Page 21 of Once Upon a Summer Night

“Is it safe to come in?”

“Did you bring pie?” the chief asked.

Hannah giggled beside him. The scene made Chase ridiculously happy. Hannah was home, family hatchets were buried, and all seemed right again with the world.

He looked back toward the kitchen to find Del and Mia not too far behind him, listening in.

“Tell him we’re almost ready to bring it out,” she whispered.

Chase turned back to the chief with a grin. “One more minute.”

“I hope that’s all it is. I’m wasting away here!”

“What, they didn’t feed you enough in Warsaw, Chief?”

Stephen Brooks snorted. “Didn’t feed me enough of anything with taste. I’m healing, not ninety. My taste buds work just fine.”

“Tell me you didn’t give the staff a hard time, Dad,” Hannah said.

Her father winked. “Only the cute ones.”

Whoa, the chief reallywasin a good mood. Chase couldn’t help but laugh.

“Well, let me go find Noah so you can meet him,” Hannah said. “Maybe by the time I get him cleaned up, the pie will be ready.”

He offered her a smile as she rose from her seat. “Okay, peanut.”

“He’s on the back deck with Faye,” Chase told her as she passed by.

“Thank you.”

He nodded, then stepped into the room to keep the chief company while the others did their thing. The chief was propped up on a dining room chair that had been brought into the living room, his casted leg elevated and stubby bare toes peeking out from the end of his cast. The last time Chase had visited him in Warsaw, the chief had been all scowls. Today, he was all smiles.

“Did you know?” Stephen asked.

“That she was coming back?” Chase shook his head and knelt to give Rex a scratch behind the ears. “I was just as surprised as everyone else.”

“I’d nearly given up. Thank God for my sister.”

It seemed Hannah had fessed up about staying in touch with Faye. Chase was glad to see the chief taking that news well. Which he should, as it had apparently kept the line of communication open between Bourbon Falls and Hannah. “Faye is definitely one in a million.”

“And the boy?” the chief asked, his focus shifting the room’s large window.

“Sweet kid. Can’t imagine the hell he’s gone through, losing his mom to a long battle with cancer. Sounds like he and Hannah aren’t out of the woods yet.”

“No, it doesn’t.” The chief paused. “She’s grown up on us, Chase.”

“That she has, sir.”

“I’d love for her and Noah to be here in Bourbon Falls, with the rest of us. That’s the way it should be.” Stephen Brooks met his gaze. “You want them to stay, too.”

Not a question. Chase answered with a nod.

“Good, because it’s going to take a team effort to make that happen. And maybe some outside-the-box thinking.”

“Probably so,” Chase said.

Down the hall, voices sounded as Hannah ushered Noah into the front bathroom to wash “duck germs” off his hands. Chase grinned. He and Hannah had practically lived outdoors in the summers when they were kids, and rarely did they bother washing their hands except before mealtimes. Sometimes, not even then. Though, this was probably more about the boy being semi-clean when she introduced him to his future grandfather.

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