Red Clover Inn

Five

The Cotswolds, England

At first Greg thought his bedside clock had stopped but his phone showed the same time. “Damn,” he said, setting his phone back on the bedside table. “Noon?”

He couldn’t remember ever sleeping until noon without a good reason, such as recovering from surgery for a gunshot wound, landing in a wildly different time zone or working all night. Even when, on the rare occasion, he’d had a bit too much to drink, he’d never slept until noon. He was a morning guy. Up with the crows.

“It’s this promotion,” he said, throwing off his duvet and sitting on the edge of the bed. It wasn’t in the top ten of comfortable beds he’d slept in, but it wasn’t in the bottom ten, either. Since he’d conked out until noon, it’d obviously done the job.

He rolled to his feet without a hint of stiffness or the deep fatigue he’d experienced when he’d first arrived in England. He peeked out the window. Gray. Wet. Not much wind. A good day to sleep in, except he had a plane to catch. He’d booked his flight last night and would be in Boston...well, he wasn’t sure. Sometime today.

He took a shower, got dressed and went downstairs. Breakfast was done. He didn’t see anyone else from yesterday’s wedding festivities. He ordered coffee and talked the waiter into bringing him toast and bacon and delivering it to him out back on the terrace. The waiter sent him off with a towel after Greg had assured him he didn’t mind the wet conditions. The rain had stopped. Fresh air was good before getting locked up in a plane for seven hours.

Since he was the only one on the terrace, he had his pick of tables and chose one by an urn of flowers. He dried off a chair and the tabletop and sat. He recognized pots of herbs, if only because they looked like herbs he’d seen in the grocery store. He’d always thought he’d have a garden one day. No idea why he’d thought that, since his family hadn’t exactly been gardeners. He’d never been around long enough to grow vegetables at home with Laura and the kids. He’d mow the yard and trim trees, and then he’d be off again.

His coffee arrived, hot and steamy, perfect in the damp, chilly conditions. The air felt great to him. He didn’t care he was the only one out here. Liked it, in fact. The waiter returned with toast and bacon, and Greg took his time, enjoying the good food, the quiet.

As lives went, his wasn’t a bad one.

He decided dessert was in order since he was having lunch and breakfast in one meal and ordered scones. Glorified biscuits in his world, but he didn’t want anything that would haunt him on the plane. Unless he’d dreamed buying a ticket, he was booked on a London-to-Boston flight that afternoon. No time to waste, he thought, slathering raspberry jam on a warm scone. He planned to head straight from Boston to Knights Bridge. Maybe or maybe not he’d run into Charlotte Bennett. He figured not. She could end up arriving after he left—if she arrived at all. People did all sorts of impulsive things at weddings, and agreeing to house-sit at a country inn struck him as impulsive, something a practical, tough-minded woman like Charlotte would roll back once she returned to familiar surroundings. The ex-fiancé showing up and memories of her aborted wedding wouldn’t have helped with her impulse control. She’d been in fight-or-flight mode. Inn-sitting in New England was pure flight.

Greg was content to let more dust settle on his divorce. Focus on his kids. Head to DC and find a place to live. Learn his new job. That was what he needed to do. He’d gone out to dinner a few times since his split with Laura and his recovery from his gunshot wound but nothing had panned out. He hadn’t been ready, he hadn’t had much free time and he’d had a hard assignment in an isolated location to complete.

Excuses, Brody would say, and he’d probably be right.

Greg finished his scones, went back upstairs to his room and packed. When he returned to the bar, he settled his bill. By the time he headed outside, his ride was waiting for him, in the form of Ian Mabry.

“Least I could do, mate,” the Englishman said.

“Thanks.”

“Heathrow?”

“Yep. No rush. I don’t care if I miss my flight.”

“On your way to Washington?”

“Via Boston and Knights Bridge.”

“Ah,” Mabry said. “Watch yourself in Knights Bridge. I went there for a wedding and now I’m planning my own wedding.”

“Your first?”

“And only.”

That’s what Greg had thought at his wedding, but he kept that tidbit to himself.

He got in the car. He watched the English countryside pass by. He’d be seeing Andrew and Megan in a few days. He’d booked their flights, too. That would help on the long trip across the Atlantic. Maybe he’d find a book on diving and marine archaeology so he’d have something to talk about with Charlotte if she ended up at the Red Clover Inn after all.

* * *

“What?” Samantha gaped at her husband of twenty-four hours. He was behind the wheel of their rental car. He hadn’t seemed to have any trouble adjusting to driving on the left. Just as well he was driving because she’d have run off the road at the news he’d just laid on her. “Greg Rawlings is staying at the inn? The DS agent? Brody’s friend?”

Justin handled a tight curve with ease. “Maybe.”

“Maybe or likely?”

“I don’t know. He could be on his way now. Heather didn’t say. I don’t think she knows his plans. She’s got her hands full with Brandon, Maggie and the kids arriving in London.”

