck to pull him close. He angled his body and gathered her intimately against him so her jerk of an ex-boyfriend could get an eyeful.

Their embrace confirmed what he already knew: Her ex was an idiot. Nothing was remotely boring about a woman who could kiss like this.

She might have been pretending, but it was a good act. She was tall for a woman, especially in her spiked heels, but felt delicate in his arms. He threaded his fingers through her luxurious long hair, which felt like silk against his skin. Her lips clung to his, her tongue darting out to stroke the tip of his. He accepted her invitation, letting his tongue slide inside her mouth.

He’d kissed a lot of women in his thirty-one years but never did he remember a first kiss like this. Their mouths melded, their bodies fit, their hearts seemed to beat in tandem. His arousal was instantaneous.

A rumble echoed in his ears, which he attributed to the blood roaring through his veins. A shrill staccato noise blared. A car horn. Belatedly, he remembered where he was and what he was doing. Correction. What he was attempting to convince Sierra he was doing.

Putting on a show. With a relative of the man who might have been involved in his mother’s death, no less.

He pulled back, his mouth reluctantly parting from hers. Her green eyes appeared huge as they stared back at his. He cleared his throat. “Well, I’ll say we fooled him.”

She nodded, appearing dazed. “Yeah.”

He disengaged from her, struggling to get his body under control, although she couldn’t miss the effect she’d had on him. He tried to make his voice sound natural. “Let me walk you to your car.”

“That’s not necessary.” Her voice sounded low and shaky. “I only live a few blocks away.”

“Then I’ll walk you home.”

She seemed about to protest further, then closed her mouth and nodded. They walked the next few blocks in silence, not touching, a half body length separating them. The street got quieter as businesses gradually gave way to a quaint row of town houses with stone facades.

“It’s this one.” She stopped in front of one of the more classy residences. A wrought-iron railing led to a redbrick door. A pot of colorful flowers adorned the ledge protruding from the front window. The entire home emanated grace and beauty, like its owner. She tucked a strand of her long hair behind her ear, which struck him as sensual. Then again, at this point just about every move she made was sexy. “Thank you for what you did back there at the bar.”

He nearly laughed aloud. “Believe me, it was my pleasure.”

Her cheeks colored, charming him all over again. He lightly rubbed the back of his knuckles against the stain, then pulled his hand back. He knew better than to reach for her again.

“You know what I wish?” he asked softly.

She stared up at him with her big eyes, her head shaking back and forth so that silken hair of hers swayed.

“I wish you were the kind of woman who indulged in one-night stands,” he said.

She anchored her hands on his shoulders, stood on tiptoe and kissed him, so briefly it was just an electric brushing of lips.

“Me, too.” She spoke so close to his mouth he felt her warm breath and smelled the faintest trace of whiskey. “Goodbye, Ben Nash.”

She disappeared inside, leaving him staring at the closed door. Only then did he realize that neither of them had thought to check her ex-boyfriend’s reaction to their kiss.

Resigned to an early night, he headed in the direction of his downtown hotel. If he meant to preserve the fiction he and Sierra had just created, returning to the Blue Haven wasn’t an option.

The real world would intrude soon enough, because the two wishes he’d kept to himself had no better chance of coming true than the first.

That Sierra’s last name wasn’t Whitmore.

And that tomorrow morning he wouldn’t have to break the news to her that he was an investigative reporter.

CHAPTER THREE

THE SPINACH AND CHEESE omelet at Jimmy’s Diner was every bit as delicious as Sierra had always heard. So was the coffee: thick, rich and not bitter in the slightest.

“Can I get anything else for you, Doc?” Ellie Marson, the waitress who was as much a mainstay at Jimmy’s as the red vinyl booths, bustled over to Sierra on Saturday morning. If Sierra hadn’t noticed her birth date when Ellie was in the office a few months ago complaining of foot pain, she’d never have guessed the other woman was sixty-two.

“Just the check, please,” Sierra said.

“Coming right up.” Ellie quickly shuffled through the orders on her pad and ripped off a sheet. “I never did thank you for referring me to that podiatrist.”

“Did he take care of the problem?” Sierra asked.

The waitress pointed to the pair of white thick-soled shoes on her feet. “These did the trick. Would have told you sooner if you’d come in here for breakfast before today.”

“I usually eat at home,” Sierra said.

Who was she kidding? She always started the day with a glass of orange juice and a low-fat, high-fiber cereal consumed at her own kitchen table. She’d complained about Chad Armstrong slavishly following his routines, yet the only thing she varied was whether she filled her bowl with Frosted Mini-Wheats or Special K.

Until today, when she’d awakened remembering the way Ben Nash had looked at her last night.

If she could attract the attention of a dynamic man like Ben simply by being a little more daring, it was time to act a lot less predictably.