Busted (Promise Harbor Wedding) - By Sydney Somers Page 0,72

hard to earn.

If a tourist could walk through the door and make assumptions about how well she did her job based on her relationship with Jackson, so could everyone else in town.

“And if it’s all the same to you,” Hayley returned, her voice cool, “you can talk to me or you can have a seat and wait a couple hours for my partner to come back.”

The redhead wasn’t happy, but she followed Hayley to a room where they could talk. Hayley listened attentively, quickly ruling out any connection between the woman’s stolen purse and the other robberies.

And the whole time she couldn’t let go of one thought—when Jackson left town, would she still be the Hayley people knew they could depend on or would she just be known as Jackson’s latest conquest?

Jackson walked down the hall in the palliative care unit, past the room with the leather couches, only to backtrack at the sound of cursing, loud and familiar. He found Coach propped on the edge of a center cushion, his gaze trained on a flat-screen television playing a recording of the NHL draft. Matt had mentioned setting it up for his grandfather.

“Can you believe this kid went in the third round? Gonna be a pain in their ass, I guarantee.” The old man didn’t look at him right away.

Jackson laughed. “Isn’t that what you said when I got picked up?”

He shrugged. “I’m wrong once or twice a decade.”

He joined Coach on the couch and they sat through thirty minutes of the draft, chatting about players and stats and what drugs some of the general managers must have been sniffing to make some of the player trades they had.

“I need some fresh air, Jack.”

Jackson grinned at the nickname. Coach was the only one he let get away with calling him that. Jack was his father, and once he’d hit twelve he’d craved an identity outside of Jack Jr.

Fresh air turned out to be pushing a wheelchair so Coach could bum a cigarette outside. Coach waved him off, guessing Jackson was going to be stupid enough to comment on him smoking. “They’re already killing me so what’s the point of giving them up now?”

Somehow Jackson knew Coach wasn’t sharing that particular outlook with Hayley. He couldn’t imagine her taking that well. He smiled at the memory of her gasping through one of Coach’s cigarettes. The old man would likely freak out over that as much as Hayley would if she spotted her grandfather sneaking around outside.

“How are the renovations going?”

“They’re coming along.” He hadn’t been at the house long enough to get anything done yet today. Talking to Hayley after she slipped out of the bed without waking him had come first. By the time he dragged on some clothes and got his car towed to a garage to replace a faulty spark plug, he’d been downright annoyed that she’d skipped out on him.

Coach stabbed out the cigarette after only a couple drags. “I didn’t realize you knew so much about carpentry.”

He nodded. “I picked up a few things from helping my dad with stuff around the house growing up, and I helped a friend build his house.” And then another friend’s house. He’d helped build half a dozen of them over the course of five off-seasons. “Hayley didn’t realize that either.”

Coach nodded. “That granddaughter of mine is something else, isn’t she?”

“Yes, sir.” Something else didn’t quite cover it though. Neither did determined, fiery, loyal and sexy as fucking hell.

“I know my diagnosis has been hard on her. Good to know she’ll have you to help her through the rough times.”

Rough times.

Jackson’s stomach knotted painfully. He hadn’t allowed himself to think about Coach’s cancer on the way over, foolishly thinking they might be able to talk like it wasn’t the pink elephant in the room.

He couldn’t make up his mind whether it helped or not that Coach thought he and Hayley were in it for the long haul. Hayley had left that little detail out. Or was that just Coach making his own assumption? Jackson had certainly never given Hayley the impression that he was staying, so he couldn’t imagine her thinking otherwise.

Thinking about leaving now, though, didn’t seem like the good idea it had last night when he’d been stranded in the rain. His agent had texted this morning to tell him that the Sentinels would be flying Jackson up for an interview any day now. He knew he would have been more excited about it if he hadn’t been