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“Collin Doherty. Playing hooky, are we?”
I looked up in time to see Collin’s million-dollar smile as we both turned to see who had called him, and my skin crawled.
“Ah, Ren. I guess that makes two of us.” Collin put his hand on the small of my back and brought me closer to his side when Ren stopped next to me. “Ren, you remember my wife, Harlow?”
“Of course.” Ren barely spared me a glance as his meaty hand drifted from my elbow down to my wrist, and didn’t seem to notice the way Collin pulled me back a step as Ren asked, “What has you away from work today? And who is taking care of the county’s money if you are here, and old Alfred McKenzie is probably out getting a hip replaced?”
Collin laughed. “The money is fine. Besides, the wife and I have some personal things we need to take care of this week. I’ll probably be working from home a lot.”
That was news to me, and unwelcome news at that. Personal things don’t usually include ice showers, guns, and bruises, and don’t need to be hidden behind a lot of makeup and scarves, I thought to myself.
“I’m sure you do,” Ren said with a chuckle. “I myself had some personal things to take care of, and now I’m here trying to get things to make dinner for the wife. She somehow seems to be catching on to these personal days.” His eyes raked over my body with his last couple of words, and I forced myself to look at the shelves of refrigerated food, then to Collin. Even though Collin had never liked Ren, and the dislike had grown into something stronger since the night of the fund-raiser, I knew that if I showed a hint of disgust for the man in front of us, I would pay for it later.
Collin’s smile never faltered, but I felt the way his body stiffened and noticed the slight change in his eyes. “I’m sure your wife will enjoy the dinner.”
Ren made an annoyed face. “So, the sheriff threw a fit over the new chief yesterday; it didn’t . . .” He trailed off and his hand shot out to rest on my hip. “Young girl, be a sweetheart and leave the men to talk about things that you don’t need to be around for.”
I tensed when Collin’s fingers dug into my back but tried to relax my body. I knew it wasn’t because of something I’d done, and I knew Collin was thinking of a hundred different things he could do to make Ren pay.
I didn’t move, mostly because I couldn’t with Collin’s hold on me, and we both stayed silent as Ren opened his mouth to talk to Collin, only to shut it when he realized I wasn’t leaving.
“Young girl,” he began again, “that wasn’t a suggestion.”
A low rumble sounded in Collin’s chest as he turned me toward him. Dread filled me when I noticed the dead look in his eyes, but he just pulled me close and kissed my cheek. “Keep shopping; I’ll come find you when we’re finished here.”
“You need to teach that wife of yours how to listen,” I heard Ren say as I escaped down the aisle, and a tiny smile pulled at my lips with Collin’s response.
“She does listen . . . to me.”
I grabbed the last two things on the list, then headed back to the produce section since Collin had been too frustrated to stay in it for more than a couple of minutes earlier, and I knew there would be hell to pay if I didn’t get the rest of the vegetables. Using the face of my phone as a mirror, I glanced around to make sure no one was looking at me before holding it up for only a second to make sure the infinity scarf was still hiding what needed to stay hidden. Even though Collin had spent five minutes before we’d left making sure it wouldn’t move, the light material had me second-guessing it every time I started walking. And now that Collin wasn’t next to me to keep an eye on it, I was shaking just thinking that someone might see something they weren’t supposed to.
My head instinctively snapped up when I heard a screech, only to find a small girl running across the produce section to launch herself at a man.
“Oh my God,” I whispered.
Knox was standing with a few men in dark blue Richland Fire Department shirts and was holding up the smiling, dimpled girl.
A girl with dark brown hair nearly identical to Knox’s. A girl who was talking a mile a minute and looking at Knox like he was her favorite person in the world. A girl whose mom had just joined them.
I took a few quick steps backward, not wanting to look at the mother, not wanting to see the woman Knox had a daughter with, and hit something.
“Excuse you!” a woman hissed.
“I’m so sorry!”
“You do realize you are in a crowded store; you can’t just go flying around without looking where you’re going.”
“I know,” I whispered, even though I hadn’t been able to hear Knox and the girl, so I knew they couldn’t hear me. “I’m sorry, I wasn’t thinking.”
She rolled her eyes and threw the can of food she’d been holding into her cart. Her already loud voice grew louder and raised an octave. “Well, don’t you think that was a little obvious when you tried to run me over?”
“Yeah, prob—” The word cut off when I felt a presence behind me, and the woman’s eyes snapped up and rounded.
“Low,” Knox’s deep voice rumbled. “Everything okay here?”
Knox
Present Day—Richland
