When Shadows Fall (Callaways #7) Read online

  If she wasn't so eager to get into Molly's diaries, she might have taken a walk, but since her time in San Francisco was limited, she didn't want to waste the afternoon. Not that it wasn't tempting to take a little time off; she'd been working a ton of hours the past several months—make that years—and she was a little burned out. She'd put everything else in her life on hold for a long time: family, friends, boyfriends…

  At some point she needed to have a whole life, not just a work life.

  But that wasn't going to happen today.

  She turned away from the window, grabbed her coffee and then curled up in the middle of the bed.

  The books were dated, and she had never been one to go out of order. Her mind was too analytical for that. She would start at the beginning, and then she wouldn't have to wonder if she'd missed anything.

  Molly's name was scrawled inside the first book, the childish handwriting not at all surprising given the date. Molly had apparently received the diary on her ninth birthday.

  Olivia settled back against the pillows and began to read. Three months in, she yawned. Molly's writings were mainly a boring recitation of her daily chores, homework assignments, and a cat named Franco who liked to sleep with Molly at night.

  One thing that resonated with Olivia was the fact that Molly was an only child. When Molly complained of being lonely and wishing she had a brother or sister to play with, Olivia felt like she was reading the pages from her own journal. While she'd enjoyed being the center of her parents' world, she'd also been jealous of her friends who had siblings.

  As she thought about family, her mind flashed back to the recent party at the senior center and the arrival of the massive Callaway clan. The room had filled with love and laughter as so many of Eleanor's family had come together to wish her a happy birthday. She couldn't imagine what it would be like to be a part of such a large family.

  Thinking about the Callaways also took her mind back to Colton. She'd been deliberately trying not to think about him, because he'd left her feeling a little rattled and off balance. She hadn’t had such a gut-clenching reaction to a man in a long time. And it had to happen with a fireman. Well, why not? He was good-looking, fit, sexy…the kind of man who didn't run away from danger but rather ran straight into it.

  She sighed. She might not choose to hook up with a guy like that, but she was a woman, and she wasn't blind or immune to a charming smile and a hot body. Not that Colton had given her much of a smile, especially not after she banged up his already injured hand and told him she was there to write his grandmother's story. He hadn't liked that idea at all.

  Frowning, she couldn't help wondering what the Callaway men were so afraid of.

  The fact that they didn't want her to talk to Eleanor or hear her story only made her want to hear it that much more. She'd always been that way. When someone told her she couldn’t do something, she wanted to prove them wrong. The Callaways had tried to warn her off, but they didn’t realize that warning her away was like waving a red flag in front of a bull.

  She smiled at the thought and then gave herself a mental scolding for daydreaming. She was supposed to be reading Molly's journal, but somewhere in between a litany of what Molly had had for dinner and what her best friend was wearing tomorrow, Olivia had allowed herself to get distracted.

  She reached for her coffee mug, but it was empty. Then she glanced at the clock on the bedside table. It was only four; too early for dinner and way too early to go to sleep. If she took a nap now, she'd be completely messed up. She just needed to gut out the next few hours so she could get rid of her jet lag and return to her normal schedule.

  She forced herself to focus on Molly's writings. She skimmed through the rest of book one and moved onto the second book and finally the third. She was halfway through the third journal, which took Molly from seventh grade to ninth grade, when Molly's world abruptly changed. On the way home from a second honeymoon, Molly's parents were killed in a plane crash.

  Today, my parents died.

  Olivia stared at the words Molly had written. The ink was smeared, probably from tears.

  Olivia flipped the page. The next one was blank, and so was the one after that. She went all the way to the end, thirty blank pages.

  No wonder. Molly's world had shattered. And she would have had no words to explain the horror of it all.

  Olivia set the journal down, knowing that Molly eventually started talking again, because there were two more journals in the stack, but she wasn't ready to move on yet. She was thinking again of how similar her own life had been to Molly's. She hadn't lost both parents, but she had lost her father, and in the same abrupt manner.

  She didn't want to think about that day, but the memories tugged at her brain. The last time she'd seen her dad had been the day of his murder. He was supposed to give her a ride to school, but she hadn't wanted to go with him. She'd wanted to go with her friends, with the boy she was interested in. So she'd said she'd see him later.

  And that was that. Later never came.

  Moisture filled her eyes, and she drew in a deep breath. It had been nine years, but it felt like yesterday.

  The hotel phone rang next to her bed, startling her with the unexpected sound. The only person who knew she was in this hotel was her mother, and her mom would call her cell phone.

  She picked up the receiver, thinking it had to be the front desk or housekeeping. "Hello?"

  "Miss Bennett?" a male voice asked.

  She sat up a little straighter. "Yes?"

  "It's Colton Callaway. We met at the Sunset Senior Center, the guy with the broken fingers, remember?"

  Her hand tightened around the phone. She couldn't believe the man she'd just been thinking about was calling her. "I remember. How did you know where to find me?"

  "You left your information with the director of the senior center. I told her I needed to talk to you, and she passed it along."

