Page 62 of Engaging the Deputy

* * *

Olivia spent thenight in her mother’s large two-bed hotel room across the street from the sheriff’s office and the apartment over it. It had been their plan to spend the night before their wedding apart, but after her fears yesterday, she wished she was curled up in his arms.

Her mother had already fallen asleep and Olivia found herself at loose ends. After the dinner and the rehearsal, Jaden had told her what he’d discovered.

“You think Dean killed her?”

He’d nodded. “I don’t think she ever left for Spokane.”

“But I thought you said she was caught on a surveillance camera?”

“I now believe it was Jenny Lee, pretending to be her. It made no sense that she would leave her car to be vandalized, her belongings stolen,” he said. “I think he either found her out at the barn or managed to get her out there.”

“And killed her.” Olivia had frowned. “You’re saying this happened when he was allegedly missing after the tornado.”

“Angie said he would turn up, and he did. But he must have come back sooner than when he was found walking down the road saying he didn’t remember anything.”

“Like Cody,” she’d said.

Now, as she looked out the hotel room window, she could see the light on in the sheriff’s office. Her husband-to-be was busy the night before his wedding writing up his report. Olivia sighed and told herself that Jaden had said there were hardly ever tornadoes, let alone murders, around Fortune Creek.

She could only hope, she thought as she crawled into bed. She was getting married tomorrow. Unless there was another murder.

* * *

Jaden hadn’t realizedhow long he’d been waiting for this moment as he stood at the altar in the church, his best man the sheriff beside him.

“Nervous?” Brandt asked. Jaden shook his head. “Liar.”

The music began. He stared down the aisle, waiting for that moment when he would see his bride. Molly Parker came in first, and moments later, there Livie was. He tried to swallow the lump in his throat at the sight of her. She’d always been beautiful, but today she took his breath away as she walked toward him.

He tried to breathe, his heart racing. This was the moment. He looked into her eyes as she joined him. He thought he might see doubts or at least nervousness, but he saw none of it. This woman was going to marry him.

The weight of that didn’t help his breathing. Somehow, he got through the ceremony. They’d agreed to keep it short and sweet, and it was.

The next thing he knew, the pastor told him he could kiss his wife. He pulled her to him, their gazes locked, and he knew in his heart that this was the real thing. The kiss drew applause. People in this small town would applaud anything, he told himself as he stepped back, smiling.

Livie was smiling, too, her face aglow. He reached for her hand as the pastor announced them as husband and wife.

* * *

For Olivia, the weddingwas a blur of people Jaden had often talked about from his hometown. All of Fortune Creek had turned out for the wedding. The sheriff’s department’s elderly dispatcher/receptionist, Helen Graves, had brought her knitting bag, working on a project as she waited in the pew. There was Jaden’s good friend Ash Holland, from the hotel, and Cora Green, who owned the convenience mart and gas station, and, of course, Alice Weatherbee, who was catering the reception in the hotel lobby. Even the local coroner, J. D. Brown, attended.

There was a huge wedding cake as well as Alice’s signature dessert, her famous huckleberry pie. Olivia couldn’t believe what a warm welcome everyone gave her. After the stories Jaden had told her, she’d felt as if she already knew them all. But over the weeks preceding the wedding, they’d become like family.

Her mother had cried during the ceremony and again at the reception. “I’m so happy for you,” she’d said, hugging her. “Did you know Ash said there is a hotel room open for me, no charge, anytime I come up to visit?”

“You can also stay with us,” Olivia told her. “We have an extra room with your name on it.”

“That’s nice, but the two of you will be honeymooning for the first year,” Sharon Brooks said.

“Maybe for quite a few months,” she agreed. “After that, the baby might make it harder.”

“Baby?”Her mother’s face lit up. “Does Jaden know?”

“I’m telling him later tonight,” Olivia said and pretended to lock her lips and then her mother’s, since she looked as if she might burst with the news.

“I’m so happy for you,” her mother said, her voice breaking with emotion. “All I’ve ever wanted was for you to be happy.”

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