cotton sweater, starting from the wrist up.
“Hey! Can you make him leave first?”
Roni cast her matching blue eyes over to Wade. “I’ve bandaged enough wounds. Why don’t you check on Cora.”
“Not a bullet wound, you haven’t. I know what to do. You don’t. I’m not going anywhere until I’ve assessed the injury.”
Lacey cut in, “Except I don’t want you anywhere near me.”
He crossed his strong arms at his chest as his reply. His stolid face expressed no emotion as flawlessly as a Westminster guard on duty. The idea of the wolf guarding the henhouse nearly made her laugh. Then Lacey screamed out in pain as Roni’s fingers met wounded flesh on her upper arm.
As Wade leaned across Lacey to inspect the area, his woodsy aftershave lingered in her face. She inhaled, then held her breath, partly to not smell any more of him, partly to keep in what she already had. She cringed at her softness. So what if he smelled good. It didn’t change the fact that he had blood on his hands.
After a quick nod, Wade’s gaze dropped down from above her. Mere inches away, he said, “You’ll live.”
“Don’t look so happy about it.”
He didn’t even blink at her remark, but he did slowly pull away. “You said someone had been following you. When did you notice them?”
Lacey sobered as she remembered her drive in. Roni’s opening of the first-aid kit became a focal point. “When I entered Norcastle. It was when they took the turnoff to come up here with me that I thought it strange two people would be traveling this far out at the same time. But they didn’t try to kill me until...” Lacey glanced at Wade. Maybe the incident had something to do with this man, and that was why he was so concerned. He was trying to cover his tracks.
“Continue.”
Lacey hesitated sharing any more while being unprotected in the man’s house. “Can’t this wait for the police?”
“I’ll need to give them as many details as I can. They’ll need to know how to proceed.”
“What other information would they possibly need other than someone took shots at me?”
“Like why you think they took shots at you. Now tell me, they didn’t try to kill you until when?”
Lacey lifted her chin. Since when did she hold back? “Fine. They plowed into me when I put my blinker on to turn into your driveway. Are you sure they weren’t friends of yours? Or rather, enemies? You must have a long list of them. I know I’m on it.”
“Our driveway?” Roni piped up. “And what enemies? What is she talking about, Wade?”
Wade raised a hand to silence Roni. “Just get her cleaned up. We’ll talk later.” He walked to the window and peered out.
Or perhaps he was looking for those enemies he refused to talk about.
He closed the blinds and stepped back against the wall. His folded arms at his chest exposed the strong, lean muscles that had lifted her with ease moments before, but now walled him off from everyone in the room.
The man was hiding something.
A stinging pain pulled Lacey’s attention back to her arm with a sharp inhale.
Roni swabbed her wound with an alcohol wipe. “It’s a bad graze. It’ll most likely leave a scar. But I’ve always said there’s nothing wrong with scars.” She reached up with one hand in a latex glove that Lacey hadn’t even seen her put on. Blood covered the fingers.
Her blood.
As Lacey’s stomach dropped at the sight, Roni reached for the scarf at her neck without thought to soiling it. She pulled it free to reveal what lay beneath it.
Scars.
Puckered and mutilated skin gave way to a fiery incident that took Lacey’s mind off her own wound to question Roni’s.
“What happened?”
“A car accident when we were kids.”
“That’s enough, Roni.” Wade gave a single shake of his head to end their conversation. A dare to defy him went out.
The heavy feeling of secrecy filled the room. It seemed Wade Spencer’s life revolved around more than one. But then when one of them was murder, it was only natural to have a lifetime of other cover-ups.
“More secrets, Mr.—” She stopped because her attention was pulled from the granitelike man against the wall down to his legs.
He literally shook in his combat boots. The man may think he stood impassive, but his own body turned traitor on him and gave his guilty secrets away. Before she could call him out on his guilt, the dog placed her paw on his thigh and pressed her head into his arm, nudging harder and harder until his hand reached to pet her head. He moved over her fur, first slowly, then with more purpose. When Lacey looked back at his legs, they had returned to a state of stability.
The dog wasn’t a typical pet, she realized.
“How’d she do that?” Lacey asked, not pretending what she saw didn’t really happen. Her mother would say she was being rude for speaking out of turn, but Lacey didn’t feel like being proper at the moment. She’d just escaped death and was looking at the man responsible for her brother’s.
“You ask too many questions,” Wade replied. “That’s probably what got you into this mess.”
“Wade, knock it off,” Roni cut in. “Promise is a service dog. The army is experimenting with trained dogs to help soldiers with post-traumatic stress disorder. They sent my brother home with her to help him—”
“I said, that’s enough!” Wade retreated from the room on a pivot. His tense, muscled back turned the corner of the kitchen and disappeared.
Now Lacey understood Roni’s concern about Wade carrying a weapon.
And she was pushing him too far with her questions.
Lacey watched Roni’s eyelashes fall over her eyes in sadness. “I’m sorry if I overstepped my bounds. My mother has tried to teach me to be a lady, but I’ve yet to live up to any of her ideals, all ten thousand of them. But it’s not for lack of trying. I really am sorry.”
Roni smiled weakly but accepted Lacey’s apology.
“So Wade is your brother?”
“Yes.” The fashionable woman taped the bandage up like a pro, not a bit of queasiness or whining like some sissy girl. Proof never to judge a book by its cover. Roni approached a dresser and pulled out an oversize blouse with tiny yellow flowers.
Lacey cringed. “Cora’s?”
“She won’t mind, and it’ll be loose enough to put on with ease.”
“I suppose, but I don’t do clothes with flowers.”
“What’s
