A Forever Home
A Forever Home
Lynn Patrick
She's earned some good karma. An Army widow at twenty-one, Heather Clarke has spent the past three years running her aunt’s quilt store, raising her twin girls alone and earning a degree in landscape horticulture. Finally, she’s launching her new career and starting to feel like she’s on solid ground.And then Rick Slater rides onto her job site.Heather needs a mysterious, gorgeous, ex-Army distraction like a hole in the head. Especially when he’s the restless type who’s flirting with re-enlisting. And flirting with her! Even if she were ready to love again, she wouldn’t it on a man who might not stay.Now, if he decides to stop moving and grow some roots… then that's a whole other story.
Another man in uniform isn’t part of her plan
She’s earned some good karma. An army widow at twenty-one, Heather Clarke has spent the past three years running her aunt’s quilt store, raising her twin girls alone and earning a degree in landscape horticulture. Finally, she’s launching her new career and starting to feel as though she’s on solid ground. And then Rick Slater rides onto her job site.
Heather needs a mysterious, gorgeous, ex-army distraction like a hole in the head. Especially when he’s the restless type who’s flirting with reenlisting. And flirting with her! Even if she were ready to love again, she wouldn’t risk it on a man who might not stay. Now, if he decides to stop moving and grow some roots…then that’s a whole other story.
Would he reenlist?
“What if you get bored staying in one place?” Heather asked.
“It’s not the places that attract me,” Rick said. “It’s the people. In the army, I had my men. We were a team…almost like a family.” He paused, studying her closely. “Maybe I’m looking for something else to fulfill me.”
Like a family of his own?
“There might be more benefits to staying in one place than I realized.” Rick slid his hand over hers and squeezed.
The way he was looking at her made Heather blush. And when he leaned forward, cupped her cheek and grinned at her, the warmth spread down to her toes.
His lips brushing softly across hers made her head go light.
Yet…this was another man who might put himself back in the line of fire.
Dear Reader,
Lynn Patrick is a pseudonym for longtime writing partners Linda Sweeney and Patricia Rosemoor.
Patricia is a master gardener, trained by the University of Illinois Extension service. She volunteers, holding workshops for enthusiastic local gardeners, mentoring a high school eco-club and working garden walks to hand out information and answer gardening questions. Her experience inspired the idea of having a heroine whose goal was to be a landscape architect who wanted to design and install beautiful gardens using mostly native plants.
As she did for scenes in Home to Sparrow Lake, Linda got the lowdown on her niece’s twin daughters to add authenticity to scenes with Heather’s twins.
We hope you enjoy A Forever Home.
A Forever Home
Lynn Patrick
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
LYNN PATRICK
Lynn Patrick is the pseudonym for two best friends who started writing together a few decades ago. Linda is a professor with a reading specialty, and Patricia writes as Patricia Rosemoor. Together they enjoy creating worlds that are lightened by the unexpected, fun and sometimes wonderful vagaries of real life.
To our very understanding and gracious editor, Laura Barth.
Contents
PROLOGUE (#uc0f88a53-8933-584a-89bc-a6e0eb4995b7)
CHAPTER ONE (#uf8eb38c5-4424-5c86-8c11-a0658332a39a)
CHAPTER TWO (#u178ca4f0-3078-5e92-aa4d-6ad0e3cc1e36)
CHAPTER THREE (#ud62aedf4-48c8-52c8-ae12-d301e100f2d4)
CHAPTER FOUR (#u5df21790-8300-5299-b170-6e736aa58d7a)
CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIXTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
PROLOGUE
AN UNUSUAL NOISE woke Cora Stanton at two-fifteen a.m.
At least she thought it was a noise.
Squinting at her illuminated bedside clock, she groggily rose to her elbows, listening intently. There was plenty to hear with the wind whipping around the creaking eaves of the old mansion and the crash of waves as Lake Michigan hit the shore some yards away. The shadow of branches clawed at the wall nearest the bed.
But it wasn’t branches scraping or the wind or the waves she’d heard...
It had been a thud.
Cora jumped as she heard the sound again. She sat up, trying to locate where the noise had come from. Definitely inside the house. But where?
No one was sleeping on this side of the house but her. Her flesh crawled at the thought of a stranger creeping around the passage outside or messing about in another room.
Not wanting to turn on a light and alert the intruder, she crept out of bed and went to the door. She turned the lock, then grasped the knob to crack the door slightly for a view of the hallway outside. Nothing. No one. It seemed empty and quiet in the faint glow of a nightlight.
She stood there for several minutes, waiting, listening...until her feet got cold.
No more thuds. No thumps.
Closing the door, she locked it again and made her way back toward the bed and her slippers lying beside it. Could her imagination have been playing tricks on her? Easy enough to conjure up noises on a windy night in a big, old house.
As she slid into the slippers and grabbed her robe from a nearby chair, she had second thoughts. Surely she’d lived here long enough to distinguish familiar sounds from strange ones. She’d definitely heard something. Could it have come from the attic? Squirrels had gotten in once and maybe they’d found their way back again. She’d have to call the exterminators tomorrow.
There was nothing she could do now except go back to sleep. But the adrenaline flowing through her veins had wakened her completely. She’d go downstairs and fix herself some warm cocoa.
Pausing in front of the windows overlooking the trees and the beach and lake beyond them, she glimpsed a sudden movement. Was it a person? She froze, then pulled back the curtain. In the dim light of a waning moon, something dark and human-shaped darted out of the shadows. It stopped, swung around...
“Ah!” breathed Cora.
Then just as quickly, the figure disappeared, blending into darkness again.
Now it was her pulse that thudded in her ears.
CHAPTER ONE
LATE. TODAY OF all days. Heather couldn’t believe her bad luck.
Her first day on the job site and both the twins decided this was the morning to drive her crazy. That was normally Taylor’s job, but to make the situation worse, Addison joined her twin in doing everything possible to put Heather behind, starting with their refusal to get out of bed when she called them. They’d ended up running around the house like little banshees instead of getting ready, then threw buttered toast at each other at breakfast so they both had to change clothes. Which meant her neighbor, who’d agreed to watch them for an hour before escorting them to school with her own son, had left without them.
Now she had to drive the girls to school herself, and Heather couldn’t believe it when she found Taylor sitting in the middle of the living room floor and playing her favorite DVD of her father before he’d gone back for the second tour of duty that had gotten him killed.
“You’re Daddy’s little girl,” Scott told Taylor, kissing her on the cheek. “You’ll always be Daddy’s girl.”
“Forever and ever?”
“Forever and ever. Cross my heart.”
And even though her twin hadn’t been there when this was recorded, the then-three-year-old Taylor had asked, “Addison, too?”
“Of course, Addison, too.”
Heather blinked away the threat of tears and turned off the television. Moments like this brought back the heartache. Even though Scott had died three years before in Iraq, he was still alive in all their hearts.
She cleared her throat. “Taylor, come on. Addison is already outside. We have to go now.”
Once through the kitchen, they headed for the SUV. Heather noted Addison was focused on a dog hanging back on the property but watching the little girl hopefully. He looked like some kind of a border collie mix.
“Mommy, look at the dog!” Taylor said excitedly.
“We don’t have time for that. C’mon, Addison. Both of you, get in.”
Maybe if she didn’t look at the dog, she wouldn’t feel guilty just leaving him there. Loose. Probably scared and hungry.
She was already late for her new job.
She checked to make sure both girls were strapped into their booster seats, then got into the driver’s seat, and with a last look at the pooch, she took off for the school. He would find his way home, or his owner would find him. She had enough to worry about without adding a possible lost dog to the list.
Five minutes later she was getting the girls out of the vehicle. No kids on the playground. School had already started, so the twins were late, too.
“I don’t want you to go to Kenosha, Mommy,” Addison said, sniffling as they walked toward the entrance.
“What if you don’t come back?” Taylor added. “Like Daddy.” Her eyes shone with unshed tears.
Heather stopped, slipped an arm around each little girl and hugged them tight. “Of course I’m coming back. I’ll be going to all different places with my new job, but they’re not far away. I told you that you’ll see me later. In Kenosha. Uncle Brian is going to drive you to your new day camp this afternoon, and after work, I’ll pick you up. We can sing songs in the car all the way home.”
Taylor blinked and swiped at her eyes with the back of her hand. “I learned a new song in kiddygarden—”
“Me, too!” Addison interrupted.
“And I can’t wait to hear you both sing it.” Heather kissed one little blond head, then the other. “But right now, let’s get you to your classroom.”
She walked them inside the building and apologized to their teacher for being late, then practically ran back to her SUV.
Thankfully she’d found a day camp close to her job site. For now, Brian or their sister, Kristen, would pick up the twins and deliver them to afternoon care for her. Once school was out, the twins could be at the camp all day.
Finally heading for Kenosha, she called Tyrone Smith, one of the two people on her team.
“Me, again,” she said. “I’m on my way. I should be there in fifteen minutes.”
“No rush.” As usual, Tyrone’s tone was smooth and easy. “We trippin’.”
“Tripping? I hope that’s another way of saying you and Amber are working hard.”
“And havin’ a good time.”
Hearing hip-hop music in the background, Heather had to force herself to keep her own voice even. “You’re clearing the land along the beachfront the way I asked you to, right?”
“Exactly.”
“Okay.” Not that she was actually sure it was okay. She didn’t know either member of her team well enough yet to judge. “Keep clearing.”
The area was becoming overgrown with Lyme grass, an invasive non-native beach grass that posed a threat to several rare native plants. Heather wanted to replace whatever they removed with native varieties.
“Just remember to only remove the grass that has bluish leaves,” she added. “They should stand out clearly from any native dune grass still present.”
“I got it the first time,” Tyrone said.
Heather flinched. She might be the boss of the team, but she didn’t want to come off as “bossy.” “I’ll be there as fast as I can.”
The short drive from Sparrow Lake seemed interminable.
Take deep, slow breaths, and enjoy the ride, she reminded herself. Let go of what you can’t fix.
She’d existed in a pressure cooker for the past couple of years. An army widow at twenty-one, she’d managed her aunt’s quilting store to make a living while raising the twins and earning a degree in landscape horticulture. In order to cope she’d had to learn how to counter stress with relaxation techniques.
Sometimes they even worked.
Now her sister, Kristen, had decided to change careers and was back in Sparrow Lake and running Sew Fine while Heather was embarking on her new career. The final project for her advanced landscape design class had been a design challenge sponsored by a nonprofit called Environmental Partners, Inc., otherwise known as EPI. She’d won the challenge and the opportunity for a paid internship that could turn into a full-time job.
This internship was a dream come true for Heather. She’d started gardening when she was a kid and her mother had no time to do anything but work to support their family. By high school, Heather had been drawing plans for friends’ yards and figuring what kinds of plants should go where. She’d known then she wanted to get a job working in landscaping. But her plans to go to college had been cut short by her early pregnancy and Scott’s determination to enlist. For years she’d had to be content with the gardening magazines she’d collected, the knowledge she’d gathered from them and a dream that one day it would all come together.
Now she actually would be able to put that knowledge to work and in a way that would help improve the earth by creating a sustainable landscape.
When she arrived in Kenosha at last, Heather drove through the historic district along the Lake Michigan shoreline. The houses on Third Street were old and huge and lovely, as was much of the current professional landscaping. Flanagan Manor was the biggest and showiest of the bunch.
She couldn’t contain her excitement as she turned onto a drive that led into the huge lakeside estate surrounded by black wrought-iron fencing. She would get to work here for a good part of the summer, redefining the grounds of the mansion built in Victorian times and once owned and expanded by the wealthy Chicago bootlegger, Red Flanagan, who’d been famous for trading bullets with his chief competitor, Al Capone. The mansion had gone through several more owners since the 1930s, after the federal government claimed the property as payment for Flanagan’s tax evasion.
One wing of the huge old home had been turned into a bed-and-breakfast by the current owner, Benjamin Phillips. The Phillips family lived in Chicago and used Flanagan Manor as their “summer cottage.” Apparently, the bed-and-breakfast paid for the estate’s upkeep. Heather had met the owner, of course, but the family wasn’t currently in residence.
The main building itself was a showpiece, a gorgeous historic greystone with a portico lakeside and a porte cochère at the side entry, so passengers could alight from their vehicles heedless of inclement weather. Close to the mansion at the top of a gentle incline sat a stone terrace with some plants in large containers and a faux Italian fountain that didn’t work anymore. An old two-story coach house that mimicked the mansion sat directly behind it. The huge expanse of grass fronting the lake tumbled down to a few modest dunes and a small beach. The rest of the shore on both sides of the mansion was lined with boulders, and to the south, a weathered boathouse was attached to a decrepit dock that jutted out into the lake. Once the site where illegal Canadian booze had been unloaded, the dock and boathouse no longer seemed to be in use.
Heather had no idea what the Phillips family intended to do with them in the future.
Her focus was on the surrounding nature.
Heather had been chosen to design and supervise renovation of the grounds, which would include reintroducing native plants to support not only stormwater containment, to keep the runoff from the lake, but also a balanced ecosystem. Many insects needed a specific plant for food. And those insects were food for small animals and birds. The landscaping would be both practical and beautiful, and she was thrilled that her work would be enjoyed for decades to come by myriad guests and visitors and the owner and his family.
Parking in back of the mansion alongside other service vehicles, she grabbed her portfolio with the design plans she was still working on, then left the SUV. The long, narrow lot along the north side of the building was reserved for guests, but today there were only a few cars. It had probably been full for Memorial Day weekend, but kids weren’t out of school yet, and the tourist season hadn’t geared up. The perfect time to get started.
Looking for her team, she headed across the south lawn, passing the century-old, glass-paneled conservatory on the southeast end of the mansion. Having had a quick tour of the inside, she knew that it wasn’t being used to its full potential. No plant aficionado in the family. Mr. Phillips had suggested he might want her to renovate it. No promises, but the prospect excited Heather.
To her relief, Tyrone and Amber were busy at work on the gently rolling dunes near the shoreline, loading the invasive plants they’d removed into a wheelbarrow. About to call out to them, she stopped when she realized they would never hear her over the combined racket made by hip-hop music coming from a boom box on the beach and the roar of a nearby lawnmower.
Wait a minute! Why was anyone other than her team doing anything with the lawn? Mr. Phillips had told her to set the boundaries for EPI, so any groundskeeper should have checked with her first.
Glancing back, Heather noted a giant lawnmower was eating up the south lawn at an amazing speed. The man riding the machine was pretty amazing, too. From the length of his leg, she’d guess he must be at least six feet tall. He had a sculpted body—she could appreciate the muscles all too obvious beneath the thin, white T-shirt—and undoubtedly sculpted features beneath a shock of dark-brown hair streaked with gray. Or so she assumed from his jawline. The rest of his face was pretty well-hidden behind mirrored sunglasses.
She’d never seen him before...but then she hadn’t been introduced to anyone who worked on the estate other than Cora, the housekeeper, who was in charge of the mansion.
Though she thought about approaching him to find out exactly who he was, Heather decided that could wait. She felt less in charge wearing an old cap to protect her face from the sun, a practical gray sweatshirt and a pair of jeans loose enough to work in. Not that Mr. Sunglasses intimidated her or anything.
Her pulse threading a little unevenly, she moved away from man and machine and headed for her team. Tyrone Smith and Amber Miller had both been working for EPI for more than a year, but because neither had gotten any kind of formal education, they did the hard labor, not the design or planning. That was up to her. So, the week before, after she’d met them, they’d all made a trip out to the estate—Tyrone and Amber to deliver the heavy equipment they would need and Heather to go over the plans for the site. She’d made further changes in her designs since and figured she would be refining until the job was complete.
As Heather approached Tyrone, he looked up. Tall and skinny, he wore his hair in cornrows, and the ends of the braids brushed a too-big T-shirt honoring a dead musician.
“Hey, Amber, the boss is here!” he yelled. “Better turn down that music!”
Her light blond hair pulled up into a ponytail, her eyes a soft gray, Amber was probably only eighteen or nineteen, a couple of years younger than Tyrone. Dressed in a T-shirt and shorts and her feet encased in work boots a lot safer than her partner’s tennis shoes, she bent over to shut off the boom box. As the music stopped, the young woman who looked too small to be so strong stopped, too, her hands on her hips like she was waiting for orders.
Heather might be used to giving orders at the store, but this was different. She had no history here. No real experience. Behind her, the mower noise grew louder, and she glanced back to see Mr. Sunglasses riding over grass he’d already cut. That wasn’t good. And how low had he set that mower? Grass should be cut no shorter than two inches. At least not if you wanted it to live.
Was this something else she needed to take care of?
Okay, she had to admit it. The thought of giving him orders intimidated her just a little. Okay, maybe a lot.
Forcing a smile, she turned back to her workers. “Looks like you got a lot done.”
“Well, we’ve been working since eight,” Amber said.
Heather’s face grew warm, but she chose not to make excuses. “When you’ve finished with the beach area, we should start removing sod for the rain gardens.”
She’d planned on two freeform rain gardens on the mansion’s lake-facing side, leaving room for a wide, stone pathway down to the beach between them.
“Retaining wall or no?” Tyrone asked.
Something she’d been undecided on the week before.
Heather nodded. “The slope is gentle enough, so we can install twelve or fifteen inches.” If the slope were steeper, a big storm could wash away a taller retaining wall, but a small one should do well. “That way, we can create flat areas with a shallow bowl for the new plantings.”
“How much of the lawn are we going to remove?” Amber asked.
Considering the estate grounds were nearly an acre, equivalent to the size of a football field, and knowing her budget, Heather said, “Not as much as I would like, but it’ll be a great start. We have four areas of concentration. In addition to this beach area and the rain gardens, we’ll plant a prairie with native grasses mixed with flowering plants as a backdrop over there.” She indicated the south end of the grounds. “And then an expanded garden starting from the terrace, with another seating area at the other end, then here, around the buildings. All that will require more lawn removal. The rest of the lawn will remain, at least for this year.”
“There’s not going to be much left if The Terminator keeps going,” Amber said, looking beyond her.
“The Terminator?” Heather turned to see the man mowing the same section for a third time.
“He’s killing that grass,” Tyrone said. “Are you sure the owners want any left?”
Heather sighed. “I’m sure.” She’d actually had to scale back her plan a bit due to their budget. New plantings weren’t inexpensive, especially for an estate of this size, so she better save that grass.
“I saw him roll right over some bushes, too,” Amber said. “He just hot dogs that thing around like he’s driving a sports car.”
Heather sighed. “Okay. I guess I have to go talk to the guy. He doesn’t work for EPI, right?”
Tyrone shook his head. “Nope.”
Great. “Go on back to work while I take care of this.”
The Terminator. He did kind of look like the movie character, wearing those mirrored sunglasses.
Not wanting to confront a stranger her first hour on the job, Heather nevertheless trekked back up the incline. The landscape was now her responsibility, and she couldn’t sit by and see the lawn destroyed, not when there would be so much of it left when they were done planting.
Moving in behind him, she cleared her throat, then called, “Excuse me!”
The Terminator kept going—apparently he hadn’t heard her—and he was moving so fast, she nearly had to run to keep up with the riding mower.
She raised her voice. “Excuse me! Sir!” When he didn’t answer, she jogged faster and grabbed his arm. “Hey!”
He suddenly stopped and she ended up just about running smack into him. Stopping the machine instantly, he jumped off. The next thing Heather knew, she was on the ground, his hand on her throat, pinning her in place and knocking off her cap. It all happened so quickly, she had no way to defend herself. Frightened and angry, she lay beneath him, shaking inside, staring wide-eyed into his half-hidden face.
“What are you doing?” she croaked. Her heart was thumping double time. “Let go! Please! I wasn’t attacking you, okay?”
As if suddenly realizing he’d overreacted, he shook himself, stood and said, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to do that.” He held out a hand to her. “You just startled me.”
Reluctantly, she took his hand and let him pull her to her feet. The breath seemed to whoosh out of her, and she could feel her pulse where his fingers wrapped around hers. “Sorry,” he said again. “Really.”
As if burned, she pulled her hand free. “I—I, uh, just wanted to talk to you.”
