It's In His Smile (A Red River Valley Novel Book 3) Read online

“Sorry, buddy, it’s all I could find at the market.”

  Lloyd whined.

  Talmadge looked in the pantry for Lloyd’s regular dog food one more time but came up with nothing.

  He blew out a breath. He had more important things to do than worry about a dog.

  “Sorry, buddy. Children are starving in Africa. I’m not driving back to the store tonight just to get different food.” And he certainly wasn’t going to call Miranda and ask her what Lloyd usually ate.

  He’d had enough of Miranda Cruz for one day.

  Hell.

  Actually, no. He hadn’t had anywhere near enough of her. That was the problem. He’d kissed her because he’d wanted to ever since the last time. Had never forgotten the time they were together.

  And since he’d stepped out onto the inn’s back porch and got a nice view of Miranda’s panties, he hadn’t stopped wanting to see her in nothing but those panties. And maybe a pair of boots.

  Jesus, he was acting like a horny teenager. Their first kiss—and everything else that had gone along with it—had happened years ago in a moment of weakness. They’d both had a few drinks at a wedding reception. And afterward Miranda told him it had been a huge mistake. A huge, drunken mistake.

  The throb in his shoulder deepened. It seemed to get worse when he was stressed, and thinking about Miranda Cruz made his blood pressure spike.

  Lloyd’s disturbing glare hadn’t faltered, so Talmadge glared back. In under a minute, Talmadge broke, and grabbed a couple of gallon-sized baggies from the pantry. He started to fill them with ice from the freezer.

  “Give me a minute, and I’ll see if I can find some human food for you.” He looked at Lloyd while scooping ice into the bag.

  Lloyd sniffed again.

  Talmadge shook his head.

  So why had he never been able to completely get Miranda out of his head? He had no idea what possessed him to kiss her today.

  Not true.

  He just liked the way she was so down-to-earth. So real. So unlike the women who’d tried to latch on to him since he’d become rich and famous. Well, he was still famous. For now. He glanced at his arm, which was cradled against his middle. If his investments and his current building project didn’t improve soon, he wouldn’t have to fend off shallow women anymore. His market value would plummet like the Dow Jones after an oil spill.

  That was probably the only upside to his problems. He had grown tired of the plastic women his career had thrust into his path. Who would’ve guessed that becoming an architect would turn him into a quasi-celebrity?

  He smirked. What a joke. He hadn’t dated much the last several years because of it.

  He grabbed an ice pick from the drawer and chipped away at the ice cubes that had frozen together in a solid block at the bottom of the ice bag.

  Miranda was a breath of fresh mountain air, and she’d obviously cared about his grandmother. And he’d gone and made stupid accusations because his ego had been wounded. Worse, he’d nearly made her cry.

  Then he’d kissed the sense out of her until she let out a tiny moan. Which only made him want more.

  It seemed to take another hundred years or so to chip and fill the bags, but he finally balanced them over his shoulder. He reached for a rolled-up ACE bandage on the counter and the bags wobbled. The hand on his injured arm shot up instinctively to steady them, and he howled in pain. An ice pack slid off and hit the floor with a thud.

  Lloyd skittered into a corner, trembling.

  Shit. Talmadge threw the other bag into the scarred ceramic sink and gripped the edge of the counter. Opened the ruffled blue plaid curtain and stared out the picture window over the sink that overlooked the twinkling lights of Red River below.

  Coming back to Red River for his grandma’s funeral had been hard enough. He knew she hadn’t been feeling well. Had heard it in her voice during their phone calls. Then it was too late, and she was gone without him saying good-bye. But coming back a failure? An absolute nightmare, even if no one knew he was all but broke.

  Kneeling, he gave the dog a scratch and picked him up. “Sorry, buddy. Didn’t mean to scare you.”

  He wandered into the den where he’d spent evenings with his grandparents and every Saturday morning watching cartoons until he was old enough to drive. The worn shag carpet was rough against his bare feet and crunched with each step. The place was tidy, but a thick layer of dust coated the coffee table, and the brown paneling and outdated furniture made the place look dank and dirty.

