I smiled. “Then we’ll take two of those.”

Dena boxed those up before grabbing a bigger box for the rest of our treats. “And the others?”

Neely Kate and I selected an assortment, and then Neely Kate paid since I didn’t have my purse.

“I’ll pay you back,” I promised.

Neely Kate shot me an ornery grin. “You sure will.”

I was in a heap of trouble. And it wasn’t just from J.R. and his nonsense. Neely Kate would find a way to make me pay, all right.

Dena gave Jed a final lingering look as we walked out of the bakery.

Neely Kate laughed as soon as the door shut behind us. “If you’re lookin’ for a girlfriend, Jed, looks like you have someone jumpin’ at the bit to apply for the role.”

“Not interested,” he grunted.

She laughed as we walked over to his car. “It’s good to have options.”

“Not interested.”

“You got a girlfriend?” she asked. “Significant other?”

He gave her a look that suggested he wanted to swat her away like a fly. Instead, he grunted again. “No. Now drop it.”

Obviously he didn’t know my best friend very well. His comment only encouraged her to run through a list of the available women in a twenty-mile radius.

“Maddie Hershey is cute, but she’s more gossipy than a hen house. I don’t suppose that would work with your career choice. Then again, it might as long as the information had a one-way valve, if you know what I mean.”

His glare only made her laugh.

“You need a woman, Jed. And I’m going to find you one.” She held up her hands as though viewing a sign. “Neely Kate Colson, woman of many trades: landscape designer, detective, and matchmaker.”

She turned to me. “Do you think any of those will make me rich?”

“Not unless you can make matches for millionaires,” I said, looking around for suspicious characters. The square seemed pretty innocuous, but I knew better than to accept that at face value. “But you won’t find many of those here in Fenton County. You might have to branch out.”

She pursed her lips. “No, if Kate really bailed Rose out, she’s lost her million, and Skeeter seems to have his hands full with strippers and bimbos.”

Jed gave her questioning glance.

“What? It’s not hard to figure out he has money. He was gonna bail Rose out, right?” she whispered. “And everybody knows he goes through strippers at his club like a crying woman goes through tissues.”

While I had no doubt that was true, I hated that she thought she had him pegged. The man I knew was more than the sleazy kingpin she was describing. Then again, that was probably the perception he wanted the world to have of him. It was so much easier to underestimate him that way.

When we reached the car, Neely Kate set both cupcake boxes on the front passenger seat. My gaze shot to a darkened spot on the asphalt outside the hardware store, several parking spaces down. It was surrounded by yellow crime scene tape, but Merv’s car had already been towed away.

“You sure you want to do this, Rose?” Jed asked quietly, leaning into my ear.

I lifted my chin and turned to look him in the eye. “Yes.” I knew I should be nervous, but I was mostly pissed. “I have my reasons.”

He nodded with a grim expression. “I’ll walk you to the door, and then I’ll sit across the street in the car. Text me when you go out the back, and I’ll meet you around the corner on the side street. That way, if anyone’s watching the office from a lower vantage point, they won’t be able to see us.”

Jed stood close, trying to shield my back as we crossed the street, but I knew it wasn’t necessary. J.R. wanted me to be terrified when I was taken. A sunny February morning in southern Arkansas was anything but terrifying.

No, he’d wait until I let my guard down.

Neely Kate unlocked the door, and Jed practically shoved me inside.

“Keep the lights off,” he said, filling the open space with his body. “We can use the sunlight to our advantage. If it’s darker inside than out, no one will be able to see you two leave out the back unless they’re pressing their noses to the window.”

“You’re not comin’ in?”

Jed studied my face for a minute. “No,” he finally said, a slow smile stretching across his face. “You were right. You gallivantin’ all over town like nothing happened is gonna piss Simmons off more than you can possibly know. I say we do it.”

Neely Kate broke into a huge grin. “I’m in.”

“We’re all crazy,” I said, dabbing the corner of my eyes. “This is dangerous.”

“But exciting,” Neely Kate said. “Let’s do it.”

“Okay.”

Jed nodded, then waited until Neely Kate locked the door before he walked across the street and sat in his car.

Neely Kate gave me a long look. “Okay, it’s just you and me now. Why were you really so insistent about coming into the office? Shoot, I could have run in to get your purse.”

“I don’t know,” I said, walking past her desk and looking down at the space I’d crawled into to hide. “I needed to see it in the daylight. So I’m not afraid of it.” I paused. “Neely Kate, Sam Teagen stood in that window with a gun, the both of us staring at each other. He would have busted in and taken me if Merv hadn’t run him off.” I walked to the back room, and opened the door to the toilet. A blood-stained towel lay in the sink, and there was a spatter of blood on the wall. “Merv was shot in our office, protecting me.” I looked back at her. “He doesn’t even like me very much. That just doesn’t seem right.”

When she started to protest, I held up my hand. “That’s not why I’m here. He works for Skeeter, and I know he was doing his job. I may still feel guilty, but he knew the risk he was taking.”

“Then why are you here?”

“Because those derelicts came into my business—our business. I’m not going to let them put their slimy stamp on it so that I’m scared to come into my own office. I’m not going to let them or J.R. Simmons—or anyone—make me cower in the dark. So I had to come here and face it, because I am scared. And I am intimidated. But I don’t want to let them have that power over me anymore. So I’m here, confronting it. This is me saying you can’t steal my life, J.R. Simmons, no matter how much you try.”