Authors: Violet Walker
E
van finished his stroll of the town with a stop in at Minnie’s for a slice of her apple pie.
“Hey there Evan,” Minnie greeted him warmly.
“Minnie,” he acknowledged. “What’s the word on the streets,” he asked with a smile, knowing Minnie was as big of a gossip as his sister Dotty, the real estate agent. If there was anything worth knowing in this town, one of them would know it.
“Oh not much,” Minnie stated sweetly. “Saw you chattin’ up the new girl a while ago,” she said, batting her eyelashes innocently.
Thankfully a few tellers from the bank walked in and took seats at the counter so Minnie couldn’t grill him any further. She was a sweet woman in her sixties with two grown and gone boys of her own. She was as proud of her match-making skills as she was of her apple pie and considered Evan her only failure. She’d tried over the years to fix him up with one girl or another but for whatever reason, Evan was never interested much in settling down. Not that he was a playboy either but none of these girls seemed to hold his interest for long. Truth was, if Evan looked deep enough inside himself, he’d have to admit that he was afraid. Afraid of a love that would destroy him by loss, like his mother’s death had done to his father. Fortunately, he usually kept himself too busy to look that deeply.
Evan finished his pie and dropped a few bills on the table. He waved to Minnie as he headed out the door and made the short walk back to his office. He went to his desk and fired up his computer, pulling up the search engine and typing in a name: Sally Andrews. He hadn’t been able to get her out of his head all day. He had immediately felt the need to protect her. But from what? Maybe it was time to find out.
S
ally woke in a cold sweat and sat bolt upright in bed. She slowed her breathing and strained to listen for any sounds of someone in the apartment. Hearing nothing, she swung her legs over the side of the bed and tiptoed down the short hallway to the living room. Everything was as she left it, door locked and dead-bolted, kitchen chair shoved up under the handle. Looking at the clock on the wall she saw that it was nearly five a.m. She went into the kitchen and turned on the lights, getting out a few slices of bread and making a mental note to buy herself a coffee pot. Sally had woken nearly every night she’d been in her new place sure that someone was there after her. Not someone, Joey. She knew that she was being ridiculous, that he was behind bars 700 miles away with zero idea where she was. Still, when she closed her eyes and drifted off her subconscious took over and tortured her with vivid dreams of his revenge. She shook off the chill and dropped the bread into the toaster.
Today was Saturday. She’d been in Oklahoma for almost a week. Yesterday she’d started her job downstairs in the bar and it had gone well. Her waitressing skills had come back rather quickly and since most everyone in town drank beer, whiskey or scotch, the bartending portion was rather easy. Buck had liked her and told her she could stay on and work as many hours as she liked. She was scheduled to work again tonight.
In the week since she’d been in town, Sally had wandered the streets, acquainting herself with the shops. She’d stopped in Minnie’s diner for lunch and walked through the antique shop that stood kattercorner. She knew she was the object of much curiosity and sometimes wished that the Marshal’s Service had placed her in a bigger city where it was easier to get lost. She mostly kept to herself but made polite conversation when addressed. If this was where she was going to spend God-knows-how-long here, she might as well make the best of it. She’d met a cashier at the grocery store they called Crazy Candy, with wild red hair and lipstick to match and struck up a sort of friendship with the slightly older woman. Sally was starting to settle in to her life here.
She’d seen the Sherriff a few times around town and but tried to avoid him when possible. There was something about him that set her nerves buzzing when she was around him and so when she saw him coming she tended to turn the other way. She was not ready to admit to herself or anyone else what it was that Evan Cole made her feel.
Evan
Evan’s week was winding down. Thankfully it had been a slow one, with just the usual drunk and disorderly’s and a handful of neighbor disputes over who’s dog was crapping on who’s lawn. One of his deputies, Steve, poked his head into Evan’s office.
“We’re all heading up to Buck’s for a few drinks after the shift if you want to come with,” he offered.
“Yeah, you guys go ahead, I just have a few things left to finish up here and I’ll meet you down there,” Evan answered.
Evan looked down at the folder on his desk and leafed through it one more time, as though he hadn’t done it a hundred times already. The folder contained everything there was to know about one Sally Andrews. And it wasn’t much. Some people might call him obsessed. That’s why those people didn’t have any clue that he’d been looking into her.
