Penelope (21 page)

So, that would explain Vivian’s distance from him all day. That was too bad, Penelope thought.

“I look forward to the girls coming to the daycare in a few weeks,” she said.

“It’s all they can talk about. That and Emma and Ava.”

Penelope smiled. The daycare was going to be good for everyone, she thought.

As Penelope dove into her pile of gifts, Brock’s mother had managed a seat right next to her where she could
oooh
and
awww
over every gift—most of which she had brought.

But the gift that had her heart nearly seizing to beat was that of a small outfit that had obviously been worn and was very old.

She turned her head toward Gwendolyn, who was dabbing at her eyes with a tissue.

“It was the outfit Brocky came home in. I thought it would be nice for the baby to come home in it too.”

There wasn’t even time to react to the crying fit that took over from there. How precious a gift was that?

Penelope set the outfit on her lap and she and Gwendolyn were automatically in each other’s arms. Her son had stepped in and stolen her heart and promised her a family and here his mother had completely cinched the deal.

Brock covered his mouth when he saw the reaction Penelope had to the outfit. Sam gave him an elbow to the side. “She’s coming to Amelia’s bridal shower, right? I mean we could use some great gifts too.”

Brock laughed and so did Sam.

“I think they might be a little excited about this,” he said watching his mother and sister continue to pile gifts at Penelope’s feet.

“I’ve been watching them all day with their grandkids, Vivian’s kids, and even Clayton’s. Some people are just made of grandparent material.”

And that was a true enough statement, Brock thought. His parents were made of that material.

A few hours later, Penelope’s gifts were loaded into Vivian’s car and Sam’s truck. Brock had escorted Penelope to his car to drive her home.

“I can ride with them. You don’t have to drive me home,” she offered.

“I’m going home with you.” He opened the car door. “Currently I have my parents, my sister and her family, and my brother and his wife sleeping at my house. I’d much rather be with you where it’s quiet.”

She laughed as she climbed into the car and he shut the door.

As they drove toward home, Penelope reached for his hand and intertwined their fingers.

“I can’t believe you’d planned to ask me to marry you.”

Brock smiled. “I can’t believe you didn’t think I would.”

“And all those gifts your mother brought for the baby. I don’t know what to think.”

“She’s very excited for you. For us.”

Penelope nodded. “Under the circumstances though, I don’t know if I would have been so gracious.”

“That’s my family. That’s how they think.”

“I like how they think.” She looked out the window. “I guess had I known about the party I could have invited my mother.”

Brock squeezed her fingers. “We did. She didn’t respond.”

Penelope kept her gaze out the window. Of course she hadn’t responded. It didn’t fit into her schedule. Penelope wanted to be mad. She wanted to call her up and let her know how disrespectful she thought it was to have just been ignored like that, but she found she really didn’t care.

She had Amelia and Vivian—her sisters.

She had Brock—her husband-to-be.

She’d always have the baby—her baby.

And she had Brock’s family. A loving mother
and
father who had already doted on her more than her mother ever had. She would gladly eat over-seasoned, hard potato salad for the rest of her life.

She turned to Brock. “How many babies do you want? You don’t want to stop with this one do you?”

A smile instantly appeared on his lips as he glanced toward her then back to the road.

“I’ve always wanted seven kids.”

“Seven?” Her voice rose with the absolute shock of his answer.

When he laughed she settled into her seat. Then he gave her hand another squeeze. “If it happens, awesome, but I certainly don’t want just this one baby.”

“I want him to have your last name.”

“And what was that Emma said about the name you picked for a girl?”

She felt her cheeks heat. “She asked me what name I’d picked out and I told her I liked Gwendolyn.”

“You have no idea what that means to me and you hadn’t even met her yet.”

“I fell in love with you. I was fairly sure I knew what kind of person she was.”

They pulled up in front of the old house on Main and Pine before the others had arrived.

“Did you leave the light on in the attic?” Brock wrenched his neck to look up at the window.

“I haven’t been up there. It would have had to have been since we found the letters.”

“Hmmm, guess we really wouldn’t have noticed. C’mon, let’s get the house open before they get home with all your loot.”

Brock climbed from his car and walked around to help Penelope out just as Sam and Amelia drove up.

As soon as Sam stepped out of his truck he was looking up at the house. “Who left the attic light on?”

Brock looked back at the house. “We just noticed it. We figured we left it on when we were up there finding the mouse hole.”

Sam shook his head. “I was up there yesterday boarding up a few more holes. I turned the light off. I remember because I fixed the light plate. A screw was missing.”

They both looked up at the house and then headed in together. Amelia stood next to Penelope.

“What’s wrong?”

“They don’t think we left the light on in the attic.”

Amelia looked around. “You stay out here,” she warned as she ran into the house.

Penelope stood there unhappy having been left outside in the dark. When Vivian pulled up she too hurried out of the car.

“Where are they?”

“Inside. We left the light on.”

“No we didn’t,” she said, hurrying past her.

The girls sat in the car in their car seats and Penelope walked over to the car and opened the door.

Emma was wiggling in her seat. “Where did Mommy go?”

“I don’t know, honey. But I think she wanted us to stay out here.”

Brock and Sam moved through the house quickly with Amelia right behind them.

Sam pulled his concealed weapon from the back band of his pants.

“You weren’t kidding about the concealed weapon, huh?” Brock smirked.

