AllFreeNovel
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My eyes narrowed on the white Mercedes SUV in the drive that clearly did not belong to Honey. Reagan’s car was parked ahead of it, left behind since Honey had driven to the store.
What the hell?
“Okay. I can’t wait to meet Reagan. I’m sorry for what you went through alone, but I’m so glad to have another grandchild. I’m so excited to get to know her and Honey.”
“Thanks, Mom. I love you. See you Sunday.”
She answered in kind and clicked off just as a woman in a long hooded gray coat climbed out of the driver’s side of the Mercedes. As she turned to walk up the porch, she lifted her face to the snow and the flawless perfection of her ice blade cheekbones and cool green eyes made me do a double take.
Penelope Conner.Here.
I frowned. Had she figured out Reagan was here? Had she come to try to ruin my happiness once again?
I opened the door and met her on the porch. “Can I help you?”
She threw back her hood and took a long moment to look me up and down, more than once. “Why, Christian, don’t pretend you don’t remember me.”
“I remember you.” I crossed my arms over my chest. “What do you want?”
“That’s how you greet an old friend?”
“We weren’t friends.”
“Yet you are spending time with my daughter.”
“She’s mine every bit as much as yours and came here of her own free will.”
“I don’t doubt that. Reagan has always been very independent and stubborn. When she gets an idea in her head, she won’t be dissuaded. Not that I tried. I let her follow her teenage dreams of a reunion with her precious mysterious daddy.”
“Did you want something?”
“I don’t remember you being so cold.” She trailed her hand down my biceps and it took everything I possessed not to shake her off me.
“Your memory’s faulty then. We aren’t friends or anything else at your doing. Now I asked if you wanted something.”
She propped her hands on her hips. “What if I want to speak to my daughter?”
“She’s not here right now.”
“I always knew she’d find her way to you someday. Maybe I wanted her to. I didn’t move that far away so it wasn’t impossible.”
“Oh, now I’m supposed to think you did things the way you did so she could find her way to me eventually?” Keeping my voice level was a feat. The nerve of this woman. “Though you wouldn’t give her a straight answer to her questions about her father’s identity?”
She tapped her heeled boot impatiently. “Regardless, she made it here. WhereisReagan?”
“The store.”
Penelope’s mouth curved, as thin as a blade. “Without her car in this weather?”
“My girlfriend drove them. They won’t be gone long. I’ll have Reagan call you.”
“Oh, girlfriend too? Isn’t that a cozy picture.” She placed her hand on the lapel of her coat, probably to show off her honking diamond. “Reagan is close with my fiancé Kyle. I hope she likes your girlfriend half as much.”
“She and Honey are getting along great.”
“Honey?” She wrinkled her nose. “What kind of name is that?”
“A great one. Sorry Reagan isn’t here and that you have to leave so soon.”