Samantha got herself under control. Brandon was Justin’s younger brother, also a carpenter and the third of the Sloan siblings. He and his wife, Maggie, a caterer, had two young sons. They’d left the wedding hotel that morning for a few days in London with Brody and Heather. Samantha and Justin had slipped out last night, spending their first night as a married couple at a tiny inn an hour up the road.

“Tyler and Aidan want to meet the queen,” Justin added.

Samantha smiled, thinking of the two boys, now eight and six, on the loose in London. “Knowing Brody, he could arrange it,” she said.

“They’ll be happy seeing the changing of the guard at Buckingham Palace. Maggie and Brandon figured they might as well see some sights if they were coming all the way to England for our wedding. Makes sense.”

“They love a good adventure.”

Justin slowed to let another car bypass them on a straightaway. They were in no hurry, Samantha thought. They were officially on their honeymoon. They had plenty of time to get to Edinburgh, their first stop in Scotland on their ten-day trip.

“I should have mentioned Charlotte would be house-sitting,” Samantha said, calmer. “I didn’t think of it. It’s a maybe, too. I haven’t heard from her. She could have decided to go straight to Washington and see about Max’s house.”

“Weddings can make people agree to things they later have to wriggle out of. Rawlings was beat. I don’t know when I’ve seen anyone that tired. Eric says it was fun watching him try to provoke Charlotte. She had no trouble holding her own with him.”

Of that, Samantha had no doubt. “It’s fine if Greg stays at the inn. It could be awkward if Charlotte shows up, too, but they’ll work it out. There’s loads of room.”

“Seriously, the guy was bone tired,” Justin said. “He could end up staying at the pub and sleep and drink beer all week.”

“His type gets restless after forty-eight hours. He’ll rally.”

“Then maybe he’ll stay at the pub and hike and drink beer all week.”

Samantha smiled. “Ever the optimist.”

“I wouldn’t say optimist. Realist. You saw what Greg Rawlings was like when he was in Knights Bridge last winter. He’s an adrenaline junkie who thrives on action. Not much action at an old country inn that hasn’t been in use for a few years.”

“There are cards and musty board games in the library.”

Justin grinned at her, his eyes a dark blue in the gray light. “He won’t last if he does show up in Knights Bridge. How long do you think Charlotte would last?”

“Not for days and days, maybe, but she looked ready for a real break.”

Justin nodded thoughtfully. “I agree.”

Samantha tilted her head back, eyeing this man she loved. Justin was solid, a concrete thinker who didn’t beat around the bush. She appreciated his bluntness and had seen him get better control of it in their months together, just as she’d gotten better control of her tendency to think she had to do everything herself and couldn’t trust anyone.

She trusted Justin Sloan with all her heart.

“Charlotte needs some downtime,” Samantha said. “She wouldn’t get into any details with me, because it was my wedding day, but I could tell.”

“Greg is a federal agent. If he and Charlotte end up at the inn together, it’s not as if she’d be holed up with an ax murderer. They’re adults. The inn’s got a dozen guest rooms and plenty of other rooms—way more space than I had growing up with five siblings. They can spread out. It’ll be fine.”

“You saw them dancing together yesterday?”

“I did.”

“It was her first wedding since she abandoned Tommy Ferguson at the altar.”

“She was happy for you, Sam. That’s what mattered to her.”

Justin downshifted, slowing to a near crawl as they approached another pretty English village. They were taking a scenic route north. Samantha didn’t know the details, didn’t have a map. She wanted to relax and enjoy the scenery. But here she was, worrying about her thirty-six-year-old cousin. Normally she’d never worry about Charlotte. No one did. She was ultraindependent, competent, good at so many things and yet not one to draw attention to herself. Not showing up for her wedding had been out of character in that sense. In character in the sense that Charlotte Bennett took decisive action once her mind was made up about something.

“Do you want to warn Charlotte?” Justin asked.

Samantha thought a moment. “No. There are too many variables. I don’t want to get her worked up about something that might not even happen if she’s about to get on a transatlantic flight.”

“This is what life’s like with our two families.” Justin brushed his fingertips on her cheek as they stopped for a traffic light. “Welcome to the Sloans and the Bennetts.”

“I love you, Mr. Sloan.”

“And I love you, Mrs. Sloan. Shall we enjoy our honeymoon?”

“Every minute.”

Six

Knights Bridge, Massachusetts

As Greg switched off the bedside lamp in his corner room at the Red Clover Inn, what felt like a million years after breakfast on the wet terrace of his Cotswolds pub, he could hear scurrying in the walls.

Mice.

He crawled under the top sheet and lightweight blanket on his lumpy double bed. Built in 1900 as an inn, the place nonetheless had the feel of a large, rambling house. It was run-down but not in disrepair, at least from what he’d seen so far. He’d arrived after dark and had turned on a few lights and headed upstairs to find a room. He didn’t have a good fix on the inn’s layout, but he didn’t need one. All he’d needed was to peel off his clothes and fall into bed. Everything else could wait. Red Clover Inn was about what he’d expected.

He’d chosen a corner bedroom on the second floor. Someone had left a set of sheets and a cotton blanket folded at the foot of the bed. He hadn’t minded making the bed himself. It wasn’t as if he could call housekeeping. He hadn’t bothered to get every tuck just right. Nobody cared. It wasn’t a real inn.

