“Especially me.”
The elevator jerked to an abrupt stop. Alex lost her balance and fell against him. Reede caught her arm and supported her long enough for her to regain her balance, which might have taken a little too long, because when they separated, Alex felt light-headed and breathless.
They were on the first floor. He shrugged into his jacket as he guided her toward a rear exit. “My car’s parked out front,” she told him as they left the building. “Should I put more money in the meter?”
“Forget it. If you get a ticket, you’ve got friends in high places.”
His smile wasn’t as orthodontist perfect
as Junior Minton’s, but it was just as effective. It elicited a tickle in the pit of her stomach that was strange and wonderful and scary.
His quick grin emphasized the lines on his face. He looked every day of his forty-three years, but the weathered markings fit well on his strong, masculine bone structure. He had dark blond hair that had never known a stylist’s touch. He pulled on his black felt cowboy hat and situated the brim close to his eyebrows, which were a shade or two darker than his hair.
His eyes were green. Alex had noticed that the moment she had walked into his office. She had reacted as any woman would to so attractive a man. He had no paunch, no middle-aged softness. Physically, he looked two decades younger than he actually was.
Alex had to keep reminding herself that she was a prosecutor for the sovereign state of Texas, and that she should be looking at Reede Lambert through the eyes of a litigator, not a woman. Besides, he was a generation older than she.
“Were you out of clean uniforms this morning?” she asked as they crossed the street.
He wore plain denim Levi’s—old, faded, and tight—like the jeans rodeo cowboys wore. His jacket was brown leather, and fitted at the waist like a bomber jacket. The fur lining, which folded out to form a wide collar, was probably coyote. As soon as they’d stepped into the sunlight, he’d slid on aviator glasses. The lenses were so dark that she could no longer see his eyes.
“I used to dread the sight of a uniform, so when I became sheriff, I made it clear that they’d never get me in one of those things.”
“Why did you always dread the sight of one?”
He smiled wryly. “I was usually trying to outrun it, or at least avoid it.”
“You were a crook?”
“Hell-raiser.”
“You had run-ins with the law?”
“Brushes.”
“So what turned you around, a religious experience? A scare? A night or two in jail? Reform school?”
“Nope. I just figured that if I could outchase the law, I could outchase the lawbreakers.” He shrugged. “It seemed a natural career choice. Hungry?”
Before she had a chance to answer, he pushed open the door of the B & B Café. A cowbell mounted above it announced their entrance. It was the place where things were happening, it seemed. Every table—red Formica with rusted chrome legs—was full. Reede led her to a vacant booth along the wall.
Greetings were called out to him by executives, farmers, roughnecks, cowboys, and secretaries, each distinguished by his attire. Everyone except the secretaries wore boots. Alex recognized Imogene, Pat Chastain’s secretary. As soon as they passed her table, she launched into an animated, whispered explanation of who Alex was to the women seated with her. A hush fell over the room as word traveled from one table to the next.
No doubt this microcosm of Purcell gathered every morning at the B & B Café during coffee-break time. A stranger in their midst was news, but the return of Celina Gaither’s daughter was a news bulletin. Alex felt like a lightning rod, because she certainly attracted electric currents. Some, she sensed, were unfriendly.
A Crystal Gayle ballad about love lost was wafting from the jukebox. It competed with “Hour Magazine” on the fuzzy black-and-white TV mounted in one corner. Male impotence was being discussed to the raucous amusement of a trio of roughnecks. The nonsmoking movement hadn’t reached Purcell, and the air was dense enough to cut. The smell of frying bacon was prevalent.
A waitress in purple polyester pants and a bright gold satin blouse approached them with two cups of coffee and a plate of fresh, yeasty doughnuts. She winked and said, “Mornin’, Reede,” before ambling off toward the kitchen, where the cook was deftly flipping eggs while a cigarette dangled between his lips.
“Help yourself.”
Alex took the sheriff up on his offer. The doughnuts were still warm, and the sugary glaze melted against her tongue. “They had this waiting for you. Is this your table? Do you have a standing order?”
“The owner’s name is Pete,” he told her, indicating the cook. “He used to feed me breakfast every morning on my way to school.”
“How generous.”
“It wasn’t charity,” he said curtly. “I swept up for him in the afternoons after school.”