  What had Bea done with the money he’d sent her over the years? She could’ve remodeled every inch of the place. Better yet, she could’ve let him tear it down and build a new house. A mansion by Red River standards. But she’d loved this old gingerbread house up on the hill with just enough elevation to look out over the town. His grandfather had built it for her when they first married, and she couldn’t part with it.

  He eased onto the frayed but comfortable sofa, set the dog in his lap so he could grab the remote, and flicked the channel to ESPN. There. Back to the real world. That should help relax him.

  Except it didn’t because all he could think about was his floundering project back in Washington that was still headlining the news across the state. He plucked his cell off the coffee table and Googled press coverage on the Trinity Falls accident. He tapped the link for a Seattle-based channel.

  Talmadge’s chest tightened as the news anchor reported on the accident, the injuries, the ancient ruins, and the unknown future of the Trinity Falls community. A preaching, teaching lecture on the irony of a leading green architect nearly destroying one of the most important archeological finds of the century. Conveniently, the reporter left out the part about how Talmadge himself stopped the project immediately to call in the authorities and every tribal council in the state of Washington.

  He stared at the screen as the reporter droned on.

  And on.

  And on.

  He hit the stop button and tossed the phone onto the lace doily in the middle of the coffee table. He let his head fall back to rest on the sofa cushion and rubbed his tired eyes.

  A new call dinged on his phone. His office assistant’s name popped onto the screen. He touched the green button and answered.

  “Hey, Ellen.”

  “Hey, boss. Sorry to bother you at a time like this. How’re you holding up?” Ellen’s kids were grown, but she still held that motherly tone.

  Probably why he hired her. She reminded him of Bea.

  “I’m makin’ it. What’s up?” Hopefully not Trinity Falls, unless it was good news.

  “That crazy reporter called again. The one who writes the gossip column for the local paper. Wanted an update on you and Monica.”

  That would be Miss January. Talmadge’s eyes slid shut.

  “I told her you were out of the office for a family emergency. Want me to give her any other message? Like maybe to get lost on a deserted island or something?”

  “She’ll just get more relentless. Ignore her for now. I’ll deal with it when I get back to Seattle. Anything else?”

  “I’ve taken up knitting. It helps pass the time.”

  He smirked. “Glad to hear business is that good while I’m gone.”

  “I’ll knit you a scarf.”

  Maybe she could teach him how to knit since he didn’t have much work going on at the moment. He let out a hollow laugh. “I’ll be back in a few days. Call if anything else comes up.”

  Fat chance.

  He ended the call, and Lloyd nuzzled Talmadge’s chest. With his arm wrapped around the pooch, Talmadge used a forefinger to scratch Lloyd’s belly.

  Someone rapped at the front door, and Lloyd yapped. Langston maybe? At the wake, his high school buddy had threatened to stop by for a beer. A beer or four sounded pretty good right now.

  Talmadge drew in a deep breath, left Lloyd on the sofa, and walked into the foyer.

  Bea’s old house didn’t have a peephole, so Talmadge flipped on the porch
light and jerked open the door, expecting Langston to be standing there with a six-pack of beer under his arm and a smart-ass smirk on his face. It had become a ritual during Talmadge’s rare visits home.

  Instead, Miranda’s eyes rounded, and she seemed to stop breathing for a beat.

  It wasn’t the gust of frosty evening air that made his skin tingle. It was her big brown eyes cascading over his chest, bared by the gaping shirt. Despite the frigid April temperatures, heat started to gather below his waist when her gaze fixed to the unbuttoned waistband of his jeans. The copper flecks in her eyes blazed to life.

  Still in the clothes she’d had on when he last saw her at the wake, she held a grocery bag in each arm.

  But her attention stayed firmly on his . . . crotch.

  He couldn’t help it. He couldn’t. The corners of his mouth curved up.

  “Can I help you with something?” Because by the look on her face, she wanted help with something.

  Her gaze snapped to his, her eyes widening even more.

  “No.”