  "What do you want to talk to me about?" she asked warily.

  "My grandmother."

  She sighed. "Look, your grandmother is a grown woman. She gets to make her own decisions, and that includes who she wants to talk to."

  "She's sick, Miss Bennett. She can't make her own decisions. Can I come up and talk to you?"

  She tensed. "What do you mean—can you come up? Where are you?"

  "I'm in the lobby. They wouldn’t give me your room number. If I can't come up, will you come down?"

  She hesitated, debating her options for a long minute. Colton Callaway didn't seem like the kind of man to be put off by the lack of a room number or her reluctance to speak to him. If she didn't talk to him now, he'd probably be hounding her steps all week.

  In the end, her curiosity won out. She wanted to know what he had to say. "I'll be down in a few minutes."

  "I'll be waiting."

  Chapter Five

  As she hung up the phone, Olivia felt a shiver run down her spine along with a tingle of anticipation. She jumped off the bed and glanced at her reflection in the mirror. She made a face at her appearance, noting the tangles in her hair and the dark shadows under her eyes. She quickly put on a little blush and some lip gloss, ran a brush through her hair and swapped her leggings for a pair of skinny jeans. Slipping on her sandals, she grabbed her handbag and walked out the door.

  The hotel had a lobby bar that was warm and inviting, much like being in a living room. Colton sat at a table by the window drinking a beer. Aside from the man tending to the small bar, there was no one else in the room.

  She walked across the room and sat down next to him. "Hello."

  "Thanks for coming. Can I buy you a drink?"

  "I don't know. Will I be here long enough to drink it?"

  He suddenly smiled, and it changed his whole face. He went from angry and annoyed to sexy and charming. She had a feeling this side of him was going to be even more difficult to deal with.

  "I'm not in a rush. What can I get you?"

  "I'll have a glass of me
rlot, whatever they have."

  "You got it." He stood and walked over to the bar to get her drink.

  As he did so, she couldn't help but let her gaze follow him across the room. He moved with confidence. He had the kind of walk that said he was a man who knew what he wanted and where he intended to go. She'd always liked a strong sense of purpose in a man, but it scared her a little, too. She liked to be in control and to have the ability to follow her own path, which usually meant she took that path alone.

  This wasn't a date, she reminded herself, wondering why she felt so nervous and fidgety. She settled back in her seat as he returned to the table.

  He set down her glass of wine, then took a seat. "So, this is kind of strange," he began.

  "I'm glad you think so, too," she said, sipping her wine.

  "I don't usually do this."

  "Do what? Buy women drinks?"

  He smiled. "That I do. What I don't do is try to tell people how to do their jobs."

  "Then why start with me?"

  "Because my grandfather cornered me at the party earlier and asked me for a favor, and he never asks me for a favor."

  "I assume that favor has to do with me."

  "Specifically you. My grandfather would like you to leave my grandmother out of the book you're writing."

  "He told me that as well. I spoke to him right before I ran into you."

  "And what did you tell him?"

  "That I wasn't going to refuse to speak to his wife. I guess he didn’t like my answer, so he decided to bring in backup and send you over here."

  "He didn't exactly send me. He asked me to keep my grandmother away from you. I thought it might be easier if I just talked to you about the situation instead of playing a game of keep-away. I prefer to be more direct."

  She appreciated his candor. She liked being direct, too, but cynically she couldn't help wondering if his honesty wasn't just part of his plan to disarm her.

  "Tell me about your grandmother," she said. "I only spent about twenty minutes with her, but she had so much energy in her eyes and her voice. She lit up the room."

  "She's always been that way," Colton said, deep affection his voice. "She has a laugh that warms you from the inside out, like a shot of whiskey. But sadly, she doesn't laugh that much anymore. And some days she has no life in her eyes. She sits in a chair and stares out the window for hours on end. She doesn't recognize her husband of more than sixty years or any of her children or grandchildren. On those days we're strangers to her, and seeing her fade away is one of the worst things I've ever had to experience."

  Dark shadows gathered in his eyes, and she could feel the despair within him. "I'm sorry."

  "I know you didn't see that side of her today, and I'm happy about that. I keep hoping that the bad episodes will just go away, but realistically I know that won't happen." Colton rested his forearms on the table as he gazed into her eyes.

  She licked her lips at the intensity in his gaze. She couldn't remember the last time someone had looked at her with so much purpose. She just wished his purpose wasn't to get rid of her.

  "My grandfather thinks that talking about her life will upset my grandmother. He told me that agitation makes her blood pressure go up and that can sometimes trigger an episode."

  She nodded. "I don't want to do anything to hurt your grandmother. But I have to ask you something."

  "What's that?"

  "What are you afraid of? What do you think your grandmother is going to tell me?"

  "I'm not afraid of anything. I'm here at my grandfather's request. I told you—it's all about her health."

  "I don't think it's only about that."

  "Of course it is. My grandfather is incredibly protective. That's the kind of man he is. He's fiercely loyal to family and friends, but especially to his wife. She's his life. He adores her."

