Total pages in book: 78
Estimated words: 78576 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 393(@200wpm)___ 314(@250wpm)___ 262(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 78576 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 393(@200wpm)___ 314(@250wpm)___ 262(@300wpm)
“I didn’t look at the menu.”
“Take a look now, or just order whatever you want.”
I blink. “I’d love a sidecar.”
“Good enough.”
When the flight attendant gets to us, Dave orders. “I’ll have a Knob Creek, neat, and the lady would like a sidecar.”
“Have you made your selections for your dinner yet?” she asks.
Dinner, right. I haven’t looked at that menu either.
“Maddie?” he asks.
“I’m sorry. I haven’t looked at the menu. Could you just tell me what there is?”
“Of course, mademoiselle. We have a lovely boeuf bourguignon or a chicken Cordon Bleu.”
“I’ll have the chicken, please.”
“Same for me,” Dave says, “and a glass of the Burgundy, please.” Then he turns to me. “I’m sorry, did you want wine?”
I shake my head. “I’m going to keep it to one drink.”
“Sounds good.”
A few moments later, my sidecar arrives, and I take a drink of the cocktail made with cognac, lemon juice, and a sugared edge. It’s always been one of my favorites. I finish, and when our dinners arrive, I ask for water.
Dave and I don’t talk a lot as we eat, which is fine. The chicken is great—another perk of this first-class ticket I didn’t pay for. You can’t go wrong with tender chicken breast stuffed with ham and cheese topped with a Dijon and white-wine sauce. Still, though, the nerves about the flight are there, and I only finish about half my dinner. Then I close my eyes, hoping to escape my anxiety.
And hoping that my dinner stays down.
Someone nudges me.
“Hey, Maddie.”
I open my eyes. It’s Dave.
“Baby, we landed.”
My vision is blurry. I blink a few times to focus. “Are you kidding me? I slept through the whole thing?”
Yeah, I did, because I have to go to the bathroom really badly. I’ll have to wait until we get off the plane at this point.
“You did. It was a totally smooth flight. No turbulence at all.” He lifts the shade on my window. “See? We’re here, Maddie. We’re in Denver. We’re almost home.”
I heave a sigh of relief. The plane is taxiing, and it stops when we get to our gate.
“I can’t believe it’s over.”
He grins. “See? I told you we were pre-disastered.”
I give him a good-natured swat in the arm. “Yeah, you did.”
We remove our seatbelts and gather our carry-ons. A few moments later we’re deplaning. Brock and Brianna are in front of us.
“All right,” Brock says. “On to baggage claim and then through customs. I’ve got a driver waiting to take us home.”
“Ugh,” I say. “A four-hour drive.”
“You’ll be comfortable, Maddie. We’ll be in a limo.”
I’ve been in more limos since this whole thing began than I’ve ever been in my life. Crazy stuff.
But I can’t think about any of it anymore.
I’m oddly awake, though, probably because I slept through the whole flight.
“What time is it?” I ask.
“It’s eight p.m.,” Brock says, “Colorado time.”
My stomach lets out a growl. “I’m kind of hungry.”
“Yeah, we’ll grab a bite before we take the long drive home.”
Dave whispers in my ear. “I’m kind of disappointed. You were asleep, so we couldn’t join the mile high club.”
“Dave, that’s really kind of gross.”
He smiles. “I sort of agree, but it seems like it should be a rite of initiation for one of the original three Rake-a-teers.”
I feel a hook catch in my heart. “So you still consider yourself a Rake-a-teer, huh?”
He shrugs. “We’ll see. For the right woman, I’m willing to give all that up.” He smiles at me again.
Chapter Fifteen
Dave
I live in the guesthouse behind my parents’ main house. Brad has his own place, built on our land, and Angie and Sage, who are still in college, live at home.
They’ve been called home as well for this big family meeting.
My alarm goes off at nine a.m. I’m exhausted. We didn’t get home until well after one in the morning, but the meeting is at ten sharp at Uncle Joe and Aunt Melanie’s house.
The entire Steel family will be there, even Diana, who drove home from her architecture internship in Denver.
I don’t know what to expect, but I have my suspicions that it has something to do with our newfound cousin, Pat Lamone.
He seems to be the missing link.
The grandson of Wendy Madigan and my grandfather, Bradford Steel, and the son of my new aunt, Lauren Wingdam—he’s the product of her rape by three men.
So he’s a Steel.
But he’s also responsible for drugging Diana her freshman year of high school. And he drugged Callie and Rory Pike, stripped them, and took photos of them in compromising positions.
The photos have been destroyed as far as we know, but only Pat knows for sure.
Then there’s Brittany Sheraton, the daughter of Snow Creek’s veterinarian, who helped Pat drug and violate the Pike girls. Her father, Dr. Mark Sheraton, unknowingly helped run a human trafficking business on Steel land in Wyoming.