She took a breath. Then another. Then a third. Only then, her entire body quivering, did she reach to take Annabelle.
Chubby arms rewarded her with a choke-hold on her neck that Grace had to fight not to return. She shifted her niece to one hip and planted a kiss on a cool cheek that suggested the little girl had been outside for a substantial time. Then she turned her gaze on her nephew.
“You scared the life out of me.”
She tried to keep her tone neutral, but her nephew’s already thin frame shrank into itself a little more.
“I didn’t mean to. I thought you were still sleeping.”
“When I woke up and couldn’t hear any of you, I thought—I thought—” Grace’s words choked off, her throat tightening against the mere idea. She blinked back tears.
Josh’s eyes widened and filled with his own tears. He put a hand on her arm. “No. No, Aunt Grace, we’re fine. We’re all fine.”
She nodded. Annabelle squirmed in her too-tight grip, and she forced herself to relax. “I’m glad. But you know the rules. No one goes outside without telling me, if only so I don’t have heart failure, all right?”
Josh’s gaze slid away. Grace frowned.
“Josh? What’s going on?”
“Nothing!” Seeming to realize his denial was too vehement, Josh lowered his voice and gave a shrug. “I was just coming in to clean up the kitchen, that’s all.”
“Me down,” Annabelle demanded. “Me down, Mama!”
Grace set the wriggling bundle on the floor. Was it her imagination, or was Josh deliberately keeping himself between her and the open door? She stepped to the right. He shuffled sideways. Nope. He was blocking her, all right.
She put her hands on his shoulders. He resisted, then, ducking his head, allowed her to move him to the side. She stepped into the opening and looked out. Sage sat on the top step, wrapped in a blanket from the living room, her eyes wide with guilt as they met Grace’s. Lilliane was nowhere to be seen.
“Where’s Lilly?” she asked.
Neither Josh nor Sage answered.
Grace swiveled on one heel and fixed Josh with a glare. “Now, Joshua Alexander Walsh. Where is your sister?”
Josh swallowed, looking miserable. “At Mr. McKittrick’s,” he whispered. “She took him cookies.”
“She what?”
“She took him cookies. To ask him a favor. But it’s okay, because I checked for bears first, and then I watched her go all the way along the path. Enough leaves are gone to see his cottage now. Look! And Sage is waiting for her to come back. She’s going to call me when she sees her again.”
Grace reached inside and snatched her coat from its hook. She tugged it on. Poised to head out the door, she gave her nephew the fiercest look she had ever directed at him, hardening her heart when the poor boy nearly collapsed in on himself.
“I want that kitchen cleaned by the time I get back,” she said. “And keep Annabelle out of trouble. Sage, inside.”
Her middle niece jumped up and scurried past her, pressing against the far doorframe to avoid contact. Grace set her jaw, resisting the urge to draw both kids in for a quick, reassuring hug. She closed the door with a distinct bang behind her and went in search of Lilly.
CHAPTER 18
………………
BALANCED ON HIS CRUTCHES AND wiping away the last of his shaving cream with the towel he’d looped around his neck, Sean looked through the sliding door. The beaming, pigtailed girl on the other side of the glass waved at him with one hand. In her other hand, she clutched a foil-covered plate. Sean lifted his gaze to search beyond the deck, but no one else stood within sight. He pulled the heavy door aside.
“Hello, Mr. McKittrick,” Lilliane said cheerfully. “Is your leg feeling better?”
Sean raised one eyebrow and furrowed the other. He rubbed a hand over his freshly shaved jawline. “Umm…a little bit, I suppose.”
“That’s good. I brought you cookies.” Lilliane held aloft the plate. “They’re still warm. May I come in?”
Sean backed out of the way without comment, and she stepped inside. She shoved the plate at him.
“Could you hold this for a moment, please?”
Sean did as requested, and she stooped to remove her shoes. She straightened again.
“Thank you,” she said, taking back the plate. “Do you want me to put them in the kitchen for you?”