He reached over to shut off the lawnmower. “About?”
“Well, that.” Her heartbeat steadying, she nodded at the fancy mower.
“You want to do the mowing?”
His lips curved slightly. Was that a smile? Hard to tell in a face that seemed to be made of granite. And one that was mostly hidden behind mirrored sunglasses. She wondered if he wore them for effect—if he wanted to seem mysterious or dangerous for some reason.
Not caring to make matters worse, she said, “Uh, no, I don’t want to do the mowing. I just want to know why you’re doing it.”
“I’m the handyman. Rick Slater. Mr. Phillips just hired me a few days ago.”
He didn’t look like a handyman. Heather frowned at him. “And he told you to mow the lawn?”
“Phillips didn’t give me orders to do anything specific. He just expects me to take care of the place in general. You have something against me cutting the grass?”
Did she? Heather wondered. This wasn’t something she’d talked about with Mr. Phillips or EPI, so she merely said, “I’m in charge of renovating the landscaping. Heather Clarke.”
His lips curved again. “You’re in charge? Then you must be that community college girl who’s doing an internship here.”
He seemed amused by the idea of her being in charge of anything. How young did he think she was, anyway? She was a very mature twenty-four. Not that she felt inclined to tell him so.
“I’m the woman who is doing the internship, yes.” Trying not to be irritated with him—she was fighting a losing battle—Heather said, “Mr. Phillips told me I could decide what we’re doing with all the plants and the lawn. Do you have experience with landscaping?”
“What kind of experience is necessary to ride a lawnmower around? Feel free to give me advice. I’m new at this.”
Then why had he been hired?
“First, you need to adjust the lawnmower so it doesn’t cut lower than two inches, or you’ll destroy the grass,” Heather told him. “Then only go over it once. And if you’re just riding from one place to another, raise the blades entirely.” She flicked her gaze around the area until she saw the bush Amber had told her about. “Apparently you’ve also sent a few shrubs to the big garden in the sky...so don’t mow the bushes, okay?”
He held up his hands, palms out. “Okay. You’re the boss. Your company does want the lawn mowed, right?”
From his expression, she was certain he was silently amused at her expense.
“Sure, mow any of the lawn that’s open—once.” Heat sizzled up her neck and her spine went stiff. “I need to get back to my team. We have a lot of work to get done today.”
With that, she whipped around, leaning over to pick up her fallen cap. She placed it firmly back on her head, tucking stray strands around the edge. All the while, she felt his gaze bore into her as she walked away. It took willpower not to glance back and look at him one last time. Tension coiled in her until the lawnmower started up again. She relaxed a bit, then realized her team had stopped work to watch the encounter. They were both grinning. Well, great. No respect from The Terminator...she could take that. But the people she would count on to follow her directions were another matter. If she didn’t have their respect, it was going to be a long summer.
She tried to play it cool as she joined them. Hoping they couldn’t sense her pulse racing or her stomach churning, she shrugged nonchalantly. “He’s the new handyman, but it seems he doesn’t know what he’s doing.”
“He looks pretty competent to me,” Tyrone said. “Like he’s been in the military. Or maybe he’s a spy. The way he flattened you on that ground in two seconds was amazing. Whoo-hoo!”
“Well, she did ambush him,” said Amber, grinning. “He didn’t even see her coming.”
Both Amber and Tyrone laughed as Heather clenched her jaw. “I was only trying to catch up with him.”
“Well, you caught him all right.” Noting his boss’s somber expression, Tyrone raised his brows at his coworker.
But Amber wasn’t paying attention. “A spy, hmm? Yeah, I dig that. A real hot one.”
Rick Slater might be hot, but Heather didn’t feel in the least like smiling. “A spy for what?” She couldn’t help but be sarcastic. “Protecting the country from invasive plants?”
Although spy was going a little too far, Heather could believe Rick had been military at some time. Probably an officer. He held himself with an authority that had bothered her. Considering her husband, Scott, had been killed in Iraq, she had no desire to get to know any man who was former, current or future military.
She only hoped the little show The Terminator had given Tyrone and Amber by making her look silly hadn’t damaged her relationship with her team.
CHAPTER TWO
RICK KEPT GLANCING over to see what Heather Clarke and her team were doing as he finished mowing the lawn area around the mansion. He’d enjoyed annoying her just a little. She was plenty bossy for someone so young. Young. Yeah, she was, no matter the tempting curves she’d hidden under that baggy sweatshirt, curves he’d felt beneath him when he’d had her on the ground. No sense in thinking about that or about her at all.
No sense in thinking about anyone, not when he was here to do a job.
He had to redirect his mind back to his mission.
Mowing the lawn was simply part of his cover, though he had carefully adjusted the mower higher as Heather had suggested. He didn’t want to be a grass destroyer. He snorted at the idea and remembered how Heather had glared at him when she’d made the accusation. Hmm, her narrow, makeup-free face had pulled into the cutest expression, and her blue eyes had gone all steely, when she’d been irritated with him...
There his mind went again, off in the wrong direction.
Raising the blades, he rode the lawnmower to the far side of the mansion, stopped and turned it off. Then he dismounted and walked along the flower garden that bordered the building. The task gave him the opportunity to covertly inspect the area where he’d found a man’s footprints early that morning. Though he hadn’t seen any signs of a break in, he was certain someone was sneaking around the grounds. If only he could figure out why. Whoever had left those tracks beneath the windows probably was up to no good, as Ben Phillips feared.
Strange things had been going on at the Flanagan estate for the past several weeks—a broken window, random diggings, tampered locks. Phillips had grown concerned, as he should have been, considering the family had quite a collection of century-old stained glass in the house, in addition to pricey antiques and a butler’s pantry filled with silver service. Also, there was the safety of the staff and the bed-and-breakfast guests to consider. With the tourist season about to heat up, Phillips had hired Rick to secure the estate and investigate the source of the trouble. And to stop it from going any farther, of course. Because Phillips had fired the last handyman/groundskeeper, he needed someone to do small repairs around the place—hence Rick’s cover.
But Rick had now been all around the mansion and the other buildings on the property, and he hadn’t seen anything more to clue him in as to what was going on. Figuring he needed to change tactics, he left the mower outside the coach house. Built to house carriages drawn by horses and walled with the same kind of fancy paneling as the house, it was now a combination garage for his employer and storage area for equipment. There was even a small shop area to make repairs. And upstairs, the second floor apartment that had been inhabited first by a carriage driver, then a chauffeur, was now Rick’s temporary digs. He’d only brought along some clothes and a bunch of books—the mysteries and thrillers that kept him company at night. The challenge of figuring out who did what and why had entertained him since he’d read the Hardy Boys as a kid. Undoubtedly the reason he’d been drawn to this particular job.
Rick was used to temporary digs. He’d never had a real home, not even when he was a kid. His dad had been military, and Rick, his brother, Joe, and their mom had moved from base to base all over the world with him. Their parents were retired now and living in Florida. And Joe had settled in to a job at the Pentagon.
Sometimes Rick wished he’d been smart enough to get out before the horrible attack that had turned his dreams into nightmares. When terrorists had attacked his team on a special mission in Afghanistan, two of his men had lost their lives. He and Keith Murphy had barely survived. He’d relegated to memory every detail of the event and the deaths of the men he’d called friends.
Afterward, he’d never felt the same about being a lifer. When his tour was over, he’d left the army. Still, Rick wasn’t settled, inside or out.
Guilt over his men’s deaths lingered, always just below the surface.
He hadn’t yet found any reason to want to remain in civilian life.
And he didn’t know if he would ever call any place home.
The only reason he’d come to Wisconsin had been to reconnect with Megan Anders, an old girlfriend, the daughter of a commissioned officer. He’d dated her off and on for a couple of years, and the last he’d heard, she’d settled in Milwaukee. Unfortunately, he’d had no clue she’d gotten married since he’d last seen her. Still, he liked the area, and having nowhere else to go, had stuck around, taking a job with Lake Shore Security, the company that had placed him in his current undercover job.
Getting to know the other employees on the estate was essential. It was day two and he’d barely met any of the help, so Rick decided to go inside the mansion and get cozy with them. He hadn’t had a chance to talk to any of the three full-time staff alone. Maybe he could get something out of one of them that would put him on the right track. The only person on the property who knew his real mission was the housekeeper, Cora, who’d been with the Phillips family for decades. He assumed that she was loyal and would keep his identity to herself, or the owner wouldn’t have told her who he was.
He entered through the huge kitchen, which still had an old-fashioned feel despite the new appliances. The large cabinets looked original to him, though they’d been painted white and sported new hardware. Gray-threaded white marble counters gave the cook several large preparation surfaces. Right now, however, she was busy at the stove, stirring something in a big pan. The smell made his mouth water.
He sized up the woman. Probably in her early forties, Kelly Bennett wore a white chef’s coat over gray trousers and had tied her red hair back from her face.
“Smells great,” he said.
She glanced at him. “Oh, Rick, good morning. I’m making carnitas, a southwestern pulled pork. You can try it later, at dinner.”
“I’ll be looking forward to that.”
Actually, he was looking forward to any meals he could catch here. He wasn’t a very good cook himself. And eating in a mess hall had never been much of a treat. So he was grateful for Phillips’s invitation to catch lunch and dinner with the other full-time employees on weekdays. On Saturday and Sunday, the cook only made brunch and only when there were guests.
“It’s pretty quiet here at this end of town,” he said. “Not much action.”
“Well, no, not now. There will be shortly. We have two guests arriving tomorrow. More on the weekend. We won’t be full seven days a week until mid-June, when school lets out. After that, all eight guest rooms are booked solid for most of the summer.”
Rick waited a beat, then said, “I thought I heard something last night.” If someone had been out in the garden as the fresh footprints indicated, the person must have made some kind of noise. Unfortunately, Rick hadn’t heard anything because he’d been too far away, sound asleep in the coach house.
“Heard something?” Kelly repeated. “Like what?”
“I don’t know. But it woke me.” A small fabrication.
“Maybe you had a bad dream.”
“I would have remembered. Well, usually I do.” He waited another beat. “So you didn’t hear anything?”
Phillips had told him that the cook, housekeeper and concierge all lived in the mansion.
“No. And I’m a light sleeper.” She went back to stirring her carnitas. “Nothing last night.”
“Another night, then?”
Keeping her back to him, she shrugged. “Old houses have strange noises sometimes. Is there something else you need?”
Rick wanted to ask her more, but he got the idea she wasn’t about to elaborate. At least not yet.
“Actually, I came in to see Cora.”
“She said she wanted to do some reorganizing in the library.”
“Thanks. See you when it’s chow time.”
He left the kitchen via a hallway that took him to the rotunda. The large, round multistory room in the middle of the building separated the two wings. An original mural of the heavens covered the domed ceiling and extended to the upper walls, where a balcony ran full circle, allowing guests to admire artwork on the walls or look down to view the activity on the first floor. The lower walls were enhanced with a rich wood wainscoting, and a carpeted stairway with hand-carved railings led to the second floor.
The rotunda did double duty as the check-in area for guests and as the concierge office. Behind the antique mahogany desk hung a large portrait of a thin, wiry man with wild red hair that stuck straight up. The man stood next to an elaborate seven-branched silver candelabra complete with glowing flames.
Red Flanagan himself, Rick assumed. Odd that Phillips would showcase a portrait of a mobster. Then again, that a mobster once owned the estate might be part of its appeal to visitors and the reason they called it Flanagan Manor rather than Phillips Manor.
At the moment, the cavernous room was empty, so he sailed right through. Phillips had given him a set of plans of the mansion, so Rick knew that the kitchen, dining room, drawing room and music room sat below two floors of guest rooms with baths, and the library, main entrance and conservatory sat below the owner’s private quarters. The Phillips family had a drawing room and huge master suite on the second floor and four more bedrooms with individual baths on the third.
Entering the library, he saw Cora Stanton on a rolling ladder, straightening some books on a high shelf. Sections of every wall were lined with shelving from floor to ceiling, all filled with books. He cleared his throat to get her attention. She glanced back and saw him.
“Ah, Rick, there you are. I wanted to talk to you.”
“Good. Then we’re on the same wavelength.” When she arched her eyebrows in question, he said, “That’s why I’m here.”
She immediately descended the ladder.
As Flanagan Manor’s housekeeper, Cora was, in effect, in charge of the estate. All employees answered to her. An attractive older woman of around seventy, she wore dark trousers and a lace-trimmed white blouse. Her silver hair was cut in a short, modern style, and designer glasses hung from the chain around her neck.
“Benjamin told me why he hired you, of course, and I must say I’m relieved. I admit that I’ve been a bit spooked by some of the things happening in or around the house lately, and I hope you’ll get to the bottom of whatever is going on. I’m at my wit’s end worrying.”
“Phillips gave me the short explanation, but I need to know more from someone who is actually living on the property full-time.”
“Let’s sit, shall we?”
She indicated the upholstered sofa and leather chairs before the massive ceramic-faced fireplace with an equally massive wood surround and mantel, where a small fire had taken the chill of the spring morning from the room.
They took the two chairs, so they were facing each other.
Concern furrowed Cora’s brow. “I’ve run this estate for more than thirty years, and I’ve never had to worry until recently. I don’t feel safe anymore, what with the noises and sightings and attempted break-ins.” She shivered.
“What kind of noises?”
“Thumping in the walls. Supposedly there were secret passageways and tunnels at one time and I’m wondering if somehow something or someone got into one of them.”
Rick started. Secret passageways. Underground. That was something Phillips hadn’t told him about. A shudder ran through him, but he covered quickly.
“I have blueprints of the house, but I didn’t see any note of hidden access,” he said.
“Well, no, there wouldn’t be, not on the original plans. When Red Flanagan bought the estate, he had the passageways and tunnels and perhaps a secret room or two built into or under the house to support his illegal business. Then the Feds took over. It’s said they walled off the entrances to the house itself before they sold the property. You know, to discourage any more illegal activity. That was nearly eighty years and two additional owners ago.”
“Where were the entrances to these supposed tunnels?”
She shrugged. “I have no idea. I never even had reason to think about them until the past few weeks.”
Rick remained silent for a moment. Secret tunnels...secret stash? Was that what the intruder was looking for? Something the person thought Red left behind and the Feds hadn’t found? Made sense.
“So start from the beginning,” he said. “When did you first suspect someone was up to no good?”
“About five weeks ago. I woke in the middle of the night because I thought I had heard a noise. I looked out at the lake through my bedroom window and movement nearby caught my eye. A dark, shadowy figure. Someone was on the property, but the gates were locked. The person either climbed the fence or came via the lake itself.”
“You’re sure it wasn’t an employee or guest?”
“It was April and the middle of the week. We have very few guests at that time, and none that night. Day employees—maids, mostly—don’t have keys. So the only ones legally on the property were the cook and concierge, and both Kelly and Gina said they were sound asleep.”
She went on to tell him about other incidents, a few Phillips had already related. It was sounding more and more like the intruder was searching for something specific.
“Has there been any kind of property damage?”
“Not with the first few incidents, which is why I wasn’t too alarmed. But then a couple of weeks ago, I heard breaking glass.” She sighed. “Fortunately I am a light sleeper. Or just an old woman—they say people my age tend to wake up more easily in the night.”
“You’re not old,” he reassured her.
She shrugged.
He went on, “So you investigated?”
“Not then. I was alone. So not until morning.”
“Well, you’re not alone anymore.” Rick handed her his card. “My cell number is there. Program it in to yours. Should you hear or see anything suspicious at any time, call me immediately.”
She took the card and slipped it into a pocket. “I will sleep better knowing that you are around and that I can call on you.”
“Good.” Rick got to his feet. “If you think of anything else—anything at all that might help—let me know.”
Leaving the library, Rick figured this was going to be a piece of cake compared with some of his experiences in a special operations intelligence team. He was going to have to install several security cameras not only around the mansion but also in several other places. The coach house for one. The old boathouse, too, just in case an intruder decided to come in by the lake. Tracking back the way he’d come through the rotunda, he saw that Gina Luca, dressed in a black pencil skirt and a bright red blouse, was standing next to her desk.
“Rick, it’s so good to see you again. How are you getting along so far?”
“I’m doing fine with a little guidance,” he said, thinking of his encounter with the college girl.
Gina’s lips curved in an inviting smile. “I’d be happy to help you with whatever you need.”
With jet black hair that trailed her shoulders, dark brown eyes and a body that would make most men take a second look, Gina was a little too high end for Rick’s taste. He preferred his women earthy and a little feisty.
Now he was thinking of Heather on the grass pinned under him, his hand to her throat, ordering him to get off...
He really hadn’t meant to go on the attack like that. His training had kicked in at the most inappropriate time.
He nodded at Gina. “I’ll let you know when I need something.”
Like information that would help him break the case.
* * *
FOR NEARLY AN hour Heather helped Tyrone and Amber clear the persistent, invading grass from the beach area.
“Wait till my younger sisters and brothers hear where I get to work,” Tyrone said, looking out to the lake, blue-green today, waves swelling and rushing in to shore with a lick of foam.
“How many siblings do you have?” Amber asked as she dumped another plant into the wheelbarrow.
“Three of each.”
Heather started. “Seven kids?” She had her hands full with two. “Your poor mother.”
“Me and my seventeen-year-old sister, Chantel, help her take care of the younger ones.”
“You?” Amber said, sounding disbelieving.
“Hey, I like kids, especially after they get past that crazy stage.”
“When is that?” Whenever it was, Heather wasn’t looking forward to it.
“Actually, there’s two crazy stages,” Tyrone said with authority. “Everyone knows about the terrible twos. But it’s the psycho sixes that get to me. That’s when they become jugheads, think they know everything and get into trouble. Darnell decided to investigate a boarded-up house for ghosts and ended up with a broken arm. And LaVonda tangled with a hornets’ nest. Man, was she ever a mess. I’m glad we’re on our last six-year-old. That would be Vaughn.”
Heather could hear the affection in Tyrone’s voice when he talked about his younger siblings and thought it was both sweet and unexpected.
“So what about you?” he asked Amber.
“Two older brothers. Big lugs. Always trying to take care of me whether I want them to or not.”
“That’s what big brothers are supposed to do,” Tyrone said, then turned his attention to Heather. “Your turn, boss.”
“Younger brother, older sister. And I have twin six-year-old girls.”
“Twins!” Tyrone puffed himself up and swaggered a little. “You need advice on how to handle them little girls, you can come to me.”
Heather laughed. “I’ll keep that in mind next time they make me want to scream.”
They all laughed together, a good sound. Heather decided that, despite the shaky start, they would make a compatible team.
Noting they were almost finished with this section, she stepped back. “I’m going to get the sod cutter from the coach house so we can start clearing our rain garden areas next.”
Tyrone saluted her. “By the time you get the equipment, we’ll be ready to go.”
“If you see The Terminator,” Amber added, “say hi for us.”
The Terminator. Right. Not having heard the lawnmower for quite some time now, Heather found herself looking to see what he was up to. And then she remembered being pinned under that big, muscular body. Heat crept up the back of her neck. Rick Slater, she told herself. His name was Rick Slater. Thinking of him as The Terminator was bound to get her in trouble.
She headed for the coach house, a miniature version of the mansion. Same gray stone, same windows, same small details. Her team had put most of their equipment in a storage room with plenty of shelving. But the sod cutter was bulky and weighed more than three hundred pounds, so they’d left it near the lawnmower and other large equipment. Of course, The Termin...Rick...had removed the mower earlier.
So when she turned on the light and approached the sod cutter, she noticed it was sitting at an odd angle. The first thing she thought was that Rick must have whacked it getting the lawnmower out of the coach house. She tried straightening it so she could turn it on and back it out but had no success. It was definitely wonky. A closer look showed her the rear pivot wheel was out of alignment.
How had the sod cutter been damaged?
Heather tried not to panic, but the breath caught in her throat as she realized the implications. She was in charge of this contract, which meant she was in charge of the equipment. Any damage was her responsibility.
If the sod cutter was inoperable...how bad was it? Her hand shook as she pressed it to her chest. Oh, please, I hope I don’t have to replace it.
