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Chapter Four

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M egan answered the door on the first knock. “Come on in. I’ve made coffee. Would you like some cream-puff swans?”

“Like those at the wedding?”

“Yes.”

“Yeah, that sounds good. I forgot about dinner.”

That information put her into a dilemma. As a good neighbor, she should offer him something to eat. Well, she certainly wasn’t going to cook for him. With a grimace, she asked if he’d like some leftovers. “There’s about a dozen of those little sandwiches left.”

“Any with the ham spread?”

“Yes.”

She placed all the remainders on a platter on the kitchen table, put out a plate, pointed out the microwave oven and told him to help himself.

He did. When he’d finished, the finger sandwiches were gone, along with the pâté, stuffed olives and some kind of veal loaf, then he polished off the last of the cream-filled swans. He finished off the glass of milk she’d also offered.

“That was good. Thanks.”

“Would you like a cup of coffee?”

“Please.” He put his dishes in the dishwasher while she poured two cups of coffee.

She joined him at the table and removed the folder from the manila envelope. Laying it on the table in front of him, she said, “This is all the information Jess and I have collected from the official files and the newspapers.”

“Nice to have relatives in the sheriff’s office, huh?”

He didn’t cast any particular inflection on the words, so she wasn’t quite sure how to take the statement. Ignoring it, she was silent while he perused the reports. When he came to the photos, he studied each of them in detail.

It was a few minutes after ten when he finished.

“What do you think?” she asked, getting up to refill their cups.

“You were right. The sailboat isn’t as far down as I thought. Maybe it won’t be an impossible task.”

“To float it to the surface?”

He gave her an appraising glance as if reassessing her intelligence. His expression was stony.

“Jess thought maybe that was why you wanted the compressor, to float the Mary Dee to the top. He said with the two motorboats, we could probably pull her in.”

“Oh, he did, did he? Did you discuss this with anyone else that I should know about?”

“Well, Kate was here.”

His lips thinned to a straight line. She returned his scowl with no expression whatsoever. Slowly his frown changed from anger to…she wasn’t sure what.

“You drive me crazy when you do that,” he at last said.

“What?”

“Look at me like that. Your eyes are fathoms deep and mysterious, like a mossy pool hidden in the woods. You’re good at disguising your thoughts.”

She blinked in mild shock at his words. “So are you.”

His gaze continued to move over her, from her eyes downward to her mouth, where he lingered for a long moment, then a quick flick along her shirt, then back to her eyes.

Heat slid gently up her neck and into her face. Her breath went jerky until she forced herself to breathe deeply several times. She stared at him, into eyes that seemed to be charcoal rather than silvery-gray tonight.

When I Dream Of You

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