“That would be fine,” he heard himself say as he peered outside again. Still no one. He frowned. Surely Grace hadn’t let her come on her own after his bear warnings.
The little girl carried the cookies through the dining area and set them on the counter, the plate connecting loudly with ceramic tile.
“Oops. Sorry.” She flashed him a grin. “Would you like one now? I can make you tea to go with it.”
“Lilliane, does your aunt know you’re here?”
“Umm…”
Both his eyebrows drew together. “Yes or no?”
Lilliane straightened her shoulders and lifted her chin. “Aunt Grace is sleeping, but Josh knows I’m here. He watched me walk through the woods so no bears could get me.”
Sean absorbed her words. Narrowed his eyes. Watched her look down and scuff a sock-covered big toe against the plank floor.
“Josh knows, but your aunt doesn’t,” he said. “This isn’t about cookies, is it?”
Lilliane didn’t look up. Sean crutched over to her and pointed at one of the benches beside the table. She sat. He stood in front of her.
“All right,” he said. “Spill.”
She looked confused. “Spill what?”
“It’s an expression. It means start talking.”
Eyes round in her head, she nodded. Then, in a voice small enough that he had to strain to hear it, she said, “We wanted to ask you a favor.”
“We who?”
“Me and Sage and Josh. But it’s a favor just for Josh.”
“I see. And what kind of favor are we talking about?”
Seeming to decide that Sean’s bark was worse than his bite, Lilliane scooted forward on the bench until she was at its edge. Feet dangling, she looked up at him earnestly.
“Josh likes to read,” she said. “A lot. But Annabelle won’t let him. She loves him too much, and she wants him to play with her all the time, and she won’t leave him alone. She cries if he goes outside on the deck without her or into his room for privacy. Stuff like that.”
Sean suspected he might know where this was going, but he held back his smile and nodded. “It can be tough being a big brother,” he agreed, “but I’m sure Annabelle has a nap time. Can’t Josh read then?”
Lilliane heaved a sigh. She shook her head sadly. “That’s when Aunt Grace makes us do our school work. So we wondered…”
“Go on.”
“If Josh is really, really quiet and he only comes over when you’re not outside, can he please, please, please keep using your hammock? He won’t make any mess, I promise.”
“I see. So what you’re telling me is that the cookies are a bribe.” Damn, but it was getting harder by the minute not to laugh.
“No, they’re raisin ones. Want to see?”
Sean tried to turn his snort into a cough, but he failed miserably and wound up making an odd honking sound instead. Alarmed uncertainty flared in Lillian’s expression.
“Are you choking, Mr. McKittrick?”
Sean gave up. He laughed so hard, he nearly fell off his crutches, and Lilliane jumped up to put a small hand on his arm to steady him. Her face grew hopeful, and when his amusement diminished to a chuckle, she smiled brightly.
“When Aunt Grace laughs, it means yes,” she said. “Is that what it means when you laugh, too?”
“Nice try, munchkin.” Sean ruffled her hair. “How about we say I’ll think about it? And I talk to your aunt about it.”
“Do we have to?” Lillian’s face fell. “She says we’re not supposed to talk to you.”
Sean cocked his head to the sid
e at the phrasing. His gaze narrowed again. He would have expected we’re not supposed to bother you, but not supposed to talk to you? Was that a child’s interpretation, or an aunt’s actual words?
“I think she might notice if Josh disappears, though, don’t you?”
Lilliane frowned. “Oh. I didn’t think of that.”
“Besides, I don’t think your aunt meant that you shouldn’t talk to me at all,” he said lightly. Watchfully. “Just that you shouldn’t bother me because of my leg.”
Pigtails moved side to side in a negative shake.
Sean considered her response for a long, silent moment. Then he swung himself around and eased down to the bench beside her, careful not to crowd. He rested both hands on the crutches before him.
“I see,” he said. “Well, I suppose Aunt Grace has her reasons for that.”
A hesitant nod. Big brown eyes met his.
“And you want to do as she says.”
A more emphatic bob of the head.
“Do you know what my job is, Lilliane?”
Pigtails shook.