“Hey, what’s going on? Is something wrong?”
She whipped around to find Rick coming into the coach house. She could see that he’d left the lawnmower directly outside. He was still wearing his sunglasses, so she couldn’t read his expression.
“Yes, unfortunately there is. The sod cutter wasn’t like this when we delivered it last Friday.”
“Like what?”
“Broken.”
“And you haven’t used it yet?”
“No. It’s the pivot...” She indicated the damaged wheel. “You didn’t bang into it or anything when you moved the lawnmower, did you?”
“Hey, I didn’t touch it, honest.” He crouched down to inspect the damage. “It looks like it can be fixed.”
“I sure hope so. A new sod cutter would cost thousands of dollars. I don’t know how I would pay for it. I don’t even know how I can pay for the repair.”
She was still managing website orders for Sew Fine, mostly at home, but she might have to arrange more hours at the store to make extra money.
Rick straightened. “Hey, it’s going to be all right. Calm down.”
“I-I’m sorry.” Now that he was closer, she could see the part of his face not hidden by the sunglasses. He appeared concerned. “I’m a little strapped for cash lately, and I’m a single mother, so I have to worry about how I’m going to feed my kids.” Though she didn’t want to rely on anyone else, her family would come through for her if she ran into a financial problem. She took a deep, calming breath. It would all work out somehow.
“You have kids?” He sounded a little surprised. “Plural?”
She nodded. “Two. Twin girls. Addison and Taylor. They were six last month.”
“Six-year-olds?” Now he sounded amazed. “How old are you?”
Remembering he’d called her that community college girl, she asked, “How old did you think I was?”
“I don’t know. Nineteen. Maybe twenty.”
She smiled despite herself. “Thanks, but I’ll be twenty-five in a few months.”
“You could have fooled me. You did fool me.” He reached out and gently touched her shoulder. “I can see why you’re worried with kids and all. But relax already. Your company must have insurance on its equipment.”
“I—I guess.” Appreciative of his sympathy, she said, “I hate even telling them something’s gone wrong on the first day. I was hoping this would turn into a full-time job after we finished this project.”
“Maybe you won’t have to tell them anything,” Rick said. “I probably can fix the wheel.”
Thinking of the way he’d wrestled with the lawnmower, she asked, “Seriously?”
“Just because I don’t know my way around a lawn doesn’t mean I don’t have other talents. I used to take cars apart and put them back together for fun. Yes, seriously, leave this to me. I’ll take care of it.”
Starting to like Rick more than she thought she would, Heather let out a relieved sigh. “If you can do that, I’ll...well, you deserve some kind of reward. I’ll owe you.”
His mouth curved slightly in a ghost of a smile. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
She blinked at him and swallowed hard. “Um, when do you think you might be able to get around to fixing it?”
“I have a couple of things to take care of first that won’t take long. If I don’t need to order a new part, I should have it to you early this afternoon.”
“Thank you!” She could hardly believe he was being so great to her after her negative thoughts about him. “I guess I’d better tell my crew our plans have changed. We need to build a composter anyway, so we can recycle the sod we remove. We’ll start on that.”
Luckily, she’d had her workers bring the materials to create a couple of large composter holding units—wood and galvanized chicken wire. Not pretty, the composters would be built at the far end of the property and hidden by native grasses that would reach six feet high by midsummer.
Shifting into a positive mode, she started to leave but turned back when Rick called her.
“Hey, Heather. If anything else unexpected happens—not just to your equipment but anything else that bothers you around here—make sure you let me know. I’m going to take care of everything.”
She suddenly felt warm inside.
“Will do,” she agreed, wondering why his assurances made her feel so good. Maybe it was because she hadn’t had the protection of a caring male in a very long time.
But as she headed back toward the beach area, she wondered what Rick meant by “anything else” that bothered her.
It almost sounded as if he expected something to go wrong.
* * *
A GUT FEELING convinced Rick that the sod cutter had been damaged by their mystery intruder. When he’d stooped down to get a closer look at the pivot wheel, he’d noticed a smear of dirt on the machine that looked like a footprint. Someone had stood on it, and perhaps the weight had bent the wheel.
The question was...why would someone stand on it?
After his discussion with Cora, he was pretty convinced the person was looking for entries to the secret tunnels. Maybe he’d had to climb over the equipment to search.
Who knew?
Rick had to admit the coach house was a perfect place for a secret entrance. Not much traffic in here, so low probability of any witnesses. He started inspecting walls for some indication of a hidden door, but the paneling made it hard to see any irregularities. And the lack of good light everywhere but in the storage area frustrated him.
And as he searched, he thought about Heather Clarke. At almost twenty-five, she was still eleven years younger than he. But why was he even thinking about the difference in their ages? He might like her, but he wasn’t looking for someone to date. He was looking to do his job—to stop whoever was up to no good around the estate.
Still, he was distracted. He couldn’t shake Heather’s distraught expression from his memory. As a single mom, she obviously had some money concerns.
Stooping down to take a better look at the sod cutter’s pivot wheel, he remembered how Heather’s tension had eased when he’d told her he could probably fix the equipment himself. And when he did, he hoped to see a big smile on her pretty face.
All the reward he would need.
CHAPTER THREE
HEATHER PUT A tuna casserole into the oven. She was grateful that Rick had come through for her and that she and her crew had been able to make short work of cutting out the two areas for rain gardens. Now she wondered what she could do to properly thank the man. Not that she had time to think about The Terminator at the moment. The nickname made her smile, made her want to think more about the resourceful man.
But right now, she had to concentrate on getting Addison and Taylor fed. Which meant making a salad to go with the casserole. A salad they would complain and fuss about before she got them to eat it. She fetched lettuce and a tomato, then carrots from the fridge and took them all to the sink, where she rinsed everything off. Addison loved carrots and Taylor could be bribed to eat them with a little French dressing on the side. She glanced around. The kitchen could use a makeover, but thankfully, it was spacious enough to be eat-in. The house was a neat bungalow with a living room, kitchen, two bedrooms and a single bath. All she’d been able to afford using her late husband’s life insurance.
A screech from outside made her wonder what was going on now. Apparently a morning of school followed by an afternoon of day camp wasn’t enough to wear out the twins. She grabbed a bowl and a cutting board and began chopping. The girls were playing in the backyard, and from the sound of their squeals and heated words, they had energy to spare.
Putting together the salad, Heather couldn’t even remember what that kind of energy felt like. Although she loved her time with the girls, they took everything out of her. She simply couldn’t keep up with them no matter how hard she tried. At one point when she was managing her Aunt Margaret’s store, she’d considered giving up on school. But then her sister, Kristen, had returned to Sparrow Lake and taken over Sew Fine. Having lost her fancy marketing job in Chicago, Kristen hadn’t known what she wanted to do at first but, luckily, her family and a new romance with the town’s police chief meant she was in Sparrow Lake to stay, and Heather was thankful for that.
She smiled wanly, thinking about how gladly she’d stepped down from the store manager job and taken the easier one of overseeing online sales. Much of which she could do at home after the twins were in bed. The only problem now was money. They were living on an even tighter budget than before.
A budget that would have been ruined if she’d had to pay to repair the sod cutter.
Rick crept into her thoughts despite her determination. There was just something about him...
And he certainly had come to her rescue this morning. Nothing she did could possibly convey her gratitude because she was hoping this internship would be the turning point in her life. If EPI hired her full time, she could give up working for Sew Fine for a fulfilling job with enough pay and benefits that she could finally relax. Then she would have more time to concentrate on the girls.
Which sounded like heaven after the past four years of pushing, pushing, pushing. Whoever had thought it was possible to “do it all,” especially if you were a single mom, was deluded. Yeah, you could do it all if you didn’t mind feeling like a zombie half the time. Her own mother had remarried and moved to California about the same time Scott had died, so Heather had been on her own.
“Hey, look what we got!”
Hearing Taylor’s chirpy voice, Heather smiled and turned to see. But though her daughters were both beaming at her, her own smile quickly evaporated. Standing between them was a scruffy dog with orange-brown and white fur and a pointed nose. The same dog who’d been watching them get into the SUV that morning.
“Whose dog is that?” Heather had hoped it belonged to a neighbor and had simply been wandering around.
“He’s ours!” Addison said. “We found him!”
Heather shook her head. “Oh, no, he’s not ours.”
“Yes, he is, and he’s starving.” Taylor went to the refrigerator and pulled out a package of turkey slices. “He needs to eat.”
Heather was about to say no when she took a better look at the dog. He did seem a little thin and he was staring at that package of lunch meat with the most hopeful expression on his sad little face. “Okay, one slice of turkey.”
But when the dog practically swallowed the slice whole, Taylor pulled out another and gave that one to him, too, saying, “His name is Kirby.”
“Sweetheart, don’t give him a name because we’re not going to keep him.”
“Why not?” Addison asked. “He’s real nice.”
Watching the dog devour a third slice of meat, Heather said, “I’m sure he is. But—”
“C’mon, Mom,” Taylor wheedled.
“I don’t have time to take care of a dog.”
Or the money. Being a responsible owner meant paying for shots and vet bills in addition to food, and the family budget was at the straining point now. Not that she wanted to burden her six-year-olds with her financial worries.
“I’ll take care of him by myself!” Taylor insisted.
“No,” Addison protested, “I’ll help.”
Heather knew Taylor couldn’t take care of the dog herself, not even with Addison’s help. The twins didn’t have that kind of focus yet. When something interested them, it was only for a short while. And then they moved on to the next thing.
“You can take care of him for tonight. But tomorrow, I’m driving him to the local shelter. They’ll either find his real owner...or they’ll find him a good home.”
“Mo-o-om!” the twins cried in unison.
“That’s enough.” Noticing the lunch meat package was empty, Heather said, “Well, it seems the dog has had his dinner.” She pulled a bowl out of the cabinet and filled it with water. “Now it’s time for you to get ready for yours. Go wash your hands so you can set the table.”
She put down the bowl of water out of the line of traffic. The dog immediately stuck his muzzle in and started drinking as he gazed up at her with shiny brown eyes. He was such a cutie. She couldn’t help herself. She patted his side. Whistling through his nose, the dog immediately whipped his head around and licked her hand. She melted inside just a little.
“Don’t worry, boy. I’ll make sure you get a home.”
As long as it wasn’t hers.
* * *
AN HOUR LATER, the kitchen was clean and Heather was on the computer, which she had set up in the bay window area of the living room. Someday it would be nice to have a bigger place, one with a real office space. She was going through Sew Fine’s newest online orders and figuring out what supplies she would need to order to replenish stock.
Directly after dinner, the twins had absconded with the dog to their room. Heather could hear them now, talking to him and giggling. She smiled sadly. They were having a good time, and she hoped their little hearts wouldn’t be broken when they had to give up the dog in the morning.
Hearing a vehicle stop in front of the house, she left the computer to see who it was. To her surprise, her sister was coming up the walk. Wearing a lavender dress and four-inch heels to match and her blond hair gathered in a sleek ponytail, Kristen was carrying a dress bag. Apparently, she was delivering Heather’s bridesmaid’s dress. Kristen and Alex’s wedding date was approaching all too rapidly.
Heather opened the door. “Hey, Kristen, what a great surprise.” They hugged, and she took the dress bag from her sister. “You didn’t have to deliver the dress, though. I could have picked it up myself.”
“But then I wouldn’t have been able to see my favorite nieces,” Kristen said as the twins came running out of their bedroom, the dog on their heels.
“Aunt Kristen!” they yelled together, each twin launching herself onto Kristen, who laughed and gave them big hugs.
The dog stopped short and started barking.
Kristen started. “Whoa, what’s this?”
“Our new dog,” Addison said.
Before Heather could object, Taylor added, “His name is Kirby.”
Over the twins’ heads, Kristen locked gazes with her. Heather squinched up her face and shook her head No. In return, Kristen rolled her eyes.
“Girls, give your aunt some breathing room. It’s time to take your baths.” When Taylor’s face lit up, Heather clarified, “I mean the two of you, not the dog. You’re not to let him in the tub. Understood?”
Taylor’s face fell. “Okay.”
“While the tub is filling, get your pajamas ready and brush your hair and teeth. And don’t get in until I tell you it’s okay.”
She let them wash themselves now but not without supervision.
The girls flew to the bathroom, the dog trotting behind.
“You actually think they’re not going to let their four-legged friend get in with them?” Kristen asked, laughing. “I remember that time I babysat and gave them a bath. When my back was turned, they brought every doll and toy horse into the tub, even though I told them not to.”
Hearing the water running, Heather laughed. “I’d like to say they’re more mature than they were a year ago, but that’s wishful thinking. Maybe I’d better get the dog and keep him with us in case they get any ideas.”
She went into the bedroom, where the girls were tossing their pajamas back and forth over the dog’s head so that he kept jumping, trying to get the clothes whipping through the air.
“Enough. I’m going to take the dog into the other room with Aunt Kristen.” She looked straight at the dog and tapped her leg. “C’mon. C’mon, boy.” He sat down. She patted her leg again. “Let’s go.” She whistled. “C’mon, boy.” He yawned.
“His name is Kirby,” Taylor sing-songed, and the dog got to his feet and trotted over to her. “See?”
Naming him was a mistake, but what else could she do? “C’mon...Kirby.”
The dog now came to her. Heather patted him on the head. “Let’s go see Aunt Kristen.”
By the time she got to the living room, Kirby trotting ahead of her and looking back to make sure she was coming, Kristen had already opened the garment bag to reveal the bridesmaid’s dress made of sheer apricot-colored material.
“Oh, it’s gorgeous.”
“You need to try it on,” Kristen said, handing it to her. “I want to make sure it’s perfect.”
“I’m not the bride. You’re the one who has to look perfect.” And Kristen would look perfect, Heather thought, having seen the elegant cream-colored wedding dress at Kristen’s last fitting.
“But you’re my matron of honor and my sister. We have to look perfect together.”
“Okay, I’ll try on the dress.”
Heather and Kristen started for the bedroom with Kirby next to Heather, bumping against her legs as they passed the bathroom. The bathtub water was running and the girls were in their room, giggling.
“Teeth!” she reminded them before closing her bedroom door. She was already removing her sweatshirt. “I haven’t had a dress that fancy in...well, never.”
Kristen laughed. “Then it’s about time.”
Amazingly, the dress fit Heather perfectly, though the fancy style felt a bit foreign to her.
“It looks great on you,” Kristen said.
Heather checked herself out in the full-length mirror on the back of a door. Kirby parked himself next to her, and she thought the color of his fur was almost the same color as the dress.
“It is nice,” she had to admit, “even if it isn’t me.”
“How did I ever get a sister so uninterested in clothes?”
“How did I ever get one so interested in labels?” Heather came back.
Luckily, Kristen had insisted on buying the garment for Heather. Or rather, Kristen and Alex. Between the two of them, they could afford it. Not that Heather still didn’t feel a little guilty. She promised herself she’d make it up to both of them someday.
Kristen asked, “You don’t hate the dress, do you?”
“No. It’s very pretty.” Heather smoothed the fabric of the skirt with her hands. “I just don’t look like me wearing it. I’m more comfortable in jeans and a T-shirt or sweater. And I’m going to have to do something with my hair. The color is so mousy against the bright apricot.”
“Your hair is shiny and thick,” Kristen said, “but I do wonder how a shade lighter would look on you.”
“I actually thought about putting in some blond highlights.”
Kristen grinned. “Now that’s the spirit! You haven’t exactly been enthusiastic about this wedding—”
“No! You know I like Alex.” And she was thrilled to see her older sister so happy. “I’ve just been too busy to enjoy things as much as I would like.”
Heather took off the dress and carefully hung it up. She listened for the girls. The water was still running, but she didn’t hear their voices. She opened the door. “What are you two up to?” she called.
“Brushing teeth,” one of the twins answered, sounding as if the toothbrush were in her mouth.
“Okay, I’ll be there in a couple of minutes.” Closing the door again, she said, “You and Alex make the perfect couple, and I’m so happy for you.” She pulled her old clothes back on. “I just don’t want the relatives who’ll come in for the wedding pitying me or something.”
“Pitying you? Why would they?”
“You know, because I’m a widow and all.”
Heather opened the nightstand drawer where she still kept a small photo of her late husband. She ran a fingertip around his face. Her memories of Scott were getting a little hazy, so every night before she went to bed, she looked at the photo and called up a nice memory of the two of them together.
Heather went on. “I know they’re going to ask me about Scott—how he died, how I’m doing without him, how my poor girls are doing growing up without a father.”
And what could she say? She still missed him. The girls missed him, Taylor especially. She’d watched that DVD so many times that Heather was beginning to worry it wasn’t healthy for her daughter. Still she couldn’t take the little girl’s Daddy away from her.
“Wow,” Kristen mused, “you’ve imagined a whole scenario with the relatives.”
“Do you have a better one for me?”
“Yeah, bring a date. With you on another man’s arm, they won’t be able to ask you about Scott.”
“Except that I’m not dating anyone.”
And hadn’t ever dated any other man in her whole life other than Scott. Part of her didn’t want to. His death had left her so brokenhearted that she couldn’t ever see herself taking another chance on love.
“So start dating,” Kristen insisted. “Aunt Margaret invited John to be her date.”
“I’m glad they connected. It’s nice to know it’s never too late for love.”
Aunt Margaret was nearing seventy and John was five years older. They’d only met the summer before, but they made a perfect couple. Heather had to admit she envied that. She just didn’t know if she was ready for another relationship.
“It’s not too late for you, either,” Kristen was saying. “You could start slow. If you’re uncomfortable calling it a date, ask a male friend to accompany you.”
“I can’t think of anyone to ask.”
The only single man of an appropriate age she’d met lately was The Terminator, and he certainly wasn’t her type. She was glad when the girls yelled, “Mo-o-om!” and knocked the image of him right out of her head.
“Bath time,” she told Kristen.
“And time for me to leave.”
Heather opened the bedroom door and saw the twins wedged in the bathroom doorway.
“C’mon, Mommy,” Addison said. “Bath time!”
Taylor echoed her twin. “Bath time!”
“Give me just a minute to see your aunt to the front door.”
Kristen was already halfway there, the dog shadowing her. She stopped and gave Heather a quick hug. “Just remember what I said about asking someone to accompany you to the wedding.”
“I doubt I’ll be able to forget.”
An image of Rick Slater was in her mind again, tempting Heather as Kristen left, and she closed and locked the front door behind her sister.
She hesitated just a moment to think about Rick...to wonder what he might look like without those sunglasses...
What sounded like a tidal wave accompanied by little girl squeals brought her around.
“What’s going on?” she yelled before realizing the dog had disappeared.
It seemed everyone was getting a bath tonight.
* * *
WAKING IN THE middle of the night had become an unwelcome habit for Cora. And it didn’t take an unusual sound to rouse her from sleep. It was simply the expectation of some sort of noise occurring. Tonight she didn’t remember anything unusual. She awakened, lay there for a while, then rose to fix some chamomile tea in the little electric teapot she’d set up in her bathroom. The teapot made things easier in that she didn’t have to leave her suite. A small nightlight made the bedside lamp unnecessary.
Sitting in the comfortable chair beside the bank of windows, she sipped her tea and watched flashes of lightning illuminate the sky over the lake, followed by a rumble of thunder. A storm was brewing. Perhaps it had simply been thunder that had invaded her dreams.
She hated having to be on guard all the time.
At least a private investigator was now in residence.
Not that he could be everywhere at once.
A cool breeze that smelled of fresh rain lifted the curtains. Thinking that perhaps she ought to lower the windows, Cora put down her cup, rose and leaned on the sill.
Storms over the lake had always fascinated her, so she didn’t immediately adjust the windows. Instead, she looked out from her attic-level quarters, which gave her a perfect view of the show. For a moment she was mesmerized by the electric light dancing in the sky.
Until another movement closer by captured her attention.
She dropped her gaze to search for the source.
Lightning flashed again and she could see the second-floor balcony and the small wiry man with red hair standing on end who perched there, back stiff, body wired with tension.
With a start, she thought she recognized him. Red Flanagan?