  Satisfaction bloomed in his chest because even though she’d just said no with more defensiveness in her tone than the Seattle Seahawks had in their starting lineup, she nodded involuntarily.

  “I, um, brought Lloyd’s food. And his dog bowls.” She gave one of the bags a jerking boost. “There’s some leftover food from the wake in this one. I thought you might get hungry, and the deviled eggs are really good.” When she mentioned the deviled eggs her eyes grew bigger and her expression turned to mortification.

  Talmadge couldn’t imagine why talking about deviled eggs would make her react that way. Deviled eggs were good. He liked deviled eggs.

  She tried to shove both bags at him at once.

  “Oof.” The bags jammed against his chest, and his good arm closed around one of them. “I can’t hold the other one. Would you mind bringing it in for me?”

  She blinked at him.

  “You’ve been inside Bea’s house, right?” He knew for certain she had.

  Two more blinks.

  He raised both eyebrows at her and angled his head to prompt her to speak.

  “You’re half-naked,” she blurted, keeping her eyes steadily on his. The sheer willpower she exerted to not look at him from the neck down showed in her stiff expression.

  A muscle next to her eye ticked.

  He fought off a chuckle. “Come on, Miranda. I’m not naked. I had a hard time changing because of my shoulder.” He paused. A tiny pang of guilt gathered in his chest for wanting to tease her. But hell no, he couldn’t resist. “Besides, we’ve seen each other naked before.”

  Like Miranda could ever forget being skin to skin with Talmadge Oaks. Especially since it had been her first and her only time to ever be skin to skin with . . . anyone.

  She narrowed her eyes at him and tried to ignore his perfectly sculpted abs.

  She really did try.

  But then he adjusted the bag against his hip and the hard muscles of his chest rippled and jumped.

  Her mouth turned to chalk dust.

  “I can’t come in.” Surely that croaking sound wasn’t her voice? “I’ll just leave it here on the porch.” Yes, she definitely sounded like a frog. Time to go before she leaped all over him or her tongue shot out to lick him or something even more embarrassing. Hadn’t she just blurted something about deviled eggs? The very ones that that were laced with her pesky pheromones.

  Holy Jeez. She started to set the bag down.

  “My shoulder’s acting up, Miranda. Can you help me out?” He shrugged. “Since you’re here and all.”

  She really shouldn’t. She hadn’t always exercised good judgment around Talmadge, especially on the rare occasions she’d found herself alone with him. Besides, the way people in this town idolized him because of his notoriety, even jumped when he snapped his fingers, irritated her.

  “Please.” His voice and his look were a little helpless and a whole lotta cute.

  Her insides turned to mush.

  Without a word she took a step toward him, and he angled his body so she could cross the threshold. When she brushed past him, the rich scent of his soap sent her pulse racing. He kicked the door closed with a bare foot and headed toward the kitchen.

  “In here.” He tossed his head in the general direction of the kitchen. With long strides, he walked ahead of her, his shirttails flapping to each side, Levi’s draping perfectly over a firm butt and muscled thighs.

  Miranda squeezed her eyes shut for a second and nearly bumped into the wall.

  Talmadge stopped and frowned over his shoulder. “You okay?”

  “Um, yeah. Just tired from putting on the wake.”

  As soon as he turned to stroll into the kitchen, Miranda mouthed a curse and followed him She set the bag on the counter and stared at the bowls on the floor.

  “He’ll never eat out of that.”

  Talmadge’s brows pulled together.

  She took the bag from his arm and set it on the counter. Digging inside, she produced a small can of expensive gourmet dog food and held it up for him to see. Then she dug into the bag again and pulled out two of Bea’s bowls. “He’ll only eat this brand of dog food, which isn’t available in Red River.” Miranda set the can on the blue kitchen counter. “And he’ll only eat out of these bowls.” She separated the two pieces of fine china and popped the lid off the can.

  “That’s Bea’s good china,” Talmadge murmured.

  “Yep.” Miranda pulled open Bea’s flatware drawer and grabbed a spoon. “He’s spoiled.”