“I’m a police officer. And you know you can trust police officers, right?”
Lilliane’s gaze widened, then dropped to the floor. She gave another shake of her head. Sean bit back an oath. Really? Where in hell had a child her age picked up an anti-cop message? Nothing got his goat faster than parents—or aunts, for that matter—passing on their personal issues to their offspring. Forcing his jaw to unclench, he leaned in to lightly bump Lillian’s shoulder with his.
“Hey,” he said. “It’s true. You know how you can talk to your teacher or your principal if something is bugging you? Well, it’s the same for police officers. You can talk to us about those things, too.”
Lilliane’s feet swung a little faster.
Sean’s frown returned. Something niggled at the edges of a brain made lazy by three weeks of inactivity and prescription meds. A few somethings, now that he thought about it. Beginning with Grace and the kids hanging out at a cottage in the woods at this time of year—even if she was homeschooling them, why was she doing it so far away from everything and everyone? And where the heck was Dad in all of this?
And then there was Josh’s nervousness around him.
And the global reluctance to answer even the most casual of questions.
And Grace’s sister’s accident.
Sean blew out a slow breath. Son of a bitch…was this situation what he thought it was? Keeping his voice calmer than he felt, he probed a little further.
“Lilliane, why didn’t Josh come over here to ask me himself?”
Lilliane’s feet stilled. She shrugged.
“Is he afraid of me?” Sean probed. “Because I yelled at him?”
No response.
His cop instincts revved up to full. “Lilliane, has someone else yelled at Josh? Another man? Was it your dad?”
Face tight with panic, the little girl slid off the bench. “I have to go,” she said. “Aunt Grace will be worried. You can keep the cookies. And the plate.”
She rushed to the sliding glass door, then skidded to a halt with a dismayed squeak. Sean heaved himself to his feet and joined her, ruffling the top of her head.
“Don’t worry, kiddo. I’ll run interference for you.” He pulled the door aside. “I figured you’d be along soon,” he told Grace. “Please, come in.”
Tight-lipped, Grace shook her head, her gaze on her niece. “Thanks, but you’re supposed to be resting, and I think Lilliane has disturbed you enough.”
“She brought me cookies. Cookies are never a bother, right, Lilliane?”
The little girl didn’t respond, instead turning her face up to her aunt, her eyes beseeching.
“I’m sorry I left without telling you, Aunt Grace,” she whispered. “I was just trying to help Josh.”
Sean’s heart melted a little more, and he gave himself a mental shake. At this rate, he’d be a puddle on the floor before she left. His decision not to have a family looked sounder all the time, because he was discovering he had remarkably little resistance to a child’s big brown eyes. Or blue ones for that matter, he thought, as he remembered the Annabelle-stuffie incident.
He watched Grace’s brows pull together.
“What does Josh have to do with this?” she asked Lilliane.
He cleared his throat, drawing her attention to him. “It seems your nephew is feeling a little overwhelmed by the attention of the youngest member of your family.”
“Annabelle?”
“She won’t leave him alone, Aunt Grace,” Lilliane explained. “Whenever she’s awake, she wants to be with him, and you know how much he likes to read.”
“I—I—” Grace looked stricken, and her voice dropped to a whisper. “I had no idea.”
“I’m sure it’s no big deal,” Sean assured her. “He’s probably just at that age where he needs a bit of space.”
“He should have said something.”
“He probably didn’t want to bother you.”
“Then I should have noticed.”
Sean resisted the urge to pull her into a hug. Damn. He wasn’t doing well with grownup brown eyes, either. He settled for putting his hand out to her shoulder and giving it a gentle squeeze.
“Hey,” he said. “Don’t you think you have enough on your plate to worry about? You’ve taken on an entire family, Grace. I think you can be forgiven for overlooking the occasional small issue.”
“But it’s not small.” Grace sighed. “I rely on him so much—too much—and he never complains. He’s such a good kid. They’re all good kids.”
Lilliane threw herself at Grace, nearly knocking Sean off his crutches. He released Grace’s shoulder and grabbed for the doorframe instead.