Could it be? He certainly reminded her of the man in the portrait hung in the rotunda.
Shocked, Cora gripped the windowsill and held her breath.
The sky went dark and she blinked several times, then took another look that made her stomach whirl.
The balcony stood empty.
Lightning flashed again, confirming that no one was there now...if anyone had ever been there at all. She’d thought the intruder was a flesh-and-blood man. But now she wondered. Surely no one these days could look exactly like an eighty-year-old portrait.
Trembling from the inside out, she closed the windows, and with shaking hands, locked them.
Not that locked windows could stop a ghost...
CHAPTER FOUR
STANDING ON THE balcony off the second-floor family drawing room with the housekeeper, Rick kept his voice low. “This should be a perfect place for one of my cameras.” He didn’t want to alert any other employees on the property as to what he was doing. It was possible someone working here knew the intruder and was sharing information, whether on purpose or not.
It was early morning—too early for Heather and her EPI workers to be on site. Truth be told, he was looking forward to Heather’s arrival, but he wanted to make certain that, before she and her workers swarmed the property, he had time to install at least a couple of the security cameras he’d picked up from his company in Milwaukee the night before.
“So this camera will show you if anyone...or anything...is on the property at night?” Cora asked.
“Well, not just this camera,” Rick said, wondering what she meant by or anything. “I brought enough of them to cover the area in each direction around the building, plus the coach house and the boathouse.”
The housekeeper nodded. She seemed tense and nervous, and she looked as if she hadn’t slept well.
He tried to reassure her. “Don’t worry, I’ll catch whoever has been messing around on the estate grounds. These wireless cameras are the best. They have spectacular night vision as far as three hundred feet. And they’re set on motion detectors that will start the camera and make digital recordings on a computer that can signal me on my phone.”
He would have to hook up each camera to a 110 AC source, a consideration in choosing locations. He also needed places that would provide camouflage for the cameras. If the intruder became aware of them, he could simply cover up the lenses. If he didn’t destroy the equipment. So Rick had to hide each camera very carefully. He would position this first one between the balcony’s balusters, near a planter with greenery that hung in long strands through the opening. A perfect nest for the lens.
“So the cameras would be able to see anything out of place?” Cora asked.
“As long as it’s moving.”
“Does it have to be...”
“What?” he asked.
Cora cleared her throat. “Um, alive?”
What exactly was she getting at? Rick wondered. “Well, uh, if someone threw something into the area covered by—”
“Not an object. That’s not what I meant.”
“Then...what?”
“I saw something last night.” Cora wrapped her arms around her middle as if trying to protect herself. “At least I think I did.”
Rick was getting a weird feeling about this. “Go on.”
“It was a figure. Male. It looked like a small wiry man with red hair standing on end—”
“Looked like? What is it you’re trying to say, Cora?”
“I thought I saw Red Flanagan.”
Silence. Part of Rick wanted to laugh at her imagination. But he didn’t want to insult Cora. She’d been stressed about whatever was going on around the mansion at night for weeks now. Perhaps it had become too much for her.
“You don’t believe me,” she said, her words almost whispered.
“Red Flanagan has been dead for what? Half a century?”
“I know that! I just said it looked like him. Like the portrait in the rotunda.”
“Hey, easy. I’m on your side. I just don’t know what to think.”
“What if Flanagan Manor is haunted?” Cora asked.
Rick could see that she was serious. “I can’t say that I believe in ghosts.”
“I didn’t think I did, either. But after all that’s happened in the past several weeks...”
“If you did see Flanagan’s ghost, why now? What made him come back? Before all these curious events, did something significant happen on the estate? Some big change?”
“I—I don’t know. I’ll have to think on it.”
Rick didn’t believe in ghosts and he started to say that he’d never heard of one leaving footprints or breaking equipment by standing on it. But he was distracted by the sound of an engine. Both he and Cora turned to see a silver sedan pull up to the mansion. The driver’s door opened and a distinguished, silver-haired man exited.
“Oh, David—I mean Mr. Guildfren—is early.”
The man advanced to the trunk of his car and pulled out two suitcases.
“A guest.” Apparently one she knew by name.
“Yes, a regular. He’s an antiques dealer who appreciates the history of this estate. He’s been coming here for the past three years for a few weeks in the summer and again during the winter holidays.”
Color flushed Cora’s cheeks, and her avid expression suggested a certain fondness for the man.
“I can take it from here,” Rick said. “If you have other things to do.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
“All right then. Call me if you need me.”
Rather than waiting for his response, she whipped back into the drawing room, a changed woman from the tired, nervous one of a few minutes before. The spring to her step informed him of her affection for the guest. Rick wondered if the feeling was reciprocated, and if so, if they had ever done anything about it. Cora had said the man was a regular, visiting the bed-and-breakfast twice a year. She hadn’t been able to hide her excitement at seeing him.
He needed to get to work. Luckily there was an outlet nearby, providing a source of electricity.
As he set the camera in place, he felt hollow. He’d never had a long-term relationship with any woman. Being military for nearly all his life, he’d never been in one place long enough. His on-and off-again romance with Megan had been the closest he’d gotten. And being part of a special ops team had brought him to some pretty grim places. None were so grim as the last. Once he’d landed back here in the States, he hadn’t known what to do with himself. The army had always been his home. Giving civilian life a chance had its own difficulties.
He’d been back for several months now, but no woman had even interested him.
Not until he’d met Heather Clarke.
* * *
TAYLOR COULDN’T BELIEVE Mommy could be so mean. First Daddy never came home like he promised. Now Mommy was going to give away Kirby.
“He’s my dog!” she said with a sniffle as they approached the counter. Dogs were barking and cats were meowing, too. She looked around and tears filled her eyes. “You can’t put poor Kirby in jail!”
“Sweetheart, he’s not your dog,” Mommy said. “And the Sparrow Lake Animal Shelter isn’t a jail.”
“Then why are all the animals locked up?” Tears slipped down Taylor’s cheeks.
Addison took her hand and squeezed hard. “They’re so sad!”
“Not so sad, honey.” The white-haired lady behind the counter smiled at them. “The animals don’t all get along with each other, so we keep them separated for their protection. But they all get some time out of the cages every day. We have several volunteers who come to take care of them and play with them. The animals here are treated very well.”
“Then I want to volunteer,” Taylor said.
“Me, too,” Addison added.
“I’m sorry, girls, but you’re too young.”
Her mom held up the rope she’d used for a leash. “We found this dog yesterday, and I was hoping you could take him and either find his owner or find a new home.”
“I’m very sorry, but we’re full at the moment. Actually, we’re usually full. So many animals lost or thrown away.” She sighed and shook her head. “But we can put him on a waiting list. You never know when one of our dogs will get his forever home. Here’s a form to fill out.” She slid a piece of paper over the counter. “We’ll also add him to the list of newly lost animals in case anyone is looking for him.”
Mommy started scribbling, and Taylor got down on her knees and hugged Kirby tight. “You don’t have to come here yet,” she whispered. “So you’re still mine.”
“What’s a forever home?” Addison asked.
The white-haired lady smiled again. “That’s what we like to say when we place one of our dogs or cats with a new family. That they’ve found the home where they will live and be happy forever.”
Taylor thought Kirby had already found his forever home. Now if only she could make Mommy change her mind...
She’d already lost Daddy. It wasn’t fair if she had to lose Kirby, too.
* * *
HEATHER ARRIVED AT Flanagan Manor early after dropping off the girls at school. She got out of the SUV, brand-new leash in hand, and the dog rushed for freedom. It took all her strength to keep Kirby from wiggling past her.
The dog, she corrected herself. She didn’t want to think of him by name, didn’t want to get too fond of him, no matter how sweet and lovable he was.
“Hang on a minute,” she muttered, meaning to clip a lead to the collar she’d bought him after she’d learned there was no room at the shelter.
Yet.
He was on a waiting list to get in, and in the meantime, Heather would try to find him a good home herself.
“Okay, come on out.” She gave the leash a small tug.
The dog lunged out of the SUV and, in his excitement to stretch his legs, nearly jerked her arm out of her shoulder socket.
She slammed the door, yelling, “Hey, slow down!”
Having checked with Alex, she’d been assured no one had called the police station to put out an official alert for the little guy, which was a real shame. He so obviously loved people. He must be missing his owner. When she got some time, she and the twins would put up notices around town with a picture of the dog. Surely someone would recognize him.
Either that or offer to give him a new home.
She headed toward an area near the parking lot where the dog could relieve himself without ruining any landscaping. As she tried to figure out where she could tie him up while she worked, she heard footsteps behind her.
“Hey, who is this?” came the unmistakable voice that made her picture granite features accentuated by mirrored sunglasses.
Heather turned to see Rick coming from the general direction of the coach house. “This is a dog the girls found yesterday,” she said. “I tried the animal shelter first thing this morning, but no luck. It’s full, and I couldn’t stand the thought of leaving him in the pound where he’d have a week or two to be claimed before they would euthanize him, so I’m going to find him a home.”
“Here?”
“No.” Hope suddenly blazed through her. “Unless...if I can’t find his owner and you want him...”
Rick put up a hand to stop her. “Not what I meant.”
She sighed. “It seems no one wants this poor guy.” Except for the twins, especially Taylor.
Keeping the dog was out of the question. But it seemed finding any owner—old or new—was nothing more than a pipe dream.
“He’s a nice-looking dog.”
Rick crouched down to dog nose level and ruffled Kirby’s ears. In return, the dog threw his head around and licked Rick’s hand. Heather smiled at the instant bond. Rick was a nice guy, as he’d proved the day before by fixing the sod cutter for her. She thought about her sister’s suggestion to have a friend escort her to the wedding. But Rick really wasn’t her friend. She barely knew him.
“What are you calling him?” Rick asked.
Heather jerked back to the present situation. “Dog.”
The mirrored sunglasses turned up toward her. “Seriously?”
“Okay, the girls named him Kirby, but I’m trying not to think of him that personally.”
Giving the animal a last pat, Rick got to his feet. “Your bringing him with you to work is pretty personal.”
“It’s not like I had a choice. He was barricaded in the kitchen all night with a makeshift bed and food and water. And he still chewed one of the shoes I left by the back door. I can’t leave him in the house by himself. Who knows what kind of mess he would make? What he might ruin.”
“He seems pretty young to me. He needs a kennel. You know, a big cage.”
“Except that he’s not my dog.”
Rick grinned at her as if saying, Sure he’s not.
Flushing, Heather looked around. Anywhere so she didn’t have to connect with his know-it-all smirk. “Now I just have to find a place to tie him up while I work.”
“What about over there by the coach house?” He indicated the area he meant. “It’s nice and quiet. I’m the only one who lives there,” he said, “in the second-floor apartment.”
“What, no wife or partner?” she asked before realizing it was none of her business.
“Nope. I live a solitary life.”
She tried again. “Maybe you could use some company.”
“Maybe, but since my future is up in the air...”
Heather sighed. Too bad. Finding someone to take the dog off her hands this soon would have been too easy, of course.
She looked over to the coach house with its nice open expanse and a big maple tree for shade. And there was bizarrely long grass to make a comfy bed. Apparently, Rick hadn’t applied his mowing skills—or lack thereof—to that particular section of grass yet. Maybe it was because he couldn’t ride the mower under such low-hanging branches.
“Looks like as good a place as any. Thanks. I need to get stuff from the car.”
“Let me help you.”
“You can hang on to the dog for me.” She handed him the leash.
Taking it, he said, “Sure. Kirby and I are buddies already, aren’t we, boy?”
“So you’re a dog person?”
“I’m an animal person. When I was growing up, no matter where we lived, there were always stray animals that needed to be fed and taken care of. I took as many of them in as Mom would allow, which was quite a few, actually.” He quickly added, “I’m just not in a position to take on an animal now since I don’t know how long I’ll be here.”
Too bad. He sounded exactly like the person Kirby needed. Heather would never have guessed that Rick had such a soft spot for animals. She had to admit she liked that about him. Opening the back of the SUV, she pulled out water and food bowls, a bag of food and a chew toy, plus a few other toys he’d gotten excited over. She’d gone into one of those giant pet supply stores that allowed owners to bring in their dogs. She’d had to take him inside to get the right size collar. Then he’d instigated her into making some of the other purchases.
Eyeing everything she was carrying, Rick cleared his throat. “Right. Not your dog.”
She gave him her best irritated expression. Buying this stuff had broken her budget, but she hadn’t been able to help herself. “Someone had to feed him, and no one else volunteered.” Not yet.
“He’s going to eat the toys?”
“I was hoping keeping him busy would keep him quiet.” She’d told herself not to buy anything except the bare necessities, but she’d felt so sorry for the dog that resisting had been useless. “The last thing I need on the job is a barking dog.”
She started off toward the coach house, Rick keeping pace with her, and Kirby—the dog, she reminded herself—racing ahead, leash taut, even though the little stinker didn’t know where he was racing to.
Standing under the tree, Heather looked up to the branches, too high above her. “I need to be able to tie him to something that will keep him put.”
“I’ll find something,” Rick said. “You could set out his water and food.”
Heather flicked her eyebrows up. Suddenly, Rick had taken over. Still, grateful for the offered help, she did as he said while he took the dog into the coach house with him. She filled one bowl with kibble and took the other to the hose attached to the side of the house to get the dog some water.
In the meantime, Rick returned carrying a three-foot length of steel with holes in it. The dog danced around her, inspecting everything she touched. As she set down the bowl of water and the dog crowded her to get a drink, Rick used the hammer he’d brought to pound the steel more than a foot into the ground.
“What is that?”
“Just something I found in the shop. Looks like someone was building a storage unit and left the castoffs.”
When he clipped the dog’s leash to one of the holes, she said, “My, you’re inventive.”
“Just call me resourceful.”
“Okay, thanks, Resourceful.” She snorted but choked back further response.
The mirrored sunglasses aimed her way, and he rose to his full height. “What?”
She grinned up at him. “Actually, my workers already have a nickname for you.”
“What?” he asked a little louder.
“They’ve been calling you The Terminator.” Which, with his features set in a frown at the moment, he absolutely resembled. “It’s the sunglasses.” She wasn’t going to bring up his skinning the grass or plowing down the bush. “Remember, in the movie, he always wore those mirrored sunglasses that made him look so dangerous.”
“They think I look dangerous?”
At first she had, too, especially after he’d flattened her. But now that she knew him better, not so much.
“Tyrone is convinced you’re a spy,” she informed him.
Rick’s turn to snort. “A commando, maybe, but not a spy.”
“Android?” she teased.
“Thoroughly human, I promise.” His lips quirked. “You believe me, don’t you?”
“Maybe if I could see your eyes. The sunglasses do come off, right?” She’d never seen him without them.
In answer, Rick slipped off the shades.
His eyes were blue. A clear, sharp blue. And they were large and fringed with thick lashes, quite at odds with the granite features that suddenly took on a softer appearance. His eyebrows were thick, too, and they quirked upward as she scanned his whole face. Nice features. High cheekbones...determined jaw...tempting mouth. She shook away the last and told herself he was decent looking. That was it. Nothing out of the ordinary.
Still, he’d make a great-looking escort at Kristen and Alex’s wedding...
“Well?” he asked.
Her pulse was thrumming. Could she do it? Ask him?
“It’s just nice to know what you actually look like,” she admitted.
“You approve?”
Not wanting him to get a swelled head, she avoided a direct answer. “I don’t disapprove.”
She was stalling, trying to make up her mind.
“So you’re neutral,” he said.
“Like Switzerland.”
She loved that he was taking the conversation in stride, even seeming amused. She appreciated a man with a sense of humor.
He was grinning at her when he asked, “You’ve been to Switzerland?”
“No. You?”
“I’ve been to a lot of different countries all over the world,” he admitted, “but that’s still on my list of places to see. I love traveling and learning about different cultures.”
In a lot of different countries? “But you’re not a spy, right?”
“Nope.”
“So why all the traveling?”
“My father was a lifer. Army. Different bases all over the world.”
“Oh.” Now on alert, she asked, “What about you?”
“Not a lifer. At least I wasn’t planning to be. I just kind of got sucked in for so many years because it was what I knew.” His expression changed, grew a little grim. “War isn’t pretty, so when my last tour ended, I wanted to see if there was something else for me. So I decided to give civilian life a chance before I make up my mind whether or not to re-enlist.”
As he spoke, her pulse crashed.
Army...thinking of re-enlisting...
Instantly reminding her of her late husband, Scott. He’d been killed along with several other men when their truck had rolled over a land mine.
His answer made her uncomfortable, and Heather was glad to see the EPI truck pull up. “Oh, look, Tyrone and Amber are here with some of our supplies.”
As if tired of being ignored and wanting to be part of the conversation, Kirby barked and looked from her to Rick, who bent over and patted the dog.
Disappointment filled Heather. For a moment, she’d thought...but there was no way she was going to ask a man who might re-enlist in the army to escort her anywhere. Rick might be nice. And good-looking. But she’d lost one man to war. She’d been devastated, and so had her girls. What if Rick decided civilian life wasn’t for him? He might want to re-enlist. What was she thinking? She wasn’t ready for a long-term relationship anyway and didn’t know if she ever would be. She couldn’t take that kind of chance with her heart again. She’d just been thinking about Kristen is all, but Rick simply wasn’t the right man for her, not even to escort her to a wedding.
Heather gave the chew toy to the dog, patted his head and gave Rick a tight smile. “Time to get to work.”
Turning her back on them both, she raced to the truck in the parking lot. Both of her workers were already in back. Tyrone was moving bags of compost to the rear edge of the truck and handing them off to Amber, who was dropping them down onto the dolly.
“Wow, look who’s early,” Tyrone said when Heather got closer. “So what is the spy up to this morning?”
“Tyro-o-one.” Amber poked his leg. “Hi, Heather.”
Heather laughed. “At the moment, he’s up to taking care of the dog my kids found last night.”
She couldn’t help but look over to where Rick sat with the dog. They were both watching the workers with lazy interest.
Thinking about going to the wedding alone, Heather felt a twinge of disappointment.
Too bad about Rick.
He was just someone she couldn’t let into her life. She needed to keep a professional distance.
To that end, thinking he could help haul stuff where it was needed, she yelled, “Hey, Mr. Sunglasses, since you’re not doing anything, why not come over here and give us some muscle?”
Rick got to his feet almost immediately and sauntered toward them. The dog sat at alert and watched.
“I still think he’s on some secret mission.” Tyrone kept his voice low. “We should see if we can crack him. A point for every detail we learn about him. Whoever gets the most points gets free pizza for lunch.”
“I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” Heather said.
“Why not?” Amber asked. “It’s all in good fun.” Then, “Hey, if you can take over here, I’ll fetch the wheelbarrow.”
Which would make things go even faster. “Great.” Heather grabbed a bag from Tyrone and lowered it to the stack already on the dolly. “This is pretty full. I’d say just one more.”
Tyrone handed her a bag, then jumped down from the back of the truck. “I’ll take these over to the rain garden.”
The idea was to move the supplies directly to the site where they would be used. Which meant bags of compost and potting soil would be piled up in several areas for the next couple of weeks. They would need the bags of mortar and the quarry gray blocks to build the rain garden retaining walls today. A lot more was coming—boards for raised beds and Wisconsin bluestone for another terrace with built-in seating and a fire pit. Heather was trying not to order too much at once. The bed and breakfast was about to get busy, and she knew the owner did not want his guests to be inconvenienced. That was why she’d decided to start with the beach area, the walkway and rain gardens—they were all directly between the mansion and the lake.
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Lynn Patrick
She's earned some good karma. An Army widow at twenty-one, Heather Clarke has spent the past three years running her aunt’s quilt store, raising her twin girls alone and earning a degree in landscape horticulture. Finally, she’s launching her new career and starting to feel like she’s on solid ground.And then Rick Slater rides onto her job site.Heather needs a mysterious, gorgeous, ex-Army distraction like a hole in the head. Especially when he’s the restless type who’s flirting with re-enlisting. And flirting with her! Even if she were ready to love again, she wouldn’t it on a man who might not stay.Now, if he decides to stop moving and grow some roots… then that's a whole other story.
