A Place to Call Home by Jessica Berg

Author:Jessica Berg [Berg, Jessica]
Language: eng
Format: azw3, epub
Publisher: Independent
Published: 2020-01-15T16:00:00+00:00

Chapter 13

At six-thirty, Grace pulled into the long gravel drive. Her heart stopped. Two cop cars parked in the driveway, their emergency lights reflecting off the newly-painted house. Her eyes darted over to Dominick’s truck, and her heart stopped. What if something had happened to him? Not seeing an ambulance, her heart slowed slightly. She slammed the truck in park and jumped out. Phoebe clutched her hand.

“Whoa there, ma’am.” Grace whirled on a red-faced young cop. His nervous eyes darted from her face to the entrance of the house. “You can’t go in there.”

“I’m Grace McIntyre, and this is my sister, Phoebe. We own this place.” Taking a deep breath, she asked the question she wasn’t sure she wanted the answer to. “What’s going on here?”

“Someone broke into your house, ma’am, and well … they did a lot of damage. There’s a lot of blood …” The officer’s complexion drained of all color.

“Blood?” Bile rose in Grace’s throat.

Phoebe squeaked.

“The perpetrators left you a welcome present of a few disemboweled squirrels.”

She sank to the ground. The next thing she knew, familiar strong arms led her to the front porch steps. Too exhausted to fight the supportive embrace, she allowed herself a moment of weakness. Just a minute. Who would do this, and why? My house and those poor little squirrels. Her eyes snapped open, and her body sprang to life. “I gotta see it.”

“Shhh.” Dominick wrapped his arms tighter around her. “It’s okay. I’ve got it all taken care of. You don’t have to worry about a thing.” His finger wrapped around a lock of her hair.

“Where’s Phoebe?”

He jerked his head toward the cop car. Sitting on the hood, Phoebe leaned against Annie’s shoulder and breathed into a paper bag. “We all left around five. I got back to my house, realized I forgot my cell phone. When I got back here, the window was busted, so I called the cops.” He threaded his fingers through his hair.

“What am I supposed to do?” She struggled to regain control. When Dominick gently grabbed her bad arm to pull her toward him, she yelped in pain.

“I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“No, I overextended it today.” Facing her house, she straightened her shoulders. She wasn’t about to let some squirrel killers keep her from her dream.

She ascended the steps, entered the foyer, and burst into tears. Slashes of blood marred every wall in the main room. Ten squirrel carcasses hung from the ceiling by nails driven into furry little tails. Rage replaced fear. When she found the person responsible for this, she’d… she’d… she didn’t know what she’d do, but she knew it’d be painful and long-lasting.

Dominick’s footsteps sounded behind her. “Whatever you do, do not let Phoebe in here.”

“It looks like someone is trying to scare you.”

“Really? What gave you the first clue?”

***

Dominick squelched the hot retort. Her fighting stance and clenched fists trembling in rage broke his heart. His own anger rattled in its cage, shaking the bars for release. All he wanted to do was drive his fist through the perpetrators’ faces.

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