Tami Hoag - Heart of Gold

“Any other surprises we ought to know about?” he asked, one dark brow crooking upward as he took the bread basket she thrust at him.

“I laced your coffee with arsenic,” she said sweetly.

He barely managed to keep his laughter locked in his chest. His eyes sparkled with rare good humor. “How thoughtful of you.”

“What’s arsnip, Mama?” Lindy asked, pausing in her game of stir-the-peas-on-the-plate.

“That’s something we give to very special guests, like Mr. Callan,” Faith said, her expression deadpan.

Something about him just brought out the devil in her, she thought, as she leaned over to cut her daughter’s meat. She had never teased William that way. Of course, expending emotion on William Gerrard had been a wasted effort. She had learned that early on in their marriage.

What William had wanted from her had nothing to do with emotion. That had been a very unpleasant reality for a young woman who had a wealth of love inside her. For a long time she had waited and hoped and prayed he would change, that she could change him, but over and over her love had been tossed back in her face. Her husband hadn’t had the time or the capacity to love another human being. His hunger for power and money had overridden that.

“Gee, Mom, I think I’m grown-up enough to cut my own meat,” Shane said dryly.

Faith jerked her head up, her startled gaze colliding with his. Out of habit she had sliced Lindy’s roast, then her own, and had somehow ended up with her knife on Shane’s plate. Her breath stuck in her throat as she stared at him. Lord, he was good-looking, and he was definitely grown-up enough to cut his own meat.

Managing to scrape together some bravado, she sat back and gave him a sassy look. “Well, you didn’t tell me you were housebroken.”

“Heck, yes, ma’am.” He sent her a dazzling smile. “I’m potty trained and everything.”

“What a pleasant surprise,” Faith commented, fighting to keep a straight face. She refused to be charmed by a man who thought she was a criminal.

“Don’t take it personally, Mr. Callan,” Jayne Jordan said, her eyes sparkling with laughter as she looked across the table at him. She tossed her mane of auburn hair over her shoulder as she shot a teasing grin at her friend. “Faith is hyper-maternal. She’ll probably try to button your coat up for you too.”

Shane couldn’t stop the fleeting image of Faith unbuttoning his clothes. Stabbing a chunk of beef, he cursed his suddenly rebellious libido.

“I’ll try to stop myself short of spitting on my fingers and combing your hair,” Faith pledged.

“Gee, thanks.”

As everyone settled into the task of devouring the excellent meal, Shane focused his attention on work. This case was a far cry from what he was accustomed to, but he was determined to do the job right. He had already been on the phone chewing out Banks about the shoddy background work that had been done. If he had been a few days later in getting here, the place would have been crawling with suspects. Faith Kincaid and her DataScam testimony might have been lying at the bottom of a cliff, shoved off by a supposed guest of the Keepsake Inn.

“What will you tell your guests when you call to cancel their reservations?”

“Nothing,” Faith said with false calm as she buttered a dinner roll. “I’m not going to call them, because I’m not going to cancel.”

“Yes, you are,” Shane said, carefully enunciating each word for emphasis. He leaned toward her, trying to intimidate her with his size as well as his cool stare.

“No, I’m not,” Faith said just as clearly. She leaned forward as well, a dizzying rush of adrenaline surging through her as she met his challenge. It was a heady feeling, one that walked a fine line between anger and passion. As she looked up at him, she felt herself teetering on that line.

“Faith,” Alaina said cautiously, “if Mr. Callan thinks-”

“If Mr. Callan thinks, I’ll consider it a real bonus for my tax dollar.” She could see a muscle jerk in his strong jaw, but the warning didn’t stop the recklessness he inspired in her. “Canceling my grand opening isn’t any more necessary than Mr. Callan’s presence here is.”

Tension sang in the air like an overloaded power line as brown eyes warred with gray. Faith thought she could feel the heat of his rising temper rolling off him like steam.

Lindy, happily oblivious to what was going on between the adults at the table, picked up the oddly shaped bun on her plate and held it out toward Shane. “Lookit,” she said, giving him her shy smile. “I made it all by myself.”

The anger drained out of Shane as Faith Kincaid’s little daughter caught his attention. What a heart stealer. So sweet, so innocent. When was the last time anything that pure and good had come within ten feet of him, he wondered.

Giving the bun a serious look, he cleared his throat and said, “That’s very nice.”

Lindy beamed. “It’s a bun.”

Faith released a pent-up breath and ran a slightly unsteady hand over her daughter’s hair. Lindy to the rescue again, she thought with a tender smile. No telling where her reckless abandon would have landed her had she pushed Callan another step. He was obviously a man whose authority was seldom questioned. “Lindy likes to help me in the kitchen. Don’t you, sweetie?”

“Uh-huh.” To Shane she explained, “I’m gonna be a mama when I grow up.” She slid down off her chair and went around the table to present her doll to Shane. “This is my baby. Her name is Mary.”

Ordinarily Faith would have herded her daughter back to her chair with a gentle reprimand for disturbing a guest’s dinner, but she was too busy watching Callan handle the situation. Something in his expression changed drastically as he looked at Lindy. The icy quality melted from his gray eyes, all the hard edges of his face softened. He looked almost… vulnerable. He accepted Lindy’s doll a bit awkwardly, but with all the care he would have shown had Mary been a real baby rather than a hand-me-down doll with frizzy brown hair and one eye that liked to stick shut.

It hit Faith that she knew nothing about him. Perhaps he had a wife and children of his own someplace, and he was separated from them because he had to be here watching out for her. Maybe he was lonely. Maybe… maybe she was romanticizing the situation, as usual.

Oh, Faith, she sighed inwardly, haven’t you learned your lesson? There’s no such thing as happily ever after. You, of all people, should know that.

“See,” Lindy said to Shane, pointing at her doll. “She has real eyelashes.”

Shane bent his dark head down as he handed the doll back to the little girl. “She’s a very pretty baby,” he said gravely.

Lindy readily agreed. “Uh-huh. She used to be my mama’s baby when Mama was little like me.” She cradled the doll expertly in her arms and looked up at Shane. “Do you know where babies come from?”

All three women at the table stifled giggles as the super-cool Agent Callan blushed like a teenager. Even his ears turned red.

“Uh-umm-well,” Shane stammered.

Lindy gazed up at him, patiently waiting for an answer. He looked to Faith, his expression comically desperate. She offered nothing more helpful than a placid smile.

Jayne finally took pity on him and came around the table to take Lindy’s hand. “Let’s go get that pudding we made this afternoon, sugar plum.”

Her earthshaking question easily dismissed, Lindy gave Shane a look that was pure flirtation and said, “It’s chocolate.”

“Do you have children, Mr. Callan?” Faith asked nonchalantly, not willing to admit to herself that she was holding her breath in anticipation of his answer.

“No.” Shane stared at his plate, angry at feeling so unsettled. Dammit, Faith Kincaid had thrown him badly enough, he didn’t need her daughter knocking his feet out from under him as well. It was just that they seemed so… normal. And everything he had seen in the last few years had been a perversion of normal life.