Another man in uniform isn’t part of her plan
She’s earned some good karma. An army widow at twenty-one, Heather Clarke has spent the past three years running her aunt’s quilt store, raising her twin girls alone and earning a degree in landscape horticulture. Finally, she’s launching her new career and starting to feel as though she’s on solid ground. And then Rick Slater rides onto her job site.
Heather needs a mysterious, gorgeous, ex-army distraction like a hole in the head. Especially when he’s the restless type who’s flirting with reenlisting. And flirting with her! Even if she were ready to love again, she wouldn’t risk it on a man who might not stay. Now, if he decides to stop moving and grow some roots…then that’s a whole other story.
Would he reenlist?
“What if you get bored staying in one place?” Heather asked.
“It’s not the places that attract me,” Rick said. “It’s the people. In the army, I had my men. We were a team…almost like a family.” He paused, studying her closely. “Maybe I’m looking for something else to fulfill me.”
Like a family of his own?
“There might be more benefits to staying in one place than I realized.” Rick slid his hand over hers and squeezed.
The way he was looking at her made Heather blush. And when he leaned forward, cupped her cheek and grinned at her, the warmth spread down to her toes.
His lips brushing softly across hers made her head go light.
Yet…this was another man who might put himself back in the line of fire.
Dear Reader,
Lynn Patrick is a pseudonym for longtime writing partners Linda Sweeney and Patricia Rosemoor.
Patricia is a master gardener, trained by the University of Illinois Extension service. She volunteers, holding workshops for enthusiastic local gardeners, mentoring a high school eco-club and working garden walks to hand out information and answer gardening questions. Her experience inspired the idea of having a heroine whose goal was to be a landscape architect who wanted to design and install beautiful gardens using mostly native plants.
As she did for scenes in Home to Sparrow Lake, Linda got the lowdown on her niece’s twin daughters to add authenticity to scenes with Heather’s twins.
We hope you enjoy A Forever Home.
A Forever Home
Lynn Patrick
www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)
LYNN PATRICK
Lynn Patrick is the pseudonym for two best friends who started writing together a few decades ago. Linda is a professor with a reading specialty, and Patricia writes as Patricia Rosemoor. Together they enjoy creating worlds that are lightened by the unexpected, fun and sometimes wonderful vagaries of real life.
To our very understanding and gracious editor, Laura Barth.
Contents
PROLOGUE (#uc0f88a53-8933-584a-89bc-a6e0eb4995b7)
CHAPTER ONE (#uf8eb38c5-4424-5c86-8c11-a0658332a39a)
CHAPTER TWO (#u178ca4f0-3078-5e92-aa4d-6ad0e3cc1e36)
CHAPTER THREE (#ud62aedf4-48c8-52c8-ae12-d301e100f2d4)
CHAPTER FOUR (#u5df21790-8300-5299-b170-6e736aa58d7a)
CHAPTER FIVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIX (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHT (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER NINE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER ELEVEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER TWELVE (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER THIRTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FOURTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER FIFTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SIXTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN (#litres_trial_promo)
EPILOGUE (#litres_trial_promo)
PROLOGUE
AN UNUSUAL NOISE woke Cora Stanton at two-fifteen a.m.
At least she thought it was a noise.
Squinting at her illuminated bedside clock, she groggily rose to her elbows, listening intently. There was plenty to hear with the wind whipping around the creaking eaves of the old mansion and the crash of waves as Lake Michigan hit the shore some yards away. The shadow of branches clawed at the wall nearest the bed.
But it wasn’t branches scraping or the wind or the waves she’d heard...
It had been a thud.
Cora jumped as she heard the sound again. She sat up, trying to locate where the noise had come from. Definitely inside the house. But where?
No one was sleeping on this side of the house but her. Her flesh crawled at the thought of a stranger creeping around the passage outside or messing about in another room.
Not wanting to turn on a light and alert the intruder, she crept out of bed and went to the door. She turned the lock, then grasped the knob to crack the door slightly for a view of the hallway outside. Nothing. No one. It seemed empty and quiet in the faint glow of a nightlight.
She stood there for several minutes, waiting, listening...until her feet got cold.
No more thuds. No thumps.
Closing the door, she locked it again and made her way back toward the bed and her slippers lying beside it. Could her imagination have been playing tricks on her? Easy enough to conjure up noises on a windy night in a big, old house.
As she slid into the slippers and grabbed her robe from a nearby chair, she had second thoughts. Surely she’d lived here long enough to distinguish familiar sounds from strange ones. She’d definitely heard something. Could it have come from the attic? Squirrels had gotten in once and maybe they’d found their way back again. She’d have to call the exterminators tomorrow.
There was nothing she could do now except go back to sleep. But the adrenaline flowing through her veins had wakened her completely. She’d go downstairs and fix herself some warm cocoa.
Pausing in front of the windows overlooking the trees and the beach and lake beyond them, she glimpsed a sudden movement. Was it a person? She froze, then pulled back the curtain. In the dim light of a waning moon, something dark and human-shaped darted out of the shadows. It stopped, swung around...
“Ah!” breathed Cora.
Then just as quickly, the figure disappeared, blending into darkness again.
Now it was her pulse that thudded in her ears.
CHAPTER ONE
LATE. TODAY OF all days. Heather couldn’t believe her bad luck.
Her first day on the job site and both the twins decided this was the morning to drive her crazy. That was normally Taylor’s job, but to make the situation worse, Addison joined her twin in doing everything possible to put Heather behind, starting with their refusal to get out of bed when she called them. They’d ended up running around the house like little banshees instead of getting ready, then threw buttered toast at each other at breakfast so they both had to change clothes. Which meant her neighbor, who’d agreed to watch them for an hour before escorting them to school with her own son, had left without them.
Now she had to drive the girls to school herself, and Heather couldn’t believe it when she found Taylor sitting in the middle of the living room floor and playing her favorite DVD of her father before he’d gone back for the second tour of duty that had gotten him killed.
“You’re Daddy’s little girl,” Scott told Taylor, kissing her on the cheek. “You’ll always be Daddy’s girl.”
“Forever and ever?”
“Forever and ever. Cross my heart.”
And even though her twin hadn’t been there when this was recorded, the then-three-year-old Taylor had asked, “Addison, too?”
“Of course, Addison, too.”
Heather blinked away the threat of tears and turned off the television. Moments like this brought back the heartache. Even though Scott had died three years before in Iraq, he was still alive in all their hearts.
She cleared her throat. “Taylor, come on. Addison is already outside. We have to go now.”
Once through the kitchen, they headed for the SUV. Heather noted Addison was focused on a dog hanging back on the property but watching the little girl hopefully. He looked like some kind of a border collie mix.
“Mommy, look at the dog!” Taylor said excitedly.
“We don’t have time for that. C’mon, Addison. Both of you, get in.”
Maybe if she didn’t look at the dog, she wouldn’t feel guilty just leaving him there. Loose. Probably scared and hungry.
She was already late for her new job.
She checked to make sure both girls were strapped into their booster seats, then got into the driver’s seat, and with a last look at the pooch, she took off for the school. He would find his way home, or his owner would find him. She had enough to worry about without adding a possible lost dog to the list.
Five minutes later she was getting the girls out of the vehicle. No kids on the playground. School had already started, so the twins were late, too.
“I don’t want you to go to Kenosha, Mommy,” Addison said, sniffling as they walked toward the entrance.
“What if you don’t come back?” Taylor added. “Like Daddy.” Her eyes shone with unshed tears.
Heather stopped, slipped an arm around each little girl and hugged them tight. “Of course I’m coming back. I’ll be going to all different places with my new job, but they’re not far away. I told you that you’ll see me later. In Kenosha. Uncle Brian is going to drive you to your new day camp this afternoon, and after work, I’ll pick you up. We can sing songs in the car all the way home.”
Taylor blinked and swiped at her eyes with the back of her hand. “I learned a new song in kiddygarden—”
“Me, too!” Addison interrupted.
“And I can’t wait to hear you both sing it.” Heather kissed one little blond head, then the other. “But right now, let’s get you to your classroom.”
She walked them inside the building and apologized to their teacher for being late, then practically ran back to her SUV.
Thankfully she’d found a day camp close to her job site. For now, Brian or their sister, Kristen, would pick up the twins and deliver them to afternoon care for her. Once school was out, the twins could be at the camp all day.
Finally heading for Kenosha, she called Tyrone Smith, one of the two people on her team.
“Me, again,” she said. “I’m on my way. I should be there in fifteen minutes.”
“No rush.” As usual, Tyrone’s tone was smooth and easy. “We trippin’.”
“Tripping? I hope that’s another way of saying you and Amber are working hard.”
“And havin’ a good time.”
Hearing hip-hop music in the background, Heather had to force herself to keep her own voice even. “You’re clearing the land along the beachfront the way I asked you to, right?”
“Exactly.”
“Okay.” Not that she was actually sure it was okay. She didn’t know either member of her team well enough yet to judge. “Keep clearing.”
The area was becoming overgrown with Lyme grass, an invasive non-native beach grass that posed a threat to several rare native plants. Heather wanted to replace whatever they removed with native varieties.
“Just remember to only remove the grass that has bluish leaves,” she added. “They should stand out clearly from any native dune grass still present.”
“I got it the first time,” Tyrone said.
Heather flinched. She might be the boss of the team, but she didn’t want to come off as “bossy.” “I’ll be there as fast as I can.”
The short drive from Sparrow Lake seemed interminable.
Take deep, slow breaths, and enjoy the ride, she reminded herself. Let go of what you can’t fix.
She’d existed in a pressure cooker for the past couple of years. An army widow at twenty-one, she’d managed her aunt’s quilting store to make a living while raising the twins and earning a degree in landscape horticulture. In order to cope she’d had to learn how to counter stress with relaxation techniques.
Sometimes they even worked.
Now her sister, Kristen, had decided to change careers and was back in Sparrow Lake and running Sew Fine while Heather was embarking on her new career. The final project for her advanced landscape design class had been a design challenge sponsored by a nonprofit called Environmental Partners, Inc., otherwise known as EPI. She’d won the challenge and the opportunity for a paid internship that could turn into a full-time job.
This internship was a dream come true for Heather. She’d started gardening when she was a kid and her mother had no time to do anything but work to support their family. By high school, Heather had been drawing plans for friends’ yards and figuring what kinds of plants should go where. She’d known then she wanted to get a job working in landscaping. But her plans to go to college had been cut short by her early pregnancy and Scott’s determination to enlist. For years she’d had to be content with the gardening magazines she’d collected, the knowledge she’d gathered from them and a dream that one day it would all come together.
Now she actually would be able to put that knowledge to work and in a way that would help improve the earth by creating a sustainable landscape.
When she arrived in Kenosha at last, Heather drove through the historic district along the Lake Michigan shoreline. The houses on Third Street were old and huge and lovely, as was much of the current professional landscaping. Flanagan Manor was the biggest and showiest of the bunch.
She couldn’t contain her excitement as she turned onto a drive that led into the huge lakeside estate surrounded by black wrought-iron fencing. She would get to work here for a good part of the summer, redefining the grounds of the mansion built in Victorian times and once owned and expanded by the wealthy Chicago bootlegger, Red Flanagan, who’d been famous for trading bullets with his chief competitor, Al Capone. The mansion had gone through several more owners since the 1930s, after the federal government claimed the property as payment for Flanagan’s tax evasion.
One wing of the huge old home had been turned into a bed-and-breakfast by the current owner, Benjamin Phillips. The Phillips family lived in Chicago and used Flanagan Manor as their “summer cottage.” Apparently, the bed-and-breakfast paid for the estate’s upkeep. Heather had met the owner, of course, but the family wasn’t currently in residence.
The main building itself was a showpiece, a gorgeous historic greystone with a portico lakeside and a porte cochère at the side entry, so passengers could alight from their vehicles heedless of inclement weather. Close to the mansion at the top of a gentle incline sat a stone terrace with some plants in large containers and a faux Italian fountain that didn’t work anymore. An old two-story coach house that mimicked the mansion sat directly behind it. The huge expanse of grass fronting the lake tumbled down to a few modest dunes and a small beach. The rest of the shore on both sides of the mansion was lined with boulders, and to the south, a weathered boathouse was attached to a decrepit dock that jutted out into the lake. Once the site where illegal Canadian booze had been unloaded, the dock and boathouse no longer seemed to be in use.
Heather had no idea what the Phillips family intended to do with them in the future.
Her focus was on the surrounding nature.
Heather had been chosen to design and supervise renovation of the grounds, which would include reintroducing native plants to support not only stormwater containment, to keep the runoff from the lake, but also a balanced ecosystem. Many insects needed a specific plant for food. And those insects were food for small animals and birds. The landscaping would be both practical and beautiful, and she was thrilled that her work would be enjoyed for decades to come by myriad guests and visitors and the owner and his family.
Parking in back of the mansion alongside other service vehicles, she grabbed her portfolio with the design plans she was still working on, then left the SUV. The long, narrow lot along the north side of the building was reserved for guests, but today there were only a few cars. It had probably been full for Memorial Day weekend, but kids weren’t out of school yet, and the tourist season hadn’t geared up. The perfect time to get started.
Looking for her team, she headed across the south lawn, passing the century-old, glass-paneled conservatory on the southeast end of the mansion. Having had a quick tour of the inside, she knew that it wasn’t being used to its full potential. No plant aficionado in the family. Mr. Phillips had suggested he might want her to renovate it. No promises, but the prospect excited Heather.
To her relief, Tyrone and Amber were busy at work on the gently rolling dunes near the shoreline, loading the invasive plants they’d removed into a wheelbarrow. About to call out to them, she stopped when she realized they would never hear her over the combined racket made by hip-hop music coming from a boom box on the beach and the roar of a nearby lawnmower.
Wait a minute! Why was anyone other than her team doing anything with the lawn? Mr. Phillips had told her to set the boundaries for EPI, so any groundskeeper should have checked with her first.
Glancing back, Heather noted a giant lawnmower was eating up the south lawn at an amazing speed. The man riding the machine was pretty amazing, too. From the length of his leg, she’d guess he must be at least six feet tall. He had a sculpted body—she could appreciate the muscles all too obvious beneath the thin, white T-shirt—and undoubtedly sculpted features beneath a shock of dark-brown hair streaked with gray. Or so she assumed from his jawline. The rest of his face was pretty well-hidden behind mirrored sunglasses.
She’d never seen him before...but then she hadn’t been introduced to anyone who worked on the estate other than Cora, the housekeeper, who was in charge of the mansion.
Though she thought about approaching him to find out exactly who he was, Heather decided that could wait. She felt less in charge wearing an old cap to protect her face from the sun, a practical gray sweatshirt and a pair of jeans loose enough to work in. Not that Mr. Sunglasses intimidated her or anything.
Her pulse threading a little unevenly, she moved away from man and machine and headed for her team. Tyrone Smith and Amber Miller had both been working for EPI for more than a year, but because neither had gotten any kind of formal education, they did the hard labor, not the design or planning. That was up to her. So, the week before, after she’d met them, they’d all made a trip out to the estate—Tyrone and Amber to deliver the heavy equipment they would need and Heather to go over the plans for the site. She’d made further changes in her designs since and figured she would be refining until the job was complete.
As Heather approached Tyrone, he looked up. Tall and skinny, he wore his hair in cornrows, and the ends of the braids brushed a too-big T-shirt honoring a dead musician.
“Hey, Amber, the boss is here!” he yelled. “Better turn down that music!”
Her light blond hair pulled up into a ponytail, her eyes a soft gray, Amber was probably only eighteen or nineteen, a couple of years younger than Tyrone. Dressed in a T-shirt and shorts and her feet encased in work boots a lot safer than her partner’s tennis shoes, she bent over to shut off the boom box. As the music stopped, the young woman who looked too small to be so strong stopped, too, her hands on her hips like she was waiting for orders.
Heather might be used to giving orders at the store, but this was different. She had no history here. No real experience. Behind her, the mower noise grew louder, and she glanced back to see Mr. Sunglasses riding over grass he’d already cut. That wasn’t good. And how low had he set that mower? Grass should be cut no shorter than two inches. At least not if you wanted it to live.
Was this something else she needed to take care of?
Okay, she had to admit it. The thought of giving him orders intimidated her just a little. Okay, maybe a lot.
Forcing a smile, she turned back to her workers. “Looks like you got a lot done.”
“Well, we’ve been working since eight,” Amber said.
Heather’s face grew warm, but she chose not to make excuses. “When you’ve finished with the beach area, we should start removing sod for the rain gardens.”
She’d planned on two freeform rain gardens on the mansion’s lake-facing side, leaving room for a wide, stone pathway down to the beach between them.
“Retaining wall or no?” Tyrone asked.
Something she’d been undecided on the week before.
Heather nodded. “The slope is gentle enough, so we can install twelve or fifteen inches.” If the slope were steeper, a big storm could wash away a taller retaining wall, but a small one should do well. “That way, we can create flat areas with a shallow bowl for the new plantings.”
“How much of the lawn are we going to remove?” Amber asked.
Considering the estate grounds were nearly an acre, equivalent to the size of a football field, and knowing her budget, Heather said, “Not as much as I would like, but it’ll be a great start. We have four areas of concentration. In addition to this beach area and the rain gardens, we’ll plant a prairie with native grasses mixed with flowering plants as a backdrop over there.” She indicated the south end of the grounds. “And then an expanded garden starting from the terrace, with another seating area at the other end, then here, around the buildings. All that will require more lawn removal. The rest of the lawn will remain, at least for this year.”
“There’s not going to be much left if The Terminator keeps going,” Amber said, looking beyond her.
“The Terminator?” Heather turned to see the man mowing the same section for a third time.
“He’s killing that grass,” Tyrone said. “Are you sure the owners want any left?”
Heather sighed. “I’m sure.” She’d actually had to scale back her plan a bit due to their budget. New plantings weren’t inexpensive, especially for an estate of this size, so she better save that grass.
“I saw him roll right over some bushes, too,” Amber said. “He just hot dogs that thing around like he’s driving a sports car.”
Heather sighed. “Okay. I guess I have to go talk to the guy. He doesn’t work for EPI, right?”
Tyrone shook his head. “Nope.”
Great. “Go on back to work while I take care of this.”
The Terminator. He did kind of look like the movie character, wearing those mirrored sunglasses.
Not wanting to confront a stranger her first hour on the job, Heather nevertheless trekked back up the incline. The landscape was now her responsibility, and she couldn’t sit by and see the lawn destroyed, not when there would be so much of it left when they were done planting.
Moving in behind him, she cleared her throat, then called, “Excuse me!”
The Terminator kept going—apparently he hadn’t heard her—and he was moving so fast, she nearly had to run to keep up with the riding mower.
She raised her voice. “Excuse me! Sir!” When he didn’t answer, she jogged faster and grabbed his arm. “Hey!”
He suddenly stopped and she ended up just about running smack into him. Stopping the machine instantly, he jumped off. The next thing Heather knew, she was on the ground, his hand on her throat, pinning her in place and knocking off her cap. It all happened so quickly, she had no way to defend herself. Frightened and angry, she lay beneath him, shaking inside, staring wide-eyed into his half-hidden face.
“What are you doing?” she croaked. Her heart was thumping double time. “Let go! Please! I wasn’t attacking you, okay?”
As if suddenly realizing he’d overreacted, he shook himself, stood and said, “Sorry, I didn’t mean to do that.” He held out a hand to her. “You just startled me.”
Reluctantly, she took his hand and let him pull her to her feet. The breath seemed to whoosh out of her, and she could feel her pulse where his fingers wrapped around hers. “Sorry,” he said again. “Really.”
As if burned, she pulled her hand free. “I—I, uh, just wanted to talk to you.”
He reached over to shut off the lawnmower. “About?”
“Well, that.” Her heartbeat steadying, she nodded at the fancy mower.
“You want to do the mowing?”
His lips curved slightly. Was that a smile? Hard to tell in a face that seemed to be made of granite. And one that was mostly hidden behind mirrored sunglasses. She wondered if he wore them for effect—if he wanted to seem mysterious or dangerous for some reason.
