Page 12 of Shielding Serena

Until Lila’s quiet question about whether she’d been raped, she’d been brushing this off as a burglary gone wrong. Positive that steady, careful Garrett Hanson was overthinking this. Now she wasn’t sure of anything, and she didn’t like it. She’d made a life being in control at all times, and now everything had been turned upside down and inside out.

“I don’t know what to think about this.” She looked around the hospital waiting room, thankful they were the only ones here while they were having this discussion. Tongues would already be wagging all across town regarding the gaggle of emergency responders at the cafe. “Can I go back to The Menagerie so I can do that thinking in a familiar place?”

Garrett nodded, “Sure. Use the back door, okay? We’ve already ruled that out as an entry point. He came and went through the front door. Also, I need to confirm who has keys.”

The fact he thought her assailant had failed at getting in the back door, so had moved to the front was unspoken and loud as a shout.

“Only me, Madeline and Gena,” Serena said. “I can’t think of anyone who’d want to do this. My ex would never, ever even consider something like this, and we both know that Madeline made friends, not enemies.”

Garrett nodded. “Keep thinking on it, okay?” The mic at his shoulder squawked and he gave a quick motion of apology and answered. It was the dispatcher, calling him back to the office soonest. “I have to head out, but I don’t want to leave without knowing you’re going to be okay.”

“I can take you home,” Walker offered, his voice gone sober. He turned to the man she hadn’t been introduced to yet. “Kujo, you're welcome to come along or you can head up to the ranch if you’d like. You’ve got the coordinates in your GPS, right?”

The man--what kind of name was Kujo?--nodded. “I know how to get there. I’ll see you in a while.” He dipped a nod in Serena’s direction and turned and walked away.

Walker turned back to her, his expression so earnest it started melting away her reservations before he spoke a word.

“I’m sorry if you think we were being high handed. I know I’m speaking for both of us when I say that wasn’t our intent. On that note, I really believe it’s best for you to come stay at the ranch, even only overnight while you consider your options and we make sure you don’t have any long-lasting medical implications.”

Garrett interjected. “Do you have a girlfriend you could stay with? I don’t want you to think your only options are to go with Landry,” he said. “But I do want you staying the night with someone, as I’m sure Doc Pearson said. And I’d like to have one of my deputies sit surveillance at your place tonight to see if he comes back. It’d be better if you considered closing tomorrow morning as well.”

Dammit, everything the two men were saying was so reasonable that she felt silly for pushing back. But it was all moving a little too fast for her liking, even if it did make sense.

Regardless of where she stayed overnight, at least it wouldn’t be here at the hospital.

Serena thought about asking to stay with Gena and Carmen but knew they were already bursting at the seams with the three of them.

She’d been so consumed with recreating The Menagerie into what she’d had in her head that she hadn't really taken the time to acquaint herself with any other women in town. Hadn’t created a girl group other than Lila and Gena, who were also hella busy.

She’d dived into the work all day before going upstairs to sleep at night and started all over again the next day. Between the renovations and making the rounds with free coffee and pastries, she simply hadn’t had the time.

Despite every intention to the contrary she’d become her father. Sacrificing all for business. The apple apparently didn’t fall far from the tree.

“Let me think about it on the way to the house. That way I can grab some clothes while I look to see if anything is missing.”

Garrett nodded in agreement as they followed Kujo through the emergency room doors and into the spring morning. “Let me know if you find anything, and I’ll be there right away to document it.”

Even as she climbed into Walker’s big pickup, she knew what her decision was going to be. She was going to go to this ranch, at least until Garrett decided it was safe to return home.

CHAPTER 7

Walker pulled into the now-empty parking lot of The Menagerie and shut off the truck’s engine. He scanned the building, taking a moment to really look at it now that he wasn’t having a heart attack over an assailant fleeing.

The building was still the warm yellow of his youth, trimmed in terracotta red reminiscent of the mountains of Sedona a few miles away. The iron fence still enclosed the half-acre grounds, topped by fleur de lis, copper finials and colorful old glass electrical insulators, along with whatever else had struck Madeline’s fancy. The lawn area between the fence and the house was really another kind of parlor. It was filled with art, of a sort, though he would suppose that some people would call it junk. But even he, who didn’t have much of an artist’s eye, thought it had whimsy.

It was also safe enough from a tactical standpoint. None of the art was large enough to hide someone lying in wait.

He turned to Serena who sat silently by his side while he assessed the building.

“Where’d you get the art?” he asked, ready to assuage his curiosity now that he’d visually secured the front of the house. He was a bit disappointed in himself that he hadn’t asked before now. A friend would have. “I don’t remember seeing it when we were building the ranch and came into town to resupply.”

She looked at him with an appraising glance, one he wasn’t used to seeing from her, even back in the day. She was thoroughly taking his measure.

“What?” he asked, wondering if she’d read his mind and was judging him.

“Sometimes people don’t see art, they see scrap. A bunch of that welding is from one of the students at the high school,” she said. “And those totems over there?” she gestured off to the right of the front door where the trio of three-foot-tall spindles stood, resembling stacked rocks and smooth ceramic and twisted metal. He nodded, so she continued. “Those were a collaboration between the ceramic shop downtown, the welding class and the hiking group sponsored by the Red Rock Coalition, one of the nonprofits that’s trying to keep a bunch of the red rock land out of the hands of developers. It made sense to approach them when I decided to make over the business. Fostering a bit of an alliance, if you will.”

That made sense to him. Even though it might seem completely opposite his military training, he’d seen enough of the world to know that art mattered. It mattered a lot. It pulled together cultures and income levels; it helped people celebrate and made them think. But he didn’t need to tell Serena that, since she already knew.