And he was bothered by Katie’s involvement in this Isaac Wells mess. The situation bordered on the bizarre. What if the old man was involved in something criminal or sinister? The police had been questioning Ray Dean, a local hoodlum who’d been in and out of prison for years. Though no connection had been made, there was speculation in town that the two men had known each other.

A lot of people had thought Isaac Wells was dead. Maybe even murdered.

Yeah, then who wrote Katie the letter?

That was what bothered him. Was the letter the real thing or some kind of grand hoax? Either way, he was worried.

Angrily he dried his hair with a towel, stepped in front of the foggy mirror and swiped at the glassy surface until he could see his reflection well enough to scrape off his five-o’clock shadow and run a comb through his hair. He’d suspected from the moment Katie had invited him that he would attend the wedding reception, but it galled him to think that he had no will where that woman was concerned. One curve of her lips, a tiny sparkle in her eye, a mocking lift of her eyebrow and he found himself doing things he’d sworn to avoid.

“Damn.” He dressed in a white shirt and black slacks, then fingered a bolo tie only to discard it and slide into his best pair of boots. By the time he walked outside it was dusk and the filmy clouds gathering over the moon were beginning to thicken. The air was hot and sultry without the slightest hint of a breeze, and yet he sensed a storm was brewing.

As he walked to his truck, he eyed the old Victorian house. It seemed strangely empty. No lights glowed in the windows, no kids ran in the yard, no angry guitar chords wailed from one of the upstairs rooms. Boxes were stacked on the porch—evidence that the Santini clan was moving out.

And Katie Kinkaid would be moving in. That thought made him edgy and restless. Living less than a hundred feet away from her was much too close. Though she probably needed a man to look out for her, he wasn’t a candidate. As he climbed into his truck he tried to take solace in the fact that he wouldn’t be here long. As soon as the electricity and phones were connected, he’d set up housekeeping at the ranch.

Oh, yeah? And then what? Are you just going to forget her and the fact that she’s wading into dangerous waters? Are you going to ignore the fact that you’d like nothing more than to kiss her until her knees went weak, peel off her clothes and make love to her until dawn? And what about the fact that Josh just might be Ralph Sorenson’s grandson? What the hell are you going to do about that?