Page 72 of Blue Norther
“Oh, absolutely not.” She waved the piece of bacon out in front of her like a baton. “It's a mess, and meant only for my eyes.”
“Are you writing a second chance romance?” My bottom lip slipped between my teeth as I winked.
She laughed. “I think we're writing one of those together, don't you?”
I nodded, placing my hand on her belly. “I think it's your best work yet.”
She sighed, but the flush that bloomed across the bridge of her nose told me she felt the same way. “After I'm done writing words that you are forbidden to see, I’d like to see the storage room, if you’re up for it. We don’t have to move things out, I just want to see what we’re working with.”
Fuck.I knew I couldn’t keep her away from that room forever. I just didn’t know if she was ready…
“Yeah, that all sounds great.”
Vi sat at the table, her laptop open while she typed like she was running out of time. I brought her over a glass of orange juice and got a smile as she gulped it down.
The eggs finished cooking just as I pulled our plates down from the cupboard. Vi gasped, and I whipped around, our plates clattering on the counter as I dropped them to get to her.
Her eyes were wide and watery, and I swear I watched as her normally flushed face drained of all its color.
“What is it?”
“He…he emailed me again. I don’t understand. No one should have this address.”
I turned the laptop away from her, my eyes running over every word. Trying to commit them to memory.
But I couldn’t, because they were already there.
“Violet. Holy shit. I can’t believe I didn’t think of this before.” Every nerve in my body buzzed as adrenaline dumped into my veins.How had I not seen it? How hadn’t Violet?
“What are you talking about?” she asked.
I pulled my phone out as I turned to walk through the house.
“Hey, Colt. Everything good?” Gage Walker, the cyber-security expert at Montgomery Defense, answered on the second ring.
“I need you to hack into my wife’s laptop and trace an email for me.”
“That…uh…I can do it, but I just need to know…is this my friend Colt, the Clarence County Sheriff’s Deputy asking, or is this Colt, the worried husband who is going to look the other way so I can get him some results?”
“The second one. You need to come over to do it?”
“Nope. I’ll access it from here. Just leave it connected to the internet. I’ll send you a text in a minute with the info I need from you, then just leave it to me, okay?”
“Thanks, buddy.”
“Anytime, man.”
Violet huffed up the stairs behind me as I hauled my ass down to my office.
“Colt?” She stumbled over my name as her eyes scrutinized every book on the shelf. Violet melted into me as my hands settled against her hips. The baby rolled as I pressed my hand against their little bum—or their head. I tried to remember how the doctor had said they were positioned when we were at the hospital.
“You have them. You have all of them?” Her books, every one that she’d published after our marriage fell apart, sat on display in my office. Even the special edition books, with commissioned artwork and painted edges, sat displayed on a shelf with their own lights to highlight them.
Stealing Hope.
Vanishing Dreams.
Finding Home.
