Page 26 of Before the Bond
I stood there for a moment. Then I ran back the way I came.
I didn't think about Elias again until I was almost at the east door.
Donovan was there, leaning against the frame with his arms crossed. He wasn't looking at me. He was looking past me, toward the tree line I'd just come from.
“You were past the perimeter,” he said. It wasn't a question.
“I stayed on the trail,” I said.
Donovan's jaw moved. His eyes finally came to me, and something in them was harder than usual. Not anger exactly. More like someone doing a calculation they didn't like the answer to.
“Did you run into anyone out there?”
I thought about Elias. His easy smile.
“A neighbor,” I said.
Something shifted in Donovan's expression. Controlled, but not fast enough.
Donovan said nothing for a long moment.
“Don't use that trail again,” he said finally.
Later that afternoon, I ran into a little surprise.
I was taking a break when Stella, from The Blackwater Tap, swung through the front door carrying a wooden crate of what looked like alcohol in her hands.
“Stella?” I called out.
Stella beamed the moment she saw me. “There you are!” she said. “God, I’ve been meaning to visit, but you know how barflies are. Can’t live without me, and all that.”
“What are you doing here?” I asked. My voice was louder than it had been in ages.
“I came to say hi,” she said. She tapped at the wooden crate.
“Sorry I haven’t been texting more,” I said.
“Oh, don’t worry about it.” Stella looked around the area, and then at me. She smiled. “This place definitely feels livelier,” she said. “No doubt because of you.”
Jake emerged behind me wrapped in a blanket like a large, cheerful burrito. “That’d be correct,” he said. “Hey, Stella.”
“Hey,” she said with a smile.
In a moment, Maureen came in as well and exclaimed, “Stella! Lovely to see you!”
“And you too, as always, Maureen.”
It occurred to me that Stella was more familiar with not only the town, but with the estate itself.
Stella deposited the crate into Maureen’s arms with the confidence of someone who knew exactly how welcome it was. “I bring supplies,” she said. “The estate’s reserve was looking pale.”
“It was perfectly adequate,” Maureen said, already carrying the bag toward the kitchen.
“Maureen. It was a 2019 Cabernet and two-thirds of a bottle of gin.”
“Perfectly—”
“Pale.”
