“I doubt that.” Their first time? He told himself there wouldn’t be a second. He could see that she wasn’t taking this as seriously as he was. Hell, the woman wasn’t taking any of this as seriously as he thought she should. Just being in this house was dangerous. Investigating an unsolved murder could be deadly.

“I know you drove out here to scold me,” she said as she dressed.

He couldn’t help himself. He leaned toward her and gently kissed her. “I want you to be safe.”

“I know.” She cupped his face in her hands and, smiling, brushed a kiss over his lips before letting go.

He stepped back, determined that if they ever made love again, it wouldn’t be in this old house against a wall and it would be for the right reasons. It wouldn’t be lust or fear.

He could hear the rainmaker driving his metal pipes into the ground again. He could see that Dulcie was listening as well. “What did that man want with you?”

“Nothing,” she said as she hugged herself, rubbing her arms with her hands even though they were both perspiring in the heat of the closed-up house. “Nothing.”

“He had to have wanted something. I saw the look on your face. Dulcie—”

“I’m fine. I’m sorry I scared you.”

“Scared me? It’s you I’m concerned about. That man is going to be working just across the creek from you. If he touched you or threatened you—”

“I told you, he didn’t do anything. He just...startled me, that’s all, and I overreacted.”

She was lying and for the life of him he couldn’t imagine why. What would have happened if he hadn’t come along when he did? Yesterday it had been Ben Carpenter. Today that damned rainmaker.

Worse, Russell had made love with her and complicated things even more. He wanted to cross the creek and pummel the truth out of that old man, but he had a feeling he’d get the same answer from him.

“That man,” she asked. “What kind of work is he doing across the creek?”

“He’s a rainmaker.”

“You hired him to make rain?”

Russell wasn’t in the mood to debate this and said as much. He had enough doubts of his own.

She must have seen that he was angry with her as he shoved back his hat and prepared to leave, because she didn’t argue the issue. “He said he was here before.”

He studied her for a long moment. “Twenty-four years ago.” He saw her expression and felt the import of his words on her.

The last time the rainmaker had been here would have been that hot, deadly dry spring when Laura Beaumont was murdered.

The school day seemed to drag. During recess, Jolene sat in the shade and read the short stories, but her mind wandered.