A Time to Keep (3 page)

Gwen studied his face, feature by feature, with a curious intensity as the gold-green eyes darkened with an unreadable expression. She liked his eyes and strong chin. There was just a hint of a cleft, as if nature hadn't quite made up its mind whether to give him one.

“Thank you, Sheriff Harper.”

He touched the brim of the wide hat with a thumb and forefinger. “You're welcome, Miss Taylor.”

Shiloh waited until she was seated before he returned to his SUV, turned off the flasher, executed a U-turn and headed southward. He glanced up at the rearview mirror. She was following him.

He decelerated and drove onto a paved road leading to a smaller version of the half-dozen restored antebellum mansions offering tours. Live oaks formed a natural canopy as he approached the house known as
Bon Temps
—meaning “good times” in French.

Shiloh wondered if Gwendolyn Taylor was aware of what had gone on behind the doors of the infamous mansion. He also wondered how well she'd known her namesake, Gwendolyn Pickering. A knowing smile parted his lips. If she didn't know, then she would once the gossips came to introduce themselves to the newcomer. His first instinct was to warn her, but he changed his mind. There was something about Gwendolyn Taylor that said she could hold her own with anything and anyone. She had with him.

He waited in his vehicle, watching Gwendolyn as she
parked her car, walked to the entrance of the house, and unlocked the front door. She disappeared inside and seconds later the first floor was flooded with soft light.

Shiloh smiled when she waved to him. He returned her wave, waiting until she closed the door. It wasn't until he'd left
Bon Temps
and headed in the direction of his own house that he chided himself for not checking to see if she was safe—that no intruder or squatter had taken up residence.

Flipping a signal, he drove back to
Bon Temps.

G
wen stood in the entryway, staring up at a cobweb-covered light fixture overhead. Muslin slipcovers were draped over all of the tables and chairs and a layer of dust coated the parquet floors bordered in a rosewood-inlay pattern.

Gwendolyn Pickering had passed away in late February, and it was now early May. It was that apparent no one had come to clean or air out the house. She pretended she didn't see the stained and peeling wallpaper. Walking across the living room, she saw a massive chandelier resting in a corner on a drop cloth, the sooty remains in the brick fireplace, and the threadbare carpeting on the staircase leading to the second floor. Despite the disrepair, she recognized the magnificence of the mansion, which dated back to the 1840s.

Bon Temps
was home, and not the three-bedroom apartment on the top floor of a turn-of-the-century town house she'd occupied for the past decade.

Heading for the staircase, she flipped on the light switch on a wall panel and illuminated the landing and the hallway at the top of the staircase.

Her footsteps were slow and determined as she climbed the stairs to see what awaited her. Her late aunt's attorney had mailed her an envelope filled with photographs of the exterior and interior of
Bon Temps,
floor plans, copies of the original architectural drawings, and a description of the furnishings with authentication of every inventoried item.

The five-thousand-square-foot house contained four bedrooms, five-and-a-half bathrooms, a kitchen, a pantry, a laundry room, a formal living and dining room, and a small ballroom for entertaining. The floor plans also included a second-story veranda that overlooked an orchard and formal garden.

It took several hours after a lengthy conversation with Gwendolyn Pickering's attorney for Gwen to digest the information that she now owned a house that if restored, would be granted historic landmark status. Mr. Sykes said she could either turn
Bon Temps
into a museum or live in it, so she'd opted to claim it as her home.

Gwen stopped as she reached the last stair when the chiming of the doorbell echoed melodiously throughout the house. Had someone seen the lights and come to investigate? She tried to remember if she'd locked the door behind her. Turning, she descended the staircase and walked to the door. She breathed a sigh of relief. Unconsciously, she'd locked it. Living in a big city had honed her survival skills—never leave a door unlocked.

The bell chimed again. Peering through the security peephole, Gwen saw the distorted face of the man whom she'd left less than five minutes before.

“Yes?” she asked through the solid wood door.

“Miss Taylor, it's Shiloh. Please open the door.”

