Jill Shalvis - Then Came You

He’d been five years old the first time he’d spent a summer here in Sunshine with his sisters. Even back then the funky old Victorian house had been falling apart.

He’d loved it, every nook and cranny.

He’d been commissioned by his grandma to be in charge of the menagerie of animals she collected; a llama with three legs, a blind cow, a deaf Australian shepherd, an albino cat. The list went on and on. It didn’t matter what type of living creature, if it needed saving, his grandma had taken it in—including her three wayward, emotionally neglected grandkids.

“Hey,” Darcy said. “The gas is the long, skinny pedal on the right. Step on it, would you? I’ve got a nap scheduled.”

“It’s seven o’clock. Why don’t you just wait an hour and then go to bed for the night? You can take a hot bath and relax a little bit.”

She laughed. “No one goes to bed at eight.”

“People who’ve survived an unsurvivable accident, gone through five surgeries and grueling physical therapy to learn to walk again do.”

She turned away and looked out the window.

“Stay home tonight,” he said. “Instead of napping until midnight and then going out.”

“Nothing good happens before midnight.”

“Darcy.”

“Mom,” she intoned, and then laughed.

Laughed.

The sound was music to his ears because for that one brief moment she almost sounded like her old self again.

When he pulled into their driveway and came around for her, she crossed her arms over her chest.

“I want my chair back,” she said.

“AJ says you don’t need it.”

“AJ doesn’t know shit. I want my chair.”

AJ knew a hell of a lot, and he’d learned it the hard way and they both knew it. AJ had fought his own battles, and he’d come out on the other side.

Just as Wyatt hoped like hell that Darcy would.

Wyatt and Darcy’s battle of wills was silent but short. Wyatt stared her down, but she’d never been afraid of him. Of being real, yeah. Of taking even a single care with her life, yeah.

But of him? No.

In the end, Wyatt once again hoisted her into his arms and carried her toward the house. Someone had weeded. The chore had been on his endless list of things to do. Zoe had texted him about it numerous times this week and he’d hit delete.

Clearly she’d gotten tired of the waist-high weeds lining the walk to the front door. Not that the grass—really more wild weeds at this point—seemed to notice. They’d had rains almost every night, and the entire yard looked more than a little neglected.

He needed more hours in his day.

“She’s going to plant roses next, you watch,” Darcy murmured with a tired sigh. “She thinks she can domesticate us.”

“We could use a little domestication,” he said.

“Hmmm.”

It was a noncommittal sound, and Wyatt knew that of all of them, Darcy had no desire to settle down. She’d never admit it, but she was the most like their parents.

Free-spirited.

Bitten by wanderlust.

Happy to call the world home.

And in a single blink, it had almost all been taken away from her. But at least she was still breathing, and by the looks of things, finally on the mend.

With a sigh, Darcy set her head against his collarbone. It was more a testament to her hour of brutal therapy than any affection for Wyatt.

But he’d take what he could get.

“You’re thinking so hard you’re making me tired,” she mumbled against him. “What are you obsessing about now?”

“I’m concentrating on not dropping you on your ass,” he said.

A lie, and she knew it, but she laughed softly.

Zoe opened the door for them. “You’d all best be hungry,” she said. “I brought home Thai— Criminy, Wyatt, kick off those filthy boots before you walk across my floor. And that had best not be my favorite tank top, Darcy.”

Wyatt bent to dump Darcy onto the couch, and their gazes met. She rolled her eyes, and Wyatt felt himself grinning again.

Yeah, she was coming back to them.

He turned and bumped right into Zoe.

His older sister was, hands on hips, staring at them. “You guys are pretty late.”

“Yeah,” Darcy said from the couch, eyes already closed. “That’s all on me.”

“How can that be, you didn’t have your car.”

Darcy huffed out a laugh. “If you don’t think I can fuck things up with or without wheels, you’ve not been paying attention.”

Zoe turned to Wyatt. “What the hell happened?”

“Don’t bitch at him,” Darcy said.

Wyatt felt the knot that was always in his chest lately, loosen very slightly. Darcy opened her eyes and flashed him a smile that was so brief he might have imagined it.