He’d opened a window and settled in, lying on his back in the pitch dark, relishing the late-spring breeze.

And then came the scurrying.

Whatever.

If the mice stayed in the walls, they weren’t his problem.

The scurrying stopped, at least for the moment. He’d considered changing his plans and checking into an airport hotel when he’d landed in Boston, but he’d had coffee while he waited for his luggage. Good to go. A flight delay, a guy snoring next to him for six hours, one fateful wrong turn coming out of the tunnel from Logan Airport—it’d been one of those travel days best forgotten.

He’d half hoped Charlotte had beaten him here but no sign of her. He was alone.

It was almost morning in Edinburgh.

Greg couldn’t keep his eyes open. He sank into the mattress—for all he knew, it had been new in 1982—and relaxed, letting his travel fatigue and twitchiness ooze out of his body. He didn’t hear any squeaks or telltale sounds of flapping wings that would indicate bats were about. A bat on the loose he’d have to deal with. Mice... He could go to sleep with mice doing their mice thing in the walls and ceilings.

How would Charlotte do with mice and bats?

No mystery. He knew.

She’d have no problem.

* * *

Hours and hours after she’d left her cozy Edinburgh apartment for her westward journey, Charlotte relished the first sips of her coffee at Smith’s, a small restaurant in a converted house just off Main Street in picturesque, totally adorable Knights Bridge, Massachusetts. She was already in love with the tiny New England town.

In love.

She smiled, relaxing, at ease now that she had arrived. She’d be fine unwinding at Red Clover Inn for a few days. No wonder Samantha had decided to make her home here. Even without hunky Justin, Knights Bridge was home-worthy.

Charlotte cautioned herself against overreaching with her expectations. She didn’t want to set herself up for a crash later when she started noticing Knights Bridge’s warts. So far, though, her inn-sitting adventure was working out even better than she’d expected.

Smith’s first customer on the early Monday morning, she ordered a three-egg omelet with green peppers, onions and ham, home fries, local cob-smoked bacon and multigrain toast.

Just what she needed to get her internal clock onto her new schedule.

As she drank her coffee, she became aware of someone sliding into her booth across from her.

She blinked. No.

But it was true. Greg Rawlings had materialized in the little restaurant as if out of thin air. Maybe actually out of thin air. How else could Charlotte explain him? She hadn’t heard the front door, felt a breeze—anything.

“Don’t say a word,” she said. “You’re not here. You’re not real.”

“I’m not?”

“I conjured you up in a caffeine-deprived, jet-lagged haze. People can hallucinate after a long trip, a wedding, too many hours without coffee. It’s not possible that Diplomatic Security Agent Rawlings is here with me in a Knights Bridge café.”

Unfazed by her dismissal of him as a figment of her imagination, he motioned for the waiter to bring coffee, then turned back to her. “It’s a stretch to call this place a café. I like it, though.”

The waiter, a local teenager, brought Greg coffee, a sign that, in fact, Charlotte hadn’t dreamed him up. Maybe she was in a somnambulant state. Maybe she wasn’t really awake, or her flight yesterday had messed with her head due to her recent decompression illness.

“We need to work on your situational awareness,” Greg said, lifting his mug.

“I see you drink your coffee black. Is that only when you’re conjured up, or do you add cream in real life?”

“Always black. Never any cream. I don’t drink latte, cappuccino, café au lait, flavored coffee. Just coffee.”

“Of course. Not surprised.” She blinked. Then blinked again. “Nope. You didn’t vanish.”

“You’re a riot, Charlotte. Okay if I order breakfast or do you want me to pretend to be invisible?”

“I doubt you’d succeed.”

“You’d be surprised. I can be invisible when it suits me.”

“Order breakfast,” she said. “I’m not imagining you?”

He shook his head. “You are not imagining me.”

“I suppose we do need to work on my situational awareness. I didn’t notice you come through the door.”

“You also didn’t notice you had company at Red Clover Inn.”

She really needed more coffee and a few more hours’ sleep. “Company?”

“Correct. The car in the driveway was your first clue. Second was the house key missing by the hose spigot. Third was finding the back door unlocked.”

She ignored the quickening of her heartbeat. “How do you know all this?”

“Because I’m the one who used the key and left the door unlocked. Apparently we’re both inn-sitting this week.”

Charlotte gaped at him. She had no words.

Greg settled back on his cushioned bench. “I bet that doesn’t happen often—you not knowing what to say. I was up early and heard your car purring outside my window. Whose Mercedes-Benz?”

“It belonged to my great-uncle Harry. Samantha is sorting through his house in Boston. He...” She stopped, breathed. “Why didn’t you let me know you were there?”

“You were only inside for a minute and I didn’t want to scare the hell out of you. I needed to get dressed. I’d just come out of the shower and only had this threadbare towel tied around my waist.”

The image of him in only a towel did Charlotte in. She covered for herself by grabbing her water glass but then took a huge gulp, a dead giveaway.

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