Taking Her Time Read Online Free Page A

hurt.
    Carly opened her eyes and stared at the car’s upholstered ceiling. She’d never backed off from Tucker and she wasn’t going to start now. She could feel herself getting warmed up to get answers and she wasn’t leaving until she had that diary in her possession.
    She sat up abruptly and fished her cosmetic case out of her bag, repairing the tearstains on her cheeks. The only remedy that she could think to help her red swollen eyes was to pour bottled water onto the tea bags she always carried. With a tea bag over each eye, she settled back to think.
    Everyone already knew how much she loved that house—and her grandmother. First she’d visit the cemetery and by the time Tucker finished work, Carly would have a plan in place.
    Carly sat up and dropped the tea bags out of the window; in the rearview mirror, she used her best cosmetic concealer to hide the damage of crying. She started the car. She had exactly two weeks to get that diary back—and somehow, push Tucker out of her grandmother’s house. Carly would be tending Anna Belle’s home and yard, not Tucker.
    She glanced at her side mirror, the one with the police car fast approaching. Norma Perry, the police chief, drove by Carly slowly. Then the car made a U-turn and pulled along the driver’s side. Norma’s silver glasses glinted in the afternoon sun. “Hi, Carly. Heard you were back in town. The boys at the post office said you’d mailed yourself a lot of boxes and that they had a time fitting them over your suitcases and into the back seat. They said you were expecting more. Are you moving back, or just reliving The Incident?”
    Carly saw no reason to hide that she’d come back to the one place everyone knew she loved. “Hi, Norma. No, I’m not moving back entirely, but I worked out a deal with my company that I can work part-time in Denver and part-time here, in Gram’s house. I plan to vacation here, too. I guess you’ve heard a few things today, huh?”
    â€œHeard you couldn’t talk after the reading of the will. That was a first. They were thinking about giving you a swig of whiskey to revive you, but then they remembered the time you decided to try alcohol. Samuel Lawson didn’t want his new office carpet messed up. Then Arlo called and said you’d made a beeline for Tucker and that whatever passed between you two wasn’t sweet. Arlo has never seen a woman put a car into reverse gear and back up like that. You could have hit one of the Jacksons’ cows. Cow-icide isn’t fun to investigate. I’ve been hoping for a real homicide for years—Well, never mind that. Forget you heard it…. But after you jumped Tucker, I heard that he had something on his mind for the rest of the day.”
    That last bit of information gave Carly hope. Tucker always sulled up when she got to him, otherwise he was even-tempered—but where he was concerned, her emotions swung everywhere. Carly felt it was only fair warning to let Norma know her plans. “I’m going to get my grandmother’s house back.”
    â€œTucker is a good, solid thinker. Slower than you, with less flash, but he usually can deliver a bottom line pretty good.”
    Norma looked straight ahead, as if setting her mind to something. She tapped her fingers on the steering wheel; beneath her uniform hat was a frizzed mass of gray hair. Norma spoke in the clipped style she’d learned on a popular police-crime television show, “When Tucker was teaching you to drive, you ran his truck over a fire hydrant. He’s pulled you out of more scrapes than I want to remember. But I don’t think he’s on your side this time. If you go in that house and he makes a trespassing complaint, I’ll have to go by the book—just so you know.”
    â€œI like your new perm,” Carly said brightly, hoping that Norma wouldn’t get that brisk, swaggering, tough police