“You sent me a birth announcement.”
“Thanks for the congratulation.”
“Did you expect one?” His brother’s voice hardened.
“No.” Shit. He bent his head and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Maybe hoped.” His own voice had come out rougher. “Whether you know it or not, I’ve missed you.”
It was so long before Conall responded, Duncan thought he’d lost him. No, I lost him twenty years ago, when I had to rein him in. Become the father he didn’t want.
“You think I don’t know what you did for us?” Tension threaded every word. “Of course I do. That doesn’t mean I have to like you.”
God. Damn. Duncan hadn’t hurt like this in a long time, not since he’d almost lost Jane before he could even tell her he loved her. He had to swallow before he could say with relative calm, “No, it doesn’t.”
“Oh, hell.” Conall sounded ragged. “I didn’t mean to say that.”
“It’s okay.”
“Listen, I have to talk to you about this investigation. Can we keep it to that?”
“Sure. Do you want to have coffee somewhere? Or shall we meet up on a deserted road?” he added dryly.
“No. It would look best if I do come to your house. Gives me an excuse to be in town.”
That ticked Duncan off some. Good to know he was worth something to this brother he’d raised from age twelve on.
“Fine.” He gave Conall his address. “Jane and I don’t go out much. I’m home by six most nights.”
“I’ll make it this evening.”
“Fine,” he said again, and hung up the phone.
He sat there for a long time, unable to decide how he felt about Conall’s call. Or maybe what he couldn’t decide was which emotion was paramount. Anger? Hurt? Resentment? Or the astonished gratitude that might even have been happiness, because he’d heard Conall’s voice again. He was going to see him.
Tonight.
He looked at the computer monitor and realized there was no way in hell he could concentrate on impoundment procedures now.
What he was going to do was take an extra early lunch and go spend time with his wife and baby girl.
* * *
CALLING NIALL WAS ANTICLIMACTIC. Conall almost didn’t, almost put it off until tomorrow. But he didn’t want his middle brother to hear from Duncan that he was in town. He and Niall had been…friends, maybe, for too long. Niall was the only family Conall had accepted after he left home. It was bad enough that Niall had cooled toward him since his wedding last fall. The one Conall had failed to show for.
He didn’t have to identify himself. Niall listened in silence to his brief explanation of his presence in Stimson.
“You’re in town” was said in disbelief.
“Weird but true.” He was actually sitting outside on Lia’s porch, on an Adirondack chair painted a glossy, cherry red.
“Does Duncan know?”
“Yes.”
Niall made a sound that might have been a laugh, might have been a grunt. “You planning to meet with him face-to-face?”
“I’m going by his place tonight. If anybody hears I’m in town, they need to think it’s to see the two of you. There can’t be any talk about this operation.”
“You’ll meet Jane.”
“Yeah.” Conall made himself say it. “I want to meet your Rowan, too.”
“I haven’t told you she’s pregnant. We, uh, didn’t want our kids too far apart in age.”
Our kids. He must be talking about Rowan’s two. And a baby. Another little MacLachlan. This was getting surreal, Conall thought. His brothers had gone and turned into average joes. How had that happened?
“I’m glad for you,” he made himself say, “if that’s what you want.”
“It’s what I want.”
No hesitation. The coolness was still there, too, the one he’d heard ever since he called to apologize for ducking out on the wedding. He’d told himself Niall wouldn’t give a damn if he wasn’t there, but Conall knew even then he’d lied to himself. He hadn’t ever been the one who’d made the effort to stay in touch, although Niall and he had gotten close after their father went to prison and their mother walked out on them. After Duncan sacrificed too damn much for them and turned into a tyrant. No, Niall was the one who had made the calls in the first few years. Who’d flown to wherever Conall was a few times. The one who seemed to need the connection.
Sitting here on the porch, gazing sightlessly at the old barn and the pasture and woods that lay beyond it, Conall had an uncomfortable insight.
He’d needed that connection, too. Maybe needed it more than did Niall, who had held on to a relationship with Duncan. Conall hadn’t admitted it to himself, but he’d been grateful every time he heard his brother’s voice.
He had somebody. One person who cared.
And he hadn’t realized how much he cared.
This unexpected homecoming, he thought, was going to be a bitch.
CHAPTER THREE
LAST NIGHT LIA had come upstairs, knocked briskly and then set two covered plates on the floor along with a couple of cold beers. “Dinner,” she’d said then left. If she’d been a waitress, she wouldn’t get much in the way of tips with that attitude.
This morning Jeff had gone downstairs and come back reporting that she made damn good waffles. By the time Conall got down to the kitchen, it was apparently closed. He found cereal in the cupboard and called it good, eating a solitary meal in the dining room.
They’d fended for themselves for lunch.
Tonight, he didn’t want to show up at Duncan’s anywhere around dinnertime; he hadn’t been invited and wasn’t sure he’d have accepted if he had been. So when Henderson said, “I had a decent breakfast and you didn’t. Why don’t you go down and eat with them?” he nodded.
“I’ll bring something up if Lia doesn’t.”
He left Henderson scanning the neighboring property with a scope that had both night-vision and digital filming capability. So far, nothing had happened over there. Literally nothing. No one had so much as stepped outside, although someone had to be letting the dogs—turned out there were a pair of Dobermans—in and out, or was at least feeding them. Tomorrow Conall planned to do some prowling. He wanted to see the back of the property, too.
This view was ideal, but unfortunately the neighbors were keeping their blinds drawn. Shadows occasionally passed in front of the windows. Any vehicles were hidden in the triple car attached garage, which had a single window covered inside with what looked like a heavy tarp.
The dogs definitely complicated things. He or Henderson could have slipped a few listening devices beside windows or on the porch if they could have gotten close enough. Somehow he suspected the Dobies wouldn’t prove to be tail-wagging friendly.
You wanted a challenge, he reminded himself. Consider yourself lucky.
Conall went downstairs to find Sorrel setting the table. A baby had already been placed in the high chair. The little girl had spiky black hair and eyes almost as dark. Her cheeks were fat and she grinned at him with no inhibitions at all, banging a spoon hard on the tray in emphasis. He retreated hastily, going to the kitchen where Lia stood over the stove, from which really good smells emitted. She glanced