Not caring to make matters worse, she said, “Uh, no, I don’t want to do the mowing. I just want to know why you’re doing it.”
“I’m the handyman. Rick Slater. Mr. Phillips just hired me a few days ago.”
He didn’t look like a handyman. Heather frowned at him. “And he told you to mow the lawn?”
“Phillips didn’t give me orders to do anything specific. He just expects me to take care of the place in general. You have something against me cutting the grass?”
Did she? Heather wondered. This wasn’t something she’d talked about with Mr. Phillips or EPI, so she merely said, “I’m in charge of renovating the landscaping. Heather Clarke.”
His lips curved again. “You’re in charge? Then you must be that community college girl who’s doing an internship here.”
He seemed amused by the idea of her being in charge of anything. How young did he think she was, anyway? She was a very mature twenty-four. Not that she felt inclined to tell him so.
“I’m the woman who is doing the internship, yes.” Trying not to be irritated with him—she was fighting a losing battle—Heather said, “Mr. Phillips told me I could decide what we’re doing with all the plants and the lawn. Do you have experience with landscaping?”
“What kind of experience is necessary to ride a lawnmower around? Feel free to give me advice. I’m new at this.”
Then why had he been hired?
“First, you need to adjust the lawnmower so it doesn’t cut lower than two inches, or you’ll destroy the grass,” Heather told him. “Then only go over it once. And if you’re just riding from one place to another, raise the blades entirely.” She flicked her gaze around the area until she saw the bush Amber had told her about. “Apparently you’ve also sent a few shrubs to the big garden in the sky...so don’t mow the bushes, okay?”
He held up his hands, palms out. “Okay. You’re the boss. Your company does want the lawn mowed, right?”
From his expression, she was certain he was silently amused at her expense.
“Sure, mow any of the lawn that’s open—once.” Heat sizzled up her neck and her spine went stiff. “I need to get back to my team. We have a lot of work to get done today.”
With that, she whipped around, leaning over to pick up her fallen cap. She placed it firmly back on her head, tucking stray strands around the edge. All the while, she felt his gaze bore into her as she walked away. It took willpower not to glance back and look at him one last time. Tension coiled in her until the lawnmower started up again. She relaxed a bit, then realized her team had stopped work to watch the encounter. They were both grinning. Well, great. No respect from The Terminator...she could take that. But the people she would count on to follow her directions were another matter. If she didn’t have their respect, it was going to be a long summer.
She tried to play it cool as she joined them. Hoping they couldn’t sense her pulse racing or her stomach churning, she shrugged nonchalantly. “He’s the new handyman, but it seems he doesn’t know what he’s doing.”
“He looks pretty competent to me,” Tyrone said. “Like he’s been in the military. Or maybe he’s a spy. The way he flattened you on that ground in two seconds was amazing. Whoo-hoo!”
“Well, she did ambush him,” said Amber, grinning. “He didn’t even see her coming.”
Both Amber and Tyrone laughed as Heather clenched her jaw. “I was only trying to catch up with him.”
“Well, you caught him all right.” Noting his boss’s somber expression, Tyrone raised his brows at his coworker.
But Amber wasn’t paying attention. “A spy, hmm? Yeah, I dig that. A real hot one.”
Rick Slater might be hot, but Heather didn’t feel in the least like smiling. “A spy for what?” She couldn’t help but be sarcastic. “Protecting the country from invasive plants?”
Although spy was going a little too far, Heather could believe Rick had been military at some time. Probably an officer. He held himself with an authority that had bothered her. Considering her husband, Scott, had been killed in Iraq, she had no desire to get to know any man who was former, current or future military.
She only hoped the little show The Terminator had given Tyrone and Amber by making her look silly hadn’t damaged her relationship with her team.
CHAPTER TWO
RICK KEPT GLANCING over to see what Heather Clarke and her team were doing as he finished mowing the lawn area around the mansion. He’d enjoyed annoying her just a little. She was plenty bossy for someone so young. Young. Yeah, she was, no matter the tempting curves she’d hidden under that baggy sweatshirt, curves he’d felt beneath him when he’d had her on the ground. No sense in thinking about that or about her at all.
No sense in thinking about anyone, not when he was here to do a job.
He had to redirect his mind back to his mission.
Mowing the lawn was simply part of his cover, though he had carefully adjusted the mower higher as Heather had suggested. He didn’t want to be a grass destroyer. He snorted at the idea and remembered how Heather had glared at him when she’d made the accusation. Hmm, her narrow, makeup-free face had pulled into the cutest expression, and her blue eyes had gone all steely, when she’d been irritated with him...
There his mind went again, off in the wrong direction.
Raising the blades, he rode the lawnmower to the far side of the mansion, stopped and turned it off. Then he dismounted and walked along the flower garden that bordered the building. The task gave him the opportunity to covertly inspect the area where he’d found a man’s footprints early that morning. Though he hadn’t seen any signs of a break in, he was certain someone was sneaking around the grounds. If only he could figure out why. Whoever had left those tracks beneath the windows probably was up to no good, as Ben Phillips feared.
Strange things had been going on at the Flanagan estate for the past several weeks—a broken window, random diggings, tampered locks. Phillips had grown concerned, as he should have been, considering the family had quite a collection of century-old stained glass in the house, in addition to pricey antiques and a butler’s pantry filled with silver service. Also, there was the safety of the staff and the bed-and-breakfast guests to consider. With the tourist season about to heat up, Phillips had hired Rick to secure the estate and investigate the source of the trouble. And to stop it from going any farther, of course. Because Phillips had fired the last handyman/groundskeeper, he needed someone to do small repairs around the place—hence Rick’s cover.
But Rick had now been all around the mansion and the other buildings on the property, and he hadn’t seen anything more to clue him in as to what was going on. Figuring he needed to change tactics, he left the mower outside the coach house. Built to house carriages drawn by horses and walled with the same kind of fancy paneling as the house, it was now a combination garage for his employer and storage area for equipment. There was even a small shop area to make repairs. And upstairs, the second floor apartment that had been inhabited first by a carriage driver, then a chauffeur, was now Rick’s temporary digs. He’d only brought along some clothes and a bunch of books—the mysteries and thrillers that kept him company at night. The challenge of figuring out who did what and why had entertained him since he’d read the Hardy Boys as a kid. Undoubtedly the reason he’d been drawn to this particular job.
Rick was used to temporary digs. He’d never had a real home, not even when he was a kid. His dad had been military, and Rick, his brother, Joe, and their mom had moved from base to base all over the world with him. Their parents were retired now and living in Florida. And Joe had settled in to a job at the Pentagon.
Sometimes Rick wished he’d been smart enough to get out before the horrible attack that had turned his dreams into nightmares. When terrorists had attacked his team on a special mission in Afghanistan, two of his men had lost their lives. He and Keith Murphy had barely survived. He’d relegated to memory every detail of the event and the deaths of the men he’d called friends.
Afterward, he’d never felt the same about being a lifer. When his tour was over, he’d left the army. Still, Rick wasn’t settled, inside or out.
Guilt over his men’s deaths lingered, always just below the surface.
He hadn’t yet found any reason to want to remain in civilian life.
And he didn’t know if he would ever call any place home.
The only reason he’d come to Wisconsin had been to reconnect with Megan Anders, an old girlfriend, the daughter of a commissioned officer. He’d dated her off and on for a couple of years, and the last he’d heard, she’d settled in Milwaukee. Unfortunately, he’d had no clue she’d gotten married since he’d last seen her. Still, he liked the area, and having nowhere else to go, had stuck around, taking a job with Lake Shore Security, the company that had placed him in his current undercover job.
Getting to know the other employees on the estate was essential. It was day two and he’d barely met any of the help, so Rick decided to go inside the mansion and get cozy with them. He hadn’t had a chance to talk to any of the three full-time staff alone. Maybe he could get something out of one of them that would put him on the right track. The only person on the property who knew his real mission was the housekeeper, Cora, who’d been with the Phillips family for decades. He assumed that she was loyal and would keep his identity to herself, or the owner wouldn’t have told her who he was.
He entered through the huge kitchen, which still had an old-fashioned feel despite the new appliances. The large cabinets looked original to him, though they’d been painted white and sported new hardware. Gray-threaded white marble counters gave the cook several large preparation surfaces. Right now, however, she was busy at the stove, stirring something in a big pan. The smell made his mouth water.
He sized up the woman. Probably in her early forties, Kelly Bennett wore a white chef’s coat over gray trousers and had tied her red hair back from her face.
“Smells great,” he said.
She glanced at him. “Oh, Rick, good morning. I’m making carnitas, a southwestern pulled pork. You can try it later, at dinner.”
“I’ll be looking forward to that.”
Actually, he was looking forward to any meals he could catch here. He wasn’t a very good cook himself. And eating in a mess hall had never been much of a treat. So he was grateful for Phillips’s invitation to catch lunch and dinner with the other full-time employees on weekdays. On Saturday and Sunday, the cook only made brunch and only when there were guests.
“It’s pretty quiet here at this end of town,” he said. “Not much action.”
“Well, no, not now. There will be shortly. We have two guests arriving tomorrow. More on the weekend. We won’t be full seven days a week until mid-June, when school lets out. After that, all eight guest rooms are booked solid for most of the summer.”
Rick waited a beat, then said, “I thought I heard something last night.” If someone had been out in the garden as the fresh footprints indicated, the person must have made some kind of noise. Unfortunately, Rick hadn’t heard anything because he’d been too far away, sound asleep in the coach house.
“Heard something?” Kelly repeated. “Like what?”
“I don’t know. But it woke me.” A small fabrication.
“Maybe you had a bad dream.”
“I would have remembered. Well, usually I do.” He waited another beat. “So you didn’t hear anything?”
Phillips had told him that the cook, housekeeper and concierge all lived in the mansion.
“No. And I’m a light sleeper.” She went back to stirring her carnitas. “Nothing last night.”
“Another night, then?”
Keeping her back to him, she shrugged. “Old houses have strange noises sometimes. Is there something else you need?”
Rick wanted to ask her more, but he got the idea she wasn’t about to elaborate. At least not yet.
“Actually, I came in to see Cora.”
“She said she wanted to do some reorganizing in the library.”
“Thanks. See you when it’s chow time.”
He left the kitchen via a hallway that took him to the rotunda. The large, round multistory room in the middle of the building separated the two wings. An original mural of the heavens covered the domed ceiling and extended to the upper walls, where a balcony ran full circle, allowing guests to admire artwork on the walls or look down to view the activity on the first floor. The lower walls were enhanced with a rich wood wainscoting, and a carpeted stairway with hand-carved railings led to the second floor.
The rotunda did double duty as the check-in area for guests and as the concierge office. Behind the antique mahogany desk hung a large portrait of a thin, wiry man with wild red hair that stuck straight up. The man stood next to an elaborate seven-branched silver candelabra complete with glowing flames.
Red Flanagan himself, Rick assumed. Odd that Phillips would showcase a portrait of a mobster. Then again, that a mobster once owned the estate might be part of its appeal to visitors and the reason they called it Flanagan Manor rather than Phillips Manor.
At the moment, the cavernous room was empty, so he sailed right through. Phillips had given him a set of plans of the mansion, so Rick knew that the kitchen, dining room, drawing room and music room sat below two floors of guest rooms with baths, and the library, main entrance and conservatory sat below the owner’s private quarters. The Phillips family had a drawing room and huge master suite on the second floor and four more bedrooms with individual baths on the third.
Entering the library, he saw Cora Stanton on a rolling ladder, straightening some books on a high shelf. Sections of every wall were lined with shelving from floor to ceiling, all filled with books. He cleared his throat to get her attention. She glanced back and saw him.
“Ah, Rick, there you are. I wanted to talk to you.”
“Good. Then we’re on the same wavelength.” When she arched her eyebrows in question, he said, “That’s why I’m here.”
She immediately descended the ladder.
As Flanagan Manor’s housekeeper, Cora was, in effect, in charge of the estate. All employees answered to her. An attractive older woman of around seventy, she wore dark trousers and a lace-trimmed white blouse. Her silver hair was cut in a short, modern style, and designer glasses hung from the chain around her neck.
“Benjamin told me why he hired you, of course, and I must say I’m relieved. I admit that I’ve been a bit spooked by some of the things happening in or around the house lately, and I hope you’ll get to the bottom of whatever is going on. I’m at my wit’s end worrying.”
“Phillips gave me the short explanation, but I need to know more from someone who is actually living on the property full-time.”
“Let’s sit, shall we?”
She indicated the upholstered sofa and leather chairs before the massive ceramic-faced fireplace with an equally massive wood surround and mantel, where a small fire had taken the chill of the spring morning from the room.
They took the two chairs, so they were facing each other.
Concern furrowed Cora’s brow. “I’ve run this estate for more than thirty years, and I’ve never had to worry until recently. I don’t feel safe anymore, what with the noises and sightings and attempted break-ins.” She shivered.
“What kind of noises?”
“Thumping in the walls. Supposedly there were secret passageways and tunnels at one time and I’m wondering if somehow something or someone got into one of them.”
Rick started. Secret passageways. Underground. That was something Phillips hadn’t told him about. A shudder ran through him, but he covered quickly.
“I have blueprints of the house, but I didn’t see any note of hidden access,” he said.
“Well, no, there wouldn’t be, not on the original plans. When Red Flanagan bought the estate, he had the passageways and tunnels and perhaps a secret room or two built into or under the house to support his illegal business. Then the Feds took over. It’s said they walled off the entrances to the house itself before they sold the property. You know, to discourage any more illegal activity. That was nearly eighty years and two additional owners ago.”
“Where were the entrances to these supposed tunnels?”
She shrugged. “I have no idea. I never even had reason to think about them until the past few weeks.”
Rick remained silent for a moment. Secret tunnels...secret stash? Was that what the intruder was looking for? Something the person thought Red left behind and the Feds hadn’t found? Made sense.
“So start from the beginning,” he said. “When did you first suspect someone was up to no good?”
“About five weeks ago. I woke in the middle of the night because I thought I had heard a noise. I looked out at the lake through my bedroom window and movement nearby caught my eye. A dark, shadowy figure. Someone was on the property, but the gates were locked. The person either climbed the fence or came via the lake itself.”
“You’re sure it wasn’t an employee or guest?”
“It was April and the middle of the week. We have very few guests at that time, and none that night. Day employees—maids, mostly—don’t have keys. So the only ones legally on the property were the cook and concierge, and both Kelly and Gina said they were sound asleep.”
She went on to tell him about other incidents, a few Phillips had already related. It was sounding more and more like the intruder was searching for something specific.
“Has there been any kind of property damage?”
“Not with the first few incidents, which is why I wasn’t too alarmed. But then a couple of weeks ago, I heard breaking glass.” She sighed. “Fortunately I am a light sleeper. Or just an old woman—they say people my age tend to wake up more easily in the night.”
“You’re not old,” he reassured her.
She shrugged.
He went on, “So you investigated?”
“Not then. I was alone. So not until morning.”
“Well, you’re not alone anymore.” Rick handed her his card. “My cell number is there. Program it in to yours. Should you hear or see anything suspicious at any time, call me immediately.”
She took the card and slipped it into a pocket. “I will sleep better knowing that you are around and that I can call on you.”
“Good.” Rick got to his feet. “If you think of anything else—anything at all that might help—let me know.”
Leaving the library, Rick figured this was going to be a piece of cake compared with some of his experiences in a special operations intelligence team. He was going to have to install several security cameras not only around the mansion but also in several other places. The coach house for one. The old boathouse, too, just in case an intruder decided to come in by the lake. Tracking back the way he’d come through the rotunda, he saw that Gina Luca, dressed in a black pencil skirt and a bright red blouse, was standing next to her desk.
“Rick, it’s so good to see you again. How are you getting along so far?”
“I’m doing fine with a little guidance,” he said, thinking of his encounter with the college girl.
Gina’s lips curved in an inviting smile. “I’d be happy to help you with whatever you need.”
With jet black hair that trailed her shoulders, dark brown eyes and a body that would make most men take a second look, Gina was a little too high end for Rick’s taste. He preferred his women earthy and a little feisty.
Now he was thinking of Heather on the grass pinned under him, his hand to her throat, ordering him to get off...
He really hadn’t meant to go on the attack like that. His training had kicked in at the most inappropriate time.
He nodded at Gina. “I’ll let you know when I need something.”
Like information that would help him break the case.
* * *
FOR NEARLY AN hour Heather helped Tyrone and Amber clear the persistent, invading grass from the beach area.
“Wait till my younger sisters and brothers hear where I get to work,” Tyrone said, looking out to the lake, blue-green today, waves swelling and rushing in to shore with a lick of foam.
“How many siblings do you have?” Amber asked as she dumped another plant into the wheelbarrow.
“Three of each.”
Heather started. “Seven kids?” She had her hands full with two. “Your poor mother.”
“Me and my seventeen-year-old sister, Chantel, help her take care of the younger ones.”
“You?” Amber said, sounding disbelieving.
“Hey, I like kids, especially after they get past that crazy stage.”
“When is that?” Whenever it was, Heather wasn’t looking forward to it.
“Actually, there’s two crazy stages,” Tyrone said with authority. “Everyone knows about the terrible twos. But it’s the psycho sixes that get to me. That’s when they become jugheads, think they know everything and get into trouble. Darnell decided to investigate a boarded-up house for ghosts and ended up with a broken arm. And LaVonda tangled with a hornets’ nest. Man, was she ever a mess. I’m glad we’re on our last six-year-old. That would be Vaughn.”
Heather could hear the affection in Tyrone’s voice when he talked about his younger siblings and thought it was both sweet and unexpected.
“So what about you?” he asked Amber.
“Two older brothers. Big lugs. Always trying to take care of me whether I want them to or not.”
“That’s what big brothers are supposed to do,” Tyrone said, then turned his attention to Heather. “Your turn, boss.”
“Younger brother, older sister. And I have twin six-year-old girls.”
“Twins!” Tyrone puffed himself up and swaggered a little. “You need advice on how to handle them little girls, you can come to me.”
Heather laughed. “I’ll keep that in mind next time they make me want to scream.”
They all laughed together, a good sound. Heather decided that, despite the shaky start, they would make a compatible team.
Noting they were almost finished with this section, she stepped back. “I’m going to get the sod cutter from the coach house so we can start clearing our rain garden areas next.”
Tyrone saluted her. “By the time you get the equipment, we’ll be ready to go.”
“If you see The Terminator,” Amber added, “say hi for us.”
The Terminator. Right. Not having heard the lawnmower for quite some time now, Heather found herself looking to see what he was up to. And then she remembered being pinned under that big, muscular body. Heat crept up the back of her neck. Rick Slater, she told herself. His name was Rick Slater. Thinking of him as The Terminator was bound to get her in trouble.
She headed for the coach house, a miniature version of the mansion. Same gray stone, same windows, same small details. Her team had put most of their equipment in a storage room with plenty of shelving. But the sod cutter was bulky and weighed more than three hundred pounds, so they’d left it near the lawnmower and other large equipment. Of course, The Termin...Rick...had removed the mower earlier.
So when she turned on the light and approached the sod cutter, she noticed it was sitting at an odd angle. The first thing she thought was that Rick must have whacked it getting the lawnmower out of the coach house. She tried straightening it so she could turn it on and back it out but had no success. It was definitely wonky. A closer look showed her the rear pivot wheel was out of alignment.
How had the sod cutter been damaged?
Heather tried not to panic, but the breath caught in her throat as she realized the implications. She was in charge of this contract, which meant she was in charge of the equipment. Any damage was her responsibility.
If the sod cutter was inoperable...how bad was it? Her hand shook as she pressed it to her chest. Oh, please, I hope I don’t have to replace it.
“Hey, what’s going on? Is something wrong?”
She whipped around to find Rick coming into the coach house. She could see that he’d left the lawnmower directly outside. He was still wearing his sunglasses, so she couldn’t read his expression.
“Yes, unfortunately there is. The sod cutter wasn’t like this when we delivered it last Friday.”
