“Who says that?” Maisie asked with a teasing glint in her eyes.
“Everyone says that, duh.” Kat rolled her eyes and let out a little sigh when Terry brought her hand to his lips and brushed a kiss across her knuckles.
“This is us, both of us,” he clarified, his icy blue eyes aimed right at his best friend and boss, Jasper, “telling you all that we are a couple. Officially. Whatever the hell that means. She’s my woman, and I love her.”
Maisie let out a wistful sigh, hands to her chest like the southern belle she tried so hard not to be. “So sweet.”
“Right?” Kat’s face lit up like a neon sign, and she wrapped her arms around Terry, beaming with pride that he’d finally made the Ashby Princess his and pressed her lips to his. “I love you too, babe.”
When they finally parted, their two sets of eyes swung to Jasper, who for some odd reason had a stick up his ass about Terry dating Kat. It didn’t make sense to me since, over the years, Terry and Jasper had been closer than brothers. If there was one man in the world he could trust with his sister, it would be my brother.
Jasper polished off a glass of red wine and smacked his lips together with a sigh as he leaned back in the high back dining chair. “I still don’t like the idea of you fucking my sister,” he began with a growl.
“We’re in love, asshole, not just fucking,” Terry added, sending Sadie an apologetic smile.
“Well, I still don’t like it, but as Kat so astutely pointed out, it’s not my place to tell her who she can and can’t love. Especially when she loves the best man I know, and one I know will put his life on the line to keep her safe.”
“Damn fucking straight,” Terry added as he pulled Kat close.
“And if he doesn’t, I’ll kick his fucking ass,” Jasper added with a smile. “I’m happy for you as long as I don’t have to hear the details of your sex life.”
Kat flashed a wide grin and hopped over to Jasper, smacking a grateful kiss on his cheek. “Terry can agree to that, but I have to tell you about this thing he does with his tongue—”
“Goddammit, Kat,” he growled and pushed her away with a laugh.
“Kidding,” she said and took her seat. “I don’t want to make you jealous, Jas. But thanks for not being a dickhead about it. Anymore.”
Terry took his usual seat beside Jasper and whispered a word of thanks, which Jas accepted and clapped Terry on the back.
“Since I’m being not a dickhead, I think it’s time we make some changes.” He stood and grabbed his recently refilled glass of wine and took the seat that had remained empty for the past twenty odd years, at the other end of the table.
A collective gasp went up around the table from my brothers and Kat as Jasper strode toward the chair once occupied by our father. He sank into the seat we’d honored every Sunday dinner by setting a place though it remained empty as tribute to the man who once headed this family. By that move, Jasper officially announced his position as the head of all that Ashby surveyed, and pointed to his just vacated place beside Sadie.
“Take it, Terry,” he said, his voice and presence indicating his authority. “That seat is yours now, brother.”
Sadie raised her glass in the air with a smile. “It’s about damn time,” she said, her gaze bounding from Kat to Jasper and finally landing on Terry. “For all of you. Now, let’s eat and talk business.”
This was usually the part of dinner where I tuned out and focused on the platters piled high with delicious food and the endless supply of top shelf alcohol. But lately, I was more invested in learning as much as I could about Ashby’s enemies, since knowing them could mean the difference between life and death. So I shoveled roast and carrots and potatoes in my mouth while doing my best to look mildly uninterested.
Jasper’s words meant more to me now that he’d taken over his father’s spot, technically Sadie’s former spot, at the foot of the table. “Still no word about Savannah Rhymer,” he growled.
“Mueller is laying low,” Kat said, “but his friends are still staying in one of the suites.”
“Any word on Molly?” Madison mostly—and wisely—stayed silent during talk of Ashby business, other than to ask about her missing sister.
Guilt flashed in Kat’s eyes and she shook her head. “Nothing yet, but that means she hasn’t turned up at a morgue either.” Kat was definitely hiding something but Madison didn’t seem to realize it. “Oh, and I spotted a certain redheaded Fed snooping around Emerald Isle.”
Sadie and Jasper sat up straighter simultaneously. “What?” I couldn’t say who actually asked the question since they both spoke at once.
“She didn’t question anyone, just sat in the lobby and observed who came and who went. Poor idiot doesn’t realize she’s barking up the wrong tree.”
Emerald Isle was the crowning achievement of legit Ashby businesses and they would never destroy it by mixing it in with their other businesses.
“I wouldn’t mind if Jas put a few guys on to watch her, though.”
“Done,” he said easily, nostrils flaring in anger. “She’s the last thing we need to fucking worry about with Brendan trying to make a name for himself away from the old man.”
And so went Sunday dinner, an odd mix of loving family, ruthless business and wisecracks.
I wouldn’t have it any other way.
Chapter Two
Vanessa
I should’ve accepted Kat’s invitation to dinner.
It was about the thirtieth time I’d had that thought today. I puttered around the enormous, five-bedroom house that my late husband Lance had insisted on buying for us, trying to take my mind off my loneliness. Lance bought the house back when we planned for a big family. And then Lance was killed before we ever got a chance to start on our dreams. Without Lance, hell, even with Lance, this house was too big. It was too much house for two people. For one person, it was just pitiful.
So many rooms in the house sat completely empty with no furniture or décor because I was too exhausted, too depressed, too over it to do anything about those rooms. They weren’t going to be nurseries, not for a long time, if ever, so why bother with them? As for the guest rooms, how many did I need for a family who never came to visit?
My parents insisted they couldn’t cross the threshold of my home because I lived in ‘Sin City.’ They had no desire to get on the wrong side of the Lord, but it was more than that. They’d never forgiven me for leaving our small Missouri town, for wanting more out of life. For wanting a bigger life than Moose Hook, Missouri, had to offer.
They’d come to visit me in Glitz exactly one time, the day of Lance’s funeral. They’d shown up, not to support me, but to remind me that this wasn’t my home, wasn’t where I belonged. They used the death of my husband, my childhood sweetheart, and the only man I’d ever loved, to try to convince me to give up and come back home. “Where you belong,” my daddy insisted with his trademark scowl.
It didn’t matter that I hadn’t lived in Moose Hook since I was nineteen years old, since I’d followed Lance to Illinois for Navy Basic Training. We married almost two years later before heading to San Diego for another assignment and then finally moved to Coronado for BUD/S training where he achieved his dream of becoming a SEAL. I’d spent almost as much of my life outside of Moose Hook as I had within the town’s narrow limits.