Shrouded in the Smokies by Lena Diaz

Author:Lena Diaz
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 2023-04-24T16:27:40+00:00

Chapter Fifteen

Trent tossed his napkin on top of his plate and set his coffee cup beside it. Across the breakfast table from him were Skylar and Ivy. Skylar was a bundle of nerves, moving her food around her plate but rarely eating any of it.

“If you don’t like the waffle, I make a mean breakfast sandwich. The rental company stocked the kitchen with pretty much everything you could want.”

“No, thanks. You already made exactly what I asked for, which is super cool by the way. I love a man who cooks.”

He grinned and Ivy chuckled. Skylar’s face flushed a light pink.

“Good to know,” he said. “But obviously there’s something wrong with my culinary skills today. You ate about two bites.”

“It’s not the food, believe me. I’m nervous. When is the video conference with your team going to start?”

Ivy stood and moved to the archway between the dining room and family room. “If that’s a complaint that I took too long setting things up, you can blame Callum. I got everything on our end going long ago. He somehow managed to mess up the state-of-the-art equipment in our headquarters conference room. It took Brice over an hour to straighten it out.”

“I can hear you talking about me,” Callum called out through the speakers in the other room.

“Oh, good,” Ivy called back. “Brice obviously hasn’t let you touch the equipment again. The sound’s still working.”

Callum swore.

Ivy laughed and turned back toward Trent and Skylar. “The gang’s all here, or there, I guess. On the TV. Ready when you are.”

Trent arched a questioning brow at Skylar. “Ready?”

She pushed back her chair and stood. “I’ve been ready since the sun came up this morning. I’m dying to know what everyone has found out.” She grimaced. “Bad choice of words.”

Ivy headed into the family room. Trent circled the table and took Skylar’s hands in his. “It’s going to be okay. We’ll do whatever it takes so you don’t have to hide for the rest of your life.”

She nodded, but didn’t seem convinced. “Thank you. If nothing else, meeting all of you and getting to talk to people again has been wonderful. Helps me not feel invisible anymore.”

The forlorn look on her face was his undoing. In spite of his determination to keep things professional between them, he couldn’t resist the impulse to pull her into his arms and cradle her against his chest. And when she immediately put her arms around his waist and sank into his embrace, he didn’t care that his team could see them through the archway via the camera that Ivy had clipped to the top of the TV.

Skylar mattered. And she needed to know she mattered, and that he cared what happened to her. His team needed to know that too. He wanted them to work their tails off on this case, no matter what it took. He wanted it solved and for Skylar to have a chance at being truly happy and safe.

A delicate clearing of someone’s throat sounded from the other room.

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