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The chair scrapes against the floor as Noah shoots out of it. “How many times do I have to tell you? I’m not an alpha. I’m not like you. I’ll never be like you, Dad. Sorry to disappoint you.” She stomps out of the kitchen and down the hall. “And by the way, you’re not supposed to be eating bacon because of your high blood pressure.”
The walls rattle with the slam of her door.
I scrub my face with both hands.Well, that went well.
Ever since Noah turned fourteen, it’s like a switch went off somewhere in the universe. I’m speaking French while Noah is speaking Spanish, and neither one of us can understand the other.
I shove away my plate, unable to find my appetite.
I pick up my phone again and slide my finger along the bottom of the surveillance video, fast forwarding to the end where Blondie picks up something from my lawn and wraps it inside her coat before darting across the street to her house.
What was she doing down there?
I rewind it and zoom in as much as I can, but it’s too dark, and the video is blurry.
I push out of my chair and head outside to see for myself. The hundred-pound pit bull we rescued last month follows me to the front door, but I tug his collar. “You stay inside, Romeo.”
He whines and flops onto his belly in front of the door.
I pull up the video on my phone again and position myself in the same spot on my front lawn, facing my house. I scan the yard and step closer to the porch, retracing her steps.
And that’s when I notice the bare space between two of my family of lawn gnomes.
Son of a bitch.
I glance over my shoulder and spot her white SUV across the street sitting in the driveway, so I march over to her house and ring the doorbell. After waiting several minutes, I ring it again.
She could be in the bathroom. Then again, the camera footage was time stamped well after two o’clock in the morning.
Aww, the princess is sleeping.
I push the doorbell rapid-fire fifty times until the door flies open.
“Jesus H. Christ. Who rings a doorbell like that?” Her sleepy eyes drag up to my face, and then she sucks in a gasp.
Her disheveled hair sticks up in every direction, half-hanging out of a messy bun. Black smudges surround her eyes, along with imprints of her bed sheet lining her cheeks. She’s in nothing but an oversized tattered KISS T-shirt, and my gaze gets stuck a little too long on her thick thighs before I swing it back up to her crystal-blue eyes.
Get it together, man. Stop checking out the thief.
“Rough night?”
Her eyes narrow. “Come here to apologize?”
“No.”
“Then what do you want?”
“I’m here for the gnome.”
She scratches her head and looks around as if she doesn’t know what I’m talking about. “Gnome?”
“You were on my lawn in the middle of the night, and you took it.”
She tips her chin. “I don’t know anything about this gnome you speak of.”
“Maybe this will jog your memory.” I face my phone to her and watch as her eyes widen for a split second when she sees herself crouching by my porch.
She hikes a nonchalant shoulder. “That’s not me.”
