Chapter 1
All you need to do is tell me where she is,” Simon growled. “Come on, you can help a guy out.”
Erin shook her head. She continued to line up portions of cream cheese icing in tiny paper cups along the tray, deliberately avoiding eye contact with him. The rich, spicy smell of the freshly baked cinnamon rolls filled the bakery.
“Sorry, can’t help you,” she told Simon. As if she hadn’t already told him a dozen times. She would just keep repeating it calmly as if he were a child and, sooner or later, he would leave. At least, that was the theory she was operating under. She hoped that it would unfold the way she planned. She didn’t want there to be any trouble.
“You know where she lives,” Simon insisted. “Where she works. You know where in town she might be.”
Erin shook her head. “I don’t keep track of Adrienne, sorry.”
“Where’s the other one? Bella? She would tell me where Adrienne is. She knows that we’re back together again. You think you’re protecting Adrienne from something, but you’re not. We’re together; I’m just wondering where she is right now. I need to talk to her.”
Bella came out of the kitchen and stood back behind the counter with Erin. She was an older teen, still in high school. She had a brilliant business mind and wanted to own her own business after college. She was one of Erin’s most dependable workers and always came up with good ideas. She was slightly heavy, with wavy blond hair and a ready smile.
At least, she usually had a smile on her face. Today, she was obviously not entertaining friendly thoughts about Simon.
“You and Adrienne are not together again,” she told him icily, “and Erin and I are not helping you find her or talk to her, or passing a message to her, or anything else. Why don’t you go back to Las Vegas or wherever you were? Adrienne doesn’t want anything to do with you.”
“My wife is in Bald Eagle Falls, Tennessee, so I am in Bald Eagle Falls, Tennessee,” Simon said in a sharp, flinty tone. “And I’m not leaving here unless she and the kids are with me.”
“That’s not going to happen,” Bella told him flatly.
Erin would never have had that kind of confidence as a teenager. She hated confrontation and would do just about anything to avoid it. But Bella was a dragon, standing up to a man twice her age, protecting Adrienne and her children.
Erin had been worried that Adrienne would get back together with Simon. Despite their efforts to keep Simon from tracking her down over the past few weeks, he had met up with Adrienne in town a couple of times. Bald Eagle Falls was not a big place; it wasn’t that hard to find her if she were in town instead of at Bella’s family farm, or wherever else she and her children might be squatting now. Erin wouldn’t be surprised if Adrienne had moved her family deeper into the bush. Simon could find out from anyone in town where the Prost farm was if he knew that was where his wife and children were. People were always trying to be helpful and put families back together, even when you told them there was good reason to keep them apart. Friends and family members were notorious for feeling sorry for a wrongly done husband and father who just wanted to make things right.
They had looked pretty cozy when Erin had seen them together. Erin worried that Adrienne would take him back and put the children at risk. Adrienne had told Erin that she didn’t want anything to do with Simon, but her actions didn’t bear that out. It was obvious that she was attracted to him. They had been together long enough to produce several children—Erin didn’t know if all of the children were his or not, but at least a few of them were—so the relationship was a comfortable place for Adrienne to return to. Being with Simon would feel natural. It would be easy to be seduced by his lies and believe that he was now going to support her. He was a changed man.
Only he wasn’t. A leopard didn’t change its spots.
Adrienne wanted to believe Simon would support her and her children now. That he wouldn’t abandon them again, or do whatever other stupid stuff he’d done in the past. Adrienne admitted they had already broken up and gotten back together more than once. Erin was reminded of Adele, the gamekeeper who lived in the woods behind Erin’s house and helped to keep them free of trespassers. Despite Adele’s saying that she never wanted to see her husband again—and hadn’t even told anyone she was married when she had first moved into town—Erin had seen how Rudolph Windsor had still persuaded her to take him in. He was bad for her and had a criminal past, but that had not stopped her from allowing him into her life again. Though, of course, it hadn’t lasted.
Erin had her own history too. Would she have fallen back in with Brandon if he had shown up unexpectedly in Bald Eagle Falls and tried to woo her instead of stalking her? She would like to think that she would not have been tempted. She had lived with him out of desperation when she hadn’t had anywhere else to go. It hadn’t been a matter of loving him. She supposed that was the difference between her and Adrienne or Adele. It was a lot harder to resist a man you loved.
As far as Erin knew, Simon wasn’t a criminal, just a lowlife. Someone who had abandoned his wife and kids one too many times. Gathering what she could from Simon’s and Bella’s words, Adrienne had finally decided to be tough and kick Simon to the curb.
