Hearts Divided (Cedar Cove #5.5)(56)
“Oh, Gran.” Chloe hugged her, moved beyond words at the wisdom and love apparent in her words and expression.
The door of the squad car opened and Chloe looked over her shoulder. Jake stood there, a frown growing as he searched her features. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Nothing.” She glanced at her grandmother.
“Did you arrest that awful man?” Winifred asked, leaning forward to look past Chloe at Jake.
Jake nodded. “A UW janitor saw Dodd toss his gun into the bushes outside Liberty Hall and followed him to McGyver Tower. When Dodd went into the tower room, the janitor locked him in and called the campus police to report Dodd for littering.”
Chloe laughed out loud. “That must’ve been Fred.”
“Yes. How did you know?”
“Fred tends to view any littering at Liberty Hall as a personal affront.”
Jake lifted an eyebrow in query, but Chloe just smiled at him without explaining further. He turned back to her grandmother. “The Seattle PD have Dodd in custody. He confessed to assaulting the limo driver and forcing him to strip off his uniform before making him climb in the trunk. I’m guessing Dodd used the gun butt or a tire iron to knock the man out so he couldn’t make any noise and alert passersby. All of which happened before Dodd picked you up at the cruise dock, Winifred.”
“The poor driver!” Winifred exclaimed. “Was he badly injured?”
Jake shook his head. “He’s been taken to Harborview Hospital, but the paramedics checked him out after the police removed him from the limo trunk. They seem convinced he wasn’t hurt beyond a few bruises.”
“Thank goodness.” Winifred heaved a sigh of relief and made a shooing gesture with her free hand, the other occupied with balancing her cup. “Scoot, Chloe. I’ll be fine here, drinking my coffee and contemplating my nice, quiet life.”
Chloe slid across the seat and into Jake’s arms. “I’m so glad you showed up at the tower when you did,” she whispered. “To put it mildly…”
“Me, too.” He nudged the car door shut and drew her away from the crowd to the far side of an empty ambulance. Then he wrapped her in his arms and kissed her breathless. Chloe kissed him back with all the emotion generated by the chaotic, terror-filled day.
He raised his head and stared at her, breathing harshly. “Marry me.”
Stunned, she couldn’t get her vocal cords to work.
“That’s right, marriage. I realize we’ve only known each other a couple weeks, but we’ve been through more in these past days than most couples go through in a lifetime.”
“Okay.”
“Okay?” He sounded as stunned as she’d felt earlier.
“Yes.”
He looked at her warily. “You’re not shell-shocked from stress? You’re not going to claim battlefield memory loss later on?”
Chloe laughed. “No. But I’m warning you, my grandmother wants great-grandchildren. And soon.”
“I think we can manage that.” He smiled lazily, his eyes hot. Then he bent his head and took her mouth with his once more.
Professor Weds Warrior, she thought blissfully. And then she stopped thinking and gave in to emotion.
From: [email protected]
To: [email protected]
Sent: May 25th
Subject: Good morning—
Dear Clara,
So much has happened since we said good-bye and I left you at the Seattle docks yesterday. I hardly know where to start! I was kidnapped by the horrible man who’s been following Chloe. He trapped her with me in the Liberty Hall tower with a dy***ite bomb he’d set to explode. I swear, Clara, I thought I was going to have a heart attack from sheer fright before Chloe spoke with Jake on her cell phone and he told us how to defuse the bomb. I had enough excitement yesterday to last the rest of my life—from now on if I ever think my life is getting dull, I’ll watch a good British mystery on television!
All is well this morning, however. The villain is locked up in the King County Jail in downtown Seattle, I’m drinking tea while writing my daily e-mails, and Chloe and Jake will soon be planning a wedding. I can’t wait to see her walk down the aisle. Now if I could only find suitable husbands for my other two granddaughters, I’d be completely content….
Have a wonderful day, Clara—we simply must get together soon. I miss seeing your smiling face.
All my love,
Winifred
THE APPLE ORCHARD
Katherine Stone
Dear Reader,
What a pleasure it’s been working with Debbie and Lois on Hearts Divided! We’ve enjoyed sharing our grandmothers and granddaughters with one another, and creating a novel in which their lives intertwine. We’ve cared about them all, and rooted for them all.
Now it’s Clara and Elizabeth’s turn. So…welcome to The Apple Orchard. To those of you who’ve read The Other Twin and Another Man’s Son, the charming town of Sarah’s Orchard will be a familiar one. To those of you who are new to my stories, I hope you’ll find the fictional locale, and its characters, a pleasant place to visit. I’ll probably return to Sarah’s Orchard in the future. I love the setting and can envision a wedding, with all the trimmings and intrigues, at the Orchard Inn.
In the meantime, I’ve wandered off to Chicago for The Cinderella Hour, which will be published in paperback in August. It was the right place, I thought, to tell the love story of Snow Ashley Gable and Luke Kilcannon. I hope you agree!