Her eyebrows inched up. He hadn't identified himself as
Sheriff Harper. She disengaged the lock. The man who'd rescued her from the ditch looked different without his hat. His close-cropped black hair hugged his head like a cap. The soft yellow light from the porch lamps flattered the angles of his dark brown face. He looked like someone she'd seen before.

She affected a smile. “Yes, Sheriff?”

Shiloh's gold-flecked green eyes lingered on her lush mouth. “Please call me Shiloh.”

Her smile faded. “Why?”

“Because I'm off duty. Your place has been vacant for several months although my men do check at least twice a week to make certain squatters or vandals haven't broken in. I just came back to make certain you were all right.”

Gwen knew it was impolite to stare, but she couldn't take her gaze away from Shiloh's face. Who did he look like? She mentally ran through the faces of people she'd met and interviewed over the years, but came up blank.

She blinked as if coming out of a trance and opened the door wider. “You're off duty, yet you're still on the job?”

He angled his head, smiling. “I'm always on the job, Miss Taylor.”

Shiloh liked listening to Gwendolyn Taylor's voice. It was a welcome change from the slow drawl and distinctive inflection of the Cajun dialect of most people in the parish. Not only did she talk different, but she also looked different from the women in the region. Despite her casual attire, there was something about her that silently screamed big city, and he wondered how long it would take for her to abandon
Bon Temps,
tire of the slower lifestyle, and return to Massachusetts.

Gwen gave him a warm smile and offered her right hand. “I'd like you to call me Gwen.”

Shiloh took her smaller hand in his, enjoying its softness. It was with reluctance that he released it. He'd returned to
Bon
Temps
to make certain it was safe for Gwendolyn Taylor to enter, and he'd also returned to see her again. He didn't know what it was about the transplanted Bostonian, but something about her intrigued him. Not knowing whether there was a Mr. Taylor or a few little Taylors, but like a besotted teenager he'd come back for another glimpse of a woman whose voice drew him to her like a moth to a flame.

He nodded, smiling. “Then Gwen it is. Do you mind if I check around?”

She stepped aside. “Not at all.”

Shiloh moved into the entryway, his sharp gaze cataloguing everything. Even to someone who lived his entire life in the South the heat inside the house was oppressive.

He walked into the living room, stopping short, and a soft body plowed into his back. Turning quickly, he reached out to steady Gwen as she swayed and struggled to keep her balance.

“Just where are you going?” he asked, glaring down at her stunned expression.

Gwen felt the unyielding strength in the fingers around her upper arms, inhaled the lingering scent of a provocative men's cologne, and shivered from the press of Shiloh's body against hers.

“I'm following you.” She didn't recognize her own voice because it had come out in a breathless whisper.

Shiloh eased his grip on her arms, but didn't release her. A frown marred his smooth forehead. “No, you're not.”

She bristled visibly. How dare he tell her what she could do in her own home? “And why not?”

“Because I'm the one with the big gun,” he drawled. He hadn't bothered to hide his arrogance.

Gwen tried unsuccessfully to bite back a smile. “Oh, really, Mr. Lawman, sir.”

Shiloh's hands fell away once he realized what he'd said.
There was no doubt she'd misconstrued his statement as a sexual taunt. Resting long, slender fingers on his waist, he smiled. “Would you like me to show it to you?” He got the reaction he sought when Gwen gasped and her eyes widened. “I personally prefer the Glock to the standard police-issue .38 revolver.”

Gwen's gaze shifted from his Cheshire cat grin to the deadly looking firearm strapped to his waist. “I don't need to see it, Shiloh. What do you want me to do?”

“Stay here.”

Recovering quickly, her eyes narrowed. “This is the second time you've told me to stay as if I were a dog.”

It was Shiloh's turn to give a questioning look. One eyebrow lifted higher than the other and that was when Gwen knew who he reminded her of.

“Do you know that you look like The Rock?”

“The Rock?”

“Dwayne Johnson. The wrestler-turned-actor,” she explained. “His complexion is lighter than yours, and your eyes aren't dark like his, but the two of you could pass for brothers.”

