The Sheriff's 6-year-old Secret

Several of his colleagues who had worked as cops in the city hadn’t been so lucky. All Nathan had to do was close his eyes to visualize the grief-stricken, tearstained faces of the wives and children of his fallen comrades. Those funerals he’d attended had been the reason he’d remained single all these years. Those sad occasions had also been the reason he’d brought Charity here to Smoke Valley Reservation. To a slower, safer way of life.

Now, however, one particularly new penny in the jar caught the sunlight, gleaming like coppery fire. Immediately Gwen Fleming’s glorious head of red hair came rushing into his mind with the force of a flash of lightning.

Wispy heat curled down low in his belly as a thundering bolt of pure desire rumbled through him. Nathan’s jaw tightened. It had been three days since he’d met his daughter’s teacher, and since then the woman had invaded his thoughts more times than he cared to admit. She was a looker, she was, with her head of wild ginger curls and a smile that could make a man give up his life’s fortune if she asked for it.

The woman was a tactile person, someone who was comfortable touching those within range. She’d reached out to him several times during their meeting, and each and every time Nathan had felt the air heat up, felt his heart thud like the hooves of a racehorse, his blood rushing through his veins.

He’d been surprised when she’d said she and her brother were alone. He’d wanted to ask her more about her situation. But Charity’s arrival had interrupted them.

Raising a teen was an awesome task. Nathan was impressed by Gwen’s dedication and her willingness to take responsibility for her brother. He couldn’t help but wonder how she’d come to find herself in such a situation. He’d have loved the chance to talk to Gwen about it further.

“Why don’t you just admit it?” he whispered to himself.

You’d have done just about anything to make that meeting last just a little longer. You lusted after that fiery-haired woman right there in that first-grade classroom, amid all the bright primary-colored shapes and alphabet letters hanging on the walls, and you’ve been lusting after her ever since.

He sighed, resting his elbow on his desk and his jaw in the V between his thumb and fingers, blind to the forms on his desk needing completion.

It really hadn’t mattered that he and Gwen had been in the most inopportune place, he realized. A classroom where children learned and played sure wasn’t the perfect location for him to experience such gut-wrenching desire. Nonetheless, that was exactly where he had experienced it.

Getting involved in his daughter’s teacher’s private life should have been the last thing on his mind. He had papers to file, forms to complete, a police station to run. A little girl to raise.

Still, the sunlight continued to gleam through the window, making that jar of copper pennies wink and smile…reminding him of one beautiful and extraordinary woman.

Gwen paced the close confines of her small living room, anxiety nibbling at her nerves like ravenous mice after a slice of fresh Swiss. Where was Brian?

She’d arrived home from school to an empty house. No note. No phone message. Nothing.

He was often absent when she got in from work. But he always left her a note. Well, almost always. And he never failed to return before dinner.

But tonight the meat loaf she’d cooked sat on the counter, stone cold. The mashed potatoes had congealed into a hard lump. And there was simply no hope for the limp green beans stuck to the bottom of the pan.

The sky had darkened long ago, and Gwen didn’t have any idea where her brother might be, or what trouble he might be getting himself into. Ever since that shoplifting incident, she’d been worried sick. She didn’t know the names of any of the boys he’d met since their move to Smoke Valley. Brian had been steadily uncommunicative about his friends. She didn’t have a clue whom to call or what to do. For all she knew, he could have been struck by a car while he was riding his bike and was lying unconscious in the emergency ward of the local hospital, in the neighboring town of Mountview. During that moment of panic, Gwen had called the dispatcher at the Smoke Valley police station. The woman had been so nice in her efforts to calm Gwen and had assured her that no accidents had been reported.

Still, the lesson plans Gwen had intended to organize for her students sat on the table, untouched. Worry had her too upset to think straight, too distressed to eat.

So she paced. Wrung her hands. And waited.

The knock on the front door nearly made her jump right out of her skin. She rushed to the door, sure that her brother must have lost his key.