According to his search, she was nearly twenty-four, originally from Indianapolis (though her slight accent suggested otherwise), and had no living family. Other than a list of a few past employers and a high school diploma there wasn’t much else. Most people in town had already formed their own opinions of the quiet newcomer; his sister Dotty’s being the most entertaining to him. According to Dotty, Sally was an assassin. Probably Russian. Dotty needed to stop reading so many Tom Clancy novels.
Evan wasn’t sure what to think. Maybe it was just as simple as Sally had suggested one day to Candy which he’d overheard. She’d just had enough of the city and wanted some small town fresh air. He had a suspicion there was much more to it. Like an abusive husband. The thought of that made his gut clench involuntarily and he was left again to wonder why he reacted so strongly to this woman he barely knew.
He heard his deputies leave and the two guys who would field the calls overnight wandered in. Evan stood and stretched his long legs, grabbing his Stetson and plunking it down on his head. Maybe he would get drunk tonight. Maybe that would wash the mystery of Sally Andrews out of his head for a bit.
S
ally looked up from the glass-washing station as she heard the door open. Four Sherriff’s Deputies still in uniform wandered in and took a corner table near the back of the bar, glancing curiously at her as they passed. She wiped her hands dry on her jeans and walked over to the table to take their orders.
“Good evening gentlemen,” she said, placing napkins in front of them.
“Oh I wouldn’t go so far as to call them ‘gentlemen’,” said a deep voice from behind her.
Startled, Sally spun around and nearly smacked into the wall of chest that belonged to Sherriff Cole. She stumbled backward slightly and he grabbed her by the elbow to steady her on her feet.
“Sorry, about that ma’am,” he drawled, taking her in with stormy grey eyes. “Didn’t mean to sneak up on you.”
“Oh, um, that, that’s ok,” she stammered. “You just startled me is all.”
Sally recovered her wits enough to realize he was still lightly holding her elbow and wriggled from his grasp.
“What can I get you all?” she tried again turning back to the table as the Sherriff took his seat with the others.
Sally took their orders and scrambled back behind the bar to calm her nerves and get their drinks. As she poured their beers she observed the five men at the table in the nearly-empty bar. They seemed to genuinely like one another as they laughed and slapped each other on the back. They were all of varying builds and heights, mostly in fine physical shape, but none of them compared to their boss. Evan Cole was tall, about six feet four she guessed, with wide shoulders, a narrow waist and a backside that filled out his Levis rather impressively. Under his trademark Stetson his black hair just brushed the collar of his shirt; a shirt that held onto that massive chest for dear life.
Candy was sitting at the bar watching Sally with a twinkle in her mischievous green eyes and cleared her throat, “careful there girly, you’re about to drool on your shoes,” she said with a wink and a crooked grin.
Sally felt her cheeks turn a shade just lighter than Candy’s hair, realizing she’d been caught staring and lowered her eyes to the floor.
“Hey, nothing wrong with admirin’ a mighty nice view there darlin’,” Candy said. “Just appreciatin’ what the good Lord put in front of ya. But that one there, he’s a mystery,” she said pointing the lengthy ash of her cigarette Evan’s way. “No woman, no kids, lives all alone on that big ranch his daddy left him,” she tsk tsk’d. “A mystery for sure,” she said finishing her drink.
Sally arranged the beers on the tray and carried them over to the table where the men sat. She put the drinks down in front of them, trying not to fidget as she felt Evan’s gaze rest on her. She straightened and brushed a stray lock of her curly blonde hair behind her ear, a nervous habit she’d had since childhood, and tried to avoid the Sherriff’s eyes. Although she wore a plain black t-shirt and jeans, under his gaze she felt completely exposed and it unnerved her. She smiled absently at the group of men and hurried back to the bar keeping herself busy doing odds and ends and trying not to think about the way his big hand had curled around her elbow. Damnit this man made her sweat.
E
van sat back in his chair, only half listening to his deputies’ conversation. He raised his beer to his lips and looked over the rim of the glass to where Sally stood trying her best to fade into the background behind the bar. She was stand-offish. Nice enough but you got the sense she didn’t really want to be noticed.
Good luck with that, he thought to himself. He had noticed Sally Andrews about five minutes after she’d arrived in his town. As the Sherriff, he made it his business to know who was living under his protection. He’d been sitting in his office going over a budget report when he first noticed her walking down the street. She was petite, maybe five feet five, with curly blonde hair and warm brown eyes which she usually kept downcast. She had a nice enough figure with slightly rounded hips and an ample bosom but it was the way she carried herself that struck a nerve in him. She had the look of a cat on a hot tin roof, always ready to run at the first sign of trouble.
