Cavanaugh Strong. Marie Ferrarella
he was just talking. She hadn’t really expected the man to actually show up. Especially to a stranger’s funeral.
Before she could say anything to let her grandmother know that their party had just increased by one, Lucy’s keen radar for good-looking men had alerted her to the tall, broad-shouldered young detective’s presence.
Noelle heard her grandmother take in a deep breath, heard the low murmur of appreciation as it fell from her tongue and felt Lucy suddenly straighten up as if an additional twenty to thirty years had just mysteriously melted away. Considering that Lucy already looked a decade younger than she was, that just about made the two of them practically the same age, Noelle judged.
“And whose tasty little morsel is that?” Lucy asked under her breath.
The question was a rhetorical one. Consequently she looked at Noelle in utter surprise when she heard her granddaughter inadvertently say, “Mine.”
Lucy’s eyes widened. And was that a spark of admiration she detected there? Noelle wondered.
“What?”
That had come out all wrong, Noelle thought, upbraiding herself. Why in heaven’s name had she said “mine”?
“I mean, I know him,” Noelle amended. “He works with me.”
At this point, Duncan had seen her and her grandmother and was now striding across the field toward them. He reached them in less than a heartbeat. She’d be the one to know since she was suddenly acutely aware of her own.
“Oh, good, you’re here,” Duncan said to her with more than a touch of relief. “I was beginning to think I’d gone to the wrong cemetery or got the time mixed up.” And then, very smoothly, Duncan shifted his attention from his stunned-looking partner to the petite woman standing beside her. “You didn’t tell me you had a sister, O’Banyon.”
“And you didn’t tell me your partner failed his vision test,” Lucy responded, never tearing her eyes away from what she viewed to be a fine specimen of manhood. “I hope they had the good sense to take away your gun, boy,” Lucy told him drolly.
“Feisty,” Duncan observed with an approving nod and a wide smile to match. “I see now where Noelle gets it from.”
In the six months they’d been together, Noelle had never heard Cavanaugh say her first name. Why the sound of it sent a warm, inviting ripple down her spine made absolutely no sense to her, but now wasn’t the time to dwell on it or to ponder why.
“And what is your name?” Lucy asked, her sharp blue eyes pinning the young man in place and devouring every available detail about him. Despite her age, Lucy missed nothing.
“Detective Duncan Cavanaugh, ma’am,” he said, giving her his full name.
Deliberately ignoring the fact that Amanda, the volunteer from the home, was making her way toward them to obviously join the tiny circle, Lucy turned so that her attention was strictly on the young man who had just introduced himself.
“Well, not that I don’t appreciate the company of a good-looking young man, Duncan Cavanaugh, but just what is it that you are doing here? Have you come to whisk Noelle to the scene of some crime?”
“No, ma’am, I have not. I thought that maybe you and O’Banyon here might like to have some company as you say your final goodbyes.” By saying “you and O’Banyon” he really meant the older woman, but he had a feeling that she wouldn’t appreciate any references that would make her appear to be vulnerable.
“Oh, you did, did you?” Lucy asked, slanting a glance at her granddaughter before focusing back on the young man before her. “Well, that was very thoughtful of you, Duncan.” Glancing around Duncan’s muscular frame, Lucy nodded toward the casket that had been set up beside the hole that the groundskeepers had dug for it the day before. Henry’s final resting place. “Right now,” she prompted, “I think we’d better get over there before that minister decides to charge me overtime.”
Duncan laughed. “Can’t have that now, can we?” So saying, Duncan offered his arm to the older woman.
Noelle’s eyes met his as she shook her head, trying to warn him off before Lucy’s tart tongue told him what he could do with his arm and his assumption as to her frailty.
To her utter amazement, her grandmother not only didn’t take off his head, snapping that she was perfectly capable of walking unassisted by some whippersnapper, but Lucy actually slipped her arm through Cavanaugh’s and proceeded on to the grave site, blending her footfalls with his.
Or vice versa, Noelle silently amended.
As if reading her mind—not to mention noting her surprise—Duncan glanced over his shoulder at her and smiled broadly.
It was that same half sexy, half enigmatic smile that he’d flashed at her the other day. She had no idea what to make of it, then or now, only that she wished he’d refrain from aiming that smile in her direction. Each time he did, rather than grow progressively more immune to it, she found herself becoming more susceptible to it.
As Lucy, Duncan and she settled in around the perimeter of what was to be Henry’s grave, there was no possible way of avoiding the volunteer from the home any longer.
Especially since the woman made a point of taking Lucy’s hand and squeezing it as she told her, “I see you made it.”
Lucy seemed insulted by the simple, five-word sentence. Venting her displeasure, she looked at the other woman and asked, “What was your first clue?”
“Lucy,” Noelle admonished, infusing her grandmother’s nickname with a warning note.
To her relief, Lucy looked just the slightest bit contrite. Undoubtedly, it was done strictly because Duncan was present, but she had always made a point of taking what she could get.
Uttering a short laugh, the woman waved a dismissive hand at Lucy’s comment. “That’s all right. I don’t get offended easily.”
“Too bad,” Lucy commented, keeping her eyes straight ahead and focused on the minister.
The latter took that as his cue to ask, “Will there be any more coming?” He directed his question to the woman who had sought him out on the spur of the moment on Saturday and retained his services for her friend’s unexpected demise.
Lucy raised her chin. Noelle’s heart quickened when she saw tears shimmering in her grandmother’s eyes as she focused on the reason they were actually here.
“Actually, Reverend, this is twice as many people as I thought there’d be,” she told him. “Sorry, Henry,” she whispered, then looked at the minister and said, “You may start.”
The minister nodded and took out a small, worn black book of prayers. Leafing through it, he found the passage he wanted.
The sky above them was a bleak shade of gray, the perfect color for a funeral, as Reverend Edwards recited several brief prayers that seemed rather suited to the occasion.
When he was finished, the minister closed the small book and returned it to the deep pocket he’d kept it in. Scanning the faces of the four people standing on the other side of the grave, he said, “If anyone would like to say something regarding the deceased,” he said, glancing from one person to the next, “now would be the time to do it.”
Since she had only met Henry once and, to her knowledge, Cavanaugh and Henry had never crossed paths, Noelle thought that the only one who was actually qualified to say something about the recently departed man was Lucy.
Leaning in toward her grandmother, she coaxed her, murmuring, “Go ahead, Lucy.”
The next moment she, Duncan and especially Lucy were surprised that Amanda stepped forward, taking the minister up on his invitation.
“I met Henry on my first day as a volunteer at the Happy Senior Retirement Home,” the woman began, and in a steady, even cadence, she went