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“I knew you were a nice man,” she said demurely.
He cocked his head and studied her. She wore on his heart day by day. He’d never felt such an attraction to anyone. He felt safe when he was with her, as if he belonged. It had been a very long time since he’d wanted to belong anywhere. This lovely little violet worried about him, loved to cuddle with him, but she was fiery and she had a temper as well. He laughed inwardly remembering their introduction when she’d demanded that he move his car out of her driveway.
“Why are you grinning like that?” she wanted to know.
And she never missed the changing expressions on his face, he mused to himself. “I was remembering the night I met you,” he explained.
She laughed. “I guess I was pretty over-the-top.”
“I noticed.”
“It’s just that people at this motel have been using my private driveway for years.”
“Pity the motel doesn’t have enough parking spots for its visitors,” he pointed out.
“I’ve told them that often enough. The manager says he’s sorry, but nothing ever gets done. In fact, you were the first person who ever apologized about parking there. The others, mostly men, got belligerent because I insist that they move their cars so I can get out.”
“I imagine that’s frustrating,” he agreed, surprised that he was angry about it. She was a sweet woman. Stupid men, to rage at a kindhearted woman when they themselves were in the wrong.
“You look really tired, Tom,” she said quietly.
His heart jumped at the sound of his name on her lips. He glanced at her and smiled. “I am. A lot of my job is verbal, but it’s still wearing.”
She nodded. “I understand.”
“How did you know about May Strickland’s grades?” he asked suddenly. “And if you searched them out, then you must know where she went to school also, right?”
She grinned. “You’re sharp!”
He chuckled. “Goes with the badge. Tell me.”
“I have a friend who works in Denver,” she confided. “She has access to information that I’d have to pay for. She found out for me, and told me what May’s grades were like. She went to a nursing school in Aspen Lodge, just outside Denver. My friend said May worked for a nursing home there just briefly.”
He was taking notes. He looked up. “Did she quit or was she fired?” he asked.
“Make thatverysharp,” she mused, studying him with warm affection. “She was invited to leave. They hesitated to fire a young nurse at her first assignment. She was messing around with an intern while an old lady she was supposed to be bathing had a stroke.”
His dark eyes flickered. “She should have been fired, and that information should have gone on her permanent record.”
“According to my friend, there were extenuating circumstances.”
Both heavy eyebrows lifted, and he waited.
“May has mental issues,” she replied. “We don’t like to label them these days. Politically incorrect. But she’s bipolar. She’s normal on some days, and about twenty degrees off-center on others.”
“She has no damned business working around sick people,” he said flatly.
“Well, she was diagnosed and medicated. The problem is that she won’t take her medication. She did take it at her next job, probably because she realized that some employers would press the issue.”
“Where was the next job?”
She sipped coffee. “At a private nursing home, La Chalet,” she said, “also in Aspen Lodge. I believe she and the owner had a, well, relationship. He was an older man and May was supposedly very pretty when she was younger.”
“Do you know anything at all about what went on while she was there?”
“Besides sleeping with the owner until his wife caught them, you mean?” she asked whimsically.
He chuckled. “Yeah. Besides that.”
