If she had to start looking at roadhouses in and around Waco, she had a feeling it would be a very long and tedious search.
Since the lady seemed to be waiting to deliver her punch line, April obliged her. “What was so funny about the name of Jenny’s new small town?”
“It’s called Lusty!” The woman laughed. “Lusty, Texas! I wonder why folks would call a place Lusty?”
April had to admit, that was funny—in a way. But she dutifully laughed and shook her head. “Maybe it’s a family name?”
“Golly, if that had been my family name, I’d have changed it. Although, those first few years my Henry and I were married…” The woman let her voice trail off. Her smile, followed by her sigh assured April whatever memory she’d chosen to visit just then had been a good one. She focused her gaze on April once more. “That would have suited us, but we wouldn’t have wanted to advertise that fact. My daddy was a preacher, you know.” She whispered that last and winked.
April returned her smile. “Thank you so much, Mrs.…” She waited, knowing the woman would provide her name.
“Mrs. Paulson. I’ll tell Camille you stopped by, dear, if you give me your name.”
“It’s Penny.” The false name rolled off her lips without a qualm. “Penny Lane.”
“You take care of yourself, Miss Lane. It’s a worrisome world these days.”
“Yes, ma’am, I will. You take care of yourself, as well.”
April moved gracefully to her car, gave the elderly woman a final wave, and then drove sedately out of the neighborhood.
If Jenny had worked at a chain restaurant outside Waco, and a roadhouse at the same time, then it was to Waco she was bound. That would be a good two-and-a-half-hour drive. It was heading toward the busiest driving time of the day, so perhaps the best thing for her to do would be to go back to her hotel here in Dallas so she could plot her next moves, going forward.
The first item on her list was to find a town called Lusty and learn all there was to know about it. The second was to grab herself some hair color and styling gel. She needed to change her appearance slightly. I haven’t had black hair in a while. The color change, a different hairstyle, and a less naïve persona, and Mrs. Paulson wouldn’t recognize her if they came face to face. But more, she wouldn’t look like Penny Lane, should Jenny hear of a visit from and a description of her ersatz college chum.
* * * *
Jenny had been raised by parents who’d truly loved her. There’d been no extended family in her formative years—no uncles or aunts, and no grandparents, as they had all passed before she’d been adopted. She’d never experienced the sensation of having a family unit say to her, “We’ve got your back.” But that was exactly what happened, not only Thursday night but again on Saturday morning.
The July day dawned sunny and hot, but Jenny loved the heat. Hat on her head, sunscreen applied, she’d walked from her apartment to the Parkview Inn to have breakfast with her parents and to see them safely off on their journey home.
She’d heard that Maggie often ate breakfast with her guests, so her appearance at the table didn’t even register. The arrival of her husbands, however, did. Judging by the way the three men pitched in, as well as keeping an eye on their very pregnant wife, she guessed Rick, Trevor, and Kevin had been doing so for a while. They seemed to have it down to a fine science.
Conversation ranged all over the place. Camille and Maggie compared notes on the Jersey Shore, as Jenny’s mother had also been born in that area, moving to Texas when she was in her early twenties. Kevin, Trevor, and Rick engaged her father in talk of business. Her father had spent a lifetime working for himself, creating but also re-working security software. He’d retired recently, but he’d loved his work and still dabbled, consulting from time to time. He liked to call it “keeping his hand in.” Soon their discussion dissolved into complicated exchanges about bits and bytes and other lingo Jenny really didn’t understand.
Before the meal was over, Rick and her dad had exchanged business cards, and her mom and Maggie had swapped email contact information.
As she was standing on the sidewalk in front of the inn, waving good-bye to her parents, Maggie Benedict came and stood beside her and slipped one arm around her waist. Her other hand rested on her swollen belly. It was a gesture she’d seen a few pregnant women perform. It’s as if they’re caressing their babies before they’re born. It was a nice thought and something to put a smile on her face after that baffling breakfast.
