She was dangerous. He couldn’t sort through all the reasons why at the moment, not while looking into her eyes and wondering how soft her skin was and how silky her hair was, but he had enough self-preservation instinct to keep her away from his house.
“I’m thinking the B & B.”
He grabbed her suitcase and started for his truck.
“But he might think to look there,” she protested. She gathered up her enormous skirts and followed him though.
“I’ll tell Heather not to tell anyone anything about you,” Zander told her, storing her bag behind the front seat and then turning to face her.
Fuck.
Again with the eyes. And hair. And lips. Okay, he hadn’t included the lips in the earlier inventory, but they were great too.
So he liked female lips. Big deal. These were not that exceptional. What the hell was wrong with him?
She’s probably your damned soulmate or some shit and the second you touch her hand you’re going to feel sparks.
I’m not going to feel sparks. That’s a stupid cliché. But I have to get some war biographies. Or maybe something about Ruth Bader Ginsburg. Something about women who are amazing but not sexy. It doesn’t have to be about sexy all the time. Get away from those romance novels.
The thing was, smart, bold women like RBG were sexy in their own way and if Zander had been Ruth’s age and run into her at a bar when she was single, he absolutely would have hit on her.
“Are you okay?” Caroline asked, stepping forward with a slight frown.
He jerked out of his stupid thoughts. “Yeah. I’m fine. You’re the one with the problem.”
Well, that had sounded rude as fuck.
Her eyes widened, but then she nodded. “Yeah. I am. We should definitely work on my problem. It’s going to keep getting bigger if we don’t.”
Zander sighed. He didn’t even know what that meant but…of course it was.
2
As she made her way across the parking lot, Caroline studied the big man who was currently her favorite person in the world.
Which was not easy. Not the studying him part. That was very easy. He was incredibly good-looking.
Walking across a dirt parking lot in this monstrosity of silk and tulle and lace with three-inch heels, however…that was torturous.
This damned dress. Who had thought this was something she would ever in a million years pick out and wear?
Was she being dramatic?
About the dress, maybe.
About thinking this small-town cop was her new best friend?
No.
Caroline had one true friend in the world, who was in San Antonio on some work assignment for the next few days. Max Keller was the only person Caroline trusted one hundred percent. Max had kept Caroline’s secrets for twenty years. The really juicy ones—like the ones that would get her disowned from her family and maybe even thrown in jail—for the past thirteen. So yeah, Max was her ride or die.
Max would hit the road immediately if Caroline asked, but wouldn’t be as much help as someone in law enforcement. Max was an award-winning investigative reporter and would love to tell the world about what Caroline had uncovered. Sometimes…okay, most of the time…that was exactly what went down. Caroline got the dirt, Max exposed the dirt. But this was something that needed someone with a badge.
And this badge was something. Caroline really liked a good guy and this one was giving her very nice tingles on top of the omg-yes-be-my-hero relief she was feeling.
He had to be six-four and had broad shoulders, big biceps, a flat stomach, and a tight ass. He was in fighting shape, no doubt about it. He had long hair and tattoos that ran from under the short sleeve of his uniform shirt to his wrist.
Damn, he wore that uniform well. There really was something about a guy with all that authority. He had a holster around his hips and carried himself with the I'm-in-charge air. But the long hair and the tattoo made her wonder if he wasn’t quite as perfectly pressed and buttoned up as he appeared.
She was intrigued.
“Where’s the B & B?” she thought to ask as she finally got to the truck.
He stepped back as she got close, presumably so she could get into the truck. She should maybe text Max about what was going on at least, right? Before getting into a truck with a strange man with a gun?
The guy just made her feel safe.
And she had excellent instincts about smarmy, lying, manipulative assholes. Spending the last thirteen years surrounded by them—and manipulating them right back—had made her an expert.
This guy wasn’t any of those things.
He jutted his chin to his left, indicating somewhere generally north of where they were standing. “Just up the road.” He paused a beat, then as if reading her mind, asked, “You want some references?”
She looked him up and down. “Do I need them?”
“I'm just saying, you don't know me. Would make sense if you wanted to be sure I was safe.”
“Who would I get references from?”
He grinned and Caroline had a flickering thought of I don't really care if you're safe. Which was absolutely the opposite of safe.
“Well, most everyone I would get a reference from is inside the bar. And they’re all relatives. But—and you'll have to take my word for this—they would be the hardest on my character. My grandma, for instance, would tell you I can be a damned grump and that I don't give people the benefit of the doubt enough.”
“And is that true?”
“Yep.”
She had no reason not to trust this guy. If he didn’t give a shit, he could have just let Chris take her back to New Orleans. And he wouldn’t be concerned about putting her somewhere safe now.
And she really did need someone to get on this problem Chris and Brantley had revealed. She’d hoped to have a little more time to dig up information, but Brantley—and more likely Brantley’s father—had decided that a surprise wedding was the way to go and she’d run out of time.
“Okay, officer, I guess you're stuck with me for a little bit.”
He narrowed his eyes. “Define a little bit.”
She gave him a half smile. “As long as it takes.”
He lifted a brow. Clearly he didn’t love that answer.
“I plan on getting you tucked away and then informing whoever shows up looking for you that you've moved on,” he told her. “You’re going to tell me what your problem is, I’m going to fix it, and then you are going to move on.” He said it all firmly. Like very firmly.
It was almost as if he thought she was planning on sticking around and wanted to be certain she understood she was not welcome.
Well, geez.
“By the way, you can call me Zander,” he told her. “No need for the officer stuff.”
She squinted at him. “Zander?”
“It’s short for Alexander. But no one calls me that but my mother. And my grandma when she’s pissed.”
“What if I get pissed?”
“You can leave.”
Wow. Okay, then. “Well, I’m Caroline. Caroline Holland.”
He gave her a single nod. “Okay.” Then he paused and frowned. “Wait. Holland? Not as in Holland Shipping?”