Page 98 of Perfectly Matched: Harbor Falls Romance Collection

“What a joke.”

Stone studied the cinderblock walls around him and rose to grasp the iron bars that separated his jail cell from the hallway. The time was somewhere past ten in the evening and he’d been tossed in the clink about twenty minutes earlier by Deputy Do-Right. He shook the bars a little, just to test their strength.

Secure enough, he supposed, for the kinds of criminals they got around here.

The kind, of course, he was not. He wasn’t a criminal at all, just a man trying to save his business.

Huffing out a quick breath, he pushed back and paced from one side of the cell to another. What in the hell was he thinking?

Well, he knew exactly what he was thinking. It had occurred to him earlier that evening that people in Podunk towns are way too trusting, and that sometimes, they even leave their doors and windows unlocked.

That’s all he was thinking.

Nothing major—just a little minor breaking and entering. Hey, if the door was unlocked, did it really count?

Did a goat have teeth?

Evidently, Harbor Falls wasn’t exactly that kind of town. Not currently, anyway. The bakery was shut up tighter than a drum. Oh, he’d rattled a couple of windows and jerked on the back-door handle once or twice, but to no avail. And it wasn’t that he was really going to steal anything, he just wanted a glimpse of the scone recipe.

Just a glimpse. Or perhaps peruse some of the ingredients stored on a counter, so he could do a quick survey.

That wasn’t stealing, was it? Just looking?

Can looks steal?

Except, he did have a photographic memory and intellectual capital notwithstanding… He hadn’t had time to contemplate it all, though, because that’s when Deputy Do-Right had crept up behind him in his cruiser and turned his light beam on him.

Busted.

This wasn’t good. The last thing he needed was bad publicity. The very last thing.

Voices rose from the outer office. A woman’s. A man’s—the deputy, he assumed. Then the woman again and it didn’t sound like she was happy.

The man argued back. Happiness wasn’t on his agenda, either, he could tell.

Then footsteps. Quick ones. Coming closer. Quieter ones, followed by louder ones, all mingled with the back and forth of the voices.

Standing close to the iron bars now, he leaned toward the hallway to see if he could get a better hearing and seeing position. That’s when the blonde popped around the corner, and that’s when he took in the midnight blue of Sydney Hart’s eyes for the second time that day.

He gulped.

“Release him.”

Sydney stopped square in front of the cell. She bit the words out to the deputy but looked straight at him.

“Get him the hell out of there,”

she added.

“But Sydney, he was poking around outside your place.”

“The man just likes my scones.”

She peered into his eyes.

“Right? You just like my scones, right?”

He had no clue why she was defending him.

“Yes, of course. Your coffee and your scones. Ms. Hart, let me explain.”

She waved him off. “No need.”

Turning to Matt, she added.

“It was my property he was messing around on and I’m not pressing charges. Release him, Matt.”

“But, Syd…”

“Do it. Now.”

Stone pursed his lips and waited. Last thing he wanted was to look a gift horse in the mouth. He could play this game. He cast his gaze first on Sydney, then Matt, and back again to Sydney.

“Well?”

She crossed her arms over her chest and tapped her foot. That was kind of cute. He wanted to smile but didn’t.

Deputy Do-Right reached into his pocket.

“If you say so, Sydney, but Suzie is going to…”

“I do say so and never mind about Suzie. I’m calling the shots here.”

“All right.”

Matt pushed they old key into the lock, and within seconds, the door swung open.

“Thank you,”

Stone said, tipping his head toward Sydney.

“I’ll be on my way now. I’ve caused enough excitement tonight.”

He slipped between the cop and the woman, ready for a quick getaway.

Would he be so lucky?

“Wait a minute, Buster,”

she said.

“I’m not finished with you, yet.”

Um, guess not.

****

His car had been impounded, Matt said, when they took the guy into the station. The impound lot was out on Spicer Road, near the mountain side of town. It was a place most people really didn’t want to go at night. Secluded. Dark. A little spooky. And there was that old, creepy story about the roaming spirits of lovers who had leapt to their depths near there, at a notorious Lover’s Leap up on Falls Mountain. Matt had said he’d take the man out there to pick up his vehicle, but Sydney put her foot down real hard and told him flat out, “No.”

To hell with Harbor Falls lore and things that go bump in the night. She had some schmoozing to do, and then some. The last thing she needed was for the town of Harbor Falls to put a bad taste in this food editor’s mouth.

Now, here she was, close to midnight and driving into No Man’s Land with a male stranger in her passenger seat whom everyone but her thought was a stalker. Plus, to beat all, she had just sprung the Mystery Man out of jail as if it was the most natural thing in the world for her to do.

