Read Online Letters and Lace (The Ronan's Harbor Series) by M. Kate Quinn - Free Book Online Page B

relic goodbye long before he’d figure it out.
    He tugged off the mitts and threw them down. So now somebody was leaving notes at Sarah’s door? Who and, better yet, why? Stop, he implored silently reminding himself that his badge was tucked away in one of his storage cartons.
    He hated the situation he’d put Sarah in. But, that little note she found was another problem entirely. His gut told him it spelled trouble. But this trouble didn’t concern him, even if it was Sarah Grayson.
    His gut told him Sarah was a genuinely nice lady—too nice for the likes of him, that was for sure. He should have remembered that before he’d asked her to dance that night at the bar, let alone gone and kissed her.
    He touched a knife tip into the ruined end of the strudel. Black flakes of dough rained onto the counter. He figured roughly eight minutes less next time he baked a strudel in the old oven. That should do it.
    He could deal with a temperamental oven much easier than he could deal with the opposite sex. When it came to women he’d always messed it up. Brief encounters—no strings, no hurt feelings—were the best way for him to go. It made life a whole hell of a lot easier that way.
    He touched a fingertip to the darkened dough. His skin sizzled on a dab of hot apple liquid. Shit.
    He ran the sore fingertip under the cold tap water spray for a long time waiting for the sting to settle down.
    What does it matter, really, that I’ve made an enemy of Sarah Grayson?
    Their having any kind of connection didn’t fit into his life plan. He’d been momentarily swayed by her, something he didn’t understand. It would have been easy if it had just been his typical primal need reaction surfacing. But, there was something beyond that with this woman.
    No flash, no subliminal cat call. Sarah Grayson had wooed his interest, had given him a single moment of what? Hope? Belief in possibilities?
    Christ, maybe Sal was right. He’d gone soft. He needed to leave Sarah and her secretive note the hell alone, stop the cop in himself from pondering scenarios of who’d stoop to that ploy.
    Benny shut the faucet off and dried his hand on a checked, threadbare towel. His fingertip pulsed. This wasn’t going away yet.

Chapter Six
    “Wait. Back up.” Gigi held a long-stemmed red rose in mid-air and halted her stem clipping as though she’d suddenly been frozen solid. “Did you say ‘strudel’?”
    “Yeah,” Sarah said, tapping her fingers on the flower shop’s work table. “I hope he burned it.”
    Gigi resumed her task, snipping the ends off the thorny stalks then gently slipping the delicate blooms among the others in the vase. She tilted her head, surveying the progress. “So, what next, Sarah?”
    “Fight the bastard.” She shrugged. “I filed all the paperwork today.”
    Gigi continued her arranging, adding sprigs of fern, tufts of powdery baby’s breath, all the while tilting her head from side to side, assessing the balance of her project. But what she was really doing was revving up, getting ready to make a bold statement.
    Sarah felt what was coming next—knew her friend like she knew herself—and she didn’t have to wait long.
    “I still think you should woo the son-of-a-bitch. Maybe ask him out for a drink.”
    “Seriously, Gigi, must you think bed whenever there’s an available man in the vicinity? Even a crazy one?”
    Gigi gave a little shrug and put on the pouty face that got her everywhere with everyone. “I didn’t say ‘bed’ him, sweetie.” She turned and gave Sarah a sloe-eyed glance. “We can’t help it if he’ll think you’re going to bed him.”
    “There’s a name for that, Gigi, and it’s not pretty. No thanks.”
    This was nothing new. Gigi had been through more men since her divorce than Sarah could count; which she’d never do for fear of fueling her concern.
    Now it was Sarah’s turn to tilt her head. She eyed Gigi fussing about with her greenery, her pretty features set on the task.