And he was desperate to get back together with her now that she had money.
Chapter 2
If you’re not going to buy something,” Erin told Simon, “please move on. Other people are waiting to be served.”
Simon’s small, black eyes flashed. He wasn’t going to be put off that easily.
“Buy something? All of these empty carbs?” He looked over the items on display in the bakery case.
It wasn’t like he was an athlete, keeping his body in pristine condition. He was on the short side for a man, with skinny arms and a gut. Not someone who worked out or watched what he ate.
Erin didn’t bother to explain or excuse the preponderance of carbs in the display case. It was a bakery. Simon had known that when he had shoved his way through the front door.
“What are these?” Simon pointed to the sample cups Erin was preparing.
“Cream cheese icing for the cinnamon rolls. These ones are dairy,” Erin pointed, “and these are vegan. Non-dairy.”
“Non-dairy cream cheese?” he scoffed.
“Not everyone has the benefit of being able to eat dairy,” Erin said evenly. “There are a lot of people who are allergic or intolerant. And they would still like to be able to enjoy their cinnamon rolls.”
“They are cinn-fully delicious,” Vic intoned from where she stood at the register.
Simon barely spared the pretty blond a glance. Most men would have at least given tall, slim, Vic a look of admiration. But maybe Simon had learned from Adrienne that Vic was trans, so he ignored her.
“All this stuff about everybody being intolerant or allergic to everything these days is just a crock,” Simon asserted. “Sure, there are a few people who have celiac disease or will actually die if they eat something, but that’s just a few people out of thousands. Everybody else,” he shook his head in disapproval, “they’re just being trendy. Pretending they are doing it to be healthy when they’re just being difficult.”
Wasn’t he the one who had just complained about all the carbs?
“This is a gluten-free and specialty bakery,” Erin pointed out. “If you don’t want gluten-free, dairy-free, or another special diet, then there isn’t anything here for you.” Erin looked at the clock on the wall. “And I think it is time for you to go.” Erin leaned to the side to see who was behind Simon, even though she knew very well who was behind Simon and didn’t need to be so dramatic about it. “Mary Lou, what can I get you today?”
Mary Lou stepped forward, so she was beside Simon rather than behind him. She looked into the display case, smoothing her pantsuit over her hips.
“I’m sure Joshua would like to try some cinnamon rolls,” she said. “The regular icing will be fine.”
“Great,” Erin agreed. “Do you want just a couple?” She knew that Mary Lou was on a budget. She wished she could do more to assist the family, but they wouldn’t accept any “charity.” Mary Lou also didn’t usually eat any desserts and was very careful of the number of calories she ate to avoid putting extra pounds on her slim figure. Joshua, Mary Lou’s son, and Roger, her husband, would eat one. But six or a dozen was not in their budget.
“Yes, two should do it,” Mary Lou agreed. “And a loaf of bread,” she pointed to the multi-grain-crusted loaf she wanted. “And… maybe a pizza shell. The herb one.”
Erin proceeded to serve Mary Lou, ignoring Simon, who didn’t move out of the way.
“Do you know Adrienne?” Simon asked Mary Lou.
Mary Lou looked at Erin, raising her brows as if she didn’t know how to respond to his question. Erin gave an infinitesimal shake of her head. Of course Mary Lou already knew not to tell him anything. Erin was confident that she wouldn’t.
“I’m sorry, no,” Mary Lou told him coolly.
“You don’t know who Adrienne is?”
“I’m afraid not.”
Simon didn’t believe it for a minute. “In this small town? Everybody in Bald Eagle Falls knows everyone else,” he insisted. “If they’re not actually related to each other. I know who you are. You’re the wife of the man who tried to—”
“Simon,” Erin interrupted, trying to avoid a painful topic of conversation. “Did you want a cinnamon roll? You really need to buy whatever you’re going to and get out.”
Erin hated to be rude. She didn’t routinely tell people to leave Auntie Clem’s Bakery, but she was tired of Simon and his antics and didn’t want him harassing all of her customers.
“You’re the only one new here,” Simon told Erin. “I know everyone else.”
“I’m not exactly new,” Erin pointed out. She had been there for a couple of years now, longer than she had lived in most places.
“You’re new,” Simon told her flatly, shaking his head. “Families like mine and Adrienne’s have lived on the mountain for generations. We are real Tennesseans. Living here for a year or two doesn’t qualify you to make any judgments about me or my family.”