“Not one bit.”

Brock wasn’t sure what Sam thought he was going to find, but he took a step behind him just in case. Amelia was quick on his heels and Vivian had run through the front door and up the steps.

She would have run right up to the attic if Sam hadn’t held out an arm and stopped her.

“Go outside,” he demanded.

“She’s here. If not in this house, she’s in this town.”

Sam took a step back and moved in toward her. “What do you know?”

Vivian looked toward the illuminated attic. “She texted me. She said she was coming for us. She was tired of me keeping the girls from her. She was mad that she had been moved away from her home—her son. She blames me.”

Sam nodded. “I don’t want you to get hurt.”

“Me? I’ll kill her if…”

Sam held up his hand. “Don’t say that.” He looked toward Brock. “Let’s go up.”

Brock nodded. It had turned from a basic chore of checking out the house to an operation. Brock took a deep breath and closed his eyes. What a funny time to have the memory of gunfire exploding in his ears. The very thought of a sneak attack had his palms sweating and his heart rate kicking up. Suddenly the scar on his shoulder throbbed and burned. He opened his eyes and followed Sam.

Sam took the lead with his weapon drawn. Brock hadn’t remembered the steps being pulled down when he’d left the house and that filled his stomach with that churning dread.

Sam ascended the stairs slowly. “Hello. Is there anyone up here?” He moved slowly and Brock held an arm behind him trying to keep Vivian from racing the stairs.

“Stella, come out! I know you’re here!” She shouted from behind him.

Brock turned to give her a disapproving look. But there was a lot of anger inside of her. He couldn’t blame her for being upset.

Sam cleared the top of the steps. “Someone’s been here.”

Brock cleared the steps with Vivian all but pushing him out of the way. “She’s looking for something. There is something else in this attic that we don’t know about.” She scanned the room. “But she’s not here. Her perfume isn’t fresh anymore.”

If he didn’t know better he’d think there was a sparkle in her eyes when she’d said it.

Just then they heard the sound of a car horn outside. Those sparkling devious eyes of Vivian’s turned into fearful black dots. “The girls. The girls!” she screamed as she shoved her way down the small steps of the attic and ran through the house.

Penelope watched all three of them run from the house and toward them.

Brock gave a solid yank on the car door before she realized she’d locked them.

She hit the unlock button and the doors flew open on all sides of the car.

“What happened? What’s wrong?” Vivian was checking the girls.

“Someone ran from around the back of the house,” she managed with a point of her finger.

Brock and Sam both took off in the direction in which Penelope indicated.

“Did she see you?” Vivian checked over the girls and then turned toward Penelope. “Did she see you?” she asked again, her tone more panicked.

“No. I don’t think so.”

Vivian let out a long breath and dropped her head with a shake. “She’s hurt us enough. Why is she doing this now?”

“From what you’ve told me I don’t think she’s right. I mean I think she has psychological problems.”

Vivian’s eyes went wider. “Ya think?” Her reply was sarcastic and Penelope frowned.

“Do you think she’ll hurt us?”

“I think between Brock and Sam they’ll make sure she doesn’t.”

“She couldn’t have gotten away that fast from the house could she? I mean, she’s old.”

Vivian snorted a laugh. “Late fifties and a runner. I have no doubt that she could outrun Sam. Brock, on the other hand, I’m sure she’d never outrun him.” Vivian looked around the car. “We should get all your gifts into the house and then you can come stay with us. I don’t think she’d know where to find us. I never even told Frank where we were staying.”

Penelope shook her head. “I have Brock. We’ll be fine.”

Vivian kept a narrow eye on her. “You don’t mess around if she comes back.”

“When they get back over here, we need to call the police.”

Vivian nodded. “You’re right.” She looked at the girls who had fallen asleep. “I’m going to try and call a deputy I know. I want to keep this as quiet as possible. The last thing we need is people thinking that the new day care center is going to have people breaking in.”

Penelope dropped her shoulders. She hadn’t really thought about that.

“Do you think we should not call them?”

Vivian shrugged. “Maybe we let Sam decide. But I want to know what she’s looking for.”

“Do you think it’s that watch?”

“No. There has to be something else.” Vivian looked up toward the house. “Something worth breaking and entering for.”

Sam, Brock, and Amelia walked back toward the car.

“She outran you? Really?” Vivian was nearly on the verge of laughter.

“I don’t think it was a she,” Brock said.

Penelope climbed out of the car. “Do you think this was some random person?”

“I don’t suppose we’ll know until we get upstairs and look around,” Sam added.

“The girls can sleep in Penelope’s room for a little bit. Let’s look around.” Vivian bent back into the car and began unbuckling the girls from their car seats.

Sam carried Emma up to Penelope’s room and Vivian followed with Ava.

When the girls were comfortable, they all moved toward the hallway.

“How will we know if they took anything?” Brock asked.

“We might not know what, but we can at least start to get a feel for it,” Sam replied and then turned toward Vivian. “We need to call the police.”

Her brows drew together leaving a deep crease in her forehead. “I will. I’m going to call Darby. Maybe he can keep this on the down low. I don’t want it to affect the daycare.”

Sam nodded. “I guess that’s understandable.” He looked up the steps. “Well, let’s see what’s up there.”

Brock turned toward Penelope. “You stay here.”

Penelope fisted her hands on her hips. “That’s not fair.”