Shiloh had lost count of the number of times people mentioned his resemblance to the wrestler, yet always claimed he'd never heard of the man.

“I suppose it's true about everyone having a double,” he said glibly. “How about you, Gwen? Do you have someone who looks like you?”

“Yes, in fact I do. My first cousin Lauren and I look enough alike to be sisters. The only difference is that I'm about an inch taller and rounder than she is in certain places despite the fact that she's had three babies.”

“Have many children do you have?” Shiloh asked, as his penetrating gaze moved slowly over her body.

“None.”

“So, it's just going to be you and Mr. Taylor living here?”

She shook her head. “There is no Mr. Taylor, aside from my father and Uncle Roy. Will my marital status also go into your police report?”

Shiloh went completely still. Miss Gwendolyn Taylor was anything but shy, timid or submissive. “No, it won't.”

Crossing her arms under her breasts, she took a step and looked directly into a pair of the most mesmerizing eyes she'd ever seen on a man. The gold was the perfect match for the undertones in his smooth-shaven jaw, the green dramatic and hypnotic.

“Good.”

“Why good?”

“I always like to maintain a modicum of anonymity.”

“That's not going to be an easy feat down here.”

“Why not?” Gwen asked.

“We're in the bayou. That means everyone gets to know everyone else. The fact that you live out here may make it a little easier for you, but I wouldn't count on complete anonymity.”

Shiloh wanted to tell Gwen that only Gwendolyn Pickering was able to keep her private life private. Those she'd invited to
Bon Temps
swore an oath never to reveal what went on behind the door once they crossed the threshold.

“What about yourself, Sheriff Harper? Does everyone know your business?”

“I'm a public servant and that means my life is an open book,” he admitted.

“You don't have a private life?”

He hesitated, then said, “Right now I don't.”

The journalist in Gwen wanted to know more about the sheriff, but she hadn't moved more than fifteen hundred miles to get involved, even if it was on a superficial level, with a man. Besides, she didn't know whether Shiloh was married, engaged or involved with a woman.

“I'll wait here for you to complete your search,” she said, deftly dropping the topic and letting Shiloh know she wanted him gone.

Shiloh averted his gaze from the softly curved luscious mouth. “I'll try to be quick about it.” He switched on a flashlight and headed for the staircase.

His footsteps were muffled by the pile of the well-worn carpet lining the winding staircase. He hadn't lied to Gwen about his private life. He hadn't had one in three years, not since his divorce, and not since he'd left the district attorney's office to serve out his father's term as sheriff after Virgil Harper was gunned down during a botched bank robbery.

Flipping on a light switch on the wall at the top of the stairs, he saw firsthand the fading beauty of
Bon Temps
concealed under dust and cobwebs. The last two years of Gwendolyn Pickering's life had been shrouded in mystery. She'd stopped receiving visitors and rarely ventured off the property.

Shiloh entered and exited bedrooms attached by adjoining sitting rooms and baths. He checked the locks on the wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling French doors in the bedrooms overlooking the rear.

It appeared as if no one, other than whoever had covered the furniture with dustcovers, had returned to the house since Gwendolyn Pickering passed away. One thing he knew was that the house was not fit for human habitation—at least not until it was aired out.

He returned to the first floor by a back stairway and found himself outside an expansive state-of-the-art, eat-in kitchen. A pantry and laundry room were set up in an alcove behind the kitchen. His booted feet left distinctive footprints on the tiled floor.

Turning the faucet on in one of the stainless steel twin sinks, Shiloh waited for the water to run clear. There were two
things Gwen did not have to concern herself with: water and electricity. Both were in working order.

Returning to the front of the house, he found Gwen where he'd left her, in the living room. She stood next to the massive crystal chandelier resting on a drop cloth in a corner.

“You can't stay here tonight,” he announced in a voice layered with an authoritative undertone.

Gwen turned, an expression of indecision freezing her delicate features. “What?”

Shiloh closed the distance between them. “The house is safe, but you can't stay,” he repeated. “The air quality is unhealthy. This place has been closed up for months and should be dusted
and
aired out before you sleep here.”