The halfling flicked her gaze up to look into Sir’s dark, beady eyes.
He’s serious. He already knew of the connection between Mom and Inmate 4872. Now he’s made it to me.
The man seemed to take her lack of response as an invitation to say more. “The next time that phone rings and you answer, I’ll know you’re ready to take me up on that offer. If you don’t, well, I guess we can both wash our hands of each other and move on.”
Cheyenne chewed the inside of her bottom lip. “My mother wants you off her property. And she doesn’t make empty threats.”
“No. I don’t imagine she would.” With a final nod at the drow halfling, Sir stepped outside onto the front porch and headed down the stairs after his men.
She closed the door behind him, and Cheyenne stood there for a long time with her hands pressed against it, listening. Boots crunched across gravel. Car doors shut. Engines started. More magically-shattered glass tinkled onto the gravel drive as the second SUV pulled out after the first, followed by the third. She stayed there until she couldn’t hear their tires, and she waited for a few more minutes after that.
I can’t believe this happened. Now I have to figure out how to get this damn tracking device out of my shoulder and come up with something to tell Mom about the whole thing. Probably won’t cut it if all I can say is, ‘Sorry, I screwed up.’
She stiffened when she heard Bianca’s footsteps enter the dining room. The double glass doors shut with a soft click, and then Bianca moved through the house at a calm, steady pace until she stood at the end of the foyer, facing her daughter.
“Cheyenne.”
The drow halfling dropped her hands from the door and turned around. “Mom, I’m sorry. I screwed up.”
“Come here.”
Pressing her lips together, Cheyenne stepped slowly toward her mom. Bianca held her gaze as if she were leading her daughter across a tightrope, which might not have been far from the truth. The halfling stopped, and her mom waved her closer. Cheyenne’s eyes and nose burned with tears that hadn’t formed yet, and she wouldn’t let them. Not now. Not when Bianca Summerlin wrapped her arms around her daughter and held her for what felt like a very long time.
Finally, Bianca pulled away and grabbed Cheyenne’s shoulders. Her daughter grimaced and tried not to flinch from the pressure on her wounded shoulder. Removing her hands, Bianca cocked her head and stepped back. “Let’s see it, then.”
Not like I can hide it from her now. Gritting her teeth, Cheyenne stared at the tile floor and pulled the sleeve of her black t-shirt up over her shoulder.
Bianca took a long, slow breath and turned Cheyenne to the right so she could get a better view of the two deep, open-but-healing wounds in her daughter’s flesh. “Do I want to know how this happened?”
“Well, it has to do with a whole bunch of words like the other one you don’t like hearing, so probably not.”
“All right.” Bianca studied the wounds, then brought her fingers up under Cheyenne’s chin. She didn’t tug or push, merely guided her daughter’s face toward her, so Cheyenne had no choice but to meet her mom’s gaze. “Let’s eat. I’ve had that chicken on my mind the whole time that moron in a uniform was talking himself into a ditch.”
When her mom smirked, Cheyenne couldn’t keep back a wry, quiet chuckle of her own.
“And then we’ll figure out how to get that damn tracking device out of your arm. My God, of all the idiotic attempts!” Bianca rolled her eyes, released her daughter’s chin, and turned to head back toward the dining room overlooking the veranda and the sweeping view of the valley beyond it.
Cheyenne pulled the sleeve of her t-shirt back down over her arm and followed her mom through the house. When she passed the still-closed doors of the study, she thought she heard movement and paused to check.
Eleanor doesn’t go in there alone.
And Eleanor definitely wasn’t in there. “Cheyenne.”
The halfling looked away from the study doors to see the housekeeper standing under the rise of the winding staircase, absently wringing her hands. “If you still have an appetite after that mess, dinner’s still hot. Your mom might eat it all if we don’t lay claim to at least some of it.”
Cheyenne’s stomach growled all on its own, and they both laughed. “I guess I don’t have a choice, huh?”
“Come on, sweetheart. We’ll get you feeling like yourself again.” Eleanor waved the half-drow forward, and Cheyenne joined her willingly.
Bianca was already in her usual chair at the table. For the first time, Cheyenne thought it was a little strange that chair was on the far side. It gave Bianca Summerlin a view of the table and the underbelly of the staircase when any other seat would have given her a fantastic view through the wall of windows behind her.
If I asked, she’d say something about the importance of focusing on the task at hand. Which I totally get. Now more than ever, I think.
“That man took up enough of our time this evening.” Bianca studied the meal Eleanor had prepared for them and laid the cloth napkin in her lap. “You two better not keep me waiting any longer. That Scotch is starting to go to my head.”
Shaking her head, Eleanor shot Cheyenne a knowing glance and took a seat where she’d been sitting for meals since coming into Bianca Summerlin’s employ. The drow halfling took her seat next to Eleanor, and they dug into dinner without another word.
Chapter Sixty-Six
Cheyenne didn’t get back to her apartment until almost 8:30 that night, although her mother and Eleanor had both taken it upon themselves to remind her—repeatedly and with a lot more insistence than she was used to from them—that she still had a bedroom upstairs and could sleep in the bed that belonged to her.
That
