Full Contact. Tara Quinn Taylor

Full Contact - Tara Quinn Taylor


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      He’d driven by his new place. Didn’t try the key he had in his pocket because the boxes he’d had shipped weren’t due until tomorrow morning. The pool in the backyard was pristine with a rock waterfall. And there was a fire pit for grilling. For once the real thing was even better than the picture.

      Really, it wasn’t Shelter Valley’s fault that he was in a rank mood. Wasn’t anybody’s fault. Not even his.

      Not many guys would like being forced into distasteful situations.

      Best get on with it. His life’s motto. Which was why an hour after he’d driven into—and around—his latest home base, Jay showed up at the clinic looking for Dr. Shawna Bostwick, the psychologist who had so effusively accepted his offer to practice clinical massage under her auspices. She had a small room at her clinic ready for him to use and some patients to refer to him.

      “You’re Jay Billingsley?” The young woman’s shock wasn’t carefully enough disguised.

      “Yes, ma’am.” He bowed his head, his hands crossed in front of him, standing the way he’d learned while waiting in the mess line during his eighteen months on the inside.

      Back to the wall and cover your balls, as he privately described it. Those months had taught him other life lessons. Accept what you can’t change. Don’t expect anyone else to watch your back. Being still is the best way to assess the opposition. Adopting a subservient stance is the fastest way to disarm others’ defenses.

      Eleven years on the outside and, whenever he was being negatively judged, he still reverted to the man he’d become while doing time for drug possession.

      Some lessons lasted a lifetime.

      “You, uh, ever been to Shelter Valley?” The pretty blonde seemed to be somewhere around his own thirty-two years.

      He waited until she looked him in the eye and said, “No. I’d never heard of the place until a month ago.”

      Her smile, though tentative, seemed genuine. “You might be in for a surprise.”

      “I doubt it,” he said easily. Then something about her, or about the damned town, had him adding, “I’m good at what I do, Dr. Bostwick. I’m in this business because I care. Because I want to help people. You can rest assured that I won’t let you down.”

      She grinned at him. “I’ve read your résumé. I’m not worried. But I do think you might want to get your hair cut. And lose the vest.”

      “My only transportation is a motorcycle.” He told her what she’d find out soon enough anyway. Who would have believed he would find a Western town without a Harley dealership? Or any other signs of motorcycle ownership? “Leather deflects bugs and is more impervious to wind.”

      “And the hair?”

      He shrugged. He could have cut it, if he’d wanted to give a false first impression. Jay was who he was. A free spirit. A man who didn’t conform to social pressure. His hair told people that up front.

      And it reminded him every single day that his freedom was in personal expression and belief, not in the making of his own laws—either moral or physical.

      “It’s taken me eleven years to grow it.” That was all the explanation anyone would get.

      Jay noticed the doctor’s firm backside at the tail end of the blue blouse that hung over her jeans as he followed her down the hall to his new space. The room would suit and, once his table arrived tomorrow, he would set up quickly.

      He’d only been in town an hour and had already seen two very fine-looking women—a jogger and his new professional sponsor.

      Too bad he wasn’t in Shelter Valley to have sex.

      JAY SWAM IN THE NUDE. His temporary backyard was completely enclosed by a cement block privacy fence. He had to traverse the entire length of the pool four times to get what he determined to be one lap. Somewhere around forty lengths he lost count.

      The cool water sluicing against his skin was like the wind pulling at his hair when he rode full-out. A communion between nature and man—raw life. Something he could trust. Count on.

      When his body was tired enough to stay put on the stool awaiting him inside the house at the breakfast bar, he hauled himself out of the deep end and grabbed the jeans he’d left in a pile on the patio.

      Zipping the pants with care born of practice, he grabbed a cola from the fridge and glanced at the neatly stacked folders awaiting him. Usually his investigative skills itched to be used. This time, Jay was reluctant to begin.

      Finding the man who’d deserted him—who’d walked out only weeks before Jay’s mother’s murder—was on his top ten list of things he most wanted to avoid. Right up there with going back to prison.

      Or ever again being out of control of his mental faculties.

      His aversion to the task at hand was the only reason he was glad to hear the knock on his front door. The uninvited intrusion delayed having to open those folders.

      He wasn’t so sure he hadn’t jumped from the frying pan into the fire when he saw a uniformed lawman standing on the front porch. “Jay Billingsley?”

      “Yes.”

      “I’m Sheriff Richards.”

      Greg Richards, Jay read the official identification the man held out. “What can I do for you, Sheriff?”

      He hadn’t done anything wrong.

      “You have a second?”

      As many of them as he wanted to have. “Sure.” Jay stepped back, leaving Greg to come in, close the door behind him and follow Jay to the second of the two bar stools at the kitchen counter.

      He offered the lawman something to drink, retrieved the bottle of water Richards requested from the fridge. The sheriff perched on the stool, both feet planted on the floor. The man’s hair was dark. Short. Proper.

      “I had some complaints about that motorcycle of yours.”

      Jay met his gaze head-on, drinking from his can of cola while he did so, his bare feet resting on the silver metal ring along the bottom of his stool. “There a law against motorcycles in Shelter Valley?”

      “No. I’ve got one myself,” Richards said, and Jay reminded himself that those who judged prematurely generally ended up making asses of themselves. “But we do have noise restriction laws.”

      “No semi engines after six o’clock?” Jay guessed.

      “No excessive noise within city limits, period.”

      “Who defines excessive?”

      “I do.”

      Jay nodded. Less than twelve hours in town and he was already being run out. If only the sheriff knew how happy Jay would be to oblige….

      “I’ll run my machine on low throttle in city limits.”

      “I’d appreciate it.”

      The lawman hadn’t opened his bottle of water. And he wasn’t leaving, either.

      “There something else?”

      “I talked to Martin Wesley. He says you’re renting this place month to month.”

      Jay had found Martin’s rental ad on the internet. “That’s right.”

      “He says you’re a medical massage therapist working with Shawna Bostwick.”

      “That’s right.” And if Jay was a betting man, he’d put money on the fact that Richards had already been in touch with the pretty doctor for confirmation.

      “We don’t have a lot of call for that around here. Seems like you’d find more work in a city like Phoenix.”

      “Or Miami,” Jay agreed, “which is


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