Carla Neggers - Red Clover Inn

“I’m not in your room, period.”

He felt a wave of fatigue and forced himself to stay upright. He attempted a grin. “You’re not going to make sure I get to bed without collapsing?”

“Tell you what,” she said. “I’ll wait outside the door, and if I hear a thud and think you hit your head or otherwise hurt yourself, I’ll call for an ambulance.”

Greg stood straight, leveling his gaze on her. “I’ll be fine, Charlotte. I’m not sick or drunk. Thanks for your help.”

The pink returned to her cheeks. “You’re exhausted,” she said finally. “Get some sleep. See you at the wedding.”

“How’s your maid-of-honor dress?”

She ignored him and left, shutting the door quickly—not in his face but it was close.

Greg managed to make it to the bed before he collapsed.

No thud for Charlotte to call backup.

* * *

Charlotte didn’t breathe normally again until she reached her room, shut the door and kicked off her shoes. She didn’t know how she’d made it up the stairs in them. Her feet ached. Adrenaline had undoubtedly helped keep her from feeling any pain.

She stared at the locked door next to the closet door. She’d lied. Her room did adjoin Greg’s room, and it did have a connecting door—inaccessible by either one of them without the key. There’d been no point in telling him and getting his imagination fired up. He needed sleep, and so did she, if for different reasons.

Her room was adorable, decorated with warm fabrics and simple furnishings. A small window looked out on the village street, dark and quiet now. She didn’t hear any noise from the pub below her. She supposed the barman would have dealt with Greg if she’d left him in the booth. Presumably, she’d see him at the wedding tomorrow, and then that would be that. They’d be on their separate ways.

She peeled off her dress. Her maid-of-honor dress was at the wedding hotel. She appreciated Samantha’s asking her to be her maid of honor and didn’t regret saying yes—but she’d come close to saying no. Unsaid between them had been the reasons why. “You’re who I want as my maid of honor, Charlotte,” Samantha had told her. “You’re as close to a sister as I have, and you’re my best friend, but I’ll understand if you just want to be a guest.”

“Thank you, Sam. I’m honored. I’d love to be your maid of honor.”

Charlotte had meant every word, but she also knew it wouldn’t be easy to walk down that aisle tomorrow without memories bubbling up. She’d just have to work at stifling them. It wasn’t her wedding. It was Samantha and Justin’s wedding, and Charlotte wanted to do her part to make it a wonderful day for them.

She washed up, slipped into her nightgown and crawled under the cozy duvet in the double bed. She listened, but she didn’t hear anything from the adjoining room. Greg Rawlings was similar to other alpha types she knew in her work. While she appreciated the training and dedication that no doubt went into his job as a DS agent, she was well aware that even tough guys bled, got sick and messed up. The problem wasn’t that she wanted to believe they were indestructible. They wanted to believe it.

She shut her eyes, giving in to her own fatigue. Even after her long day, she had no sign of a headache.

Progress.

But she didn’t want to make too much of it, and she knew getting rid of her headaches didn’t mean she’d ever dive again.

She put that thought out of her mind and pictured Greg instead, half-asleep, genuinely exhausted and yet still capable of teasing—and, no doubt, of getting himself to his room.

She put him out of her mind, too. She’d done her bit for him, but Greg Rawlings was a fit, capable man.

The Diplomatic Security agent in the next room wasn’t her problem.

Two

Greg managed to take a shower, pull on jeans and a sweatshirt, and tie on a pair of running shoes when he woke up at oh dark thirty. He’d been wiped out when he’d arrived in London yesterday. Mop-the-floor-with-him exhausted after months of nonstop, high-intensity, high-stress work. Not an excuse for passing out in an English pub, but no harm, no foul.

As he started down the steep stairs, he remembered more of his encounter with Charlotte Bennett last night than he wanted to remember.

“Should have had more to drink.”

Breakfast was set up in the same room as last night’s party. Eric Sloan, a police officer and the eldest of the Sloan siblings, invited Greg to join him. Greg had met him briefly in February. Eric resembled the rest of the Sloans: dark haired, blue eyed, strong. Straightforward. Another Sloan trait. It was still the middle of the night back home in New England, but Eric looked wide-awake. Probably used to odd hours. He, too, had on jeans and a sweatshirt.

Greg sat at Eric’s table by a partially open window, exchanged a couple of pleasantries, ordered coffee and then got up again and went to the cold buffet table.

He returned with Weetabix and cut fruit. “I’ve never had Weetabix,” he said. “Have you?”

Eric shrugged. “It’s like Shredded Wheat?”

“Sort of. I think it’s one of those things you can do anything with. Add fruit, peanut butter, cream cheese, hot milk, cold milk. Probably can make tacos out of it.”

Eric didn’t look amused or interested. He had coffee. Black. Nothing to eat yet.

“Brody and Heather made it back to the wedding hotel?” Greg asked.

“As far as I know. Just my brother Christopher and I are here. The rest of my family’s at the hotel, too.”

“Christopher’s the full-time firefighter?”

“Yes. The youngest brother. Justin’s a volunteer firefighter.” Eric drank some of his coffee. “I skipped the buffet. Just having the hot breakfast.”

“There’s a hot breakfast?”

A slight smile. “You aren’t restricted to Weetabix.”

Suddenly starving, Greg ordered a full English breakfast minus the black pudding. He wondered if Charlotte would be down for breakfast before leaving for the wedding. Since she’d come in from Scotland, she was on the same time as the Cotswolds and wouldn’t be jet-lagged. Early riser? Late riser? He gave himself a mental shake. Last night was over. Time to behave.

“You’ll enjoy staying at the inn for a bit,” Eric said.

Greg tore open his Weetabix. What inn? Had he zoned out and missed something? He dumped the two biscuit-like triangles into his bowl. “I have some time before I need to be in DC for my new assignment,” he said, neutral.

“Great,” Eric said. “Brody says you like to camp. You can pitch a tent out back if you want. The inn could have bats.”

Bats. Still clueless, Greg added some of his cut fruit to the Weetabix. “Good location?”

“It’s within walking distance of the village but feels more remote.”

Okay, getting some specifics. This village? Another village in the Cotswolds? Was this mystery inn located in England? Was staying there Brody and Heather’s idea? Greg was stumped. He had no memory of discussing an inn, with or without bats, with anyone, ever.

“It has an open field on one side,” Eric added. “Makes sense given its name.”

The waiter set a coffee press on the table as Greg poured cold milk over his fruit and Weetabix. Maybe he should have waited and had some coffee before going to the cold-buffet table. “I don’t remember the name of the inn...”

“Red Clover Inn.”

“Cute name,” Greg said, desperate now. What had he done? He cleared his throat. “Homey sound to it.”

“Justin and Samantha want to keep the name. I don’t care one way or the other. It sounds more like it should be out in the country rather than a half mile from the village. We bought it on a whim. The owner died without a proper will and there was a family squabble. It took some time to get sorted out. They couldn’t wait to sell the place.”