Orchid Beach (Holly Barker 1)

Ham’s eyes narrowed, and he looked back and forth at the two of them.

“Now, don’t start, Ham,” Holly said. “I’ve been a big girl for a long time, and I’ll decide where I sleep.”

Jackson looked at Ham and shrugged.

Ham rolled his eyes. “Whatever you say, darlin’.”

Holly looked down at his bag. “I see you’ve got your stuff. You get some sleep, and tomorrow morning, you come down to Jackson’s place, and we’ll all have breakfast, and I’ll fill you in.”

“Okay, what time?”

She looked at Jackson. “Ten o’clock?”

Jackson nodded.

“Hell, that’s practically afternoon,” Ham said.

“If you get hungry earlier, just root around in my galley.” She gave him directions to Jackson’s.

“Okay, ten o’clock.”

Holly got a small duffel and stuffed some clean clothes and underwear into it. When Ham wasn’t looking she dug her diaphragm out of a drawer and stuck it under the clothes. “All right,” she said, “let’s go. The sheets are pretty clean, Ham; don’t get them any dirtier. If the phone rings, let the answering machine get it. The station knows to call my cell phone first if they need me.”

“Okay, then,” Ham said. “See you in the morning.” He glared at Jackson. “You be nice to her.”

“Ham, shut up!” Holly said.

“Don’t worry,” Jackson replied, “I’ll take good care of her. See you at breakfast.”

They left the trailer and got into Jackson’s car.

“Jesus, what a shock!” Holly said.

“Aren’t you glad to see him?”

“Sure, I am, but I would have liked a little notice. What am I going to do with him? We can’t both sleep in the trailer. I’d kill him the first day.”

“Listen, you can go right on bunking with me until we can find him a place.”

She reached over and patted his thigh. “What a sweet offer,” she said.

“He seems like a nice guy,” Jackson said. “But he talks about killing a lot.”

“He’s done a lot of that in his time. You’re lucky he didn’t kill you with a single blow,” Holly replied. “He’s been trained to do that, you know.”

“I’ll make it a point to be real nice to him.”

“And me, too.”

“Especially you.”

CHAPTER

28

H olly woke up at nine forty-five and reached for Jackson, who wasn’t there. She struggled out of bed, threw on some clothes, brushed her teeth and her hair and went downstairs. Jackson and Ham were drinking coffee over the remains of a large breakfast. Daisy was leaning against Ham, looking up at him with adoring eyes.

“What time did you get here?” she asked Ham.