AllFreeNovel
Share Us
She had no idea what he wanted her to say. While her mind whirred, Cayden sighed.
“Ginny,” he said very seriously. “Are you interested in me for me, or are you interested in me because I’m a cowboy with the exact type of hat and unsophisticated demeanor that will drive your mother mad?”
She sucked in a breath. “Cayden,” she said. “Of course not.”
“I’m not sure I believe you,” he said.
“I was just looking at my calendar, because I don’t want to wait until the fall festival is over to see you.”
“Yet, that was exactly the reason you gave me a few weeks ago,” he said.
“I said earlier that I’d like to go to dinner with you.”
“You said that in conjunction to staying in,” he pointed out. “Staying in to go to your commitments.” He exhaled. “I’m just going to be honest. I think you might have been interested in me a few weeks ago, but you were overwhelmed with work and family. I don’t think you lied to me. Meanwhile, I think something changed with your mother, and now you want to use me to irritate her.”
“No,” Ginny said, though she could’ve easily have said yes. Would Cayden annoy Mother? Yes, he would. “Why can’t it be both?” she asked. “Iaminterested in you, and I think you won’t be my mother’s first choice for me.” In her mind, that was a win-win.
“I’m a Chappell,” he said. “We’re respected all over the South. We produce the best racehorses from any farm across six states. I don’t see why she wouldn’t approve of me.”
“It’s complicated,” Ginny said. Before she could explain further, her home security alarm blared, filling the air with high-pitched squeals and screams.
Ginny’s heartbeat ricocheted around inside her body, and she jumped to her feet.
“Ginny?”
“My alarm is going off,” she said, stepping over to her bedroom door and locking it. All three dogs started barking. “I have to go.” She hung up before Cayden could say another word, and she swiped to get to the camera feed on the security app.
She had cameras everywhere around her house, and sometimes a slow-moving car would set it off. The public entrance to Sweet Rose was on the opposite side of the property from her house, across the highway. Any time anyone drove by her house too slowly or too often, her security system registered it and would sometimes go off.
It sent her anxiety through the roof every time, and Ginny would often pack her weekend bag and her dogs and go to Drake’s for a few nights after the alarm got triggered.
Everyone in her family got notified whenever her alarms went off, just like she got notified if theirs did. Texts started rolling in despite the late hour, but Ginny ignored them all in favor of answering the call from the security company.
She grabbed Minnie and said, “Come on, guys,” as she fled toward her closet. It was the quietest place in the house while the alarm rang, and it provided another locked door she could hide behind.
“Virginia Winters?” a man asked.
“Yes, sir,” she said.
“I need your verification code, ma’am.”
“7VHEDW4,” she said. “I’m in my bedroom closet with my dogs.” Sarge dashed in as fast as his puggy legs would carry him, and she closed the door. “The door is locked. I didn’t have time to check the cameras.”
“My name is Ronald Featherston. We have a broken seal on the north side of the property,” he said. “I’m pulling your floorplan right now, and I can see it’s a set of French doors that lead into a music room…or a library.”
“It’s the library,” she said, and her room sat on the other side of the house from that room. The library was at the back of the house, and those French doors led out onto a beautiful patio that wrapped around to the back yard.
“Cameras on that side of the house don’t show anyone there,” Ronald said.
“How did the door get open then?” she asked.
“I’m checking the weather now, ma’am.”
Ginny couldn’t remember the last time she’d used the French doors in the library—or even been in the library itself. Those doors had been locked for a while, and no amount of wind was going to knock a deadbolt loose.
She put the call on speaker and pulled down her weekend bag. Clothes went inside, and Ginny thanked heaven above that she’d just looked at her calendar, so she knew what she needed for the next few days.
“We’re sending officers,” Ronald said. “I still see nothing on any of the camera feeds to suggest there’s a person there, but that door was opened, and is in fact, still open.”
