now she mostly just sits silently in the rocking chair in the master bedroom.”
“Like she has all day today—I never saw her.”
“No one did. She didn’t want to see anyone. But I didn’t want her alone in the bedroom the whole day either—”
“So you hired a companion.”
“Only after I promised Theresa that it wouldn’t be anyone who had known her in the past. I have no idea why that was such a big deal, but it was.”
Out came three more volunteers—including sixteen-year-old Missy Hart, Theresa’s companion—and after another round of gratitude and good-nights, Cam said, “Theresa’s okay inside alone?”
“She’ll still be sitting in the rocking chair when I go up to her—that’s why I told Missy she could leave. I have a hard time getting Theresa to even come out of the bedroom, and since she’s been in a panic at the thought of seeing anyone she used to know, she won’t come out for sure until I let her know the coast is clear.”
“Any early opinions on our geriatric runaway?”
Neily didn’t consider it a breach of confidentiality to tell her brother what she knew because Cam had already been involved with the case.
“Theresa’s physical exam showed no indications of mistreatment—and she isn’t claiming any when I can get her to answer my questions. She’s well fed, well dressed, clean. All in all, she’s sound of body, if not of mind. The caseworker in Missoula has done some preliminary checking of the caregiver and the grandson who are coming sometime soon. So far they’ve been cleared to take over again temporarily when they get here. Under my supervision, anyway. The rest will take interviews and assessment—I’ll do that here with Theresa and with whoever comes to be with her.”
“But mentally, Theresa is really…off,” Cam said kindly.
“She has a lot of issues, yes. Memory for one—she keeps forgetting who I am and calling me Mikayla. When I ask who Mikayla is, she can’t—or won’t—tell me. She does seem to like Mikayla, though.”
Against the tide of cars, trucks, vans and people on foot streaming down the hill, an SUV Neily didn’t recognize made slow progress toward the house.
“If that’s another reporter coming here, I might get violent,” she told her brother with a nod at the approaching vehicle.
There had been a public search for Theresa in Missoula. Once she was located in Northbridge, reporters had begun descending on the small town in search of a follow-up story, and they’d become a nuisance.
“I’ll check it out and get rid of them,” Cam offered. Then, with a glance at Neily as he headed down the porch steps, he said, “You should wash your face—it’s full of fireplace soot.”
The last group of volunteers came out of the house right then, though, and Neily remained on the porch to say good-night to them, merely brushing blindly at her face in hopes of cleaning it as much as possible.
By the time that last group had left, Cam was back—with guests who seemed shocked by their first glimpse of the house.
“Not a reporter,” Cam informed her as the man and a heavyset woman followed him onto the porch. “This is Theresa’s grandson, Wyatt Grayson, and her caregiver, Mary Pat Gordman.”
Wonderful. And I’m a mess, Neily thought.
She’d known even before her brother’s earlier comment that her clothes were soiled and her shoulder-length, chocolate-colored hair was falling shaggily from her ponytail. It certainly wasn’t how she normally presented herself professionally. And if that wasn’t bad enough, one glimpse of Theresa’s grandson only made Neily more self-conscious because she guessed him to be her own age—and he was eyepoppingly handsome.
Not that it mattered under the circumstances, but it definitely didn’t make Neily happier to be unkempt herself. It made her feel at a disadvantage.
There wasn’t a thing she could do about it, though, so she pretended nothing was amiss and in her most professional-yet-friendly tone of voice, she said, “Hi, I’m Neily Pratt, Theresa’s caseworker.”
The caregiver hung back but Wyatt Grayson stepped up to meet Neily, standing tall, confident, broad-shouldered, and just muscular enough for the khaki slacks and navy-blue sports shirt he was wearing to give evidence to the fact that he probably worked out.
And then he took a real look at Neily and did a double take.
Do I look that bad?
“I’m sorry about—” she waved her hand up and down in front of herself “—this. We’ve been cleaning decades of dirt today.”
Wyatt Grayson shook his head as if he were dumbstruck. “No, it isn’t that,” he muttered. Then the darkblond eyebrows that matched his hair rose from a V into twin arches and he said, “You just look something like—”
“Someone named Mikayla?” Neily guessed. “Because Theresa keeps calling me that.”
“Mikayla,” Wyatt Grayson repeated, his deep baritone voice echoing with something Neily couldn’t pinpoint. “Yes. Mikayla.”
No wonder Theresa kept getting confused then.
But Wyatt Grayson didn’t explain who Mikayla was, leaving Neily still curious as he recovered himself and held out a hand for her to shake. “Good to meet you, Miss Pratt.”
“Neily,” she amended.
She didn’t know why, but she was uncommonly eager to accept that handshake. And once she had, she was also far too aware of every detail, every nuance of the meeting of his skin with hers, of the feel of that hand closing around hers—big, warm, strong, adept…
It was one of the oddest things she’d ever experienced.
But noticing all she was noticing about that simple handshake—and liking it—had no place in this so she ended the contact in a hurry.
Cam spoke up then, while Wyatt Grayson continued to study Neily with intense pewter-gray eyes.
“I have to get to the station, Neily,” Cam said. “My shift starts soon. Unless you need me…”
“No, go ahead,” Neily answered her brother, despite the fact that Wyatt Grayson’s scrutiny was beginning to make her uncomfortable. She was grateful when he turned to say goodbye to Cam.
But given the opportunity to do some scrutinizing of her own when Wyatt Grayson wasn’t looking, Neily couldn’t seem to stop herself.
His gleaming, sun-streaked dark-blond hair was cut short on the sides and slightly longer on top where he wore it in a natural disarray that gave him a casual, devil-may-care look. He had a perfectly shaped, straight nose. His lips were a little on the thin side but had a sort of sexy quirk to their corners. The bone structure of that photogenic face was a sharply defined collection of angles and hollows composed of high cheekbones, lean cheeks and a sculpted jawline. Plus there were those eyes! Sultry gray that she’d already seen reflect silver one minute and blue the next.
But