“Like what?”
“Broken.”
“And you haven’t used it yet?”
“No. It’s the pivot...” She indicated the damaged wheel. “You didn’t bang into it or anything when you moved the lawnmower, did you?”
“Hey, I didn’t touch it, honest.” He crouched down to inspect the damage. “It looks like it can be fixed.”
“I sure hope so. A new sod cutter would cost thousands of dollars. I don’t know how I would pay for it. I don’t even know how I can pay for the repair.”
She was still managing website orders for Sew Fine, mostly at home, but she might have to arrange more hours at the store to make extra money.
Rick straightened. “Hey, it’s going to be all right. Calm down.”
“I-I’m sorry.” Now that he was closer, she could see the part of his face not hidden by the sunglasses. He appeared concerned. “I’m a little strapped for cash lately, and I’m a single mother, so I have to worry about how I’m going to feed my kids.” Though she didn’t want to rely on anyone else, her family would come through for her if she ran into a financial problem. She took a deep, calming breath. It would all work out somehow.
“You have kids?” He sounded a little surprised. “Plural?”
She nodded. “Two. Twin girls. Addison and Taylor. They were six last month.”
“Six-year-olds?” Now he sounded amazed. “How old are you?”
Remembering he’d called her that community college girl, she asked, “How old did you think I was?”
“I don’t know. Nineteen. Maybe twenty.”
She smiled despite herself. “Thanks, but I’ll be twenty-five in a few months.”
“You could have fooled me. You did fool me.” He reached out and gently touched her shoulder. “I can see why you’re worried with kids and all. But relax already. Your company must have insurance on its equipment.”
“I—I guess.” Appreciative of his sympathy, she said, “I hate even telling them something’s gone wrong on the first day. I was hoping this would turn into a full-time job after we finished this project.”
“Maybe you won’t have to tell them anything,” Rick said. “I probably can fix the wheel.”
Thinking of the way he’d wrestled with the lawnmower, she asked, “Seriously?”
“Just because I don’t know my way around a lawn doesn’t mean I don’t have other talents. I used to take cars apart and put them back together for fun. Yes, seriously, leave this to me. I’ll take care of it.”
Starting to like Rick more than she thought she would, Heather let out a relieved sigh. “If you can do that, I’ll...well, you deserve some kind of reward. I’ll owe you.”
His mouth curved slightly in a ghost of a smile. “I’ll keep that in mind.”
She blinked at him and swallowed hard. “Um, when do you think you might be able to get around to fixing it?”
“I have a couple of things to take care of first that won’t take long. If I don’t need to order a new part, I should have it to you early this afternoon.”
“Thank you!” She could hardly believe he was being so great to her after her negative thoughts about him. “I guess I’d better tell my crew our plans have changed. We need to build a composter anyway, so we can recycle the sod we remove. We’ll start on that.”
Luckily, she’d had her workers bring the materials to create a couple of large composter holding units—wood and galvanized chicken wire. Not pretty, the composters would be built at the far end of the property and hidden by native grasses that would reach six feet high by midsummer.
Shifting into a positive mode, she started to leave but turned back when Rick called her.
“Hey, Heather. If anything else unexpected happens—not just to your equipment but anything else that bothers you around here—make sure you let me know. I’m going to take care of everything.”
She suddenly felt warm inside.
“Will do,” she agreed, wondering why his assurances made her feel so good. Maybe it was because she hadn’t had the protection of a caring male in a very long time.
But as she headed back toward the beach area, she wondered what Rick meant by “anything else” that bothered her.
It almost sounded as if he expected something to go wrong.
* * *
A GUT FEELING convinced Rick that the sod cutter had been damaged by their mystery intruder. When he’d stooped down to get a closer look at the pivot wheel, he’d noticed a smear of dirt on the machine that looked like a footprint. Someone had stood on it, and perhaps the weight had bent the wheel.
The question was...why would someone stand on it?
After his discussion with Cora, he was pretty convinced the person was looking for entries to the secret tunnels. Maybe he’d had to climb over the equipment to search.
Who knew?
Rick had to admit the coach house was a perfect place for a secret entrance. Not much traffic in here, so low probability of any witnesses. He started inspecting walls for some indication of a hidden door, but the paneling made it hard to see any irregularities. And the lack of good light everywhere but in the storage area frustrated him.
And as he searched, he thought about Heather Clarke. At almost twenty-five, she was still eleven years younger than he. But why was he even thinking about the difference in their ages? He might like her, but he wasn’t looking for someone to date. He was looking to do his job—to stop whoever was up to no good around the estate.
Still, he was distracted. He couldn’t shake Heather’s distraught expression from his memory. As a single mom, she obviously had some money concerns.
Stooping down to take a better look at the sod cutter’s pivot wheel, he remembered how Heather’s tension had eased when he’d told her he could probably fix the equipment himself. And when he did, he hoped to see a big smile on her pretty face.
All the reward he would need.
CHAPTER THREE
HEATHER PUT A tuna casserole into the oven. She was grateful that Rick had come through for her and that she and her crew had been able to make short work of cutting out the two areas for rain gardens. Now she wondered what she could do to properly thank the man. Not that she had time to think about The Terminator at the moment. The nickname made her smile, made her want to think more about the resourceful man.
But right now, she had to concentrate on getting Addison and Taylor fed. Which meant making a salad to go with the casserole. A salad they would complain and fuss about before she got them to eat it. She fetched lettuce and a tomato, then carrots from the fridge and took them all to the sink, where she rinsed everything off. Addison loved carrots and Taylor could be bribed to eat them with a little French dressing on the side. She glanced around. The kitchen could use a makeover, but thankfully, it was spacious enough to be eat-in. The house was a neat bungalow with a living room, kitchen, two bedrooms and a single bath. All she’d been able to afford using her late husband’s life insurance.
A screech from outside made her wonder what was going on now. Apparently a morning of school followed by an afternoon of day camp wasn’t enough to wear out the twins. She grabbed a bowl and a cutting board and began chopping. The girls were playing in the backyard, and from the sound of their squeals and heated words, they had energy to spare.
Putting together the salad, Heather couldn’t even remember what that kind of energy felt like. Although she loved her time with the girls, they took everything out of her. She simply couldn’t keep up with them no matter how hard she tried. At one point when she was managing her Aunt Margaret’s store, she’d considered giving up on school. But then her sister, Kristen, had returned to Sparrow Lake and taken over Sew Fine. Having lost her fancy marketing job in Chicago, Kristen hadn’t known what she wanted to do at first but, luckily, her family and a new romance with the town’s police chief meant she was in Sparrow Lake to stay, and Heather was thankful for that.
She smiled wanly, thinking about how gladly she’d stepped down from the store manager job and taken the easier one of overseeing online sales. Much of which she could do at home after the twins were in bed. The only problem now was money. They were living on an even tighter budget than before.
A budget that would have been ruined if she’d had to pay to repair the sod cutter.
Rick crept into her thoughts despite her determination. There was just something about him...
And he certainly had come to her rescue this morning. Nothing she did could possibly convey her gratitude because she was hoping this internship would be the turning point in her life. If EPI hired her full time, she could give up working for Sew Fine for a fulfilling job with enough pay and benefits that she could finally relax. Then she would have more time to concentrate on the girls.
Which sounded like heaven after the past four years of pushing, pushing, pushing. Whoever had thought it was possible to “do it all,” especially if you were a single mom, was deluded. Yeah, you could do it all if you didn’t mind feeling like a zombie half the time. Her own mother had remarried and moved to California about the same time Scott had died, so Heather had been on her own.
“Hey, look what we got!”
Hearing Taylor’s chirpy voice, Heather smiled and turned to see. But though her daughters were both beaming at her, her own smile quickly evaporated. Standing between them was a scruffy dog with orange-brown and white fur and a pointed nose. The same dog who’d been watching them get into the SUV that morning.
“Whose dog is that?” Heather had hoped it belonged to a neighbor and had simply been wandering around.
“He’s ours!” Addison said. “We found him!”
Heather shook her head. “Oh, no, he’s not ours.”
“Yes, he is, and he’s starving.” Taylor went to the refrigerator and pulled out a package of turkey slices. “He needs to eat.”
Heather was about to say no when she took a better look at the dog. He did seem a little thin and he was staring at that package of lunch meat with the most hopeful expression on his sad little face. “Okay, one slice of turkey.”
But when the dog practically swallowed the slice whole, Taylor pulled out another and gave that one to him, too, saying, “His name is Kirby.”
“Sweetheart, don’t give him a name because we’re not going to keep him.”
“Why not?” Addison asked. “He’s real nice.”
Watching the dog devour a third slice of meat, Heather said, “I’m sure he is. But—”
“C’mon, Mom,” Taylor wheedled.
“I don’t have time to take care of a dog.”
Or the money. Being a responsible owner meant paying for shots and vet bills in addition to food, and the family budget was at the straining point now. Not that she wanted to burden her six-year-olds with her financial worries.
“I’ll take care of him by myself!” Taylor insisted.
“No,” Addison protested, “I’ll help.”
Heather knew Taylor couldn’t take care of the dog herself, not even with Addison’s help. The twins didn’t have that kind of focus yet. When something interested them, it was only for a short while. And then they moved on to the next thing.
“You can take care of him for tonight. But tomorrow, I’m driving him to the local shelter. They’ll either find his real owner...or they’ll find him a good home.”
“Mo-o-om!” the twins cried in unison.
“That’s enough.” Noticing the lunch meat package was empty, Heather said, “Well, it seems the dog has had his dinner.” She pulled a bowl out of the cabinet and filled it with water. “Now it’s time for you to get ready for yours. Go wash your hands so you can set the table.”
She put down the bowl of water out of the line of traffic. The dog immediately stuck his muzzle in and started drinking as he gazed up at her with shiny brown eyes. He was such a cutie. She couldn’t help herself. She patted his side. Whistling through his nose, the dog immediately whipped his head around and licked her hand. She melted inside just a little.
“Don’t worry, boy. I’ll make sure you get a home.”
As long as it wasn’t hers.
* * *
AN HOUR LATER, the kitchen was clean and Heather was on the computer, which she had set up in the bay window area of the living room. Someday it would be nice to have a bigger place, one with a real office space. She was going through Sew Fine’s newest online orders and figuring out what supplies she would need to order to replenish stock.
Directly after dinner, the twins had absconded with the dog to their room. Heather could hear them now, talking to him and giggling. She smiled sadly. They were having a good time, and she hoped their little hearts wouldn’t be broken when they had to give up the dog in the morning.
Hearing a vehicle stop in front of the house, she left the computer to see who it was. To her surprise, her sister was coming up the walk. Wearing a lavender dress and four-inch heels to match and her blond hair gathered in a sleek ponytail, Kristen was carrying a dress bag. Apparently, she was delivering Heather’s bridesmaid’s dress. Kristen and Alex’s wedding date was approaching all too rapidly.
Heather opened the door. “Hey, Kristen, what a great surprise.” They hugged, and she took the dress bag from her sister. “You didn’t have to deliver the dress, though. I could have picked it up myself.”
“But then I wouldn’t have been able to see my favorite nieces,” Kristen said as the twins came running out of their bedroom, the dog on their heels.
“Aunt Kristen!” they yelled together, each twin launching herself onto Kristen, who laughed and gave them big hugs.
The dog stopped short and started barking.
Kristen started. “Whoa, what’s this?”
“Our new dog,” Addison said.
Before Heather could object, Taylor added, “His name is Kirby.”
Over the twins’ heads, Kristen locked gazes with her. Heather squinched up her face and shook her head No. In return, Kristen rolled her eyes.
“Girls, give your aunt some breathing room. It’s time to take your baths.” When Taylor’s face lit up, Heather clarified, “I mean the two of you, not the dog. You’re not to let him in the tub. Understood?”
Taylor’s face fell. “Okay.”
“While the tub is filling, get your pajamas ready and brush your hair and teeth. And don’t get in until I tell you it’s okay.”
She let them wash themselves now but not without supervision.
The girls flew to the bathroom, the dog trotting behind.
“You actually think they’re not going to let their four-legged friend get in with them?” Kristen asked, laughing. “I remember that time I babysat and gave them a bath. When my back was turned, they brought every doll and toy horse into the tub, even though I told them not to.”
Hearing the water running, Heather laughed. “I’d like to say they’re more mature than they were a year ago, but that’s wishful thinking. Maybe I’d better get the dog and keep him with us in case they get any ideas.”
She went into the bedroom, where the girls were tossing their pajamas back and forth over the dog’s head so that he kept jumping, trying to get the clothes whipping through the air.
“Enough. I’m going to take the dog into the other room with Aunt Kristen.” She looked straight at the dog and tapped her leg. “C’mon. C’mon, boy.” He sat down. She patted her leg again. “Let’s go.” She whistled. “C’mon, boy.” He yawned.
“His name is Kirby,” Taylor sing-songed, and the dog got to his feet and trotted over to her. “See?”
Naming him was a mistake, but what else could she do? “C’mon...Kirby.”
The dog now came to her. Heather patted him on the head. “Let’s go see Aunt Kristen.”
By the time she got to the living room, Kirby trotting ahead of her and looking back to make sure she was coming, Kristen had already opened the garment bag to reveal the bridesmaid’s dress made of sheer apricot-colored material.
“Oh, it’s gorgeous.”
“You need to try it on,” Kristen said, handing it to her. “I want to make sure it’s perfect.”
“I’m not the bride. You’re the one who has to look perfect.” And Kristen would look perfect, Heather thought, having seen the elegant cream-colored wedding dress at Kristen’s last fitting.
“But you’re my matron of honor and my sister. We have to look perfect together.”
“Okay, I’ll try on the dress.”
Heather and Kristen started for the bedroom with Kirby next to Heather, bumping against her legs as they passed the bathroom. The bathtub water was running and the girls were in their room, giggling.
“Teeth!” she reminded them before closing her bedroom door. She was already removing her sweatshirt. “I haven’t had a dress that fancy in...well, never.”
Kristen laughed. “Then it’s about time.”
Amazingly, the dress fit Heather perfectly, though the fancy style felt a bit foreign to her.
“It looks great on you,” Kristen said.
Heather checked herself out in the full-length mirror on the back of a door. Kirby parked himself next to her, and she thought the color of his fur was almost the same color as the dress.
“It is nice,” she had to admit, “even if it isn’t me.”
“How did I ever get a sister so uninterested in clothes?”
“How did I ever get one so interested in labels?” Heather came back.
Luckily, Kristen had insisted on buying the garment for Heather. Or rather, Kristen and Alex. Between the two of them, they could afford it. Not that Heather still didn’t feel a little guilty. She promised herself she’d make it up to both of them someday.
Kristen asked, “You don’t hate the dress, do you?”
“No. It’s very pretty.” Heather smoothed the fabric of the skirt with her hands. “I just don’t look like me wearing it. I’m more comfortable in jeans and a T-shirt or sweater. And I’m going to have to do something with my hair. The color is so mousy against the bright apricot.”
“Your hair is shiny and thick,” Kristen said, “but I do wonder how a shade lighter would look on you.”
“I actually thought about putting in some blond highlights.”
Kristen grinned. “Now that’s the spirit! You haven’t exactly been enthusiastic about this wedding—”
“No! You know I like Alex.” And she was thrilled to see her older sister so happy. “I’ve just been too busy to enjoy things as much as I would like.”
Heather took off the dress and carefully hung it up. She listened for the girls. The water was still running, but she didn’t hear their voices. She opened the door. “What are you two up to?” she called.
“Brushing teeth,” one of the twins answered, sounding as if the toothbrush were in her mouth.
“Okay, I’ll be there in a couple of minutes.” Closing the door again, she said, “You and Alex make the perfect couple, and I’m so happy for you.” She pulled her old clothes back on. “I just don’t want the relatives who’ll come in for the wedding pitying me or something.”
“Pitying you? Why would they?”
“You know, because I’m a widow and all.”
Heather opened the nightstand drawer where she still kept a small photo of her late husband. She ran a fingertip around his face. Her memories of Scott were getting a little hazy, so every night before she went to bed, she looked at the photo and called up a nice memory of the two of them together.
Heather went on. “I know they’re going to ask me about Scott—how he died, how I’m doing without him, how my poor girls are doing growing up without a father.”
And what could she say? She still missed him. The girls missed him, Taylor especially. She’d watched that DVD so many times that Heather was beginning to worry it wasn’t healthy for her daughter. Still she couldn’t take the little girl’s Daddy away from her.
“Wow,” Kristen mused, “you’ve imagined a whole scenario with the relatives.”
“Do you have a better one for me?”
“Yeah, bring a date. With you on another man’s arm, they won’t be able to ask you about Scott.”
“Except that I’m not dating anyone.”
And hadn’t ever dated any other man in her whole life other than Scott. Part of her didn’t want to. His death had left her so brokenhearted that she couldn’t ever see herself taking another chance on love.
“So start dating,” Kristen insisted. “Aunt Margaret invited John to be her date.”
“I’m glad they connected. It’s nice to know it’s never too late for love.”
Aunt Margaret was nearing seventy and John was five years older. They’d only met the summer before, but they made a perfect couple. Heather had to admit she envied that. She just didn’t know if she was ready for another relationship.
“It’s not too late for you, either,” Kristen was saying. “You could start slow. If you’re uncomfortable calling it a date, ask a male friend to accompany you.”
“I can’t think of anyone to ask.”
The only single man of an appropriate age she’d met lately was The Terminator, and he certainly wasn’t her type. She was glad when the girls yelled, “Mo-o-om!” and knocked the image of him right out of her head.
“Bath time,” she told Kristen.
“And time for me to leave.”
Heather opened the bedroom door and saw the twins wedged in the bathroom doorway.
“C’mon, Mommy,” Addison said. “Bath time!”
Taylor echoed her twin. “Bath time!”
“Give me just a minute to see your aunt to the front door.”
Kristen was already halfway there, the dog shadowing her. She stopped and gave Heather a quick hug. “Just remember what I said about asking someone to accompany you to the wedding.”
“I doubt I’ll be able to forget.”
An image of Rick Slater was in her mind again, tempting Heather as Kristen left, and she closed and locked the front door behind her sister.
She hesitated just a moment to think about Rick...to wonder what he might look like without those sunglasses...
What sounded like a tidal wave accompanied by little girl squeals brought her around.
“What’s going on?” she yelled before realizing the dog had disappeared.
It seemed everyone was getting a bath tonight.
* * *
WAKING IN THE middle of the night had become an unwelcome habit for Cora. And it didn’t take an unusual sound to rouse her from sleep. It was simply the expectation of some sort of noise occurring. Tonight she didn’t remember anything unusual. She awakened, lay there for a while, then rose to fix some chamomile tea in the little electric teapot she’d set up in her bathroom. The teapot made things easier in that she didn’t have to leave her suite. A small nightlight made the bedside lamp unnecessary.
Sitting in the comfortable chair beside the bank of windows, she sipped her tea and watched flashes of lightning illuminate the sky over the lake, followed by a rumble of thunder. A storm was brewing. Perhaps it had simply been thunder that had invaded her dreams.
She hated having to be on guard all the time.
At least a private investigator was now in residence.
Not that he could be everywhere at once.
A cool breeze that smelled of fresh rain lifted the curtains. Thinking that perhaps she ought to lower the windows, Cora put down her cup, rose and leaned on the sill.
Storms over the lake had always fascinated her, so she didn’t immediately adjust the windows. Instead, she looked out from her attic-level quarters, which gave her a perfect view of the show. For a moment she was mesmerized by the electric light dancing in the sky.
Until another movement closer by captured her attention.
She dropped her gaze to search for the source.
Lightning flashed again and she could see the second-floor balcony and the small wiry man with red hair standing on end who perched there, back stiff, body wired with tension.
With a start, she thought she recognized him. Red Flanagan?
Could it be? He certainly reminded her of the man in the portrait hung in the rotunda.
Shocked, Cora gripped the windowsill and held her breath.
The sky went dark and she blinked several times, then took another look that made her stomach whirl.
The balcony stood empty.
