Lily and the Lawman

“They don’t work with me, they work for me,” she corrected. “And what do you suggest I do, shut off my phone, forget about everything and after two weeks, come back to no restaurant? No thank you. I want Arthur to bother me with work questions if it means I have a thriving restaurant when I get back.”

Max was trying to get a fix on what she was actually saying. “Then this Arthur you have running things for you while you’re gone is incompetent?”

Lily became indignant. Arthur might have his failings, but no one was going to say that about him but her.

“No, of course he’s not incompetent.”

A smile spread along his lips slowly, like the early morning sun creeping out over the horizon. “Oh.”

She didn’t like the sound of that at all. “What do you mean, ‘oh’?”

Again Max shrugged, pausing to look out the window before he answered. They were getting close to home. Longest run from the airport to Hades he could remember, he thought.

“Just that maybe you’re afraid that this Arthur guy can get along without you.” He watched her eyes. They began to darken as he spoke. “Maybe you don’t want to find out that you’re not as indispensable as you’d like to think you are.”

She’d had just about enough of this man. She hadn’t come all this way to be ignored by her siblings and packed off with some know-it-all guy with a badge.

“Is this what you do as sheriff? Hand out homey advice?”

He saw her eyes grow darker still, like a storm coming in from the ocean. “I like to think of it as pointing people in the right direction.”

“Well, your sense of direction is off, Lawman. Because my instincts are fine and I’ll handle my restaurant the way I see fit, thank you very much.” She could feel her anger building. “Where do you get off, telling me how to run my business?”

The louder her voice grew, the quieter his became. The way he saw it, for every storm, there had to be a calm. That was his role in the scheme of things. He rarely, if ever, lost his temper.

“Wasn’t telling you how to run the restaurant, I was telling you how to relax. Something—” he cast about for a polite wording of the problem “—I don’t think you quite know how to do.”

When was this damn plane going to land? She wanted to get out of these close quarters, where she was confined with this man, before she forgot that she was a lady. A very tired, exasperated lady. “Not all of us are lucky enough to have found a way to make a living doing nothing.”

“We’re here,” Sydney announced a little too brightly, hoping to prevent a major flare-up.

“Great,” Lily growled.

The sooner she was away from the know-it-all sheriff, the better. What were Alison and Jimmy thinking, sending him to accompany her? She would have sooner ridden in a cage with a boxful of tarantulas. They might have been hairier, but they would have certainly been better company. And a hell of a lot less judgmental.

The landing that came several minutes later was almost flawless, but Lily could still feel her stomach churn as the wheels touched down. The second they came to a stop, she began unbuckling her seat belt. It wouldn’t give.

It figured, she thought grudgingly as she heard Sydney disembark. Frustrated, she tugged on the belt, trying to disengage the two halves.

“Stuck?”

Lily looked up to see that the know-it-all with the liquid-green eyes had not only gotten off the plane, but had rounded the rear and come to her side. To add insult to injury, he was looking down at the belt that refused to come undone.

“I can manage,” she snapped.

For a second, Max debated standing back and letting her continue to struggle. But then his training got the best of him. Being a sheriff meant taking the good with the bad. This part was obviously the bad.

“Why don’t you stop being superwoman and let someone help you once in a while?” Not waiting for an answer, Max moved her hands aside and took over.

She was about to swat his hands away, but her desire to get free overrode her desire to put him in his place. “Ever hear about giving someone an inch and they take a mile?”

He raised his eyes to hers and, for a moment, managed to stop the very air around them. “I don’t want a mile, Lily. I don’t even want the inch.” The belt snapped apart. “There, you’re free.”

Why the air had managed to lodge itself in her lungs when he’d raised his eyes to hers just then, she had no idea.

Maybe she was a little unstable from the flight, she thought, her head slightly foggy.

“Yes,” Lily heard herself saying, “I am.”

As she reached for the side of the cabin, to brace herself before she took that first long step down, she felt his wide hands on her waist, his tanned, strong fingers registering one by one. The next moment, he was swinging her out of the plane and her feet were touching the ground.

It was hard working her tongue around the cotton in her mouth. “Thanks.”

He touched his fingers to the brim of his hat by way of acknowledgment. “Don’t mention it.” Glancing at Sydney, he said, “She’s all yours,” with what sounded like unadulterated humor and relief.

And with that, he turned and walked away.

Lily wished that she’d come in winter instead. That way, there would have been snow on the ground and she could have made a snowball. Throwing one at his head would have made her feel a whole lot better.

Chapter Three

Lily turned back to look at Sydney. “Is he always this charming?”

Sydney smiled, taking out the single suitcase that Lily had brought with her. Funny, she would have pegged the woman for someone who packed a minimum of two suitcases just to go away for the weekend. Just showed you could never tell.

She glanced at Max’s retreating back. “Pretty much.”

Lily took the suitcase from her. “I was being facetious.”

“I know.” Sydney’s grin grew wider. “I wasn’t.”

She led the way to her sports utility vehicle, which stood waiting for them at the end of the small runway. The airstrip was little more than a large clearing, but then, there really wasn’t much need for anything more. Not until there were more airplanes in Hades than just theirs and the one that belonged to Jeb Kellogg, the former grocer’s son.

Sydney opened the door on the driver’s side and reached in for the trunk release. “Well, let’s get you delivered.”

Lily dropped her suitcase in, then came around to the passenger side. “You didn’t lock your car?”

Sydney shook her head. “The only thing we lock our doors against in Hades is the wind, not each other.” Getting in, she put her key into the ignition.

Lily watched the only other vehicle in the area pull away. The word Sheriff was painted on the side of the Jeep in big, bold black letters.

Black suited her mood, as well, and she wasn’t altogether clear as to why. Residue from Allen, she surmised. That, and having to deal with an irritating specimen of manhood just now. “Why did he bother coming at all, I mean, if he was just going to leave like that?”

Sydney noted the way Lily was watching Max drive away. She doubted the woman even realized how interested she looked. Well, Alison’s sister wouldn’t be the first woman, young or old, to get hooked on the town’s sexy sheriff.

Glancing in her rearview mirror for any stray animals darting into the road, Sydney put the vehicle in gear and pulled out. “Because April asked him to.”

So he had indicated. She didn’t like thinking of herself as an assignment, liked his thinking of her as such even less. “Does he always do everything April asks him to?”