Page 31 of His Southern Temptation

He glanced at his watch, realized he had a few minutes, and decided to bring Jack up to speed on the missing persons case.

“I’m worried about Sarah Morgan. Eddie Wilkes is just big-time enough to be a real problem, and if Sarah was sleeping with him or crossed him, she might be dead.” Jack leaned forward, the spark in his eye demonstrating how much he loved this work. “This isn’t the case I thought it was when I took it on. I should just turn it over to Sheriff Burke and leave it alone.”

“But?” Jack said.

“Mr. Clean, I didn’t like the look he gave Taylor one little bit. My gut tells me Eddie is going to be a problem for her and he has something to do with Sarah being missing.” He looked down at the Formica tabletop, trying to curb the unease burrowing under his skin. When he met Jack’s gaze, he knew he understood exactly what was driving him nuts. “I wanted to get away from this kind of stuff, asshole criminals, always looking over my shoulder, and now it looks like I’m right back in it.”

They both rose from the table, each throwing a few bills on the table to cover their meal, waving at Dolly as they exited the diner and stepped out into the summer sunshine and the bustle of Main Street. Elliott was waking up, and Lucky knew his dad had been up and moving for a couple of hours. He needed to get out to the farm or his father would have done all the work himself.

“So, what are you going to do?” Jack paused in the middle of the sidewalk, ignoring the busy foot traffic.

“I’m going to have to find Sarah Morgan. And until I do I’ll have to keep Taylor from Eddie and Mr. Clean.”

“Sticking close by Taylor shouldn’t be too much of a hardship for you,” Jack said with a grin. “That is if she still doesn’t want to kill you for embarrassing her in front of Teague.”

“I have a feeling she’s going to make me pay for that.”

“Yes, but you’ll find a way to enjoy it,” Jack said with a laugh. “All right, I’m off to see if I can steal a kiss from my wife in between her appointments.” He slapped Lucky on the shoulder before turning toward Michaela’s office with a look of contentment on his face. Jack had been a happy man since finding “his Kayla” and it was the God’s honest truth that Lucky envied him. It hadn’t been an easy road, but Jack had come out on top and found a peace of mind that Lucky hadn’t known since he was a child.

Home was where you went to find the answers, and a few days ago he thought he knew all of them. Now, Lucky wasn’t sure he even knew the question.

Chapter Eleven

“I heard you got arrested last night at the Jolly Gent.”

“Holy shit. Can’t you keep anything secret in this town?” Lucky asked his dad, Owen, as he paused in his caulking job on the barn roof. The sun was hot and oppressive where he stood on top of the roof, but his father’s continued silence really made Lucky sweat. They were finishing up the last of the repairs to the roof in their usual mode—lots of hard work, little conversation, and many things present but remaining ignored. “Who told you?”

“Your mama. She heard it from one her regular customers at the beauty shop.” He turned to throw rotted boards over the side, the crash when they hit ground drifting back up to them in the quiet of the farm. As he swung back around, Owen peered at him from under the brow of his ball cap. “You’ve got some explaining to do.”

“Well, for the record, I didn’t get arrested. I was just taken in for questioning.” Obviously, he wasn’t used to being in Elliott again. He knew from a lifetime of prior experience that he should have called his mom and told her what happened before she opened Sissy’s Southern Style and learned of his exploits from her customers.

“I’m not the one you need to explain it to. Your mama was not pleased,” Owen said and returned to his job. “I heard the Elliot girl was arrest—” He paused, looking at Lucky, amusement teasing at his edge of his mouth. “I’m sorry—questioned—as well. You have anything to do with that?”

“Why do you assume I did?” Lucky asked, just to be ornery.

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