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 her 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
