“How long have I been asleep?” Anelya stretched. “Oh! You’re all eating. I must really have been tired. Hello Detective.”
“I can bring you a plate. You must be exhausted,” I said.
She stood. “Please don’t. I will come join you.”
She was still yawning when she sat next to Greg at the table. I put a plate in front of her with a burger and a small piece of salmon, fresh fruit, and potato salad.
“Thank you, this looks amazing.”
“I love grilling,” I said.
“I think we will need to have many, many meetings out here about this case,” Rhonda said.
We all laughed.
***
An hour later, Rhonda and Bryan left, and Greg was showing Anelya around the house while I cleared up from dinner.
When I brought in the last of the dishes, she was studying pictures on the mantlepiece in the family room. “Your dad looks so familiar,” she said to Greg.
“No one thinks we look alike,” he said. “I take after my mother.” He pointed towards an older photo, of his late mother when she was younger.
She nodded, then looked at the picture of his dad again. “He looks just like someone from my hometown. Someone Carolinadated for two years, actually. Jared Waltzan. Just like him. The nose and the eyebrows especially. Jared had grey eyes. He had a twin sister, Evie, though she took more after her mother.”
“My father has grey eyes.” Greg looked startled.
“Do you have any pictures of Jared?”
“Hm, Carolina may have some old pictures of him on her social media. Do you mind if I search on my phone for a few minutes?”
“No, why don’t we turn on a movie while you do that?”
She sat between us on our long leather sofa as if we’d been doing that forever after Greg let her pick a Marvel movie. I was delighted that she liked those as much as we did.
After a few minutes into the movie, she passed me the phone. Jared did look like my stepfather. I handed it to Greg.
He frowned. “It’s uncanny. Do you mind if I send myself this image?”
“Of course. Do you think you might be related?”
“You know what people say about small towns,” he said, but I could tell he was not joking.
Anelya rested her head on my shoulder and was soon asleep again.
***
“Do you think we should put her in a bed?” We asked later when I put a light blanket on her.
“I’m not sure. She might be uncomfortable when she wakes up. Do you want to stay here with her, or should I?”
Our couch was big, but Greg was right. We wouldn’t both fit along with Anelya. “I’ll do it.”
He nodded. “I’ll make breakfast in the morning. I’m not sure when she needs to be up for work.”
“Good point.” I noticed neither of us cared about when we had to go in to work.
I closed my eyes and stretched out, enjoying the soft sounds of Anelya’s breathing. I had it bad, definitely.
