Watching

Joely Hudson came home to Indiana to help her best friend and regretted it almost immediately. Her mother hasn't stopped needling her, she just found out her best friend believed a damaging lie about her for years, and the small town she escaped at eighteen has pointed opinions about her return.

What Leroy does offer is Garrett Gordon. He's the sheriff's department tech specialist and father to a sharp-witted little girl who has him completely wrapped around her finger. He also has the kind of steady decency that makes a woman forget she's supposed to be guarding her heart.

Garrett isn't looking. He has Emma to think about, and a quiet life that works fine. But Joely is as stunning as she is unexpected, and every time he decides to keep his distance, she catches him off guard and makes him laugh instead.

Someone else has been paying attention, too. Small things at first—things that could be kindness, if you didn't look too closely. Then things that couldn't. Whoever is watching Joely has been watching a long time, and he has already decided how this ends.

Watching is the seventh book in the Olman County Series, women's fiction novels of small-town romantic suspense.