Page 35 of Colton's Secret Weapon
Daddy.
The name of old came to her. Called out of her toward him. Pulling him out of an abyss and back to her. She was there. Present. Helping him save the business that he loved.
Hold on, Daddy.
The words came to her, and from her, followed by a flow of conviction, of strength, so powerful that the sorrow left her being. Only for a few seconds. But for that brief time, she’d felt peace.
Grasping hold of the memory, she opened her eyes. Wiped her cheeks. And slowly stood. Holding on to that last impression she’d had, she finished putting together the breakfast casserole. Took the salmon out of the air fryer, wrapping it tightly for future salad use. Washed dishes while she waited for the lasagna to finish baking so the casserole could go in.
And heard Mitchell’s phone ring.
Snatching her hands from the soapy water, she grabbed a towel, dried them and grabbed up the phone. Saw Kansas’s name on the screen.
Just that.Kansas.
She pushed to answer. It wasn’t like she had time to run all the way upstairs before the call disconnected.
And he could be in the shower. She had no right to trespass there.
She said the first thing that came to mind. “Mitchell Colton’s phone. This is Dove St. James speaking.” She shivered, but remained otherwise calm.
“Dove? Where’s Mitchell? Is he okay?”
“He’s upstairs in the shower,” she said. At least that was her summation. She wasn’t going looking to find out.
“And he left his phone with you?”
“It’s my father you’re calling about, right? If not, I’ll hang up and have Mitchell call you back.” She’d just finished the sentence when she heard footsteps on the stairs. “Oh, hold on, he’s coming down now,” she said and held out the phone, impatient to give it to Mitchell so that she could hear whatever it was Kansas had called to say.
Life was hanging in the balance, and protocols still mattered. There was something comforting about that.
Expecting to see Mitchell dressed, she stared when he came down wearing a towel with a robe over it. “I heard you talking to someone,” he said, his expression containing a question and a bit of alarm.
Warming at his concern—even if it was just because he was a good man caring about humankind in general—she handed him the phone. “It’s Kansas.”
His instant attention to detail, the way his gaze firmed and he grabbed the phone to his ear, warmed her more. A sensation she clung to as she heard him give a couple of affirmatives but nothing more.
Trying to read anything from him, she failed. The robe, the towel, his bent head, she just couldn’t tell what was going through him. Tension, no doubt about that. Having her there at all was causing some of that.
With a “Thank you. Keep in touch,” he hung up.
And Dove, while scared and shaky, also felt a bit of a smile start to emerge inside her. They wouldn’t be keeping in touch if they’d found a body.
She didn’t say a word. Just watched Mitchell. Giving him time to formulate whatever would be forthcoming. Because he needed that. She didn’t.
“They found evidence of a skirmish just over the side of the cliff, on a fairly substantial-sized ledge. A couple of footprints, which the forensics team are on now. We’ll need your father’s shoe size, and as much as you can tell us about the footwear he had on the last time you saw him.”
“But no body,” she said. No body meant there was still hope.
“No body,” he confirmed. Studying her so long she felt a squirm coming on. “A body could have gone over, Dove. Itwasn’t visible from the top, but a search and rescue team has been dispatched to coordinates directly below.”
She’d already accepted that a body could have gone over. Didn’t mean it was her father’s. It could be whoever he’d been fighting with. “Signs of a skirmish are a good thing,” she said then. “My dad’s one hell of a fighter. You might not think so, given the way he hasn’t been taking care of himself since Mom died, but prior to that, for his entire life, he’s been focused on keeping himself strong and in the best physical shape possible. His freedom to do what he wanted depended on it. He’s still stronger than a lot of guys half his age.” She might be exaggerating a tad. She hadn’t actually seen her dad on a weight machine in over a year. But if she was off, it wasn’t by much.
“Then, we’ll continue forward with good thoughts for his return,” Mitchell said, still standing there, seemingly assessing her. Whether he really believed Whaler was dead or alive didn’t much matter to Dove. She needed him, his focus, on her, on St. James Boats, not on her father. She—and she was certain her mother’s spirit—had that one covered.
But she was only human. She faltered and fell prey to humanity’s greatest evil: fear.
Mitchell’s presence was needed to cover her. To keep her afloat while she held her father up. She fully believed that. Had seen proof of why he was there over and over in the past few days.
