“That works,” Hannah said. She looked up and saw Brody. Her smile lit her eyes. She crossed the room and kissed him.
Brody kissed her back. “Hey there, counselor.”
Grant shoved his pencil behind his ear. “Are you two still coming for dinner?”
Hannah shot him a duh look she must have learned from Ellie’s teenage daughter. “Ellie’s grandmother is making macaroni and cheese. Who in their right mind would miss that?”
Grant grinned and grabbed his coat off a chair. “OK, then. I’ll see you in an hour.” He went out the back door. Hannah flipped the dead bolt.
She waved a hand over a set of plans on the plywood. “What do you think? My office will be here. This is a waiting area. Storage over here.”
“What are you going to do with all this space over here?” Brody pointed to the extra rooms on the other side of the house.
“I’m saving that for Grant’s office. I’ve just about talked him into starting his own contracting business. Now I just need to talk Ellie into quitting her job and coming to work for me.”
“About time.” Brody put a finger under Hannah’s chin and turned her to look at him.
“What?”
“Nothing. You look happy.”
“I am happy.” She kissed him. “Are you ready to go home?”
“Always.” Brody took her coat off the hook in the hall and held it for her.
She smiled, turned, and slid her arms in. He settled the coat on her shoulders, a similar memory of his grandparents choking him for a second. Hannah locked up, and they started down the sidewalk. “I can’t believe I’m walking home from work. Six weeks ago I thought I’d be spending most of December in Spain.”
“So you miss it?” He wondered, always, if she would tire of living in the suburbs. Tire of him.
“Not one bit.” She leaned against him. “I don’t know what I was looking for, but I found happiness here, with you. Maybe I wasn’t looking for something as much as running away. There were a lot of bad memories here.”
“Aren’t they still here?”
“Yes, but now we’re making some good ones to cancel them out.”
“I heard from Chet today,” Brody said.
“How is he? Has he had any luck?”
Chet was in Las Vegas. Detective Douglas hooked him up with a private organization that searched for missing kids. He was consulting and hoping to find some trace of his daughter. “No luck yet, but he hasn’t given up hope. There have been a few leads. He’s sober. He’s keeping busy, and he seems to have found some purpose helping families find their missing kids.” Hope, that’s what Chet had found in Vegas.
“That’s something.”
They walked to the house. Inside, Danno greeted them with a meow, looking over his shoulder and trotting to the kitchen. Hannah handed Brody her coat. “I’m coming.”
She followed the cat down the hall. Brody hung their coats on pegs and joined her in the kitchen. She opened the fridge and took out a small piece of leftover chicken. The old cat rubbed on her ankles as she handed him the meat.
“You’re going to spoil him.” Brody leaned on the wall.
“Yes, I am.” Leaning over, Hannah grinned and scratched Danno’s head. The old cat purred louder.
Eyeing her long legs and tight butt in her faded jeans, Brody walked up behind her and wrapped his arms around her waist. His lips cruised along her collarbone. “We have an hour.”
“Don’t you think of anything else?” She laughed, angling her head to give him better access.
He nuzzled the soft skin at the base of her neck. “Once in a while I have other thoughts, but I forget everything when you’re in the room.”
Just as Hannah had run from her hometown to escape bad memories, Brody had been running away when he left Boston. He’d thought he’d found happiness in Scarlet Falls, but happiness wasn’t a place. He could be happy anywhere as long as he was with her.