Total pages in book: 114
Estimated words: 114820 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 574(@200wpm)___ 459(@250wpm)___ 383(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 114820 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 574(@200wpm)___ 459(@250wpm)___ 383(@300wpm)
Or maybe she was still involved, just not day to day, and she’d handed the helm to Lucinda and kept in the background.
She indicated she was well aware of her granddaughter’s recent loss, but this wasn’t the only reason she enveloped Madden in a grandmotherly hug that was so warm and openly nurturing, it seemed at odds with the fact she was home on a Saturday, about to babysit, and she was wearing an outfit much like her daughter’s. Except she didn’t have the cardigan, the white sweater wasn’t a turtleneck, and her smart slacks were charcoal gray.
Things got more interesting after their quick introduction led to another one when a tall, good-looking, dark-headed man, around Lucinda’s age, showed up behind Indira.
“You’re here,” Lucinda said to him.
“In the flesh,” he replied, his attention on Rus.
Lucinda delayed no further. “This is my brother, Porter. Porter, Special Agent Lazarus.”
Yeah.
Total immersion.
“Rus,” he invited the man to use his nickname, offering a hand.
Porter took it. “Hey.”
They broke contact, the man glanced at Lucinda, his mother, then claimed his niece by throwing her over his wide shoulder to her delighted squeal.
“Sundaes,” he declared, walking away.
“Yay!” Madden cried.
“It’s nine thirty in the morning,” Lucinda called to his back.
He waved a hand and didn’t bother even looking over his shoulder as he kept walking.
Madden lifted her head, grinning huge, and said, “Bye, Momma. Bye, Mr. Lazarus.”
“Later,” Rus called.
Lucinda said nothing.
They disappeared.
Indira shifted into their line of vision.
“We have this, go,” she said to Lucinda.
“I don’t want her eating a sundae at nine thirty in the morning, Mom,” Lucinda decreed.
“There are times for nine thirty sundaes, my darling, and this is one of them,” Indira refuted with the god’s honest truth. Before her daughter could say more, if she was going to, Indira looked up at Rus. “It’s nice to meet you. I’d offer you coffee, but I think time is tight for you.”
“It seems it is. Another time. And it’s nice to meet you too,” he replied.
Indira made a shooing gesture, and since only Madden had made it over the threshold, the door was closed in their faces.
He looked down at Lucinda.
“You have a brother.”
“One. Older. Annoying. He needs to settle down and have kids of his own so he’ll stop spoiling mine,” she groused.
“Hmm,” he hummed his disagreement to this statement, since he not only spoiled his daughter, he spoiled both his brothers’ daughters.
And their sons (and, in his way, his).
She gave him a side eye then turned to walk down the steps toward his SUV.
Her mother lived in a gated condo complex. Rus had been surprised at its existence in this area, mostly because the gate was manned, and it was clear HOA fees were hefty. The condos were semi-detached townhomes, and they looked huge. On the way to her unit, they’d passed a clubhouse, an outdoor swimming pool and tennis courts.
It seemed more suited to Scottsdale than rural Washington state.
He stood at her door while she climbed in the vehicle, he closed it for her and only got into it when he was in, and they were moving.
“There’s money in Misted Pines.”
“There’s money everywhere. But this is a weekend playground for people in Seattle, and though it’s more of a drive, Spokane. It’s a tourist spot for those out of state too. Pinetop Lodge has one of the best spas I’ve been to, and I know spas. We get weekend warriors. We get write-off corporate getaways in the guise of conferences. There’s fishing, hiking, trail running and riding. And there’s skiing close. The locals keep the local places secret. There are a lot of ‘keep out’ and ‘private property’ signs, and everyone encourages outsiders to take those seriously. We have no industry but the tourist industry, some logging and a quarry. So if people stopped coming, the town would die.”
Shit, fuck, and everything damning.
How hadn’t he thought of this before?
“What?” she asked, clearly sensing his change in mood, or maybe he hadn’t kept the fact he was suddenly pissed at himself off his face.
“Your mom retired early,” he noted, and had to admit the words sounded strangled.
“We all do. You can’t keep things fresh if you’ve been doing it for forty years. But that wasn’t what you were thinking. So what were you thinking?”
The Bonners ran their ship tight, but she was correct, that wasn’t what he was thinking.
“Your brother isn’t involved in the business?” he asked, instead of telling her what that was.
“My brother manages the stage, particularly building sets. He likes working with his hands. That also wasn’t what you were thinking. So, again, what were you thinking?”
All those elaborate sets were her brother.
And this was news.
“Did he know Brittanie?”
“He probably saw her around, but as much as it makes me feel the need to gargle with acid because these words are coming out of my mouth, even I, as his sister, know he’s exceptionally handsome. The girls flirt with him all the time. It not only annoys him, it wastes his time. He’s not a time waster. And he’s into fresh-faced, let’s-have-a-picnic-after-a-three-hour-hike mountain women. He’s also highly intelligent and understands you don’t shit where you live. So if he said more than five words to her in the four years she worked for me, I’d be surprised.”