Lightning flashed again, confirming that no one was there now...if anyone had ever been there at all. She’d thought the intruder was a flesh-and-blood man. But now she wondered. Surely no one these days could look exactly like an eighty-year-old portrait.
Trembling from the inside out, she closed the windows, and with shaking hands, locked them.
Not that locked windows could stop a ghost...
CHAPTER FOUR
STANDING ON THE balcony off the second-floor family drawing room with the housekeeper, Rick kept his voice low. “This should be a perfect place for one of my cameras.” He didn’t want to alert any other employees on the property as to what he was doing. It was possible someone working here knew the intruder and was sharing information, whether on purpose or not.
It was early morning—too early for Heather and her EPI workers to be on site. Truth be told, he was looking forward to Heather’s arrival, but he wanted to make certain that, before she and her workers swarmed the property, he had time to install at least a couple of the security cameras he’d picked up from his company in Milwaukee the night before.
“So this camera will show you if anyone...or anything...is on the property at night?” Cora asked.
“Well, not just this camera,” Rick said, wondering what she meant by or anything. “I brought enough of them to cover the area in each direction around the building, plus the coach house and the boathouse.”
The housekeeper nodded. She seemed tense and nervous, and she looked as if she hadn’t slept well.
He tried to reassure her. “Don’t worry, I’ll catch whoever has been messing around on the estate grounds. These wireless cameras are the best. They have spectacular night vision as far as three hundred feet. And they’re set on motion detectors that will start the camera and make digital recordings on a computer that can signal me on my phone.”
He would have to hook up each camera to a 110 AC source, a consideration in choosing locations. He also needed places that would provide camouflage for the cameras. If the intruder became aware of them, he could simply cover up the lenses. If he didn’t destroy the equipment. So Rick had to hide each camera very carefully. He would position this first one between the balcony’s balusters, near a planter with greenery that hung in long strands through the opening. A perfect nest for the lens.
“So the cameras would be able to see anything out of place?” Cora asked.
“As long as it’s moving.”
“Does it have to be...”
“What?” he asked.
Cora cleared her throat. “Um, alive?”
What exactly was she getting at? Rick wondered. “Well, uh, if someone threw something into the area covered by—”
“Not an object. That’s not what I meant.”
“Then...what?”
“I saw something last night.” Cora wrapped her arms around her middle as if trying to protect herself. “At least I think I did.”
Rick was getting a weird feeling about this. “Go on.”
“It was a figure. Male. It looked like a small wiry man with red hair standing on end—”
“Looked like? What is it you’re trying to say, Cora?”
“I thought I saw Red Flanagan.”
Silence. Part of Rick wanted to laugh at her imagination. But he didn’t want to insult Cora. She’d been stressed about whatever was going on around the mansion at night for weeks now. Perhaps it had become too much for her.
“You don’t believe me,” she said, her words almost whispered.
“Red Flanagan has been dead for what? Half a century?”
“I know that! I just said it looked like him. Like the portrait in the rotunda.”
“Hey, easy. I’m on your side. I just don’t know what to think.”
“What if Flanagan Manor is haunted?” Cora asked.
Rick could see that she was serious. “I can’t say that I believe in ghosts.”
“I didn’t think I did, either. But after all that’s happened in the past several weeks...”
“If you did see Flanagan’s ghost, why now? What made him come back? Before all these curious events, did something significant happen on the estate? Some big change?”
“I—I don’t know. I’ll have to think on it.”
Rick didn’t believe in ghosts and he started to say that he’d never heard of one leaving footprints or breaking equipment by standing on it. But he was distracted by the sound of an engine. Both he and Cora turned to see a silver sedan pull up to the mansion. The driver’s door opened and a distinguished, silver-haired man exited.
“Oh, David—I mean Mr. Guildfren—is early.”
The man advanced to the trunk of his car and pulled out two suitcases.
“A guest.” Apparently one she knew by name.
“Yes, a regular. He’s an antiques dealer who appreciates the history of this estate. He’s been coming here for the past three years for a few weeks in the summer and again during the winter holidays.”
Color flushed Cora’s cheeks, and her avid expression suggested a certain fondness for the man.
“I can take it from here,” Rick said. “If you have other things to do.”
“Are you sure?”
“Positive.”
“All right then. Call me if you need me.”
Rather than waiting for his response, she whipped back into the drawing room, a changed woman from the tired, nervous one of a few minutes before. The spring to her step informed him of her affection for the guest. Rick wondered if the feeling was reciprocated, and if so, if they had ever done anything about it. Cora had said the man was a regular, visiting the bed-and-breakfast twice a year. She hadn’t been able to hide her excitement at seeing him.
He needed to get to work. Luckily there was an outlet nearby, providing a source of electricity.
As he set the camera in place, he felt hollow. He’d never had a long-term relationship with any woman. Being military for nearly all his life, he’d never been in one place long enough. His on-and off-again romance with Megan had been the closest he’d gotten. And being part of a special ops team had brought him to some pretty grim places. None were so grim as the last. Once he’d landed back here in the States, he hadn’t known what to do with himself. The army had always been his home. Giving civilian life a chance had its own difficulties.
He’d been back for several months now, but no woman had even interested him.
Not until he’d met Heather Clarke.
* * *
TAYLOR COULDN’T BELIEVE Mommy could be so mean. First Daddy never came home like he promised. Now Mommy was going to give away Kirby.
“He’s my dog!” she said with a sniffle as they approached the counter. Dogs were barking and cats were meowing, too. She looked around and tears filled her eyes. “You can’t put poor Kirby in jail!”
“Sweetheart, he’s not your dog,” Mommy said. “And the Sparrow Lake Animal Shelter isn’t a jail.”
“Then why are all the animals locked up?” Tears slipped down Taylor’s cheeks.
Addison took her hand and squeezed hard. “They’re so sad!”
“Not so sad, honey.” The white-haired lady behind the counter smiled at them. “The animals don’t all get along with each other, so we keep them separated for their protection. But they all get some time out of the cages every day. We have several volunteers who come to take care of them and play with them. The animals here are treated very well.”
“Then I want to volunteer,” Taylor said.
“Me, too,” Addison added.
“I’m sorry, girls, but you’re too young.”
Her mom held up the rope she’d used for a leash. “We found this dog yesterday, and I was hoping you could take him and either find his owner or find a new home.”
“I’m very sorry, but we’re full at the moment. Actually, we’re usually full. So many animals lost or thrown away.” She sighed and shook her head. “But we can put him on a waiting list. You never know when one of our dogs will get his forever home. Here’s a form to fill out.” She slid a piece of paper over the counter. “We’ll also add him to the list of newly lost animals in case anyone is looking for him.”
Mommy started scribbling, and Taylor got down on her knees and hugged Kirby tight. “You don’t have to come here yet,” she whispered. “So you’re still mine.”
“What’s a forever home?” Addison asked.
The white-haired lady smiled again. “That’s what we like to say when we place one of our dogs or cats with a new family. That they’ve found the home where they will live and be happy forever.”
Taylor thought Kirby had already found his forever home. Now if only she could make Mommy change her mind...
She’d already lost Daddy. It wasn’t fair if she had to lose Kirby, too.
* * *
HEATHER ARRIVED AT Flanagan Manor early after dropping off the girls at school. She got out of the SUV, brand-new leash in hand, and the dog rushed for freedom. It took all her strength to keep Kirby from wiggling past her.
The dog, she corrected herself. She didn’t want to think of him by name, didn’t want to get too fond of him, no matter how sweet and lovable he was.
“Hang on a minute,” she muttered, meaning to clip a lead to the collar she’d bought him after she’d learned there was no room at the shelter.
Yet.
He was on a waiting list to get in, and in the meantime, Heather would try to find him a good home herself.
“Okay, come on out.” She gave the leash a small tug.
The dog lunged out of the SUV and, in his excitement to stretch his legs, nearly jerked her arm out of her shoulder socket.
She slammed the door, yelling, “Hey, slow down!”
Having checked with Alex, she’d been assured no one had called the police station to put out an official alert for the little guy, which was a real shame. He so obviously loved people. He must be missing his owner. When she got some time, she and the twins would put up notices around town with a picture of the dog. Surely someone would recognize him.
Either that or offer to give him a new home.
She headed toward an area near the parking lot where the dog could relieve himself without ruining any landscaping. As she tried to figure out where she could tie him up while she worked, she heard footsteps behind her.
“Hey, who is this?” came the unmistakable voice that made her picture granite features accentuated by mirrored sunglasses.
Heather turned to see Rick coming from the general direction of the coach house. “This is a dog the girls found yesterday,” she said. “I tried the animal shelter first thing this morning, but no luck. It’s full, and I couldn’t stand the thought of leaving him in the pound where he’d have a week or two to be claimed before they would euthanize him, so I’m going to find him a home.”
“Here?”
“No.” Hope suddenly blazed through her. “Unless...if I can’t find his owner and you want him...”
Rick put up a hand to stop her. “Not what I meant.”
She sighed. “It seems no one wants this poor guy.” Except for the twins, especially Taylor.
Keeping the dog was out of the question. But it seemed finding any owner—old or new—was nothing more than a pipe dream.
“He’s a nice-looking dog.”
Rick crouched down to dog nose level and ruffled Kirby’s ears. In return, the dog threw his head around and licked Rick’s hand. Heather smiled at the instant bond. Rick was a nice guy, as he’d proved the day before by fixing the sod cutter for her. She thought about her sister’s suggestion to have a friend escort her to the wedding. But Rick really wasn’t her friend. She barely knew him.
“What are you calling him?” Rick asked.
Heather jerked back to the present situation. “Dog.”
The mirrored sunglasses turned up toward her. “Seriously?”
“Okay, the girls named him Kirby, but I’m trying not to think of him that personally.”
Giving the animal a last pat, Rick got to his feet. “Your bringing him with you to work is pretty personal.”
“It’s not like I had a choice. He was barricaded in the kitchen all night with a makeshift bed and food and water. And he still chewed one of the shoes I left by the back door. I can’t leave him in the house by himself. Who knows what kind of mess he would make? What he might ruin.”
“He seems pretty young to me. He needs a kennel. You know, a big cage.”
“Except that he’s not my dog.”
Rick grinned at her as if saying, Sure he’s not.
Flushing, Heather looked around. Anywhere so she didn’t have to connect with his know-it-all smirk. “Now I just have to find a place to tie him up while I work.”
“What about over there by the coach house?” He indicated the area he meant. “It’s nice and quiet. I’m the only one who lives there,” he said, “in the second-floor apartment.”
“What, no wife or partner?” she asked before realizing it was none of her business.
“Nope. I live a solitary life.”
She tried again. “Maybe you could use some company.”
“Maybe, but since my future is up in the air...”
Heather sighed. Too bad. Finding someone to take the dog off her hands this soon would have been too easy, of course.
She looked over to the coach house with its nice open expanse and a big maple tree for shade. And there was bizarrely long grass to make a comfy bed. Apparently, Rick hadn’t applied his mowing skills—or lack thereof—to that particular section of grass yet. Maybe it was because he couldn’t ride the mower under such low-hanging branches.
“Looks like as good a place as any. Thanks. I need to get stuff from the car.”
“Let me help you.”
“You can hang on to the dog for me.” She handed him the leash.
Taking it, he said, “Sure. Kirby and I are buddies already, aren’t we, boy?”
“So you’re a dog person?”
“I’m an animal person. When I was growing up, no matter where we lived, there were always stray animals that needed to be fed and taken care of. I took as many of them in as Mom would allow, which was quite a few, actually.” He quickly added, “I’m just not in a position to take on an animal now since I don’t know how long I’ll be here.”
Too bad. He sounded exactly like the person Kirby needed. Heather would never have guessed that Rick had such a soft spot for animals. She had to admit she liked that about him. Opening the back of the SUV, she pulled out water and food bowls, a bag of food and a chew toy, plus a few other toys he’d gotten excited over. She’d gone into one of those giant pet supply stores that allowed owners to bring in their dogs. She’d had to take him inside to get the right size collar. Then he’d instigated her into making some of the other purchases.
Eyeing everything she was carrying, Rick cleared his throat. “Right. Not your dog.”
She gave him her best irritated expression. Buying this stuff had broken her budget, but she hadn’t been able to help herself. “Someone had to feed him, and no one else volunteered.” Not yet.
“He’s going to eat the toys?”
“I was hoping keeping him busy would keep him quiet.” She’d told herself not to buy anything except the bare necessities, but she’d felt so sorry for the dog that resisting had been useless. “The last thing I need on the job is a barking dog.”
She started off toward the coach house, Rick keeping pace with her, and Kirby—the dog, she reminded herself—racing ahead, leash taut, even though the little stinker didn’t know where he was racing to.
Standing under the tree, Heather looked up to the branches, too high above her. “I need to be able to tie him to something that will keep him put.”
“I’ll find something,” Rick said. “You could set out his water and food.”
Heather flicked her eyebrows up. Suddenly, Rick had taken over. Still, grateful for the offered help, she did as he said while he took the dog into the coach house with him. She filled one bowl with kibble and took the other to the hose attached to the side of the house to get the dog some water.
In the meantime, Rick returned carrying a three-foot length of steel with holes in it. The dog danced around her, inspecting everything she touched. As she set down the bowl of water and the dog crowded her to get a drink, Rick used the hammer he’d brought to pound the steel more than a foot into the ground.
“What is that?”
“Just something I found in the shop. Looks like someone was building a storage unit and left the castoffs.”
When he clipped the dog’s leash to one of the holes, she said, “My, you’re inventive.”
“Just call me resourceful.”
“Okay, thanks, Resourceful.” She snorted but choked back further response.
The mirrored sunglasses aimed her way, and he rose to his full height. “What?”
She grinned up at him. “Actually, my workers already have a nickname for you.”
“What?” he asked a little louder.
“They’ve been calling you The Terminator.” Which, with his features set in a frown at the moment, he absolutely resembled. “It’s the sunglasses.” She wasn’t going to bring up his skinning the grass or plowing down the bush. “Remember, in the movie, he always wore those mirrored sunglasses that made him look so dangerous.”
“They think I look dangerous?”
At first she had, too, especially after he’d flattened her. But now that she knew him better, not so much.
“Tyrone is convinced you’re a spy,” she informed him.
Rick’s turn to snort. “A commando, maybe, but not a spy.”
“Android?” she teased.
“Thoroughly human, I promise.” His lips quirked. “You believe me, don’t you?”
“Maybe if I could see your eyes. The sunglasses do come off, right?” She’d never seen him without them.
In answer, Rick slipped off the shades.
His eyes were blue. A clear, sharp blue. And they were large and fringed with thick lashes, quite at odds with the granite features that suddenly took on a softer appearance. His eyebrows were thick, too, and they quirked upward as she scanned his whole face. Nice features. High cheekbones...determined jaw...tempting mouth. She shook away the last and told herself he was decent looking. That was it. Nothing out of the ordinary.
Still, he’d make a great-looking escort at Kristen and Alex’s wedding...
“Well?” he asked.
Her pulse was thrumming. Could she do it? Ask him?
“It’s just nice to know what you actually look like,” she admitted.
“You approve?”
Not wanting him to get a swelled head, she avoided a direct answer. “I don’t disapprove.”
She was stalling, trying to make up her mind.
“So you’re neutral,” he said.
“Like Switzerland.”
She loved that he was taking the conversation in stride, even seeming amused. She appreciated a man with a sense of humor.
He was grinning at her when he asked, “You’ve been to Switzerland?”
“No. You?”
“I’ve been to a lot of different countries all over the world,” he admitted, “but that’s still on my list of places to see. I love traveling and learning about different cultures.”
In a lot of different countries? “But you’re not a spy, right?”
“Nope.”
“So why all the traveling?”
“My father was a lifer. Army. Different bases all over the world.”
“Oh.” Now on alert, she asked, “What about you?”
“Not a lifer. At least I wasn’t planning to be. I just kind of got sucked in for so many years because it was what I knew.” His expression changed, grew a little grim. “War isn’t pretty, so when my last tour ended, I wanted to see if there was something else for me. So I decided to give civilian life a chance before I make up my mind whether or not to re-enlist.”
As he spoke, her pulse crashed.
Army...thinking of re-enlisting...
Instantly reminding her of her late husband, Scott. He’d been killed along with several other men when their truck had rolled over a land mine.
His answer made her uncomfortable, and Heather was glad to see the EPI truck pull up. “Oh, look, Tyrone and Amber are here with some of our supplies.”
As if tired of being ignored and wanting to be part of the conversation, Kirby barked and looked from her to Rick, who bent over and patted the dog.
Disappointment filled Heather. For a moment, she’d thought...but there was no way she was going to ask a man who might re-enlist in the army to escort her anywhere. Rick might be nice. And good-looking. But she’d lost one man to war. She’d been devastated, and so had her girls. What if Rick decided civilian life wasn’t for him? He might want to re-enlist. What was she thinking? She wasn’t ready for a long-term relationship anyway and didn’t know if she ever would be. She couldn’t take that kind of chance with her heart again. She’d just been thinking about Kristen is all, but Rick simply wasn’t the right man for her, not even to escort her to a wedding.
Heather gave the chew toy to the dog, patted his head and gave Rick a tight smile. “Time to get to work.”
Turning her back on them both, she raced to the truck in the parking lot. Both of her workers were already in back. Tyrone was moving bags of compost to the rear edge of the truck and handing them off to Amber, who was dropping them down onto the dolly.
“Wow, look who’s early,” Tyrone said when Heather got closer. “So what is the spy up to this morning?”
“Tyro-o-one.” Amber poked his leg. “Hi, Heather.”
Heather laughed. “At the moment, he’s up to taking care of the dog my kids found last night.”
She couldn’t help but look over to where Rick sat with the dog. They were both watching the workers with lazy interest.
Thinking about going to the wedding alone, Heather felt a twinge of disappointment.
Too bad about Rick.
He was just someone she couldn’t let into her life. She needed to keep a professional distance.
To that end, thinking he could help haul stuff where it was needed, she yelled, “Hey, Mr. Sunglasses, since you’re not doing anything, why not come over here and give us some muscle?”
Rick got to his feet almost immediately and sauntered toward them. The dog sat at alert and watched.
“I still think he’s on some secret mission.” Tyrone kept his voice low. “We should see if we can crack him. A point for every detail we learn about him. Whoever gets the most points gets free pizza for lunch.”
“I don’t think that’s such a good idea,” Heather said.
“Why not?” Amber asked. “It’s all in good fun.” Then, “Hey, if you can take over here, I’ll fetch the wheelbarrow.”
Which would make things go even faster. “Great.” Heather grabbed a bag from Tyrone and lowered it to the stack already on the dolly. “This is pretty full. I’d say just one more.”
Tyrone handed her a bag, then jumped down from the back of the truck. “I’ll take these over to the rain garden.”
The idea was to move the supplies directly to the site where they would be used. Which meant bags of compost and potting soil would be piled up in several areas for the next couple of weeks. They would need the bags of mortar and the quarry gray blocks to build the rain garden retaining walls today. A lot more was coming—boards for raised beds and Wisconsin bluestone for another terrace with built-in seating and a fire pit. Heather was trying not to order too much at once. The bed and breakfast was about to get busy, and she knew the owner did not want his guests to be inconvenienced. That was why she’d decided to start with the beach area, the walkway and rain gardens—they were all directly between the mansion and the lake.
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Lynn Patrick
Тип: электронная книга
Жанр: Современные любовные романы
Язык: на английском языке
Издательство: HarperCollins
Дата публикации: 16.04.2024
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О книге: She′s earned some good karma. An Army widow at twenty-one, Heather Clarke has spent the past three years running her aunt’s quilt store, raising her twin girls alone and earning a degree in landscape horticulture. Finally, she’s launching her new career and starting to feel like she’s on solid ground.And then Rick Slater rides onto her job site.Heather needs a mysterious, gorgeous, ex-Army distraction like a hole in the head. Especially when he’s the restless type who’s flirting with re-enlisting. And flirting with her! Even if she were ready to love again, she wouldn’t it on a man who might not stay.Now, if he decides to stop moving and grow some roots… then that′s a whole other story.