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He also hadn’t managed to drop Dolly off at his place, but it was a nice night. She could stay in the car or he could put her on a leash and leave her with one of the nurses. Dolly was a hit with the residents of the assisted living home.
He wasn’t so sure it would be as easy to deal with Brynn.
“Did they say what was happening?” It was the first question she’d asked since they’d argued about him taking her home. She’d been the one to point out the fact that the B and B was in the opposite direction of the residential home when he’d explained where he had to go. Apparently she’d been learning the layout of the town.
She’d given him space when he’d gone quiet. She hadn’t pushed him on anything except going with him.
“All I got was that my dad was upset by an incident that happened.” There was cell service out at Rene’s, but it was spotty, and he’d gotten about half of what Juan had said. He’d called as soon as he’d gotten back to the marina, but it had gone straight to voice mail, which worried the hell out of him.
As did the sight of another SUV. As he turned into the parking lot, he caught sight of a familiar vehicle. It was identical to the one he drove. The parish had been called out? How bad was it? He hadn’t heard anything about the sheriff’s department being brought in.
“Is he hurt?” Brynn asked.
“I don’t know.” He pulled into the spot beside the parish SUV. He was almost certain it was Roxie’s. She was working the second shift through the weekend. “He’s not violent, but he forgets he’s not twenty years old.”
He sometimes tried to do things his frail body couldn’t handle anymore. He’d broken his wrist once trying to show another resident he could do a handstand. Because he’d thought he was in gym class at his old high school.
Major’s gut twisted. What had gone wrong now? Would this be the incident that his dad didn’t come back from? Was last night the last time he would see the father he knew?
It was a constant worry. And a constant guilt. He could have been here sooner if he hadn’t been running around on the islands. His father needed him, and he’d been trying to get into a Hollywood star’s panties.
Damn it. That was cheapening it, but his mind kept going there.
“I’ll keep Dolly with me,” Brynn offered. “I can walk her around the parking lot so she’s not in the way. Unless you’d like me to come with you. I would love to help. Or just be around for you.”
She would distract him. He would worry about her rather than his father, and his dad had no one but him. He turned to her, and she was so pretty it made his heart clench. “I don’t know what I’m going into. Please take care of Dolly. I’ll get you home as soon as possible. I’m sorry.”
She shook her head. “Don’t be. I’m fine here. We all have family. I’ll be close if you need me.”
He forced himself to slip out of the SUV without doing what he wanted to do. He wanted to kiss her and pretend like she really was here for him. It wasn’t that he doubted her goodwill. Brynn seemed to be a genuinely kind person, but he wasn’t sure she was ready for the kind of chaos Major had gotten used to.
He strode toward the front of the building and sure enough, there was Roxie. The lobby was lit up, and through the sliding glass doors he could see Roxie standing there, hands on her hips and her head nodding. Juan was there, his jaw clenched and hands in his pockets. There was a man he didn’t recognize. He had a bag strapped across his chest and a camera in his hand.
His father wasn’t in the room. At least no ambulance had been called. That meant any injuries would be minor. His mind was whirling with the possibilities as he started up the path to the entryway.
“Well, well, look who showed up. I didn’t think this plan would work.”
A flash went off from his left side, and for a moment Major was blinded by it.
He stopped, and his vision started to come back. “What the hell?”
“I’m Jeannie Carbo from Entertain America,” a no-nonsense voice said, and he realized there was a woman standing in front of the big oleander bushes that decorated the path leading to the lobby of the building.
Had she been standing in the bushes? She wasn’t alone. A man was with her, and he seemed to have put his big camera on video function. He turned the lens to catch the woman.
She smiled at the camera, a big bright expression that didn’t come close to reaching her eyes. “I’m here with the small-town deputy who’s taken the Internet by storm. His name is Major Blanchard, but America affectionately knows him as Tighty-Whitie. Deputy, how does it feel to be an instant celebrity?”
