From the Shadows (Buckhorn, Montana #2) - B.J. Daniels Page 0,14

else. She’d felt an electric shock at his touch and hoped he hadn’t felt her reaction. “Nice guy,” he said of Earl Ray as they took seats across from each other.

Casey nodded distractedly. What was she doing here with this man who unsettled her? Worse, she hated to admit that he was right. The moment she walked into the café, she could tell that word had gotten out about her—and the sale. While it had been ten years since she’d been here, people had recognized her. Probably the hair. Eyebrows had shot up at the sight of her. The sight of her with Finn added even more disapproval to their expressions.

“This may have been a mistake,” she whispered. Of course this was a mistake. Coming back to Buckhorn had been a mistake.

“You have to face the music sometime,” he said. “Don’t worry—they’ve been serving me for months. They’ll still feed us.”

“And spit in our food,” she said.

“Where is your faith in the goodness of humanity?” he joked as a waitress she didn’t recognize came over with two glasses of water and two menus.

Casey could feel the locals staring at the two of them. She hid behind her menu until she heard Finn chuckle.

He couldn’t have missed the sour looks they were getting and seemed to be enjoying it. “They can’t eat you,” he whispered, still chuckling.

She peered at him over the top of the menu. “You should know.” The items to order hadn’t changed in all the years her grandmother had brought her to this café—the only one in town. Only the prices had changed. She closed her menu and put it down, concentrating on the man sitting across from her as a distraction.

“You were going to tell me the real reason you’re here, why someone invited you to this...reunion and how you knew Megan,” she said quietly. “You haven’t been here looking for a ghost.”

Finn didn’t bother to pick up his menu, just pushed it aside, as he leaned forward and locked gazes with her. She stared into those sparkling eyes and realized he was about to tell her the truth whether she was ready for it or not.

“I grew up mowing lawns.” He nodded affirmation as if she had questioned that. “My father owned a landscaping business. I knew I didn’t want to do that the rest of my life, so I worked hard in school and college and started my own business.”

“That was all in the news after you disappeared.”

He smiled at her impatience. “I’m getting there.” The waitress returned. “Want a milkshake?” Finn asked Casey impulsively. “Chocolate?”

She shook her head and turned to the waitress. “Ice tea, please, and I’ll take the baked-chicken salad with vinegar and oil.”

Her companion looked crestfallen before he ordered a chocolate milkshake and the chicken-fried steak with fries. He grinned over at her. “If you’re nice, I’ll give you a bite.”

Casey shook her head but couldn’t help smiling. “You really are incorrigible,” she said as the waitress left, taking the unused menus with her.

“But you’re glad you came to dinner with me, aren’t you?”

She couldn’t help but smile and admit she was. With the waitress gone to put in their orders, he continued as if he hadn’t been interrupted. “Then I worked more years, nose to the grindstone, to make the business successful. One day I was offered more money than I could count for that business. I took it, not realizing how it would feel when suddenly I didn’t have that challenge anymore. I’d worked hard since I was fourteen. Suddenly I didn’t have a job. I had so much money that I didn’t have any reason to get up in the morning unless I felt like it. I didn’t have...a goal. I was questioning everything about my life. My father had died a few months before that, my mother right after him. I was alone with too much money and too much time on my hands.”

“I’m sorry about your parents,” she said, offering condolences and wondering where he was headed with this discussion and if he would ever get there.

“My father and I were especially close since we used to work together. He and I used to take care of the Broadhurst estate.” She felt her eyes widen before he added, “Megan lived there before she took a summer job at your grandmother’s hotel. Before she was murdered.” He shrugged. His gaze felt electric as it settled on her. “She and I had gotten close for a while back