The sight of Nathan Thunder standing on her doorstep stole every thought from her head.

“Evening, Gwen,” he greeted her. “My dispatcher got word to me that you called. I thought I’d stop by and check on you. Is everything okay?”

The concern on his handsome face nearly made her knees buckle. All Gwen wanted to do was lean on him, unload all her troubles onto his shoulders. He was barely in the door when she let her concerns roll off her tongue.

“I don’t know where Brian is. He’s never been this late before. He could be out there getting into trouble. He could be hurt. He could be—”

“Okay, now—”

His voice was soft, gentle, and so were his hands as he slid his fingers over her upper arms. He pulled her against his chest.

“—don’t let your imagination get the best of you, Gwen.”

Something happened when he embraced her. The molecules in the air heated and swirled, danced and constricted. Gwen felt as if she’d suddenly been enveloped by a warm, downy blanket.

The smoky spice of his cologne filled her lungs like a drug. For some reason, the idea of laying her head on his shoulder didn’t seem the least bit strange. He held her for what seemed a delicious eternity. She felt safe. She felt as if nothing bad could ever happen to her. Soon her heartbeat steadied and her tense muscles relaxed.

Leaning away from her, yet obviously unwilling to release her completely, he asked, “You feeling better?”

Although she felt impelled to answer him with a small nod, leaving the safe haven of his arms was the last thing she wanted to do. This hazy stupor held her a willing captive.

Then she began to tremble with some unnamable thing, something that had nothing whatsoever to do with fear and distress over her brother. A silent yet humming electricity seemed to crackle about them, snapping and sparkling like bare high-voltage wires.

How had this energy manifested itself so instantaneously? Or had it been there all along and she was only now comprehending it? And where, she wondered, was the vibrant current going to lead?

She studied his gaze as he studied hers. Of one thing she was certain—wherever it led, her drowsy mind reasoned, she was eager to follow.

Brian pushed his way through the front door.

“Hey.”

As he spoke the greeting, he lifted his chin at her and Nathan as if coming in this late was commonplace, as if he came home every day to find his sister in a man’s arms.

Immediately Nathan released Gwen, and without his nearness to warm her, she was hit with the sensation of being chilled to the bone. But the appearance of her brother caused her to be bombarded with numerous emotions all at once: relief that he was safe and sound, anger that he’d caused her such worry, irritation that he seemed untroubled by this whole situation. Heck, he acted as if there wasn’t a situation at all!

“Hey, man—” Brian grinned at Nathan “—I don’t know what brought the police here, but whatever it was, I didn’t do it.”

“You’re not in any trouble,” Nathan assured her brother. “I’m just here to check on your sister.” Solemnity knitted his brow. “She was worried about you.”

“Oh.” Brian looked from Nathan to Gwen, unspoken curiosity lighting his eyes. “As you can see,” he said to his sister, “I’m okay.” Then without another word he turned with the clear intention of making for his room.

“Hold it! Where have you been?” Gwen demanded.

Brian shrugged. “Out.”

“Out where?” She raised her hands, palms heavenward, her level of frustration impossible to contain. “Brian, you’ve got school tomorrow. You should have been here doing your homework long ago. Dinner is ruined. You left no message telling me where you were going or who you’d be with. What is going on with you? You’ve never done anything like this before.”

There was pointed accusation in her tone. She heard it. But there wasn’t a thing she could do about it. Anxiety had taken control.

His red hair, with its wiry texture, was sticking out in several directions. He was sweaty and grimy. But Gwen was too upset to remark on his physical appearance.

His face turned crimson. Being reprimanded in front of Nathan, whom he barely knew, embarrassed him, that much was evident.

“I’m going to bed,” he declared. “Like you said, I have school tomorrow.”

He moved to duck around her, but she planted herself in front of him.

“Oh, no, you don’t.” She glared at him. “You’re not walking away from this. You’re going to tell me who you’ve been with, where you’ve been and what you’ve been doing.”