Chapter 18
Five days had passed since Girls’ Night when Dan had arrived to find her crying out the back of the Rollaway, and Leah was now heading home from running some errands in town.
She still didn’t know what to do about him, so she’d chosen to avoid him, and since he’d been busy, according to Birdie, this wasn’t proving too difficult.
Being back in Lyntacky was good for both Leah and Hudson. The ache of Cassie’s death still sat heavy, but she believed—hoped—that, in time, they could find happiness here.
That was, of course, if she steered clear of Dan Duke.
Her phone rang from the seat beside her, so Leah pulled over to take it.
“Leah, this is JD Hooper.”
“Hello, JD,” Leah said, wondering what he wanted. She didn’t know the man well, after all. His woman yes, but not him.
“Any chance you could stop at The Gnat?” he asked her.
“Ah, why?”
“I have something for Hudson I think he’ll love.”
“Okay.” This was weird. “What?”
“Nina, for pity’s sake!” JD roared into the phone, making Leah wince. “Look, I have to go. See you soon.”
She could hear him yelling at Nina as he cut the call. Leah tapped her fingers on the steering wheel. She then did a U-turn and headed back into town because if she didn’t go, she’d spend the entire day wondering what that call had been about.
The Gnat was a long, low building where you could get all your beauty needs tended under one roof. Plus, they served coffee. It was an odd mix that worked, and after the initial resistance to change when JD had done it, the locals had learned to love it, or so one of Birdie’s emails had told her.
“Hi, Leah.”
“Oh hey, Mrs. C.” She waved at the woman who was sitting outside drinking coffee.
“Good to see you back, dear. You bring Hudson to visit me soon.”
“Will do.” This town, she thought, shaking her head. Everyone was in everyone’s business.
She entered The Gnat and headed to reception, but no one was there. There was, however, a lot of noise coming from the rooms she couldn’t see.
“Just catch her, for pity’s sake. How hard can it be?”
“Deirdre is freaking the poor dog out. She keeps running at him and clawing his face,” a female voice said.
Leah thought she knew who it belonged to.
“Hello!” she called.
“Back here, Leah,” JD yelled.
She followed the noises and found Cill, JD, and a man she didn’t know in a room that had beds and smelled really good. Candles were lit, and Bradford was stretched out on the table, his lower half covered in a sheet.
“Leah, thank God,” Cill said. “This is Jessie. He’s amazing with hair.” She waved at the man. “Come in one day, and he can do something with yours.”
“Ah, okay,” Leah said, unsure what was going on.
“Thank fuck you’re here,” JD said. “This is your new dog.”
Leah looked at the small, scruffy brown animal he held out to her. “He needs a home, and you need a dog.”
“Dog?”
“Someone dropped him at my place, but my duck doesn’t like him—”
“Duck?” Leah said.
“Velma,” JD said, sounding testy like she should already know that. “They don’t get along, and she was there first, so he’s yours.”
“Ah….” She had nothing else as JD thrust the little dog at her. Leah then received a lick on her chin from a raspy tongue.
“Aww, he never licked us once,” Cill said. “We were going to take him, but Jed said no, three dogs are enough.”
“Apparently he was found wandering on the side of the road. Miss Jonas has checked him out and given him shots,” JD added. “I brought him in for Cill today, but like she said, Jed said no. So now he’s yours.”
“Miss Jonas?” Leah had been forming sentences for years, but right then, they seemed beyond her.
“The vet. Sheriff Dans’s girl,” Bradford added.
“Right. I don’t know if we want a dog,” Leah lied. She’d actually been thinking that very thing. The dog was looking at her with its soft black eyes. Small, with brown-black hair, it was cute.
“Want me to book you in now for a cut? You look overdue,” Cill said. “Those eyebrows too. I’ll need a weed eater for those,” she added. “In fact, your nails could do with work. Girl, you need the full deal.”
“I’ve been a little busy for pampering,” Leah said, finding her words.
“Even more reason to get some,” JD said.
“I’ll think about it.”
“I’ll book you in for tomorrow morning,” JD added.
“No, you won’t,” Leah said with a little more force. You had to stand up to these people or they just stomped all over you.
JD studied her. “I don’t suppose you know how to drive a computer.”
“Drive a computer? Don’t you mean operate?” Leah said.
“Well, can you?” JD’s eyebrows drew together in a scowl.
Slick in trousers and a fitted T-shirt, the man was all class. Beard and brows neatly trimmed, the latest leather sneakers on his feet. Cill was the same, if a little more eclectic.
“I can, yes.” The dog licked her again.
“I need someone two days a week. You can do school hours,” JD said. “Start next week.”
“Do I get to say yes or no?” Leah asked.
“No.” JD then walked away.
“I’ll think about it!” Leah called after him.
Cill clapped her hands, looking happy, and then went back to massaging Bradford, who had watched the entire scene play out with a smile on his face.
