Page 45 of Chasing Shelter (Sparrow Falls #5)

I chuckled. “I think you’re looking pretty great right now.”

He shrugged. “My frogs are starting to fall.” One plopped onto the ground as if to punctuate his point .

“My main man,” Linc greeted, holding out his fist for a bump.

Benny’s gaze turned suspicious, but he tapped his knuckles to my brother’s. “Are you looking out for my girlfriend?”

Linc chuckled as he wrapped an arm around Arden. “I’m doing my best, but you know she’s hard to rein in.”

Benny beamed up at Arden as if she’d hung the moon. “You look beautiful, Miss Arden.”

“You are just the sweetest, Benny,” Arden praised.

“What about my hair?” the Eiffel Tower brunette asked, tugging Pippi Longstocking behind her.

“This is Isabella and Gracie,” Keely told me. “They do art with Auntie Arden.”

“I do, too,” Benny interjected.

Isabella huffed out a breath. “We know. Everyone knows because you never stop talking about how you’re Miss Arden’s favorite.”

Arden straightened at that. “I don’t have favorites.”

Linc leaned into her, whispering, “That’s not what you told me last night.”

Lolli let out a hoot as she approached, Nora in tow. “That’s my girl. Gettin’ herself some of the good stuff.”

“What’s the good stuff?” Keely asked, all innocence and curiosity.

“Lolli,” Trace warned, “we are at an elementary school.”

Lolli sent him an exasperated look. “Love, of course, my little pumpkin pie. Love makes the world go round.”

“And weed and diamond dicks, apparently,” Kye grumbled behind me.

“Kyler,” Fallon hissed.

Keely, clearly bored of the adults, joined a huddle with Isabella and Gracie, who hadn’t said a word. There was something about the girl’s soft quietness that tugged at me. And I didn’t miss how her gaze kept flicking to Kye behind me. He probably looked like a towering giant to her.

Benny turned his focus on Linc again, making a two-fingered gesture from Linc’s eyes to his. “Don’t forget, I’m watching you. ”

I looked up at Linc, trying not to laugh. “What’d you do?”

“He stole my girlfriend,” Benny announced. “Right out from under my nose.”

Isabella rolled her eyes. “You said you’re in love with Miss Anderson now. Which is it?”

My laughter came harder as Trace pulled me back to his side.

“A real Casanova, huh?” Trace asked.

Benny’s face scrunched. “A whatta?”

“He means you’re a ladies’ man,” Lolli said, moving into the group.

Benny puffed up his chest. “I’m a romantic .” He turned hazy eyes to Arden. “And Miss Arden will always be my first love.”

“Jesus,” Linc muttered. “I don’t stand a chance.”

Arden patted his chest. “It’s good that someone’s keeping you on your toes.”

Linc dipped his head and brushed his lips across Arden’s. “Pretty sure you do that every single day, Vicious.”

Keely looked up at the two of them. “Are you two bleep buddies?”

Everyone in the circle froze, slowly turning to the woman with a rainbow extension in her hair and a headband with little mushrooms springing off it…

And almost in unison yelled, “Lolli!”

Keely bounced up and down in her booster seat as we made the drive home from the elementary school. “Can I play with Bumper and Grem when we get home?”

“I think that depends on what plans your dad has,” I said, glancing at Trace.

“You might want to take off your horn first,” he suggested. “Bumper could think you’re a one-horned friend.”

Keely giggled. “Bumper doesn’t have horns. ”

“But her cousins do,” Trace warned.

Keely began singing some sort of made-up song about goats, and I twisted in my seat to face Trace. “Keely’s friends seem sweet.”

Trace shook his head. “I have a feeling that Benny is going to be trouble.”

A laugh bubbled out of me. “Pretty sure he has Linc running scared.”

One corner of Trace’s mouth kicked up. “It’s good for him.”

“What about Gracie? She seems a little quiet.”

Something passed over Trace’s face. “Not sure about the whole story there, but I get the sense her older sister is the one who mostly takes care of her.” His voice lowered so Keely couldn’t overhear.

“Fallon has been trying to get a better sense of what exactly is going on, but everything has checked out so far.”

My stomach twisted at the new information. If Fallon was getting involved as a social worker, Trace was concerned. “Let me know if there’s anything I can do.”

Trace sent a soft smile my way. “Got the biggest heart.”

“Sometimes.”

“All the time.”

I shook my head. “Sometimes, I’m cranky. And sometimes, I have a you-know-what list.”

Trace’s lips twitched. “How many times have I made that list?”

I laughed as we pulled into Trace’s driveway. “Only a couple. Mostly because it’s annoying how gorgeous you are.”

That had him grinning. “Good to know, Blaze. Good to know.”

I hopped out of the SUV and started toward the street. “I’m going to grab my mail and get Grem. Meet you in the backyard?”

“I’m going for Bumper,” Keely yelled, already running in that direction.

Trace let out a long sigh. “When are we moving that goat to her new home?”

“After I find her a friend. She’ll be lonely out there all alone,” I called as I opened my mailbox.

Trace gaped at me. “Now I’m taking care of two goats? ”

“Everyone needs a friend, Chief.”

I frowned as I pulled out the mail. There was a legal envelope on top with no name and no postmark. I flipped it open and pulled out a stack of what I thought were flyers. Only they weren’t.

They were photos.

Of me.

Sleeping.

In my bed upstairs.

Wearing the pajamas I’d worn two nights ago.

And whoever had taken them had been standing right next to my bed.