Not making a lot of sense here, Sydney, she chided herself.

Nevertheless, she needed to keep a level head. If her suspicions were correct, and this man was an editor or writer for a major food magazine, or a network television show, or a foodie Web site or something, she had to keep him happy.

And happily in scones and coffee, if need be.

“I’m very sorry about all this,”

she told him, staring straight ahead.

“My apologies for the town, the police force, the universe, whatever. Totally uncalled for.”

“It’s okay. Thank you for getting me out of there, however.”

“No problem. Glad to do it.”

He cleared his throat.

“Actually, I was snooping around.”

She gripped the steering wheel tighter and said a prayer. “Oh?”

He didn’t immediately respond. With her fingers firmly wrapped around the wheel, she negotiated a slight curve, the beams of her headlights playing over the skeletons of trees alongside the road and glanced his way.

He sat looking straight at her.

Her lips went dry. He didn’t look like a stalker, she reasoned. He was actually a very nice-looking man. If he looked menacing or sported a sinister tic like squinting his eyes at her or had a scar slashed across his cheek or something, she could more easily consider him a bad guy—but as it was, he just looked rather normal.

And hunky, too.

She wondered what color his hair was, always covered up under that ball cap. It was short, whatever the color.

Same thing about his eyes. Always hidden.

But maybe he doesn’t want you to see his eyes, Sydney. Eyes reveal things. Bad things. Windows to the soul. Bad soul.

Stop it, Sydney.

Man was she conflicted.

“I was curious, actually.”

Curious? Crap. Sounded like something a stalker would say.

“Um. About?”

She waited. What would she do if he said something like, about how you would look with a noose around your neck while I’m having my way with you and peeling the skin off your back with a paring knife.

Her tummy went all riffle-y.

“Oh, well... About your kitchen, actually. Loved your scone, by the way, and the coffee. You were baking a lot today, and I’m sort of a food buff, and I love seeing how other people set up their kitchens, so I thought I’d sneak a peek in your back door or window. Just curious, mind you. But...”

Ah, ha! She smiled. Knew it. Knew it, knew it, knew it. He had food editor written all over him. Gotcha.

“If you had asked, I would have given you the grand tour.”

He pondered that. “Really?”

“Absolutely.”

“Perhaps I can take a rain check on that?”

Sydney spotted the sign for the impound lot and pulled off onto a darkish side road. Rain check.

“Oh, well, sure.”

Really Sydney? Are you sure? Of course, I am.

There was a little, shack-like building close to the gate, and the guy who watched over the lot was supposed to be there waiting for them. He lived just down the road. Even though she was convinced the man sitting next to her was safe now, the spooky, dark, tree-covered lane was a mite unsettling.

A horn blasted from their right. Mike’s truck was parked in a side lot. She braked hard, shrieked a little, and parked the car with a sudden jerk.

“Oh! Sorry.”

“No problem.”

Without hesitation, she decided to forge ahead. Turning in her seat toward Mystery Man, she spied Mike getting out of his truck and heading toward the gate. She stuck out her hand toward MM.

“I’m Sydney Hart, and I really believe we should just cut to the chase here.”

MM’s eyes widened. She could tell that even from under the brim of his ball cap. “Oh?”

She nodded.

“Yes. Who are you?”

“I’m St...St...Steve...”

He took her hand.

Mike flashed his flashlight toward their car and then banged it on the chain link. Sydney guessed that meant the gate was open now.

They both jerked their gazes toward him. Her hand remained in his palm.

“Gate.”

“What?”

“Steve Gate. That’s my name.”

Turning back, it was her turn to reply, “Oh.”

Mike banged on the gate again. She guessed he wanted this transaction to happen quickly so he could back home to his warm bed and coonhound.

She shook Steve’s hand then quickly released it. He made a move toward the passenger side door, laying a hand on the handle.

“I know who you are,”

she told him.

The light flashed around inside the car. Mike shouted something.

Steve looked a tad uncomfortable.

“Okay,”

she plunged ahead.

“I don’t know really who you are, but I believe I know why you are here. You are in the food biz, right?”

His eyes widened, and she saw his hand lift the door latch.

“You’re an editor, right? Or a producer? You saw the article in the magazine, and you want to know more about me. Right? It’s okay. You don’t have to sneak around. Let’s just set up a time for an interview and the grand kitchen tour and move on with it.”

There. Her shoulders fell and a whoosh exited her lungs. All out in the open.

A brisk rapping came at her window, startling her.

“Sydney! What the hell? C’mon.”

Turning, she said.

“Okay, Mike!” Geez.