The Benedicts had treated her parents like…well, like family.
“I recognized the puzzled look on your face in there because I used to wear one just like it,” Maggie said.
Jenny shook her head. “I’ve worked at the roadhouse for nearly two years and have lived in Lusty for about half that time. I’ve seen the way folks are around here.”
“You just never thought all that family mojo would be centered around you.”
“Not on me and not on my folks. I mean, Thursday night at Ari’s, yeah. Ari and I have been BFFs more or less since I landed in the area. That supper, and that…that love wasn’t unexpected, but it was very much appreciated. That night I nearly blubbered like a baby.”
“And you thought that was the whole of it.”
“I did, yes.”
“Baby? We cleared the table and loaded the dishwasher. A fresh pot of coffee is on, and the cups and things are out.” Kevin came down the steps and stood on the other side of Maggie.
They must be expecting other company. “Thanks for making my folks feel so welcome. I’ll just get out of your way—”
“You can’t go yet,” Maggie said that before Jenny could even finish her sentence.
“I can’t?” Jenny turned so she was facing Maggie.
“No, you can’t,” Trey said as he joined them on the sidewalk. “We just put out a big plate of Aunt Anna’s cookies.”
“Cookies?”
“Yup. Cookies and coffee. The fuel of the best war councils.” Rick stood on the porch above them.
“War council?” She knew for certain right then and there, that there must have been something in the air or the water or the soil or, heck, maybe all three, after all! If she saw a plate of cookies with a sign that read “Eat me,” she was not going to do it. Nope, uh-uh, not at all. No way. She was already down the rabbit hole because she had no idea what these people were talking about.
“Yes, war council,” Kevin said. “And here comes yours, now.”
Jenny looked up and encountered what, for Lusty, would be considered a case of heavy traffic. She recognized Parker and Dale’s truck. They brought up the rear. Within barely a minute, that line of vehicles came to a stop. There were Montana Benedicts and Texas Benedicts, as well as Kendalls and Jessops and even a Jones or two.
“A war council?” Jenny thought the words bore repeating.
Sheriff Kendall, who’d parked beside the curb a few doors down, was only steps away and clearly having heard her, nodded a greeting and then he smiled. “Think of it as more of a strategy session.” He turned and looked over his shoulder. “Isn’t that right, Jake?”
Jenny hadn’t noticed Jake Kendall. He was a lawyer, and the man who’d set her up with the apartment she loved so well. And then her eyes widened when she saw who Parker and Dale had with them.
She’d only spoken to Mrs. Benedict a few times, when she’d come into the roadhouse for lunch. Jenny could only gape when the woman walked right up to her and gave her a hug.
“Don’t you worry, sweet girl. We have everything under control.” Then she slipped her arm around her and turned her toward the porch. With surprising strength, the woman everyone called Grandma Kate propelled her up the steps and back into the dining room of the Parkview Inn.
“You sit right here, between me and Parker.” Grandma Kate’s word was law because everyone had waited to see where she’d choose to sit. Once Jenny was settled, with Kate Benedict on her right and Parker on her left, Kate nodded and patted h
er hand.
“There were those, not so long ago, who wanted to make Lusty a gated community. This was something we could have easily done because we own all the land around the town, and the road going through is, in fact, a private road.”
Kate looked around the table. She smiled at all those assembled. Now that she was sitting Jenny realized how many people there were. Jackson and Jesse and Trace appeared to represent the newly repatriated Montanans. Jake and Adam, Josh, along with Maggie and her husbands, these were men Jenny knew fairly well—Kendalls and Benedicts born and raised in Lusty. Chance and Logan, Benedicts originally from New York and married to her friend and coworker, Bailey, were there. Paul Jessop and his wife, Kat Lawson Jessop, Jenny didn’t know as well because they spent half their time in Los Angeles, where Paul and Kat’s other husbands, Lucas and Wesley, were successful screenwriters. Kat used to be a bounty hunter but now was a private investigator.
