Page 62 of Maverick Detective Dad
“Well, you can say theI love youright now,” Everly offered. “And I’ll say it right back to you.”
Noah smiled. Kissed her. “I love you.”
Everly managed to say her own “I love you, Noah Ryland” before he kissed her again and stole her breath.
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Keep reading for an excerpt fromMurder at Sunset Rockby Debra Webb.
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Murder at Sunset Rock
by Debra Webb
Chapter One
FireflyLane
Sunset Cove,Tennessee
Tuesday, June 6, 4:00 p.m.
Olivia Ballard’s fingers tightened on the steering wheel as she slowed for the final turn.
Firefly Lane.
She’d grown up here. At four, when her mother died, her grandparents had carried on with raising her. There was no one else. Her father had disappeared the year before. Olivia drew in a deep breath and made the turn that would take her home. Except was it really home anymore? Everyone was gone.
A fresh wave of tears burned her eyes. Her grandmother—Gran, she had called her—had passed away when she was only nine. Grieved herself to death, Willy, her grandfather, had explained. She never got over losing her daughter, her only child. As much as Gran had loved Olivia, and Olivia had no doubt that she had, her heart had been fractured beyond repair.
Pushing away the memories, Olivia focused on maneuvering forward. Somehow the long gravel road that cut through the thick woods seemed narrower than the last time she had visited. The thick canopy of trees blocked the sun, leaving the road in an eerie twilight. Half a mile later, the trees parted and the landscape opened up into a lush clearing, rich with the colors of nature. Olivia braked to a stop at the end of the road, which was actually the driveway. Willy’s cabin was the only house on Firefly Lane, and it sat at the very end. His land stretched from the road, several acres wide, through the dense forest, over the cliffs and spiraling downward to the world below. As a young girl, Olivia had dared to hike along that cliffside—too close, her Gran would say. Willy would chuckle and tell her to be careful.
Willy, she smiled sadly at the memory of the man she had adored and depended on for everything as an adolescent with no mother or siblings and no grandmother. Everyone had called him Willy—his name was William, after all. No matter how her gran had attempted to prod Olivia into calling him Grandpa or Papa, she had refused. He was Willy. Her father and grandfather all rolled into one. The man who took care of scraped knees and prom dresses and everything in between.
How could he be gone?
Grabbing her cell, Olivia emerged from her car. She tucked the phone into the pocket of her jeans and surveyed the yard. Willy had bordered a full acre around the cabin with a stacked stone fence nearly three feet high. She smiled and shook her head at the idea of just how many stones were required to build that fence. He’d teased her gran often, saying the stone fence was really more of a decoration—remembered from long ago visits to faraway places. Gran would remind him that she had agreed to spend the rest of her life in this mountain cabin of his, but only if he turned it into the cottage of her dreams.
To Olivia, it was very European. With the multitude of flower beds, there were more blooms than grass. A post-and-wire fence surrounded a vegetable garden that would be the envy of gardeners anywhere. Vines snaked up every possible vertical space, including the walls of the house. The place looked more like a hundred-year-old English cottage than a cabin in the woods of Tennessee. Her gran had spent decades creating exactly that look. Even as a little girl, Olivia had known Willy was right about the stone wall being decorative. But that touch had made her gran immensely happy, and Willy would have done anything for her.