Then she closed her eyes again and turned over.

Zoe stared down at her and then nudged Wyatt hard with her shoulder.

Her version of a long, hard hug.

Emily got home late. She parked in the driveway and got out, hesitating when she heard that odd sort of howling she’d heard several times now. Not a coyote, she thought.

A dog. And it sounded like it was in pain.

Unable to take it, she was going to have to check it out. It wasn’t quite dusk, but getting there, so she grabbed the flashlight she kept in her car and walked down the street about twenty yards toward the sound, moving faster when she heard it again.

Where was it? She walked a little farther, searching. The houses here were spread out, many of them small ranches with horses and other livestock in the back. She saw nothing odd.

Nor did she hear the cry again.

She kept walking. As the last of the sun sank over the horizon, she came to the last house on the block.

It was a ranch style like the others, with acreage behind it. All the lights were on and there were a handful of trucks in the driveway. As she stood there, the front door opened and a man appeared in the doorway.

She couldn’t make out his features, but lifted a hand and waved, anyway.

He was still for a beat and then returned the wave.

“Did you hear an injured animal?” she called out.

But the guy had already turned back inside the house, shutting the door.

Frustrated and tired, and no longer hearing anything, she turned back and walked home. It was Sara’s boxing night—she’d signed up for lessons at the gym and wouldn’t be back until late. So as she entered the house, she was immediately accosted by Q-Tip.

“Meow!”

“Let me guess,” Emily said, dropping her purse and crouching to pet the cat. “You’re hungry.”

Q-Tip bit her ankle.

Emily hissed out a breath and stood up. “I’m changing your name to Satan.” She headed toward the kitchen to feed them both.

“Meow,” Q-Tip said, and ran between Emily’s legs, nearly killing them both.

After feeding the cat, Emily studied the sad contents of the fridge in order to feed herself. Nothing called to her, so she grabbed her purse, and headed back outside.

A quick drive-through would have to do, which she wished she would’ve thought of before getting all the way home—

She stopped, startled by a sudden flash of light that came around the side of her house.

Flight or fight? Flight. Always flight.

Slightly closer to the house than her car, she ran back up the walk while fumbling with her keys at the same time. “Come on, come on,” she whispered on the porch, and finally got the key into the lock, shoving open the front door. Shutting it hard behind her, she hit the lock.

And then the dead bolt.

“Meow.”

“Shh.” Emily rush to the living room window. Still in the dark, she peered out.

Nothing.

“Meow.”

“I already fed you,” she whispered, staring out the window.

Q-Tip rubbed her face against the ankle she’d bitten only a few moments before. Happily fed, she was feeling friendly now. Emily appreciated that but she couldn’t concentrate on anything but the light. She could see it again, farther away, maybe twenty-five yards. But it was on the other side of her house now, like maybe whoever held the flashlight had seen her coming and retreated behind the house, and then come out on the other side.

Why?

Then she heard the distant rumble of a truck engine starting, and headlights appeared, crawling down the street toward her, and she sucked in a breath. When the truck pulled into her driveway, she held that breath and shoved her hand into her pocket, finding the familiar and comforting weight of her phone. Should she call the police? She didn’t recognize the truck, and was so frazzled she couldn’t have said if it was one she’d just seen in her neighbor’s driveway.

It idled in her driveway for the longest ten seconds of her life before slowly pulling back out and driving off.

And then nothing.

At her feet, Q-Tip pulled out the last trick in her arsenal. She began to purr, gazing up at Emily innocently.

In the still of the night, with the only sounds now the rumbly purring and Emily’s own escalated breathing, her cell phone rang, startling her into near cardiac arrest. She answered while still staring out the window into the dark night. “Hello,” she whispered.

“Hey,” Wyatt said. “About tomorrow’s schedule—I’m on surgery detail, so we’re going to start half an hour earlier—” He paused. “You okay? You’re breathing like you’ve been running.”

“Yeah, I’m okay. Gotta question for you, what do you know about the local police response time?”

“Where are you?” he immediately asked.