Evan watched Sally make polite small talk with the few customers at the bar and saw her blush at a comment from crazy Candy. He’d noticed her eyes flicker briefly in his direction before returning to the floor, where she looked most of the time. He thought back to how she had jumped when he’d come up behind her, how she’d stiffened at his touch when he grabbed her elbow to steady her. The more Evan observed her, the more interested he became. Why did a city girl come alone to Oklahoma? Was she running from something? Someone? Again, the thought of that sucked the wind right out of him. This girl was going to bring a world of trouble down on him, he could feel it. And he knew at that moment, watching her over the rim of his glass, that there was nothing he could do to stop it. He decided to wait until the end of her shift and see if he could talk to her again. His deputies called it a night and Evan waved them off, standing up and walking to the bar where he sat down and ordered another beer.
“So how are you liking it here so far,” he asked.
Sally walked over to him and placed his drink in front of him.
“It’s nice,” she said, “I’m finding my way around.”
She had a nice smile, Evan noticed. They made small talk in between her looking after the few other customers and noticed that she seemed to finally relax a bit talking to him. Once or twice, she even laughed, a light musical sound that he wanted to hear again and again. When her shift ended, he offered to stay and wait while she closed up and to make sure she made it upstairs safely. He could sense that she wanted to say no, that she almost did say no, but in the end she acquiesced.
Sally finished her closing duties and locked up the bar before heading around the side of the building to the stairway that led to her apartment.
“I’ll have to talk to Buck about putting a light up on this side,” Evan said. “You shouldn’t be walking up here in the dark.”
“You mean to tell me your town isn’t a haven of safety,” she asked him and it took him only a brief moment to realize she was teasing him.
“Look, I can keep the criminal element at bay all I want but that won’t stop you from tripping on these damn stairs and breaking your neck,” he replied.
“Well good thing I’m not a klutz,” she said, reaching the small landing at the top of the stairs. She put her key in the lock and turned but the door seemed to stick. She put her shoulder to it and gave it a shove. The door gave way and she fell forward into the dark apartment. Evan reached out quickly and wrapped his arm around her waist, hauling her up against him to steady her. Gaining her footing, Sally turned in his arms finding herself for the second time this night plastered against Evan’s chest. Her hand instinctively went up to rest against his heart and she could feel it beating as quickly as the pulse in her own ears. They stood like that for a moment, eyes locked, breath held, until Evan’s cell phone rang and broke the spell. Sally blinked quickly and stepped from his grasp into her apartment.
“Thanks for walking me home Sherriff,” she said and quickly closed the door.
S
ally slumped against the door, trying to steady her pulse. Her palms were sweaty and her breathing a bit ragged.
Good Lord girl, get ahold of yourself, she thought. She locked her door and walked to the bedroom, stopping in the bathroom to turn on the shower. She quickly shed her clothes and returned to the bathroom where the steam was gathering around the edges of the mirror. She climbed under the hot spray, letting the water wash the tension from her body. She touched her breasts and remembered what it felt like to have been pressed up against Evan’s broad chest just a few moments earlier. Her nipples went hard at the thought of it. It had been a while since she’d been with a man. It’d been months since she had seen Joey before the trial, the Feds keeping her under lock and key so she couldn’t change her mind. She briefly wondered what Evan would feel like over her, under her, inside of her. A moan escaped her lips as she felt a flood of warmth pool in her lower belly.
Sally finished her shower and got out to towel herself off. She brushed her teeth and dressed for bed. She went into the living room to turn off the lights and noticed a scrap of paper on the floor near the door. Bending down to pick it up, she turned it over:
Dinner tomorrow? 7 pm.
Pick you up at 6:30.
-Evan
Her pulse jumped again at his note and she immediately began to think of excuses she could give, of reasons she couldn’t or shouldn’t go. It was hard for her to trust another person, and honestly she didn’t feel very trustworthy herself. The only man who’d ever loved her would be sitting in a jail cell for the next twenty-five years because of her. Logically she knew that she’d done the right thing. That even though Joey had been good to her, he wasn’t a good person. He’d robbed and ruined lives and he deserved what he had gotten but her role in the whole thing still left a bad taste in her mouth.
No, tomorrow she would call Evan and politely decline his offer. She wasn’t ready. Not for dinner, not for romance, and certainly not for whatever her imagination could come up with might happen after.