She kept up the gaze avoidance until she ushered him into an office. There was cowhide here, too, on the pair of chairs, and there was a large plastic Angus bull shoved into the corner. It was on its butt, its stiff legs jutting out, as if the bull was at attention.

Judd skimmed his gaze around the rest of the room. A cop’s habit. And his attention immediately landed on the framed photo on the bookcase behind the desk.

A photo of Cleo, Judd and his brothers, Kace, Nico and Callen.

Cleo was in the center, grinning, as was Nico. Kace was looking pleased, too, since it was his eighteenth birthday. Callen and Judd sported their usual “pissed off at the world” expressions. Judd was sure he still sported his often, though Callen was smiling more these days.

Cleo closed the door, went behind the desk and finally looked at him. “Sorry about the ‘Judd the Stud’ thing, but I called you that after I broke up with that Realtor I’d been dating and was whining to Daisy about there not being any good men. The rhyme just sort of rolled off my tongue, and I didn’t expect her to remember it.”

“A rhyme,” he muttered. It was stupid to feel any kind of pride over being called a stud, but that brainless part of him behind his zipper seemed to like it. “Good thing my name isn’t Rick or the rhyme might not have been so flattering.”

She smiled again, and because “brainless” had gotten in on this, Judd wanted to say something else to put that light back on her face. He might do it, too, after he got a few more explanations, and one he needed was about the bar itself. The other was about why she’d called him. Judd just made a circling motion with his finger for her to start talking.

For such a simple gesture, Cleo immediately understood what he wanted. She blew out a breath, motioned for him to sit down. “I bought the bar, but it’s in Daisy’s name.”

He gave that a few seconds of thought and figured it out. “Because of your criminal record. You thought you might have trouble getting a liquor license.”

She nodded, smiled. “Are you going to arrest me?”

Judd studied her and sank down into one of the chairs. “No. But I’m not sure you needed to do things this way. You were arrested for stealing a car when you were barely sixteen. That’s a juvie record and doesn’t usually have any weight once you’re an adult.”