“I’m sorry I broke the rules, Aunt Grace! Really, really sorry!”
Grace dropped to one knee, reaching up to stroke back a strand of hair that had escaped Lilliane’s pigtails. “I know, sweetie, and as long as it doesn’t happen again, we can forget about it, all right?”
A vigorous nod. Then, “So is it okay, then? Can Josh come over here to read?”
“What?”
“That was the favor,” Sean told her. “He’d like to use the hammock on my deck for—”
“No.” Grace blushed as he raised an eyebrow at her abruptness. “I mean, thank you, but I don’t want him bothering you. I’ll make sure he gets time alone at the cottage.” She stood again. “We should get going, Lilliane. It’s late, and you need to help the others clean up the kitchen.”
Lilliane nodded, turning resigned eyes up to Sean. “I’m sorry I bothered you, Mr. McKittrick. I hope you like the cookies.”
“You were no bother at all,” Sean told her. “And I’m sure I’ll love the cookies.”
The little girl slipped out the door past her aunt, heading for the stairs. Sean caught hold of Grace’s wrist before she could follow.
“Grace, wait. Let Josh use the hammock. I’d be nuts to try doing so myself” —he nodded ruefully at his cast— “so it will just be sitting empty anyway.”
Refusal gathered in her eyes. “Thanks, but I’d rather—”
“He wouldn’t be bothering me.”
“But I—”
“And I’m sure it would be easier on you than trying to keep Annabelle away from him. I’ve seen her tantrums, remember?” Sean let his hand slide down her wrist to her fingers. It lingered there, as if it had a mind of its own. “Seriously. I’d like to help, and while I can’t do much, at least I can let the kid camp out on my deck with a book.”
Hesitation replaced the refusal. Sean gave the fingers he held a gentle squeeze.
“Please,” he said.
Grace heaved a sigh, but a tiny smile belied her exasperation. “And you call me stubborn? Fine. He can use the hammock. Once in a while.” She held up the hand he still held. “Can I go now?”
“Yes. No.” He tightened his grip. “Grace, is everything okay? With the kids, I mean?”
&nbs
p; “Of course. Why do you ask?”
“Lilliane said you told her she wasn’t to talk to me. I wondered why.”
She lifted one shoulder in a shrug. “I just didn’t want the kids bothering you, that’s all.”
Bullshit. He didn’t think he’d ever seen a smile more forced. But just as he knew she lied, he also knew she wouldn’t be pushed. Corner her now and the tiny thread of trust he’d established would snap. Getting Grace to let down her guard was going to take time and patience.
“Right. I figured that must be it.” He released his hold on her and watched her cross the deck. Lilliane was already at the edge of the trees, waiting by the path’s entrance.
“Grace.”
Poised to descend the stairs, she looked back over her shoulder. A woman and four kids camped out in the woods in mid-September. A sister in a coma. Kids walking on eggshells. Josh petrified half to death whenever Sean so much as looked in his direction. A glaringly absent father.
Sean shook his head. He couldn’t afford to spook her. Not until he’d figured out whether his suspicions were right.
And what the hell he was going to do if they were.
“Nothing,” he said. “Just…take care, all right?”
He stared after her long after she was out of sight, then pulled the cell phone from his pocket. Even though he hadn’t used it since Gareth had called, the battery level had still dropped to eight percent. It wouldn’t hold out long enough for the calls he needed to make to get to the bottom of this.
He tapped the phone against his cast, then pocketed it again. He’d have to wait until Gareth brought the charger out on Sunday. He closed the sliding door and turned back to his cottage.
“Hell, Grace,” he muttered. “What have you done?”
CHAPTER 19
………………
“I DON’T HAVE TO GO.” Josh turned at the foot of the stairs to look up at Grace.
She’d taken up position in the doorway to watch her nephew traverse the woods to the other cottage, ostensibly to keep an eye out for bears. For the moment, however, she was wholly focused on Josh, scuffing the toe of his shoe into the dirt path.
Forever Grace Page 11