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“Lyrica dear.” Her voice charming, lilting, the South American beauty Carmina Lucient spoke with a cheerful smile and warm dark brown eyes.
Long and straight, her dark brown hair fell to the middle of her back and framed a delicate, almost aristocratic face. With her naturally arched brows and thickly lashed eyes, she could have been a model rather than an interior designer and fiancée to a soldier whose return home she was awaiting in the next few weeks.
Dressed in light gray capris and a sleeveless silk blouse, the woman looked classy and cool. A far cry from Lyrica’s own jeans and white T-shirt that proclaimed Despite the Look on My Face You’re Still Talking, along with a pair of ragged leather sneakers.
She was comfortable, she excused herself. Comfort meant everything at the moment.
“Hey, Carmina,” Lyrica returned in greeting. “Have you seen Mom?”
“I believe she stepped into the kitchen,” the other woman informed her, her gaze going to the luggage sitting in the foyer as a light frown flitted across her face. “You are leaving us, then?”
“It’s time to go home,” Lyrica agreed. “I’m sure the smell of bug killer has evaporated by now.”
The story that she was staying with her mother again because of the smell of the insecticide in her new apartment hadn’t rou
sed anyone’s suspicions, she didn’t think.
“We’ll no longer have our evening chats, then.” Carmina pouted gently. “I have greatly enjoyed them.”
“So have I,” Lyrica promised. “I’m going to find Mom and tell her good-bye. Enjoy your stay.”
Her mother was worried. Her dark eyes filled with tears when she saw Lyrica standing next to her luggage a few minutes later.
“Don’t cry, Mom,” Lyrica groaned, feeling the surge of guilt her mother could always give her. “I promise, I’ll still visit.”
Mercedes acted as though her children were moving to another world when they moved out of her house. Because all her children had moved out now, she always seemed heartbroken.
Tim so needed to take her on a cruise or something.
“All my babies think they have to leave me.” Mercedes sighed sadly as she wrapped her arms around Lyrica and held her close. “This isn’t fair. My nest is far too empty.” Leaning back, she smiled back at Lyrica beatifically now. “You should convince Eve to have grandbabies soon.”
“Yikes!” Lyrica jumped back. “Grandbabies? Really, Mom? Let them enjoy the honeymoon first or something.”
Amused disgust pulled at her mother’s expression. “If I cannot have my babies home then I should have grandbabies.”
This was evidently a new idea her mother had come up with.
“Discuss it with Eve.” Lyrica was not going to get into this conversation.
Her mother shook her head before her expression tightened once more into worry. Pulling Lyrica back into her embrace, she held her tightly for several long moments.
“Be careful, my soulful heart,” she whispered at Lyrica’s ear. The words reminded her of her childhood and the personal farewells she and her sisters had gotten each morning before they went to school.
“I will, Momma,” Lyrica answered, kissing her mother’s cheek as emotion welled in her throat. “I’ll call soon. I promise.”
She had to escape before her mother had her crying.
Grabbing her bags, she rushed from the house, refusing to look back in case her mother was crying. Because if she was, there would be no choice but to return right back to the house and stay another night, or week, or the rest of her life so her momma wouldn’t shed tears over her again.
Her mother had shed far too many tears over the years, Lyrica had always thought.
Stowing her luggage in the Jeep, she was in the vehicle and driving back to town within minutes. Thankfully, the inn wasn’t far from the apartment she’d rented just off Somerset’s main thoroughfare.
It wasn’t as busy and rushed or as loud as Main Street. She had a postage-stamp-size plot of grass in front of her patio doors with a privacy fence on each side and two parking spots right in front of it. The apartments, owned by Mackay Enterprises, the company her brother and cousins had created to combine all their business interests and oversee their children’s futures, were safe, roomy, and quiet.
The best part about living there was the fact that she knew they were secure. A Somerset detective, Samantha Bryce, lived on one side of her, while the girlfriend of an officer lived on the other. That put two law enforcement personnel on the premises for the better part of any given day.
Pulling into her parking spot, Lyrica breathed her first true sigh of relief since she’d stepped from the elevator and nearly died. Pulling her luggage from the Jeep, she lugged it to her patio door and was preparing to unlock it when Samantha stepped outside.