Also present were Addison Jones-Jessop and her husbands, Mike and Terry.
“I personally didn’t want to see Lusty turned into an enclave, and so we came up with another plan. The town trust made the decision that anyone wishing to move to Lusty was welcome—but before they moved into town, we’d have a background check conducted.”
“We’ve had a few bad incidents in the last decade,” Sheriff Kendall said.
Jenny had the sense they were trying to explain themselves. She shook her head. “I completely understand and agree you should be careful. Why, that murderer who stopped in at the roadhouse and then made it all the way to the Big House…I felt bad about that because he had been at the roadhouse. I’d even waited on him!”
“Now, sweet girl, that man had altered his appearance. It was his knife that gave him away, and you certainly didn’t see that.”
“Grandma Kate is right, Jenny,” Jake Kendall said. “That’s not on you. Hell, we had a couple of people there watching for him, and they missed him, too.”
“But in the end, it all turned out the way it was meant to be.”
Jenny ducked her head for just a moment. Kate had said that with a smile in her lovely, almost musical voice, and her grandsons Adam, Jake, Chance, and Logan looked like they might want to protest that happy statement.
She’d heard the entire story, of course, and she had to agree with Grandma Kate. There’d been some dicey moments, but things had turned out well. The villain had been captured and charged and would never see life outside a prison again.
Once she had the urge to laugh under control, she looked around the table and then focused on Jake and Adam, sitting exactly across from her. “If you were worried I’d be angry about whatever kind of a security check you conducted on me, you don’t have to be. I understand, and I totally agree with the practice.”
Jake nodded. “Good. Jackson called me yesterday morning and relayed the concerns your parents had, that someone appears to be looking for you after all these years.” He looked at Grandma Kate, who nodded. “This was a matter we’d already known about.”
Jenny reached out, and Parker took her hand. Dale had sat forward in his chair. He turned and met Jenny’s gaze. A touch and a look and she felt them both bolstering her.
“If it was something you knew about…then why did you feel it necessary to have a…a war council?”
“Because, sweet girl, there are now actually two parties looking for you—and that, potentially, is a huge problem.”
Jenny felt her heart trip inside her chest. If Grandma Kate thought there could be a problem, Jenny was willing to bank on it. “My....my mother seemed to think that whoever was looking for me was connected to my birth mother’s family—to Mandy’s family. I know she didn’t come right out and say that Thursday night.” She looked at her guys then across to Jackson.
“That’s the impression we got too,” Jackson said. He looked at Grandma Kate. “So, if y’all weren’t surprised when I called…” He stopped. “What can you tell us about what’s going on?”
“Jake has been working to try and uncover Jenny’s past—her antecedents—since she first came to us.” Kate sighed. “It seemed a great mystery, like a hole in your background. And where there’s a hole…” Kate met Jenny’s gaze.
“Where there’s a hole, there could be trouble.”
“Yes. As well, there’s the whole question of your medical background. It would be a good thing to know what all runs through your birth family. One day, that information might become critical, even life-saving.”
“Grandmother’s a nurse,” Rick said. He smiled at Kate. “I bet that was your first thought when you learned Jenny had been adopted.”
“You’d win that bet.” Kate looked at Jake. “What do you know about this second person or party who’s begun to look for our Jenny?”
“Not much, yet. That’s why I asked Kat to join us.”
“Do you think whoever’s looking for her might be another hired private investigator?” Kat Lawson Jessop asked.
“I do. And I thought that since they’re snooping around Dallas, you might be able to reach out to any of your contacts who might have business there,” Jake said.
Kat nodded. “Consider it done. If the investigator is legit, he or she might be willing to tell me who their client is. I have a friend who is based in Austin, but she takes cases all over the state. I’ll give April a call. She might be able to steer me where I need to go.”
“If you find them, and they don’t tell you, or if they’re not legit, let me know,” Adam said. “I can get some assistance on that from some of my contacts.”