  It was possible that was true, but she'd done too many interviews in the past four years with reluctant family members not to be able to discern between someone who was being protective and someone who had something to hide. Right now the Callaway men, especially Colton's grandfather, were falling into the second category.

  "I'm quite capable of talking to your grandmother without upsetting her, and I understand the concerns about her health, but can I be frank?" she asked.

  "Can I stop you?" he countered.

  "You said you wanted to be direct and not play games," she reminded him.

  He didn't look too happy to have his words thrown back in his face, but he nodded. "Go ahead then."

  "I don't think you know why your grandfather doesn't want Eleanor to talk to me."

  "I know what he told me, and I don't have any reason to doubt him or to think there's some sort of hidden agenda."

  "Well, I do think there's a reason he hasn't shared with you."

  "What are you basing that on?"

  "My instincts. I've been working as a research assistant for a well-known biographer, Philip Dunston."

  "Never heard of him."

  "Well, a lot of people have. His most recent book just hit the New York Times and had the biggest first-sale day of any biography in the past ten years. The subject was Carlton Hughes, former secretary of state, but he's only one of many people I've researched over the last several years. I've become very good at reading between the lines and figuring out what someone's motive is."

  "Fine. Maybe you have good instincts, but you've been researching public figures. My grandmother and her friends are lovely women, but I don't know anything that they did that would warrant a book about their lives."

  "Just because you don't know doesn't mean there isn't anything. A few weeks ago, Molly Harper wrote me a letter about herself and her friends at the senior center. She told me that they all had amazing stories to tell and that they were part of a generation of women who had been silenced by men, and it was time to tell their story. She mentioned secrets and danger and doing something amazing without getting caught."

  "What does that mean?" he asked with a puzzled look in his eyes.

  "I don't know yet. Molly asked me to be the person who would give her and her friends a voice before they couldn't speak anymore. And that's what I want to do."

  "My grandmother has never had a problem speaking up. If she wanted to say something, she would say it."

  Olivia didn't believe that, and she wasn't basing that opinion just on Molly's letter but also on the conversation she'd had with the women and with Tom at the center. They'd exchanged very pointed looks at times, as if they weren't sure how much to say. They were definitely hiding something.

  "Did you find anything interesting in Molly's box?" Colton asked.

  "I've just started reading her journals. Molly was quite detailed in her writing. Unfortunately, I've only gotten through her childhood and into high school. You called right about the time I found out her parents were killed in a plane crash."

  "I didn't know that. That's sad."

  "I don't know what happened to her after that. I guess I'll find out tonight. Do you know if Molly has any relatives—a husband, children, grandchildren?"

  "Her husband died a long time ago. She has some kids, but I've never met them. They would be my parents' age."

  "Maybe I could speak to your parents at some point."

  "I'm confused. Is the book about Molly or my grandmother?"

  "I don't know yet, Colton. I haven't decided if there's going to be a book at all. It's too early for me to say."

  He gave her a thoughtful look. "I'm not going to be able to stop you from talking to my grandmother, am I?"

  "Not if she wants to speak me, too."

  "You'd think I would have learned by now," he said with a frustrated shake of his head.

  "Learned what?"

  "Not to think I could change a woman's mind when it's made up," he said with a dry smile. "I have three sisters, a mother, a grandmother, a bunch of sisters-in-law and many female cousins, so I've had a lot of practice dealing with women, but apparen
tly I like beating my head against a wall."

  She couldn't help but smile at his words, and she also couldn't help but notice that he didn't mention a girlfriend in his list of females. "Are your sisters younger or older?" she asked, curious to know more about him and all of the Callaways.

  "I have two older sisters and one twin sister."

  "I've always found twins to be fascinating. Are you similar in personality? Do you have the ability to finish each other's sentences?"

  "We're not alike at all. Shayla is a genius, for one thing. She skipped ahead of me in kindergarten and never looked back. She entered college at sixteen and is now a physician finishing up her last year of residency."

  "High achiever," she commented.

  "Oh, yeah, like most of my family, but Shayla's brain power is amazing."

  "And you didn't get any of those smart genes?" She liked the way he'd spoken so admirably of his sister.

  "I'm more street smart than book smart, but I hold my own. But we're not just different when it comes to IQ. Shayla has always been organized, studious, efficient and driven. She'd set her mind to a goal and she wouldn't stop until she got there." He paused. "Actually, you remind me of her a little. You have similar bulldog qualities."

  "Great. I love being compared to a dog."

  He smiled. "I was referring to your tenacity."

  "You haven't seen me in action yet."

  "I have a feeling I'm going to."

  "If the adjectives you used to describe Shayla don't describe you, what words do?"

  "Let's see. Impatient, impulsive, restless and determined."

  She sipped her wine. "The first three are opposites of your sister, but driven and determined are pretty much the same thing."

  He tipped his head. "I can compete."

  "I have a feeling that not only can you compete, but you like to compete. More importantly, you like to win."

  "There's a certain rush to doing something better than anyone else," he conceded. "You sound a little competitive yourself, Olivia. And determined. And driven."