“Okay. Tomorrow-”

“Now. Dani, have you ever heard of a book called Joe Cutler: One Soldier’s Rise and Fall?”

Dani shook her head.

“Joe Cutler is-was-this Zeke character’s older brother. I knew there was something familiar about his name. I asked Aaron, and he remembered.” Aaron also taught history at the local high school. “Joe was pretty messed up.”

“You’ve read the book?”

She nodded. “A few years ago. It’s got nothing to do with Zeke being in town so far as I can see.” Her intelligent eyes focused on Dani. “Except for one thing-he and his brother grew up in Cedar Springs, Tennessee.”

And there it was. A connection. Cedar Springs and Mattie. But her grandmother hadn’t returned to her hometown since she had left for Hollywood at nineteen, long before Zeke was even born.

“What’s he up to?” she asked.

“Beats me,” Kate said, “but you need to watch yourself with this guy.”

Dani snatched a brownie. “I will.”

“If Cutler’s responsible in any way for that bruise on your arm-” Kate waved her spatula “-you let him know he’ll have to answer to me.”

Impossible to tell if the woman was serious. And yet, beneath her bantering tone was a concern for Dani, something she never wanted to take for granted.

She went down a darkened hall and through the antique-filled drawing room where the oil portrait of her mother at sixteen still hung above the mantel. She seemed so sophisticated, yet demure, the perfect young heiress. The artist had failed-or, given who was paying the bill, perhaps simply had known better than to try-to catch the glint in her eye, the determined set to her jaw that hinted at a seething soul. Lilli Chandler had been privileged and beautiful at sixteen. At thirty, privilege and beauty hadn’t been enough to satisfy her.

“I’ve tried to take that portrait down,” Eugene Chandler said from a Queen Anne chair, startling Dani. “I thought it would be easier on all of us, Sara in particular. She always adored your mother. But she insisted it should stay.”

Dinner must have broken up for the more informal dessert, or he, too, had made good his escape. “Look, if I in any way-”

He cut her off, or hadn’t heard her. “You know, right or wrong, that’s how I remember Lilli-as a lovely, devoted sixteen-year-old girl who might never really have existed…” He trailed off as he sighed, sounding tired and old. When he continued, his voice was almost inaudible. “That’s the most difficult part. She’s gone, and I never knew her. My own daughter.”

“I’m sorry-”

“No. I am.”

Dani took a step toward him. “Are you all right?”

He smiled sadly. “No, I’m not.”

She’d never seen him so depressed. Even when it had become clear that something had happened and her mother had disappeared, he’d shown only anger, determination, raging worry. Never real, quiet, reflective sadness. “Should I get Sara?”

“You should go on, Danielle.”

As she moved closer, he looked away. He was not a man given to touching, the quick kiss, the tender hug. And he’d come not to expect such affection from his only granddaughter. “I’m not sure I should leave you-”

“I prefer to be alone,” he said, not gently.

“If you’re sure.”

“I’m sure.” His clouded eyes met hers, just for an instant. “I’ve never known what to say to you nor you to me. So go on, Danielle. Carry on. You always have, you know.”

Would he like her better if she fell on her face? If she had to crawl on her knees to him in desperation? But it wasn’t the time for accusation or asking him to be something he wasn’t. How could she ask him to accept her when she couldn’t accept him?

Suddenly she was nine again, running from the grandfather she’d never been able to please.

She kicked off her high heels on the porch and scooped them up in one hand, walking through the cool, soft grass to the sidewalk. She’d left her sneakers in Zeke’s car. It didn’t matter-she’d walk home barefoot. She wanted off North Broadway, away from the Chandlers and back to her own little cottage where she’d learned to keep the memories at bay.

“Your feather’s drooping.”

Zeke fell in beside her, dark, solid, taking her in with an efficient glance that told her nothing of what he was thinking. In the darkness the shadows of the trees and streetlights played on his face, making his expression even more impossible to read.

“What’re you doing here?” she asked.

“Just hanging out.”

Dani didn’t believe him. “You don’t strike me as the type to just ‘hang out.’”

He shrugged. “Know me so well, do you?”

“Mr. Cutler-”

“You’ve really got to stop that. The name’s Zeke, as in Ezekiel James Cutler. Only bad guys call me Mr. Cutler. How come you’re leaving early?”

“No reason.”

He slowed his pace, eyeing her. “You’re not a very good liar, are you?”

She wished she hadn’t noticed the humor playing at the edges of his voice and in his eyes. She didn’t answer, instead thinking about what Kate had told her about him. She’d hoped she’d have a chance to think, to talk to Mattie, before confronting him again.

“Why don’t I give you a ride home,” he said, “and you can tell me what’s on your mind.”

They’d come to his car. He unlocked the passenger door and swung it open. He looked very tough and very controlled, and Dani suddenly wondered what kind of woman a professional white knight went for, what kind he attracted.

“I prefer to walk,” she said.

“Kind of a long way to walk in bare feet.”

“You could give me my sneakers back.”

He smiled. “I could.”

They were at an impasse, his will against hers. Her high heels dangling from one hand, she wiggled her toes on the cool, rough sidewalk and became aware-too aware-of the fit of her dress and the aching of her bruises and just how tired she was.

“I’ll ask you again. Was your being in my garden yesterday afternoon a coincidence?”

He stood back from the door, leaving it open. “Dani, you know I didn’t rob you or-” he touched her wrist “-do that to you.” His eyes, dark and serious, held hers. “But I don’t often believe in coincidences.”

Dani knew there were other ways to get home without Zeke Cutler’s help. She could call the Pembroke for a ride, or call a friend, or a taxi. She could even go back and ask her aunt or grandfather if their driver could take her home.

She could fight one Ezekiel James Cutler for her sneakers.

But without a word, she slid onto the passenger seat of his rented car. She wanted to know more about this man. Had to know more about him. It wasn’t just the burglary, his profession, his being from Cedar Springs, Tennessee. It was also her reaction to him, the strange, unsettling feeling that she was meant to find him in her garden one of these days. And how could she explain the rushes of warmth when she was around him? She was wary, and annoyed that he was clearly holding back on her, but, she had to admit, she was also intrigued.

“If I’d been your crook,” Zeke said, climbing in behind the steering wheel, “I’d have gone after you when you tried to nail me with that bottle of mineral water.”

“You did go after me.”

He glanced at her, turning the key in the ignition. “Honey,” he said in an exaggerated drawl, “that wasn’t going after you.”

There it was again, not just a rush of warmth but a flood. Dani shifted in her seat, reaching down onto the floor for her sneakers. She slipped them on and didn’t bother tying the laces.

“Tell me, would you have thrown the skillet or just bonked me on the head with it?”

“I don’t know. I guess it would have depended on what you did. I’m not a trained white knight. I have to operate on instinct-like when I walked into my room and saw it had been trashed. Since I don’t carry a weapon, I used what was at hand.”

“Which was?”

She hesitated, then held up one red shoe as she had yesterday.