“You people are weird,” Leah muttered, carrying the dog back out to reception and then to her car. After placing him in the back seat, she then drove to Calloways.
“Hey there, Leah.”
“Hi, Mr. Calloway.” She waved at the man who’d been greeting her since she’d come in here for gum as a kid. He was stacking something on a shelf.
“Nasty business, that stabbing,” he said as she grabbed a basket to pick up a few things, including dog food. Leah wasn’t sure how the dog would do in the car, so she didn’t want to be long.
“Stabbing?” She found the dog food and grabbed a bag of biscuits.
“Dan.”
“Pardon?” She whirled to face Mr. Calloway.
“A man broke into our storeroom, and Dan confronted him. He cut our deputy’s hand open with a knife, but he overpowered the man and arrested him.”
She knew about his injury, just not exactly how it had happened. The thought of anyone hurting Dan made her feel nauseous.
“I’m glad they caught him.”
Mr. Calloway smiled. “We have dog bowls beside the food, if you’re wanting one of those too.”
“No thanks. We’re good!”
She was sure there would be something to feed him in at the house. They’d had a dog once, and her father threw nothing away.
The bell above the door had him moving back to the counter. Leah grabbed her things and followed. After paying, she got back in her car. The dog was now in the passenger seat and gave her an accusing look.
“Hey, I went to get you food.”
He tilted his head slightly as if studying her.
“Yeah, well, I haven’t got me figured out either yet, so you have no hope.”
She thought about what Mr. Calloway had said, about Dan being stabbed.
What if it hadn’t just been his hand? What if the blade had struck his heart?
The thought slipped in before she could stop it, sharp enough to leave her unsettled.
She told herself it didn’t matter, that it shouldn’t matter, but the ache in her chest betrayed her.
No matter how she tried to deny it, Dan Duke was becoming important to her again, and that was the last thing she needed.
“I’m an idiot, dog.” He did the head tilt again as she drove them back to the farm. “And you need a name.”
Turning into her driveway minutes later, Leah studied the land.
It needed work, and now that she knew Hudson could be happy here, it was time to do something about that.
This place showed signs of disrepair. Her father had neglected what needed doing in favor of doing what he wanted, which wasn’t much.
The Dukes had helped make it a warm, dry house to live in and did a few repairs outside, but there was still so much more to do, and she needed to get on with it.
This was hers now, hers and Hudson’s, for better or worse. Her father was never coming back here.
“Right, buddy, this is your new home,” Leah said, opening her door. “Come on inside and take a look around.”
He jumped out behind her, and after she collected her things from the back seat, they headed inside. Leah went to the kitchen, and the dog followed, sniffing everything he passed. She put the things on the counter, then rummaged under the sink and found two large bowls.
“You hungry?”
The dog tilted his head. She filled one bowl with water and the other with food.
“Have at it.”
When the dog had finished, Leah decided to go outside.
“Okay, now, we’re going exploring,” Leah said, heading out the back door with the dog on her heels.
She felt better knowing she wasn’t going into her father’s sheds alone because yet more memories awaited her there, and none of them good.
But it was time. Leah also thought they’d had an old doghouse once, and if that was the case, it would still be here somewhere.
Walking around the side of the house, she saw the ladder hanging down from the tree.
Moving closer, she realized that someone had been here and finished the tree house.
Had Dan done that? Leah would have to find out who and thank them.
She didn’t want it to be Dan but thought it likely, as he’d made the promise to Hudson.
“We’ll deal with that later,” she said to the dog as she headed away from the house toward the barns.
She and Hudson had already spent lots of time in them. Leah was excited about the project and couldn’t wait to see their efforts turned into actual produce.
The first barn was the smallest and closest to the house, which would be good for her supplies.
There wasn’t much inside but dust, mold, and firewood, which would come in handy in the winter months. Looking up, she noted a hole that would need fixing in the roof. But it’s useable, she thought.
Wandering around the space with the dog on her heels, she found a pair of bolt cutters, some other tools, a box of rusty nails, and a pile of canvas tarps. In another box she found a supply of paint.
The feds had gone through the barns after her father’s arrest, and thinking about that time made her angry, so she shut those thoughts down and closed the doors before moving on to the second barn. This one had a chain and padlock.
After retrieving the bolt cutters from the first barn, Leah broke the lock, the dog watching her every move.
“I’ll tell you right off, dog, my father was an asshole. So don’t let anyone tell you otherwise.”
This barn held tools and equipment her father had used to run his illegal chop shop business. The one that had put him in jail, a place he’d never leave.
The feds had taken everything of value and all the papers her father had kept, so the leftovers would be worthless, but maybe she could sell some of the tools.
Leah would head back to the house and find something to write on soon. She needed to do a full inventory. Any money she could make from selling things would help with her own business.
She closed the door again and moved on to the third barn.
It would be the ultimate revenge if she could make a success of something here when her father had been an abject failure at everything, including parenting.