Page 29 of Dangerous December
At the sound of Carl’s familiar, crotchety voice, Dev straightened and looked over to find the old guy standing on the porch, his hands braced on the railing.
His dark mood started to lift at the sight of Carl’s perpetual scowl. “Feels good,” he called. “Join me?”
“Only if I want to die.”
Dev choked back a laugh. The old codger was as cantankerous as they came. “We can’t have that.”
Someone was sitting in the shadows of the porch and now stood to join Carl at the railing. Reva, he realized, when a beam of sunlight hit her pale face.
“If you’ve got a minute, we could use some help,” she called out.
He glanced at his sweat-stained T-shirt and muddy running shoes. “I’ll go change and be right back.”
“No need,” she said archly. “The attic isn’t the cleanest place around.”
He dutifully jogged up the porch steps and followed her and Carl up to the second floor. At the landing, Carl paused to catch his breath.
Reva marched around the corner and ascended the much narrower steps leading to the attic.
At the top, she flipped on a switch for the three bare light bulbs hanging from the rafters.
“I have a trunk and some boxes that need to go to my room, if you don’t mind. I need my fall wardrobe for an interview coming up.” She pointed them out. “While you’re up here, maybe you’d like to take a look at your parents’ treasures.”
Treasures. More like outdated clothing in mothballs, he guessed, but he dutifully followed her to the far wall of the cavernous attic, where stacks and stacks of boxes had been stored, along with a great deal of dusty furniture.
His childhood desk and bed. Why had his parents kept them?
The beautiful old dining-room set that had come from his grandmother Lydia’s home.
A surprising number of end tables and whatnots. Sofas and overstuffed chairs, and large, mysterious pieces that loomed in the shadows.
Reva lifted an eyebrow. “Did you know this was all still up here?”
“Not a clue,” he admitted. “I have no idea what to do with it all.”
“You’ll need furniture if you use the guest cottage. I don’t suppose you’d want to buy anything new, since you’re going back into active duty when you get done with us. Right?”
Her words slammed his thoughts back to his appointment this morning, when the doctor’s casual words had changed his future in the space of fifteen seconds.
She rested a slim hand on his shoulder. “I’m sorry—did I say something wrong?”
“No.”
Her thin, softly wrinkled face furrowed with concern. “I’m afraid you aren’t very convincing. I promise that we aren’t as hopeless as we might seem. Every one of usistrying to move on.”
“It isn’t that.” He shifted uneasily, hating the thought of discussing anything personal. Despising his own weakness.
But the worry in her eyes deepened and he had no choice but to elaborate just to reassure her. “I...was just thinking about my appointment at the VA, is all. I can’t get back into active service...quite as soon as I’d hoped.”
“Oh, dear.” Her hand fluttered at her throat. “I hope you’ll be all right. If there’s anything—”
“Nothing. Nothing at all.” He wheeled around, picked up her trunk, and started for the stairs.
“Wait—maybe you shouldn’t be carrying that after all,” she called out as she trotted after him. “I can handle it....”
So now his life had been reduced to hearing a fifty-something woman offer to carry a trunk because she thought he wasdisabled.
He gritted his teeth against the gnawing pain in his shoulder and silently continued down the stairs to the door of his parents’ second-floor master bedroom suite, where “Reva” had been engraved on a brass doorplate.
