Page 10 of Peril in Piney Woods

He ran his fingers through his hair, took a breath and headed through the home. The place was a typical farmhouse. Two stories. All the bedrooms and a bath upstairs. The common rooms and a half bath that was added in the fifties downstairs. Nothing fancy. Hardwoods on the floors. Painted plaster on the walls. All in need of a refresh, according to his sister.

Still, the place suited him. He was happiest in a pair of jeans and boots. He wore a cowboy hat the way his father and grandfather had. When his ex-fiancée insisted the hat had to be saved for the proper occasion, he should have realized things between them would never work. He’d grown up with cows and horses and chickens and such. The proper boots and hat were more important than any other attire he’d worn.

Meg liked his hat. He smiled at the memory of her saying so.

He opened the door and the woman standing on his porch made him smile even wider. Meg Lewis had the brownest eyes he’d ever seen. So dark they were like gazing into midnight. And the hair. He loved her hair. Long, dark and thick, but she almost never allowed it to hang free. It was always in a single braid hanging down her back all the way to her waist or draped over one shoulder with a cute little ribbon tied at the end.

Today there was no ribbon.

His gaze roamed back up the pink tee that sported images of blooming botanicals then to her face. She smiled, and that alone had his heart stuttering.

He almost laughed at the reality of just how pathetic he was. Maybe it was the idea that forty was looming in the not-so-distant future and the wife and kids he’d expected to have were still nothing more than an expectation. Or maybe it was the idea that he’d finally met the one, and she only wanted to be friends.

Meg held up a brown bag with the diner’s logo on the front. “Katie insisted we try her new breakfast burritos.”

Griff hummed a note of anticipation. “If Katie made them, they’ll be good.” He hitched his head. “Come on in.”

Meg stepped inside. “How’s your herd this morning?”

“Nervous.”

“Guess so. I saw Lonnie’s truck out there.”

“Yep.” His stomach rumbled. “Man, those burritos smell good.”

MEG COULDN’T AGREE MORE. She hoped the food would help stave off his questions about last night. She’d tossed and turned the few hours she’d spent in bed wondering how to get past the questions he would no doubt have. To some degree, Griff saw through her facade. His ability to view her so clearly made her a little nervous.

Deputy Battles had been happy to accept her explanation of what happened—or at least he appeared to do so. But Griff would have other concerns. Like how had she managed to react so exactingly? How had she recognized how deep the knife should go to inflict the necessary result?

Worse, she hadn’t been able to suppress the worries about her photo ending up in the media. All this time, she had been so careful to ensure she stayed below the radar. To her knowledge, not a single photo had been taken of her since her arrival in Piney Woods. But if this rescue of hers picked up too much steam in a slow news cycle, the reporters involved would go to great lengths to find something on her.

If that happened...

Just stop. She cleared her head. She had no control over what others did. All Meg could do was take this one step at a time. Maybe the whole thing would fizzle out today. Maybe Griff wouldn’t ask as many questions as she feared he would. And maybe he would accept her answers without wanting additional clarifications.

Yeah, right. She’d never get that lucky.

Whatever happened, she would do what she had to.

The trouble was Avery Griffin had spent seven years as a forensic auditor in one of Nashville’s top financial groups. He was trained to look beyond what he saw and to find the reasons behind the results. Actually, she suspected his university training had little to do with this ability. She firmly believed the man instinctively saw what others didn’t. For the past year she had worked extra hard to keep him at arm’s length.

Not an easy task. She took in his crisp white cotton shirt and faded blue jeans. The boots...she resisted the urge to sigh. Too distracting, too desirable. The man just got under her skin somehow.

He was just too good-looking. Too nice. Too...good.

In the kitchen, he gestured to the counter. “Coffee’s ready. Orange juice is handy.”

Meg placed the bag of burritos on the table. She liked this house. The big farm-style kitchen with the table in the center made her want to bake bread, and she’d never baked bread in her life. It just felt so homey. “Should we invite Lonnie? I’m sure we have enough food.”

Griff frowned before he seemed to catch himself and fix his smile back into place. “He mentioned that Mrs. Bauer made him breakfast this morning. He was helping out with the birth of a calf.”

“You have a sick animal, or is he here for routine examinations?” She opened the bag and removed the warm wrapped goodies. It was Sunday after all. Not the usual office hours even for a country vet.

“Just vaccinations and checkups.” He poured two steaming mugs of coffee. “He has a big week coming up and wanted to get a head start.”

He didn’t have to ask how Meg took her coffee. They’d had coffee together enough times that he knew she liked it black. They’d made fast friends only a few weeks after she got her shop going. He’d gone out of his way to send business in her direction. He brought two or three of his dogs each week. She doubted he’d ever bothered with a groomer before, but he was thoughtful like that.

By the time she had the food on the plates he’d provided, she was salivating at the delicious smells of peppers and onions and cheeses. The eggs and spicy sausage and all those other juicy ingredients were rolled into homemade tortillas. She was ravenous this morning. She wouldn’t mention this though since most people wouldn’t likely understand her having any sort of appetite after what happened last night.

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