is...?” Justin prodded.
“Okay, okay, I get it. You don’t have to whack me over the head with it.”
“Then I’ll be on my way,” Justin said. He’d walked only a couple of steps before turning back. “By the way, cousin. If I catch you going so much as one mile over the speed limit, there won’t be enough money in the family coffers to bail you out of my jail.”
Harlan Patrick laughed, which put a scowl on his cousin’s face.
“I’m dead serious.”
“I know you are. That’s why it’s so funny. You can lock me up and throw away the key, but I flat out guarantee you that granddaddy will have your badge for it. Weigh that while you’re chasing me down.”
He let that warning hang in the air as he put the car into gear and took off, kicking up a trail of dust just to taunt Justin. The man really did need to loosen up. He’d hoped marriage to Patsy would do the trick, but it hadn’t. Therefore Harlan Patrick considered it his personal—if not his civic—duty to see to it.
* * *
Laurie expected Harlan Patrick to show up at her mother’s again before dawn. When he still wasn’t there by nine, she began to wonder what he was up to. As the morning dragged on with no sign of him, her gaze kept straying toward the window.
“Expecting someone?” Val inquired as she sipped another cup of coffee.
Val had settled into Laurie’s mother’s kitchen as if she’d been visiting there for years. She’d appropriated the portable phone to follow up on publicity arrangements for the final stops on the tour. She had papers spread all over the Formica-topped table. One thing Laurie had to say for her: Val could work efficiently just about anywhere. She didn’t require the trappings of an office.
Val continued to regard her with amusement. “Not answering, huh? Must mean the answer’s yes.”
“Just how furious do you think he was when he left here last night?” Laurie asked.
“Who?”
“Who do you think?” Laurie growled. “Harlan Patrick was the only man who left here in the middle of the night, wasn’t he?”
“As far as I know,” Val said evenly. “I’m just surprised it matters to you. You seemed mighty anxious to see him go. You were looking downright pleased with yourself when he walked out the door.”
“I wasn’t anxious for him to go,” Laurie protested. “I was just trying to make a point.”
Val tried unsuccessfully to smother a grin. “Well, I guess you succeeded, then, didn’t you? He knows now that you are even trickier than he is.”
“Do you suppose I should call him?” Laurie fretted.
“If you want to.”
“I don’t want to,” she snapped.
“You just said—”
“I’m just worried that something might have happened to him. It was awfully late. He was ticked off at me. He was probably driving too fast the way he always does. The roads out here are dark as sin. What if his car’s in a ditch or something? Who besides us would know to go looking for him?”
“Worried about me, darlin’?” the very man in question inquired from behind her.
Laurie almost jumped out of her skin at the sound of his voice. She whirled around and glared. “Don’t you sneak up on me.”
“I thought you’d be relieved to hear my voice. Weren’t you picturing me in a ditch?”
“With pleasure,” she retorted.
His crooked smile mocked her. “Liar, liar,” he taunted.
“Well, you’re just fine, aren’t you, so it hardly matters what I was thinking.”
He gave Val a wink, then bent and brushed a light kiss across Laurie’s lips. “Glad to know you missed me.”
“I never said I missed you,” she said, though an unmistakable shiver had washed through her at the touch of his lips against hers.
“Didn’t have to,” he said, helping himself to a cup of coffee. “That blush tells the story.”
“I do not blush, Harlan Patrick.”
He cast a look toward Val. “What do you say? Did her cheeks turn pink just now or not?”
Val held up a protesting hand. “Leave me out of this. The woman pays my salary.”
“If she fires you, I’ll hire you,” Harlan Patrick promised. “We can always use a whiz like you out at White Pines.”
Laurie tried to stop herself, but she couldn’t help it. She chuckled at the image of the dainty whirlwind before her herding cattle. “Somehow I don’t see Val on a ranch. Getting up close and personal with a cow is not her style.”
“We have an office, darlin’. We have books to keep, logistics to plan.