Page 125 of Whiskey Wednesdays
The corner of Officer Teasdale’s mouth twitched. “What?”
“Her nose bled. And she sneaked me outside, but she didn’t have shoes on. Then we ran from my mom, and we went to Titus’s house.”
His eyes went wide. “Titus Tremblay? The Spartan? One of the greatest centers of all time?”
Elodie nodded. “We just call him Titus though.”
He glanced at Connor. “Any chance Tremblay is coming back to play in Vancouver again? We could sure use him. It was a tragedy when you retired. And then we lost Tremblay.” The officer shook his head glumly.
“You’d have to ask him that,” Connor clipped out. “Now back to my girls.”
“Right.” Officer Teasdale straightened and turned back to Elodie. “Is there anything else you want to tell me?”
“Yeah. Can you tell Noah and my mom to leave us alone? They’re mean and they might scare Belly away. We need her.”
I swallowed thickly.
Officer Teasdale glanced at me and smiled a little. “I’ll certainly try. And I understand why you’d want to keep her.”
Later that night, Connor curled around Elodie as she slept between us again, with his arm draped across both of us.
“I talked to the police officer who interviewed Noah this afternoon,” he said softly. “He said Noah told him they rang the doorbell and you let them in.”
I sighed. “Did they believe him?”
“No, because Amelia told another officer she’s my wife and had every right to be there. She also said Noah bribed my cleaner for the codes, and that’s how they got in.”
“If you don’t sell your house, you need to get security cameras installed here.”
He nodded. “I do. I have an alarm, but no cameras.”
I cupped his cheek and admitted the truth. “I want to go home. Vancouver is beautiful, but I don’t think it’s safe for us right now, and I don’t belong here.”
He squeezed my hand to his cheek. “I love Vancouver, and I’m going to bring you back someday so I can really show it to you. But we’ll fly out tomorrow. And you belong wherever we are.”
The next morning, we went to see Elodie’s great-grandmother before flying back to Palm Springs. The senior apartment community where Mémé lived seemed sunny and cheerful. There were several elderly people in wheelchairs and walkersin the main atrium when we walked in, and a few assistants in bright scrubs mingled among the residents.
We found Mémé in her suite, sitting up in a recliner.
Elodie ran over to the woman and patted her hand when we walked in. “I brought Belly to see you, like I promised.”
Mémé looked frail, but I could tell she’d been statuesque and striking in her prime.
She gazed at me, then turned back to Elodie. “Good morning, sweetheart. Thank you for bringing her here to see me.”
“You’re welcome. And you know what? Mommy hit Belly in the face and made her bleed. And we had to go outside and run, and she didn’t have any shoes on. But we got away. And guess what?”
Mémé frowned and her forehead crinkled. She glanced back at me, looking closely at the bruises on my face.
“What, sweetheart?”
“I can read good now. And Javy makes cookies with me and has a one-eyed cat. And I want Daddy to marry Belly so we can keep her.”
I choked and shifted around nervously, looking up at the ceiling.
Mémé cleared her throat, sounding like she was stifling a laugh. “Well. It sounds like you’ve been a busy bee in California. What’s this about a one-eyed cat?”
For the first half of the flight back home, Elodie sat between us and chattered away. When she eventually fell asleep, Connor took off her shoes and laid her chair back. I covered her witha lap blanket while he spoke quietly to the attendant who disappeared into the cockpit.