Steve took advantage of the pause and quickly left the car. It was so abrupt that it gave her a momentary brain shake. What? Why was he retreating when all he’d been doing for a couple of days now was move toward her? He gave her a backward glance and said,

“Sure thing, hon. Thanks for the ride. Will be in touch,”

then slammed the door and off he went.

She sat for a moment, a little deflated, and watched him walk alongside the burly Mike.

He pulled his wallet out of his hip pocket, she supposed to pay the impound fee. Mike led him into the small shack, a light came on inside, and the door closed.

She slapped the palm of her hand at her forehead.

“I’m an idiot.”

An unsettled feeling snaked across her abdomen. This all felt just too…weird. And scary. Had she just sprung her stalker from jail?

Good Lord!

****

“In the first place, I can’t believe that you convinced Matt to let the stalker go, and in the second place,”

Suzie went on, tugging a tray of cinnamon rolls out of the back of Sydney’s van.

“I can’t believe you drove the man all the way out Spicer Road to get his car. I mean, that’s like Deliverance territory out there. Not the kind of place you want to be with a stalker, and…

Sydney took one side of the tray and steadied it while Suzie balanced it in her arms.

“And thirdly, I can’t believe that you freakin’ invited him back to your bakery for a tour, no less. Are you insane?”

Sydney chewed on that a second. Probably.

But not in the way that Suzie thought. She was still convinced that this Steve Gate was harmless, not a stalker. She just hadn’t totally figured out yet why he was snooping around her place. He hadn’t reacted much when she’d blurted out that she knew why he was following her.

He’d just sort of cut her off, slammed the door, and left.

What was that all about?

Had she scared him? Had he changed his mind about her because she was too assertive? She could be that, you know, assertive.

Dammit.

Had she ruined her celebrity foodie career before it even got off the ground?

So, she had to turn the tide somehow. Take another tack. My God, was she plotting in her mind a way to get him back to the bakery?

Yes.

She followed Suzie up the back entrance to the Lodge, mulling all that over in her head while carrying another tray of pastries, and entered the kitchen. It was barely six o’clock in the morning, and she’d been up since four. She’d not gotten home until after midnight and had barely managed three hours sleep, since for the first hour she lay in bed asking herself the same stupid questions that had rolled off Suzie’s tongue.

What was she thinking?

How could she be certain this man was a food editor? All she had was a hunch. Was he a stalker, like Suzie insisted? Or maybe he was simply a harmless lover of scones.

Whatever.

She had to put it out of her mind right now, though—there was nothing she could do about it now. Time would tell whether Mystery Man or Steve Gates or whatever-the-hell his name was ever crossed her path again.

She didn’t care. Not right now.

This morning, she had too much work to do to bother contemplating.

“I don’t want to talk about it right now,”

she told her cousin.

“Fine.”

Suzie put down the tray of rolls, brushed her palms together, and headed back toward the door.

“I’ll go get the last tray of muffins. Can you start arranging the platters?”

She nodded. Of course.

“But I will say that I do not think he is a stalker. I really do think he’s connected some way in the food entertainment business.”

Suzie circled back in one fluid movement and caught her gaze.

“Sydney, I know the food entertainment business. I am in the food entertainment business. I know editors and producers. They don’t sneak around back alleys trying to break into bakeries, and they don’t stalk people in grocery stories. If they want you, they’ll approach you straight up. Sneaking around is not what professionals do.”

Sydney gulped and took in every word Suzie said. It all made sense.

“But maybe he just...”

She put up a hand.

“Stop. It. Now.”

Her shoulders slumped.

“Okay. Got it. I’ll steer clear.”

Stepping forward, Suzie forced eye contact with her again.

“Repeat after me, Sydney Hart, God as my witness, I swear on my fanciest spatula that I will not invite that man into my bakery for a tour, and if I see him coming, I will close the shop and call Matt. Got it? Now, repeat after me.”

Sydney mumbled the words while her dreams of being scone-famous evaporated. Oh, well. Suzie was probably right. Likely not room in this town for two celebrity chefs anyway, right?

Of course.

She’d let Suzie go with it and be happy riding along on her coattails.

Sort of.

“So, now I’m heading back to the van for that last tray. Let’s get busy here.”

“Sure.”

They had a continental breakfast spread to get out in the smaller dining room of the Lodge before seven. The annual writers’ conference attendees had trickled in yesterday, according to Suzie, and the retreat started today. Truth be told, she was happy to keep her hands busy for the next hour or so, and her brain devoid of any thought of stalkers or editors or men in general.

“Just work, Syd,”

she mumbled.

“It’s what you do best.”