"My bike won't fit in your car."
"We can leave the trunk open." His voice was liquid sand; he was enjoying himself. "It's not that far to your house."
She opened her mouth to argue about taking her chances, but Hannah gave her a shove, putting all of her insubstantial weight into it. "Piper, for heaven's sake. Get in the man's car and go home."
"Or get struck by lightning," Clate muttered.
Piper made a face. "I've been plotted against."
"You've just come up against common sense," Hannah said, pushing her out the door. "Now run along. I'm falling asleep on my feet."
She wasn't. She was having a grand time. She waited on her doorstep until Piper's bike was safely crammed into Clate's trunk and she was sitting next to him in his front seat. "She doesn't look tired to me," Piper grumbled.
Clate started the engine, his casual attire in contrast with the plush interior of the car. "So far as I can see, you two deserve each other."
She waved stiffly to her aunt as he backed out. "She's going to go right back in there and work on her computer or watch 'Bewitched' reruns or stew up some herbs. She doesn't take naps."
"She's having fun."
"At my expense."
"Well, you've no business riding a bike in the middle of a thunderstorm."
Piper gave him a sideways look, noticed the way the muscles in his forearms worked as he drove. "The thunderstorm was just a convenient way to get me in this car with you."
He tossed her a sexy grin. "Worked."
"I'm still mad at you."
"No kidding. Well, I called my office. No one's admitting to asking anybody anything up here, but if anyone was considering it, they'll think again."
"Then you're saying you didn't put someone up to it?"
He sighed. "I've been saying that."
"And you didn't do it yourself?"
"You'd have heard if I had," he said dryly.
True, she would have. This was her town, not his, which, she reminded herself, was exactly the way he wanted it. "Then Andrew and Benjamin were wrong on this one. Or someone's pulling a fast one on you down in Nashville."
He gave a nearly imperceptible shake of the head. "That wouldn't happen."
"Oh, I see. I'm supposed to entertain every manner of farfetched explanation for a handful of nasty phone calls, but you can't entertain the idea that someone who works for you has stepped over the line."
"Point well taken."
"But you still think you're right?"
"Yes."
Piper settled back in her seat, strangely comfortable. She appreciated his certainty. It meant he believed he hired good people, that he trusted them. In her view, trust was a positive sign of character. But she decided to change the subject. "I told Hannah you didn't find anything under the wisteria."
"She has new ideas about where to dig?"
Prioritized from one to forty-seven. Piper smiled. "She's a Macintosh. She always has a plan."
"According to what I've learned of your family's history," Clate said, "this isn't necessarily a good thing. Macintosh plans have a way of going awry."
"That's why we've learned to keep them to ourselves."
He glanced at her, the corners of his mouth twitching. "You must have been hell as a little sister. Luckily," he added, "I don't think of you that way."
* * *
Chapter 11
Rain slashed the windshield, lightning flashed, and thunder rumbled, but so far as Clate could see, Piper still wished she'd ridden her bike home. "I'll get my bike. No need for you to get wet."
She slid out of the car into the pounding rain. Clate waited two seconds, then decided to hell with it and climbed out, basically ignoring the rain as he joined her at the trunk. She was wrestling with her bike, which had twisted around on itself and didn't exactly fit anyway. A determined woman. He eyed her clamped jaw, the tensed muscles in her arms, her soaked hair and shirt, and wondered why in hell he didn't just scoop her up and carry her inside.
Without asking, he grabbed hold of the handlebars and helped her pull the bike out of the trunk. "I can do it," she said.
"Just smile and say thank you."
She scowled at him, and he laughed. That defiant pride and independent streak were something they had in common, although they'd developed the qualities for different reasons. He because he was alone in the world, she because she wasn't.
"You're getting wet," she said.
"I'm from the South. Thunderstorms don't bother me."
"I'd like to see the South."
Lightning and thunder came together in a crash, the storm moving over their heads. The hard, steady rain dripped off her nose and her hair and made her skin seem paler. They were both drenched. "You'll have to come to Nashville. It's a good city. There's more to it than country-and-western music."
"Are you a fan?"
They were standing in the pounding rain, discussing Nashville. "Absolutely. I'm also a fan of the long, beautiful Nashville springs."
"Summers are hot."