“Will do.”
“Big brother, why don’t you let Jenny, Parker, and Dale know what measures we already have in place, security-wise?” Jake looked at Adam.
Adam nodded and directed his comments to her. “We’ve installed surveillance equipment at both ends of Main Street. We did this independent of this current situation. All vehicles passing through Lusty are photographed, and the plates are run through an automated program. The process is instantaneous. When a vehicle comes through that doesn’t belong, we know. The plates are run, and within a few minutes, we know who’s driven into town.”
Jenny knew she must look like a fish because her mouth was gaping open. Beside her, Dale and Parker both looked surprised.
“That sounds like something out of a spy novel,” Jenny said. She flicked a look at Grandma Kate and wondered about the expression that crossed her face just then. It was there and gone so fast, Jenny thought maybe her mind was having fun with her.
“We have some good technological brains in the family,” Jake said. “Makes sense to make use of them. We initiated this protocol shortly before you hired on at the roadhouse. We’d had enough instances of ‘dustups’ over the last few years to warrant it. It took us several months to have the system designed and then implemented.”
“There’s a separate computer on its own power source that monitors the system, and that’s at the sheriff’s office,” Adam said. “So, for the time being, the situation in town is in hand.”
Beside her, she felt Parker’s tension. “Jenny works at the roadhouse,” he said. “That’s not inside town.”
“It’s not, no,” Jake said. “We’re going to install two more cameras, front and back entrances of the parking lot there. It won’t take much, and the system is set up to incorporate several more feeds beyond the two current ones.”
“Once we have reason to believe a person of ill intent is in town, then I’ll activate the reserve deputies.” Adam grinned. “That’s more than half the male population—and yes, several of the women have been deputized, as well.”
“We wanted you to be assured that we’ve got your back,” Kate said to Jenny. “And as soon as Jake, Adam, and Kat figure out what’s going on, they’ll let us all know.” Grandma Kate looked around the table.
Jenny couldn’t hold back her smile. Two male faces that nearly scowled smiled instead, and heads nodded. No one, apparently, wanted to go against Grandma Kate.
> I want to be her when I grow up.
“Now, there is just one more item for us to touch on,” Kate said. She turned and looked at Jenny. “The Sheriff and Jake both believe the apartment building you’re in, while very nice, does not present a good, defensible position. They have some background experience to justify that opinion.
“So, as a precaution, they’d like to move you into a house. As well, I’m sure you’ll feel safer—and they would feel better about this situation themselves—if Parker and Dale were there with you. So, if you have no strong objections, we’ll take care of that little thing right now.”
Chapter Nine
The sound of the front door of the two-story house closing was followed by absolute, stunning silence. As she stood in the living room, Jenny’s gaze left the door, only partially in view from where she stood. They didn’t even give me time to walk them all to the door! It was like a buzzer sounded, and they all just fled!
That was an inane thought. In the almost deafening silence, Jenny turned a slow circle, taking in the furniture which hadn’t been there just a couple of hours before. She began a slow walk through the downstairs of this house, peering into each room, now fully furnished, and came to a stop in the kitchen.
Parker and Dale were leaning against opposite kitchen counters, facing each other and looking as gobsmacked as she felt. Between them, a pretty kitchen table and chair set stood ready to host them for their next meal. The counter held a one-cup coffee maker, a carousel of coffee pods, a toaster, and a roll of paper towels on a dispenser. She’d passed a dining room that was just as attractively furnished. She’d bet if she opened the cupboards here she’d find dishes and canned goods and that the fridge would be at least partially stocked.
It was just coming up on three in the afternoon, mere hours after seeing her parents off.
Jenny shook her head. “What the hell just happened here?”
Parker met her gaze. “I know exactly how you feel. We’ve been trying to find the answer to that very question ourselves. I was good through the meeting this morning, and I got that the big worry was that someone was looking for you, and for some reason, that had Jake, Adam, and Grandma Kate, especially, really worried.”
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