Home by Dark. Marta Perry

child.

      Well, she’d wanted to know why Amanda had left the place to her, and now she did. She could hardly complain if the answer wasn’t to her liking.

      * * *

      “I’M HOME.” Colin figured the announcement was hardly needed, since Duke, Dad’s elderly black lab, had given his customary woof of welcome and padded over to receive a thump on the back.

      But there was no answering call from the kitchen or the study. “Where is he, Duke?” Colin walked back the hall toward the kitchen, poking his head into the study and laundry room en route, his pulse accelerating as each place he looked turned up empty. Duke padded after him, head down, as if accepting blame for his master’s absence.

      Colin opened the back door for a quick look at the yard, but his father wasn’t dusting the rose bushes or checking out the young tomato plants in the garden. Colin stood for a moment, hand gripping the knob.

      Okay, think. Don’t panic. If his father had fallen somewhere in the house, Duke wouldn’t be trailing along at Colin’s heels. That meant Dad had gone out.

      “Did he go for a walk without you?”

      Colin must be losing track of his mental facilities himself, standing here questioning the dog as if expecting an answer. Dad was an inveterate walker, but he ordinarily took the dog with him, and that fact provided Colin with a minimal measure of assurance. If Dad forgot why he’d gone out or how to get back home, something that happened at times, Duke could be relied on to pilot him safely home.

      “Stay, Duke.” Leaving the dog sitting forlornly in the living room, Colin headed out the front door. He’d take the car and do a quick spin around town. No doubt he’d find his father walking casually back from the coffee shop. There was no need for the apprehension that prickled along his skin.

      Rachel would hardly credit it if she could see him now, he thought wryly. In her eyes, he was obviously still the hell-raiser who’d turned his parents’ hair gray. She’d never believe he could be as panicked over his seventy-year-old father as she must sometimes be over her nine-year-old child.

      He’d nearly reached the car he’d left in the driveway when another vehicle pulled in behind his. Jake Evans, driving the battered pickup he’d had since college, came to a stop. Dad sat next to him, frowning a little with that faintly lost look he’d worn so often since Mom’s death.

      “Hey, Colin.” Jake slid out, going around and opening the passenger-side door before Colin could get there. “I ran into your dad down by the antique shop and gave him a lift home.” The look he sent Colin suggested there had been more to it than that, but whatever it was would keep until his father was out of earshot.

      Colin nodded, caught between gratitude and grief—gratitude that most people in Deer Run seemed to accept his father’s mental lapses with kindness, and grief that his father, always so sharp and in control, had to rely on others just to find his way home.

      “Why didn’t you take Duke with you, Dad?” He attempted to take his father’s arm, but Dad pulled free with a sudden spurt of independence.

      “Didn’t feel like it,” he said shortly, his lean face showing irritation. “I don’t need Duke to babysit me, you know.”

      Don’t you? Colin suppressed the thought. “Maybe not, but you know how hurt he is to be left behind.” Colin turned to Jake. “You should have seen that dog when I came in, head hanging like he’d done something wrong and couldn’t figure out what it was. Come on in. There’s probably some cold beer in the fridge.”

      “Sounds good.” Jake fell into step with him, his faded jeans and frayed Lafayette T-shirt an ironic comment on having been recently named one of the area’s most eligible bachelors by a regional magazine.

      “So, you have to beat the ladies off with a stick since that article came out?” Colin couldn’t resist needling Jake just a little.

      “I should have known better than to speak to that reporter.” Jake pulled the brim of his ball cap down as if hiding his identity. “I wouldn’t have, but the senior partner insisted it was good publicity for the law firm.”

      Colin grinned, appreciating the comment for the joke it was, since the senior partner in question was Jake’s father. “You sure he’s not just trying to get you married off?”

      Jake shuddered elaborately. “Please, don’t say that. He reminds me every other week that I’m not getting any younger, and my mother sighs and says that all her friends are becoming grandmothers, and why can’t she?”

      Why indeed? Colin’s heart cramped at the thought of his own mother. If she’d cherished dreams of grandchildren, he’d never known it.

      In a few minutes they were settled in chairs on the back porch, cold cans in hand. His father, having apologized to Duke for leaving him, walked down to inspect the garden with the dog at his heels.

      “He can’t hear us. What happened?” Colin focused on the beads of moisture that formed on the can, not wanting to see the sympathy in Jake’s brown eyes.

      “Nothing too bad,” Jake said easily. “I happened to be passing the antique shop when I spotted him. I figured you didn’t know where he was, so I offered to drive him home.”

      He gave Jake a level glance. “There’s more, right?”

      Jake shrugged. “Your dad thought he recognized a bureau as belonging to his mother. Wanted it sent home right away. If Phil Nastrom had been there, he’d have known just how to handle it, but he wasn’t. The clerk was a spotty teenager who wouldn’t know a bow-front dresser from the kitchen sink, and he was getting a bit riled. I had a word with him. That’s all.”

      It took an effort to unclench his teeth. “Right. Thanks, Jake. I’ll speak to Phil.”

      “No problem. And you don’t need to worry about Phil. Or any of the other old-timers in town, for that matter. They know and respect your dad.”

      “Yeah.” He wasn’t sure whether that made it better or worse. “Look at him.” He gestured to his father, who was tying up a tomato plant that had sagged away from its stake. “Much of the time he’s fine. It’s bad enough that he had to give up the business. I can’t take away his freedom, and he won’t hear of having anyone else in the house to look after him.” It kept Colin awake at nights, wondering what he was going to do when his father got worse, as he inevitably would.

      “It’s rough.” Jake’s voice was rough, too, with the slight embarrassment guys felt when sympathy was required. “Guess it’s part of life, reaching the point that we have to take care of the parents. It just hit you earlier than most of us.”

      Colin nodded. There wasn’t much else to say, and he’d do what he had to do. Right now he’d better change the conversation. It was getting downright maudlin.

      “I stopped by to visit Rachel Mason today. Have you seen her since she got back?” he asked.

      “No, we did most of our business in winding up the estate via emails and phone calls.” Jake set the can down on the porch floor. “I guess either Dad or I should stop to see her, since we represented old Mrs. Mason. How is Rachel doing?”

      “Okay, I guess.” Actually, he doubted it, but it seemed disloyal to say too much negative. “She’s trying to fix the house up to run it as a bed-and-breakfast. Seems to me she’d be better off selling for whatever she could get. What possessed Amanda Mason to leave her that white elephant?”

      “If Amanda heard you she’d be turning over in her grave.” Jake grimaced. “There’s a gruesome thought. The woman scared me to death, I don’t mind telling you. Dad did most of the dealing with her, thank goodness. The one time he took me along to introduce me, she looked at me as if I’d crawled out from under a rock.”

      “She probably remembered you as one of Ronnie’s cronies, leading her lily-white boy into trouble.”

      “She