small dynamo with blond pigtails, dashed in their direction. The little girl wore jeans, a ruffled cotton blouse and a pair of neon pink cowgirl boots—possibly the same pair Madison had appropriated—along with a broad grin.
Evidently, all was forgiven.
Madison wriggled out of her car seat and jumped to the ground while Daisy, excited, barked and scrambled around inside the Volvo.
“This is my mommy,” Madison told Becky, indicating Kendra, who stood beside the driver’s door in her working-mother outfit, a trim beige pantsuit, expensively tailored. “Mommy, this is Becky. She’s six already, but she likes me anyway, even though I’m only four.”
Becky stopped, looked up into Kendra’s face, squinting a little against the bright sunshine and said, “My mom is going to call you on the phone. She says both of you have to get to know each other a little before there can be any sleepovers for Madison and me.”
“I’ll look forward to hearing from your mom,” Kendra said, offering a hand. Privately, she thought Madison was still too young for sleepovers, but she didn’t want to cast a pall over the girls’ day by saying so now.
The child shook Kendra’s hand without hesitation. “Mom says,” she went on cheerfully, “that for all you know, we could be a family of ax-murderers.”
Kendra chuckled. “I doubt that,” she said, though she was a little taken aback by the graphic visual that came to mind. Becky’s family must have moved to Parable recently, because she couldn’t place them.
Madison waved at Daisy, who had wriggled into the front passenger seat at some point and was pressing her nose against the inside of the windshield, and waited politely while Kendra bent to give her a see-you-later kiss on the forehead.
“Be a good girl,” Kendra said.
Madison, young as she was, actually rolled her eyes in what appeared to be comical disdain. “I will,” she replied. “Mostly.”
“Try to do a little better than ‘mostly,’ please,” Kendra instructed, folding her arms and tilting her head to one side, letting her eyes do the smiling while her mouth pretended sternness.
Madison and Becky clasped hands, giggling, and ran toward the throng of children and playground attendants up ahead.
Kendra watched until they were safely enfolded in the group, then got back into her car, told a fretful Daisy that everything would be all right and drove off.
Deputy McQuillan was waiting on the sidewalk in front of her office, once again in full uniform.
Daisy growled at him, at the same time cowering a little.
“Good morning,” Kendra said with a businesslike smile.
McQuillan looked down at the little dog—for the briefest moment Kendra thought he might try to kick Daisy, there was so much distaste in his expression—then turned his attention back to her. “I’ve decided to get another real estate agent,” he announced bluntly. His eyes fairly snapped with suppressed fury.
Kendra shifted her keys from her left hand to her right and unlocked the office door, gently urging Daisy inside. The pup took refuge under the desk Joslyn used when she came in.
“That’s certainly your prerogative,” Kendra said with cool dignity, setting down her purse and keys. She took their listing agreement from her in-box and handed it across to Deputy McQuillan.
He tore the document into two pieces and threw them at her, before stalking out of the office and slamming the door behind him.
“That certainly went well,” Kendra told Daisy ruefully as the dog low-crawled out from under Joslyn’s desk, now that the coast was clear.
For the next hour, Kendra busied herself with routine tasks—reading and replying to emails, initiating and returning phone calls, and surfing the web for for-sale-by-owner listings in the surrounding area.
She came up dry that morning, though, and was thinking about locking up the office and playing hooky for the rest of the day when Walker Parrish came in again.
Daisy went right over to him, and he laughed as he bent to ruffle the dog’s ears in greeting.
“My friend’s decided she’d like to take a firsthand look at your house,” Walker told Kendra. Once again she thought how attractive he was, and marveled that he didn’t do a thing for her. “Casey’s on the road with her band until after the Fourth, but she says she could stop in for a quick look at the place late next week.”
“Not Casey Elder?” Kendra asked, surprised to find herself holding her breath for the answer. She’d dealt with a number of celebrities in the course of her job, and she wasn’t the type to be starstruck, but Ms. Elder