What Doesn't Kill Her (Cape Charade #2)(52)

Kellen’s gaze flew back to Max’s.

“Very funny, Rae.” His voice rose. “What did you think you were doing stowing away in that van?”

“I wrote you a note!” But Rae looked guilty and concerned.

Max went to the sink, wet a paper towel and cleaned Rae’s sticky fingers and face. “You wrote me a note. What did you think I was going to do when I found out you’d run away?”

“I didn’t run away. I was with Mommy!”

Max turned to Kellen. “What were you thinking letting her come with you?”

Zone turned a kitchen chair backward, sat down and cradled his chin in his hands. He watched the action and grinned.

“I didn’t let her come with me. I didn’t find her until—”

“You couldn’t have called me?”

“Horst stole my phone!”

Max mocked, “The big bad Army captain let some half-wit thieving security man steal her phone?”

Before Kellen could answer hotly, Rae asked, “Daddy, what does thieving mean?”

“It means he was a thief!”

“Then why are you surprised he stole her phone?”

That was when Max lost his precarious grip on his simmering temper and roared at Rae, “Child! You stay out of this!”

Rae looked serious but not afraid, and Kellen realized this was the daddy Rae had warned her about—he had been scared, and so he yelled.

Rae started to slide out of her chair and sneak toward the workshop.

Kellen caught her arm. “No, you don’t. We’re in this together.” Also, if she had to be yelled at, she was going to do it while horizontal.

Rae dragged her feet as she followed Kellen toward the bed.

Kellen sat sideways on the mattress, a slow controlled movement until she reached a critical point and collapsed. She leaned her back against the wall. Rae hopped up and leaned against her. They watched as Max followed and paced the floor and raged.

“Of all the careless, thoughtless immature acts—”

“Daddy, I’m sorry.”

Kellen nodded. “I’m sorry, too.”

“Do you know how worried her grandmother has been? Her nerves! When I called her tonight—”

“That poor woman,” Kellen said, and she was being sincere. “Max, I hope she can sleep well tonight knowing Rae is safe.”

“Don’t think because neither one of you was killed, you can do this again!”

“No, Daddy.” Rae’s voice slurred.

Kellen looked at her. Her eyes had closed and her jaw hung open. She had fallen asleep without talking about her princess dolls or her blankie or whether she had eaten enough peanut butter and Spam to fill her empty belly. Rae trusted Kellen to keep her safe. Kellen let her slide limply down onto the bed and flung the plaid wool throw over her.

Max kept pacing and raging.

She watched him affectionately.

She was exhausted, so maybe that was what opened her subconscious, but it seemed to her she could remember her first time with him more clearly. In that faraway time in Pennsylvania, he had been unendingly gentle, with never an unkind word. He must have had fears and frustrations he wished to share, but he never did, and she had felt like a cherished crystal he feared would break under any rough handling.

This yelling—this felt real. Like they had a relationship, with fights and misunderstandings and making up and... Like a cat around her kitten, she wrapped herself around Rae and listened to him rage without really hearing the words.

In midsentence, Max stopped shouting, stopped pacing and stared at the two females asleep on the bed.

Zone came to stand beside him. “You have those women terrorized.”

“I know. What’s a man to do?”

“Seems like you’re doing okay. Tuck ’em in!”

“Right.” Max dragged Kellen and Rae to the top of the bed, slid pillows under their heads, covered them and smoothed the hair over their foreheads.

He went back to the kitchen table where Zone had his weird spy mechanics spread out. “Can you see anything alive out there in those woods?”

“Nothing human. Only critters.” His green eyes gleamed through the thick lens of his glasses. “That’s a good thing. No one’s going to attack tonight.”

“Yeah. A good thing.” Max allowed all his cynicism to leak into his voice. “Let’s call the national park rangers and put them on the case. This is a crime scene!”

“Great idea. Which of us do you think they’ll arrest first?”

Max remembered his encounter with the rangers, and his unease must have shown, for Zone said, “Exactly. They don’t love me, either, and I have no desire to spend a month in custody trying to explain how some murdering sons-a-bitches climbed up my mountain and shot up the place and got offed by Kellen Adams, who is going to spend more than a month in custody, and God only knows what truthful thing your daughter would say that would send us all to prison.”

“Never mind. We’ll, um, handle it somehow.” Max had never in his life been afraid of the officials and their calls, but he was afraid now.

“I handle everything alone. Learned that the hard way.” Zone didn’t look satisfied at Max’s capitulation; he looked angry. “I can get right to work on figuring out whether that head is the real thing or a great forgery.”