  She spooned the mushy dog food into the bowl and called Lloyd’s name. She placed the bowl on the floor next to the other two. He pranced into the kitchen and buried his thin snout in the food, lapping it up like it was his first meal of the day.

  “That’s amazing.” Talmadge watched Lloyd eat. “Bea never let me use those dishes, because she didn’t want any pieces to get broken.”

  “What did you need help with?” Miranda wiped her hands on a dishtowel.

  He turned those silvery eyes on her and stared at her for a second like he was still trying to wrap his head around a dog eating out of his grandmother’s coveted china. “Oh,” he finally said. “Can you help me wrap up my shoulder? I can’t do it one-handed, and it needs to be iced several times a day.”

  Simple enough. She could do that.

  He tugged one sleeve down over his arm, and that side of his dress shirt fell away, exposing more of his chest.

  Miranda’s vision went all fuzzy for a second.

  “I’ll show you how to do it,” he said.

  Those words made his ripped torso snap back into perfect focus. Once—seven years, three months, and twelve days ago—he’d shown her how to do other things. Very nice things. Things she missed right about now.

  “Miranda?” He fished the ice packs out of the sink.

  She shook her head to clear her muddled brain. “Yes.” She nearly yelled. “Sure thing.”

  “Can you grab one of the bandages?” He nodded to the two long strips of rolled elastic bandages and set the bags of ice on the counter. “I’m going to hold one bag in the front and the other in the back so they overlap just a little.”

  She scurried over and snatched up the bandage. Then she sidestepped around him to work from behind. No way was she going to stand face-to-face with him so close that his breath would wash over her cheeks, down her neck, and prickle her skin all the way to her—

  “Wrap the bandage over my shoulder.”

  She jumped. Then reached up to follow his instructions.

  The heat of his skin and the cold ice mingled together as her fingers brushed across his chest to stretch the bandage into place, and a shiver ricocheted through her. She swallowed. Okay. Done. God, he smelled good.

  “Okay, circle it under my arm and back up over the shoulder again.”

  What? She breathed him in. Oh. Yeah. She followed his instructions, her hand skimming along the sleek angles of his torso.
/>   “Now diagonal across my back.” His tone turned husky.

  She smoothed the bandage across his back, and the muscles rippled under her touch.

  Good God.

  “Then all the way around my chest . . .” His voice cracked on the last word and trailed off.

  What was that annoying ringing in her ears?

  She reached around his torso with the bandage and had to wrap both arms around his middle to catch the bandage roll with the other hand. And oh, sweet baby Jesus, he was so warm and hard. Her breasts pressed against his back, and she really wanted to kiss the bare skin between his shoulder blades, because it was right there just an inch from her lips.

  His breath hitched, and she hesitated. Her arms were still wrapped around him like a sensual embrace. He released the ice packs, secured now by the bandage, and placed his hand over hers.

  “Miranda?” He said her name, soft and gentle, and this time his tone held a question that entailed far more than just helping wrap his shoulder.

  “What?” she snapped, peeved at herself much more than at him. Because, really, how could she let herself react like . . . like one of his hotel-owning groupies? “I just couldn’t reach it.” She switched the bandage to the other hand and put a few inches between them while she wrapped it over his shoulder again.

  His big hand fell away from hers. “I was just going to ask where Bea gets the dog food.” His voice went hard, just like his body.

  “Oh.” She wrapped and diagonaled and circled and wrapped. And tried to shake off the zing of heat pulsing through her veins straight to the spot between her thighs. The spot that only Talmadge had been able to bring to a boil. “She had to drive into Taos for it.” She tried to smooth the damned croak in her voice. “I’ve picked it up for her the past few months because she didn’t feel like making the trip.”

  Finished with the bandage, she secured the end by tucking it into the web she’d woven around him.

  He turned to face her. Stared down at her from under shuttered lashes. “Thank you for helping Bea. And thank you for the wake.”

  Oh. Well. She cleared her throat, and the ringing in her ears got a little louder.

  “Is there anything else I can do for you?” She nearly swallowed her tongue. “I mean do you need help with anything else?”