.

gates would help to shield her, to keep her from reaching out again.

      While she was searching for words, he spoke. “It’s good to see a Spencer doing the right thing. I think Emma was thankful for your help.”

      Ashlyn had done her share of Spencer bashing, but his statement felt like a personal affront. “Some of us Spencers have a bit of honor.”

      Sam’s hands rested on his lean hips. “That’s not what I wanted to say.”

      “What did you intend?”

      She noticed the slow simmer of his temper in the tensing of his fingers on his hips. “Let’s forget it before I say something we both don’t want to hear.”

      “Anything you say won’t exactly be a news flash, Sam. Just go for it.”

      “Nothing.” Dead, empty eyes, void of fight.

      “Heck.” She shrugged, wanting to get their differences out in the open. “Why don’t I do it? The Spencers are a greedy lot. Stingy, monstrous, ugly. Is that it?”

      He stayed silent.

      How could she explain her flash of anger without seeming illogical? How could she make sense of the idea that she was the only one allowed to criticize her family? When she did it, it didn’t hurt as much.

      “I think it’s time for you to leave, Ashlyn.”

      In the background, Deputy Joanson cleared his throat. Ashlyn attempted to rein in her temper.

      “I know, Sheriff, that having your father killed at my family’s factory won’t make us best friends.” There. She’d said it. Put it out there for Sam to handle any way he wanted.

      Finally, something exploded in his eyes. His jaw tight, he said, “You don’t want to know how much hate I hold for your family. If I were you, I’d just walk through the door.”

      He jerked his head toward the exit. “Joanson, drive her home.”

      She said, “My car’s at Locksley Field. I can take it from there.”

      But he was already moving toward the jail cells, oblivious to her voice. She watched him leave, shame catching in her throat.

      She hadn’t gotten the chance to tell him how sorry she was about his parents.

      But it didn’t make much of a difference. He probably wouldn’t listen anyway.

      To Sam, this feeling of lingering guilt was much worse than any hangover he’d ever dealt with. And he’d nursed plenty of them following the weeks after he’d quit the District of Columbia Metropolitan Police Department in disgrace, the days after his wife’s death.

      As he listened to the blessed quiet of Junior and Sonny sleeping off their canned-beer binges, Sam wiped a hand over his face, regretting what he’d said to Ashlyn Spencer.

      Of course, it was no big mystery that his father had been killed in the factory. Everyone in town knew it. Ten other people had died that day, as well. Worst part of it was, Horatio Spencer had blamed Sam’s father for the deaths, but Sam knew better. His father had been talking about the grinding machinery, the wear and tear on the assembly line.

      But any way you looked at it, Ashlyn wasn’t responsible for those deaths. Putting her on the same level as her family wasn’t fair.

      Fairness. Justice. Words he didn’t believe in anymore. His sense of faith in the world had died the night his wife, Mary, had been killed by a hit-and-run driver.

      He’d quit his job a few weeks before the accident. So when his buddies from the D.C. police force had shown up on his doorstep, pity dragging down their expressions, he’d known something was very wrong. Sam even remembered the exact instant his soul had been sucked from his body by the news of her death. He remembered feeling a numbness slide into the place where he used to keep happiness in all the colors of a rainbow, the place he’d tried to fill with dreams of marriage and warmth.

      Rainbows. He hadn’t noticed one for a while, didn’t even know if he could still recognize the different shades. But when he’d looked into Ashlyn’s eyes tonight, he’d seen them—vibrant facets of blues, greens, violets—swirled together to create a glint of what heaven must look like.

      Right, Sam. Just forget that she’s a Spencer.

      He couldn’t forget the stark horror grimacing his mother’s lips when she’d heard her husband had been caught in the Spenco Toy Factory machinery. Couldn’t forget the quiet funeral she’d requested before she’d contracted a fatal case of pneumonia, joining her husband in death.

      There were so many things he couldn’t forget. Couldn’t forgive.

      Dammit, he’d come back to Kane’s Crossing to erase his past. His parents were far enough in the land of memories that it shouldn’t be tearing at him right now. All Sam wanted was to live the rest of his life in peace, in the presence of his foster brother, Nick, and his family.

      Headlights flashed through the front office window, jerking Sam from his thoughts. Good thing, too. He’d never get any work done if he sank into a pool of emotion.

      Deputy Joanson stuck his head in the door. “Sheriff?”

      Sam tried not to seem as if he’d been mulling over useless memories again. “Yeah.”

      “Ashlyn Spencer? Well, I dropped her off at Locksley Field, but…”

      By God. “What?”

      “Well, I know the other deputies, before me, would’ve chased her down, but she’s not too good at listening.”

      Sam stood, worried now. He realized his agitation and erased his mind. “What the hell did she do?”

      “Oh.” Gary stepped in the door, shrugged. “Nothing like that. Sorry to make you fret, Sheriff.”

      “I wasn’t fretting.”

      “Right. So she said she had her car at the field, but she lied to me. Wouldn’t get back in the grandma car. Said she’d rather freeze her patootie off than be caught dead in it again.”

      “She walked home?” Two degrees below red-nose weather and the blasted woman was taking a stroll? “I’ll take care of it.”

      Gary shuffled his feet. “Sorry I couldn’t tackle her like the other deputies would’ve. But she’s a lady.”

      “Appreciate it, Joanson.” Sam grabbed his coat and clutched the Bronco keys. And he thought he’d only have to deal with drunks as Kane’s Crossing’s sheriff. Ashlyn would obviously make him earn his paycheck.

      “I know, I told her.” Gary rattled on, blocking Sam in his bid to provide more information. “Women-folk shouldn’t be walking alone. Especially during April Fool’s with the high school boys roaming around.”

      Sam almost laughed at his deputy’s concern. Maybe Joanson should visit Washington, D.C., on a normal night. That’d give the guy nightmares for sure.

      Still, the idea of Ashlyn walking home alone made him cringe. Any number of things could happen to a woman strolling by herself on a country road. Things he didn’t want to think about.

      “Besides,” added Gary, “her daddy’ll kill you if something happens to her.”

      “I wasn’t put here to please Horatio Spencer,” Sam said, shutting the door on Gary’s answer.

      The cold air nipped at his skin, and he thought of Ashlyn’s thin, fashionable red sweater and ankle-skimming pants. What was going through her mind?

      He settled himself into the Bronco, easing the vehicle onto the road again. Ashlyn Spencer—a synonym for trouble, if there ever was one.

      He cruised to the outskirts of town, near the Spencer mansion, intending to backtrack from there to Locksley Field. When a flash of red sweater filtered into his headlight view, he slowed to