Grant ignored him.
“She’ll hate it here by day two anyway. No valet parking. No yoga brunch places. Dirt. Actual weather.”
Burke shook his head slowly over his coffee.
“What?”
“Nothing.”
“What?”
Burke’s grin widened. “I’m excited to watch this unfold.”
Grant gave him a long, flat stare. “You know, you think being sheriff gives you carte blanche to decide everybody else’s life for them.”
“So I’ve been told.”
“You volunteered me without even asking.”
“You would’ve said no.”
“Correct.”
Burke smiled smugly. “And yet here we are.”
Grant muttered something under his breath and grabbed a lead rope off the fence.
“She’s pretty,” Burke added casually.
Grant didn’t even slow down. “Couldn’t care less what she looks like.”
“Sure.”
“I mean it.”
Burke looked entirely unconvinced.
Grant pointed at him without turning around. “Don’t do that.”
“Do what?”
“That thing where you decide you know something I don’t.”
Burke’s grin only widened.
Grant shot him a final look of pure irritation, then turned and disappeared into the barn.
Burke watched him go, still smiling into his coffee.
“Yeah,” he murmured to himself. “This oughta be interesting.”
2
Bridlepath Farm — Sylva, North Carolina
By the time Izzy Moreno turned the silver convertible out of the Asheville rental lot, she’d been awake for nearly twenty hours.
The last seat out of Denver had gotten her to Atlanta after dawn. A delayed connection into Asheville had eaten another two hours, and she’d spent the entire drive west gripping terrible airport coffee while trying not to picture Marcus Halpern touching her gallery walls.
