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“Please, everybody, just one more night. Just a full twenty-four hours of quiet. I just want to sleep. If there’s more, save it for tomorrow.”
And closing her eyes, she dropped straight into sleep and stayed there.
Whatever passed through the room, whatever wandered the halls, did so quietly. After so many years, one night wasn’t long to wait.
Chapter Twenty-eight
She knew the lull couldn’t last, but it stretched through the next day, and into the following. She worked while a spring snow shower whisked tiny flakes outside that melted the moment they hit the ground.
And midmorning, she accepted an offer to design another book cover. That called for a celebrational Coke and a bowl of pretzels.
While she ran final tests on the Doyle project, she thought about her years with By Design. At this point in a project, she’d have other eyes on the work, and now she only had her own.
There would have been coworkers or bosses to bounce around ideas with or discuss solutions to problems.
Now, again, she had only herself.
She supposed a part of her would always miss the office camaraderie, but the trade-off? Trusting herself, her eyes, her instincts?
It balanced it all out.
“I’m sending this to the three Olivers, Yoda. Then we’ll take a walk before I come back and do a round on the florist.”
She composed the email, attached the files, and sent it off.
And sat back.
“Amazing what you can get done without distractions. From coworkers to ghosts.”
She started to turn off her music—she’d given the tunes over to Clover—rising as she did.
Yoda wasn’t napping by the fire, or curled under her desk.
With the music off, she heard the sound of the ball bouncing downstairs, and Yoda’s scrambling race over the wood floors.
She slipped quietly out of the room, and began to creep down the stairs.
Yoda ran after the ball, snagged it at the front door. He raced in two circles before he trotted back down the hall.
She heard it, faint but clear. Laughter, a young boy’s laughter.
The ball came bouncing back her way as she neared the bottom of the stairs.
And a tread creaked under her feet.
With a silent curse, she dashed down the rest, and caught a glimpse of a figure. A boy! Yes, a boy who sprinted away, fleet of feet down another hallway.
Ball clutched in his jaws, eyes alive with the game, Yoda chased after. Sonya did the same.
“Wait! Please. I’m not going to hurt you. How the hell would I hurt you?”
She followed the sound of the dog, running past sitting rooms, toward the solarium, beyond that to the morning room. When she neared the formal dining room, she heard the cabinet doors slamming, and slowed.
“Okay, all right.”
More than a little breathless, she stepped into the kitchen, where Yoda sat, head angled, the ball at his feet.
“There’s no need to be mad.” Briskly, voice even, she went around closing cabinet doors. “I’m glad you’re playing with him. He’s a really nice dog, isn’t he?”
