Once a Family. Tara Taylor Quinn

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      CHAPTER FOUR

      SANTA RAQUEL, CALIFORNIA, had to be heaven on earth. Sedona, who’d been born and raised in the quaint coastal town, sat on her deck Tuesday evening, sipping a glass of wine, munching on Havarti, grape jelly and French bread, while she watched the waves come in. Again and again. Washing to shore. Going back out to sea. Only to return again.

      They were steady. Assured. Reliable. Sometimes they were angry and plowed onto the beach with the force of a minibulldozer. Other times they were calm, almost sleepy, sliding quietly up on the sand and dissipating with hardly a trace left behind. But, always, they were there.

      Like the love her parents shared. With each other. And with her and her brother, Grady, a pediatrician in Scottsdale, Arizona.

      She didn’t know what she’d do without her older brother in the background of her life. He was her best friend. Her confidant.

      She couldn’t imagine being afraid of him....

      Sedona sipped. Bit off a piece of cheese and then breathed, pulling the salty tang of air deep into her lungs. Washing away the day’s impurities from her bloodstream as the ocean’s energy erased twelve hours’ worth of tension, blanketing her in peace. When she felt a little more relaxed, she’d go in and change out of the navy suit she’d worn to work that day. Slide into some workout clothes and take a walk on the beach.

      Grady had called the night before. Her older brother’s wife was expecting their second child. A man who’d dedicated his life to caring for children, Grady had clearly found his own piece of heaven when his son, two-year-old Cameron, had been born. And now he’d have heaven times two.

      Sedona was happy for him. She liked to hope that he’d found a bit of heaven in his wife, Brooke, as well. She just didn’t see it.

      The flap of the doggy door sounded behind her, and Sedona waited for Ellie—short for Elizabeth Bennet from the Jane Austen novel—to appear. The rescued, seven-pound poochin had to knock a few times before she trusted the entry and exit way Sedona had had installed for her. Every time she went in or out. Heavy plastic whooshed against metal framing again. And then Ellie made her appearance on the wooden decked balcony, stopping about a foot short of Sedona and staring at her. The little miss didn’t make a sound. Didn’t scratch at her or jump up. She just stared.

      “You could just take yourself, you know,” Sedona told her, setting her glass of wine down on the round glass-topped wicker table next to her as she scooped up her apricot-colored family member and carried her down the three steps to the small patch of fenced-in grass she’d had planted the week after she’d adopted her Japanese Chin/poodle mix.

      Ellie had been a couple of months old then. Sedona had been visiting Grady and had attended a barbecue with him and Brooke in a little town called Shelter Valley, Arizona. She’d heard about the animal rescue organization being run out of the local vet’s office and had asked to see the current rescues.

      And had fallen in love with Ellie on sight. The little girl held herself with dignity even after spending the first eight weeks of her life locked in a windowless shed with so many other puppies there hadn’t been enough floor space for them to live without lying on top of one another.

      Even now, three years later, Ellie didn’t travel far alone. She completed her business a short distance away and came right back, jumping a couple of feet off the ground to bounce off Sedona’s hip.

      Catching her in midair, Sedona thought about a walk on the beach. And noticed the Richardsons outside with their four-year-old son. The private stretch of beach behind her small house was shared by four other homes. And tonight she felt more like finishing her glass of wine than socializing.

      Besides, Joshua, the Richardsons’ son, liked to run after Ellie. His parents thought he was playing with the little dog. To Sedona, who admittedly coddled her little girl, the activity seemed more like torment.

      Margie Richardson saw her and waved. Still holding Ellie, Sedona knew she was going to have to go say hello. And could feel the tension beginning to seep back into her bones.

      She took one step and her phone rang.

      From the table. On her deck. Next to her glass of wine.

      “Saved by the bell,” she said softly to Ellie as she waved once more in the Richardsons’ general direction and hurried up the stairs to grab her phone.

      “I hate to disturb you again, Sedona, but you said to call immediately if there was any break in the Talia Malone situation.” Lila McDaniels did not sound calm.

      “I did and I meant it. What’s up?” Switching mental gears in a blink, Sedona set Ellie inside the French doors leading to her living area and, with her phone held between her shoulder and her ear, grabbed the glass of wine and plate of cheese and headed indoors.

      “Lynn Duncan just left Maddie’s. She called right afterward to tell me that Talia looks like a girl she’d seen a picture of on the news a little while ago. She’s a missing person. And if it’s the same girl, her name’s not Talia. It’s Tatum.”

      “Can you wait for me to get there before you do anything?”

      “Of course.”

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