DONOVAN (Gray Wolf Security, #1)(105)

She didn’t answer.

I went to the door and threw open the door, barely moving out of the way quick enough to avoid having my toes crushed by JT’s chair. I followed him inside, moving through the wide entryway to the sitting room that opened up into the kitchen, the living room, and the lovely brick and wood deck out back. I loved the open design, loved that I could have people over and talk to them while I cooked. Cooking was one of the few pleasures I often indulged when I wasn’t working. And it was something I liked to share with my close-knit group of friends and family.

JT wheeled around, making the circuit of the three rooms several times before he paused beside a high, thin table that sat along the back of the couch in the sitting room. He picked up a picture that rested there, his fingers careful not to smear the silver of the frame.

“Who is this?”

I moved up behind him and smiled when I saw that it was one of the many pictures of my niece and nephew Libby always made sure I had.

“Libby’s kids – your cousins. You’ll probably meet them tomorrow night when we go to my mother’s for dinner.”

“They’re cute.”

He set the picture back down and looked at a few more before moving on, coming to a rest at one of the high French doors that opened onto the deck. He didn’t seem terribly interested in the pink and blue lights of the setting sun and moved on. But Penelope was drawn to it, standing with her hand resting lightly on the doorknob, staring out over the garden that made up my back yard.

I moved up behind her, close enough to smell the light scent of her perfume, but not close enough to touch.

“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”

For just a brief second, the tension left her shoulders and she moved back slightly, enough so that her back brushed my chest. I could have wrapped my arms around her waist, could have tugged her closer to me and buried my face in the side of her neck. I really wanted to. But then JT called to me from somewhere near the kitchen.

“Hey! What’s for dinner?”





Chapter 23


Penelope

I used to be an artist. I studied art in college and worked at a Fifth Avenue advertising firm for a while before my parents…before everything changed. I hadn’t picked up a paintbrush or a piece of charcoal since then. Every once in a while I would do a quick sketch, but it was usually as part of designing a cake for a customer at the bakery. But that wasn’t really what I’d been trained to do.

Being here, being in Ashland, Oregon, made me wish I had my brushes at my fingertips.

Nothing had inspired me as much as seeing the landscape here. The trees were so tall, so green, and so beautiful. The mountains were…there were no words for them. It was a beautiful place, so different from the flat landscape of home. I mean, Texas has its own beauty. But there are only so many rocks and sagebrush and dusty canyons a girl can paint. Here…this place was a different story. There was so much I could put on a canvas just sitting in this bedroom Harrison had so politely escorted me to last night, just sitting in this chair, staring out the window at the lush garden behind the house.

I wish I had a sketchbook and couple of pieces of charcoal.

I sighed, reluctantly forcing myself to my feet. JT was up. I’d heard him call up the stairs when he woke, looking for anyone willing to help him fix something for breakfast. I could just imagine the mess he and Harrison were getting into at that moment. I guess it was time to go down and rescue them.

But when I came down the stairs and stepped into the kitchen, they were humming right along, the wonderful scents of eggs and bacon and pancakes filling the house.

“Morning,” Harrison said, winking playfully at me.

“Harrison taught me how to make eggs,” JT said from the high stool where he was sitting.

“Great. Now you have no excuse for not eating something halfway healthy when you come in from school.”

JT laughed, but the pleasure had gone out of the morning for me. I kept forgetting that JT wasn’t coming home with me. His afternoon snacking habits were no longer my problem.

“Have a seat,” Harrison said, “and I’ll bring you a plate.”

I did, tucking my leg under me as I settled at the kitchen nook, my eyes moving to the scenery outside. These windows overlooked the front of the house, the driveway and front hedges. Not as enticing as the back yard, but beautiful none the less.

“I’m going to have to wander over to the office for a couple of hours,” Harrison said as he set a plate overflowing with pancakes and bacon in front of me. “But I’ll be back before seven and we’ll head over to my mother’s for dinner.”

I nodded, only hearing half of what he’d said.

“We get to meet my grandmother tonight, Penny. That should be fun.”

I looked over at JT and forced a smile. He seemed to really be enjoying himself these last few days. And he deserved it after everything that’d been going on. So I forced a smile and tried to look pleasant as I dug into a plate of food I really didn’t have the appetite for.

After Harrison left, JT settled himself in the game room—an entire room there on the first floor that was filled with game consoles, game accessories, flat screen televisions, and everything else a teenager would need to enjoy a few games—and I could hear the familiar sounds of machine guns firing and animated characters dying.