“I’m not making any judgments about you or your family,” Erin told him, bemused. “And my family has lived here for generations; I’m the only one who has not. I don’t see what that has to do with anything. You’re in a bakery. Buy something and move on.”
“You can’t talk to me like that.”
There were increasingly restless movements from the other customers. No one had come to get in the middle of some domestic situation. Mary Lou gave Simon a disapproving look and walked past him to the register to pay for her purchases.
Erin took her phone from her apron pocket, tired of dealing with Simon. She tapped the screen a couple of times to call Terry.
That is, Officer Terry Piper.
He and K9 would be happy to get Simon on his way. They were probably bored with a quiet patrol day and could use some excitement.
“Erin,” Terry’s voice was warm, but also concerned. She didn’t normally call him when she was on shift at Auntie Clem’s. “What’s up?”
“I have a trespasser at Auntie Clem’s who is causing some problems, Officer Piper,” Erin told him, her eyes on Simon. “I could use some help.”
“I’ll be right there,” Terry growled. He terminated the call.
Erin slid her phone back into her pocket. She looked past Simon again.
“Betty, what can I get you?”
Betty Thompson was a senior who usually came in with her husband and was notoriously slow in choosing what she wanted to buy. Best to get her up to the counter so she could start pondering her choices. At least now that she had been coming to Auntie Clem’s for a couple of years, she didn’t have to ask for the ingredients in each item or to ask Erin where each had come from or to debate the benefits and drawbacks of each.
Betty shuffled up to the display case to have a look, giving Simon a wide berth.
“Okay, give me a cinnamon roll,” Simon snapped. “You see? I’m a legitimate customer. I’m not trespassing.”
He’d been back in town for long enough to know that Terry Piper was, in fact, law enforcement and that he would be on Erin’s favorite contacts list. It wasn’t just a bluff.
Erin got a single cinnamon roll for him and put it in a sleeve. She did not ask him, as she would have asked any other customer, if he wanted her to warm it in the microwave for a few seconds so that the icing would soften and run into the spiral layers.
“Did you want the cream cheese or non-dairy icing?” she asked him politely, as if she hadn’t heard his earlier diatribe.
Simon choked, swore under his breath, and then apparently decided that if he were trying to be a legitimate customer, he’d better watch himself. “Cream cheese,” he snarled.
Erin nodded and added a plastic knife and a little container of cream cheese icing to his bag. She briefly entertained the idea of giving him the non-dairy icing to see if he noticed the difference. But she had seen enough people cause harm by restaurant employees “testing” to see if someone really would react to a small bit of a food they claimed to be allergic or intolerant to. She would never give someone anything other than what they had ordered. It just wasn’t in her makeup.
She put the bag on the counter next to the cash register for Vic to ring up.
The bells on the door jingled as it was pushed open, and Terry came in, devastatingly handsome in his police uniform, a bit of a five o’clock shadow on his jaw after a long patrol. K9 walked briskly at his side, ears pointed alertly forward as he looked for any sign of trouble.
“You’re having a problem?” Terry asked Erin, not seeing any immediate issues.
Erin indicated Simon. “Mr. Simpson is ready to leave.”
Simon glared at Erin. “I’m a customer,” he said, holding up the bag containing the cinnamon roll. “I have a legitimate reason to be here.”
Erin folded her arms. “And now that you’ve completed your transaction, you’re ready to leave.”
He opened his mouth to argue. But where was that going to get him? If he had already purchased what he needed, then there was no need for him to stay around. If he was there for another reason, like to threaten Erin into revealing where he could find Adrienne or to cause problems with the other customers, he obviously couldn’t do that in front of local law enforcement.
And even if he didn’t happen to think that Terry Piper was a formidable force, he had to consider whether he would win or lose in an argument with K9. And most people Erin knew would choose not to be on the receiving end of a German shepherd bite.
“You’re ready to go?” Terry asked.
Simon looked at Erin and Bella, then back at Terry and K9. There wasn’t any way for him to save face or to stay there any longer, so he gave up.
“Yeah, I’m leaving,” he agreed. He shook his head and departed the bakery.
A collective sigh went up from the remaining customers. And staff.
“That guy is trouble,” Terry observed.
Erin nodded. “That won’t be the last we see of him.”
“Just keep calling me. Or the dispatcher if I’m not available. Don’t try to argue with him or convince him to go. Just call me the second he walks in the door. It shouldn’t take too long to discourage him from showing up here.”
“Okay. I’ll let everyone else know,” Erin agreed.
But Erin was wrong, because it was the last time that Simon would set foot inside Auntie Clem’s Bakery.
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