pack there was a thump as the trunk closed and she walked past the driver’s window carrying a lockbox and the holster. She jogged up the steps in her bare feet, paused, then knocked on the door.
A few seconds later, the door opened, and a tall man with a broad but saggy build that spoke of years of too much beer and not enough exercise filled the doorway. Even with Lacey about as far away from the glossy New Yorker he’d first met, Victor could not see a single similarity between them. Nothing to indicate they were blood relations, let alone father and daughter.
Lacey said a few words and handed over the gun and accessories. A couple more words. Then she stepped back as if to go. Not a single touch between them. Not the smallest gesture of affection.
The man said something, and Lacey shook her head. The man spoke again, giving a grizzled frown as he gestured toward the car.
This time as Lacey shook her head, her posture went ramrod straight. Another exchange and Lacey’s shoulders bunched up toward her ears.
Victor’s whole body coiled as if he was waiting for the starting pistol for a race.
The man stepped forward, and Victor was out of the car, his strides eating up the distance to the saggy porch before he even registered the sound of the car door slamming behind him. “Is everything okay?”
Lacey and her father had both turned toward the sound of the door. Lacey’s father’s hand was around her upper arm. It didn’t look like it was a tight grip, but Victor’s fingers still itched with the desire to slap them away.
“Who are you?” Lacey’s father barked the words, and it was impossible to miss the way his eyes darted down to the box in his hands as if calculating how quickly he could get it open and a gun in his hands.
“It’s fine, Dad. He’s a colleague. We’re traveling together.” Victor couldn’t read Lacey’s flat expression and had no idea if he’d just made things worse or better.
But here he was. “Victor Carlisle. Mr. O’Connor. Sir.” At least he hoped that was his name. Victor gave the man a nod from the bottom of the steps.
“Jim.” Lacey’s father shifted the gun box to one hand and stepped forward, hand outstretched. Victor took the steps in a bound and accepted the solid handshake. The man eyed up his scar with interest but didn’t ask any questions.
“You hold any sway with my daughter, young man?”
He didn’t even need to look at Lacey to be pretty certain about the expression that would be on her face. “Your daughter is her own woman, sir. I’m just along for the ride.” He wasn’t getting in the middle of this. And whatever it was, he was Team Lacey all the way.
Especially with the unbroken expanse of rural Minnesota to hide a body fresh in his mind.
A hint of approval glinted in the man’s eye. “Do you have siblings, Victor?”
“A brother, sir.”
“Well, I was suggesting my daughter might want to stop in on her sister before she leaves town. Seeing as she rarely makes it this way.”
“And, like I said, we have a flight we need to make tonight, and we’re already cutting it close.” Something tightened in Victor’s chest at her casual use of we. Even though he knew it was nothing more than the most neutral use of a plural pronoun.
“And like I said, Betsy will be hurt if she hears you’ve been in town twice in a week and didn’t stop by.”
From the way Lacey bit her bottom lip and shifted on her feet it didn’t take a genius to work out her relationship with Betsy was almost as complicated as his was with Peter.
Victor stayed silent.
“I’ll think about it, okay. No promises. But for us to even have a chance, we need to go now.”
“You’re not even going to even say hi to your mother?”
“She’s got two packages out here. You should take them to her.” Lacey stepped back and shoved the packages into the doorway at her father’s feet. “I’ll get someone to come around and do a quote on painting the house.”
“You don’t have to do that. I said I’ll get around to it.” But the way her father diverted his gaze and leaned down to pick up the first package and move it into the house said everything.
Victor’s gaze tracked over the man’s shoulder and into the hallway that ran down the middle of the home. The