Du Rose Family Ties by Bowes K T

Author:Bowes, K T
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: murder mystery, cozy mystery, paradise lost, mystery and suspense, new zealand author, cozy romance, multicultural and interracial romance, small town charm, contemporary women fiction new zealand, ranching fiction
Publisher: K T Bowes

Chapter 32

Backbone

Leslie waved and screeched through the school gate, armed with Logan’s ute and his vulnerable credit card. Hana pushed the front door open and took her sleeping son upstairs, laying him in the travel cot and turning on the baby monitor. Then she went on the hunt for Caleb, figuring he must be on the ground floor somewhere. “I didn’t hear you come in,” he stammered, a guilty look on his face. He removed the boot of his cast from the low coffee table in front of him and muted the TV.

“I dropped the children at school and kindy. Leslie’s gone to the supermarket.” Hana sank into a wing-backed chair next to the sofa. “Are you hungry?”

Caleb nodded. “The fridge is empty, but I found bread and a few biscuits.”

“Yeah, sorry about that.” Hana eyed him with curiosity. “What happened at the hotel?”

The atmosphere crackled with tension as the teenager licked his lips and searched for a ready lie. Hana scented deceit before it passed across his lips. “Just lonely after you left.” He widened his eyes to puppy-dog proportions and turned on the charm as easily as flicking a switch. Robert Dressler’s huge personality filled the room as Caleb exercised the genetic code with precision.

Bile rose into Hana’s throat as she realised she’d been played, accommodating a stranger into the Du Rose clan without regard for her own children. The gap in her life left by Tama ached like a wound and she’d filled it with Caleb; but something in his blue eyes drove a warning into her heart like an arrow. Her expression hardened. “Tell me the truth or leave now.” No smile accompanied the command to soften the delivery and Caleb’s mouth opened in an unattractive gape.

“I just did! Nobody came to see me after you left and it got boring.”

“So where does Asher fit into all this?” Hana’s green eyes lacked empathy and she watched the boy baulk at this new, combative side of her nature.

“We hung out a bit is all. He knew my dad and told me some stuff.”

Hana snorted with disdain. “Yeah, I bet he did. Most of it would be make believe too. Bobby didn’t waste his energy on Asher Du Rose and you’d do well to copy him. That kid’s on the road to nowhere and he won’t stop until he runs into a mirror and sees his own reflection. He’s lucky he’s not in prison.”

Caleb shrugged, keen to end the conversation. “I thought he seemed fine.”

“Well, he isn’t.” Hana drove her point home and rose from her seat. Caleb’s body language reminded her of Bodie during his rebellious years and the memory induced a deep bone tiredness which made it hard to move one foot in front of the other. “I’ll get some wood and light a fire,” she said with a sigh. “This house is freezing.”

“It’s better than the streets,” Caleb muttered, determined to invoke guilt seeing as he’d failed at sympathy. Hana chose to ignore the veiled

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