His Everlasting Love: 50 Loving States, Virginia by Theodora Taylor Read Free Book Online Page A

sounded a full fifteen minutes before she was due.
    He’d been anticipating it, too. Not only had he’d informed Josh that he’d only be doing half days for the next few Tuesdays, he’d rushed home from work in order to clean up for her. By the time the doorbell rang, he’d been ready and dressed for physical therapy for an hour, and he actually had to hold himself back from running to the door.
    Somehow he managed to open the door with some measure of cool. Smooth, like he’d been doing something other than waiting for her to show up. However, the composed look fell right off his face when he saw the person on the other side of the door.
    “Dad, what happened to calling first?” he asked, not bothering to mask his annoyance.
    “I called over to the office and the girl behind the desk said you’d already left for the day,” his father answered. “I’m sorry, Son, is this a bad time for you?”
    Quentin Grant showed just how much he cared about the answer to that question by pushing into the house past him. Bold as the four-star admiral he used to be, before switching to a career in politics.
    Sawyer watched his father survey the front room. The Admiral still had officer posture. Straight spine, chin forward as he scanned the living space he’d ceded to his youngest son. Sawyer could just about hear Terminator-style beeps as he searched for something to disapprove of.
    Earlier in the day, he would have found plenty. Bottles, one of his old prosthetics, a crapload of unopened mail. But he’d cleaned up for Willa.
    “I see you took my advice and called in Grace to keep house for you.”
    “Yeah, I did,” Sawyer said, crutching over to stand beside him. “She’s officially retired now, but she agreed to start coming over on Tuesdays and Thursdays starting next week.” He let a significant pause go by before he added, “…on the condition you wouldn’t be here. That’s not going to be a problem, will it, Dad?”
    He watched for his father’s reaction, wondering not for the first time what he’d done to make Grace, their longtime housekeeper, quit. Knowing Quentin, he’d gotten upset over some immigration bill or something and said something so elitist and racist, even the super agreeable Grace couldn’t put up with him anymore.
    But whatever it had been, it was huge. His father had moved out of the house to his apartment in Bon Air soon after, and as far as Sawyer knew, neither of them had been back to the house since.
    Sawyer watched his father’s salt-and-pepper head—more salt than pepper now that Quentin was no longer keeping it “just the right amount of brown” for the cameras—move back and forth as he scanned the great room.
    Again, Sawyer had to wonder what had compelled him to come back here. He could have run his campaign somewhere else. Some trendy apartment with a doorman, so his father couldn’t just show up without warning.
    But he’d been drawn back to the house where he’d grown up. Like a magnet he couldn’t figure out how to fight. And now, he was standing here on his crutches, waiting for his father to finish his inspection. Feeling like a plebe, forced to stand there while his superior decided if his rack passed inspection.
    “Can I get you anything, Dad?” Sawyer asked. “Beer, whiskey, water. That’s all I’ve got.”
    His father answered with a censorious frown. “As soon as Grace gets back, tell her to start keeping a pitcher of tea at the ready for unexpected guests.”
    “So I guess that’s a no.”
    His father held up a manila folder. “I’ve got some copy for a few more campaign ads we’d like to record next month with you. It needs your approval.”
    Sawyer took the folder and dropped it on the nearest Victorian couch without so much as a glance.
    “Next time you can just email it to me. No need to come all the way out here.”
    “What is this I hear about you buying one of The Crazy Librarian’s girls a car?”
    So that was the real reason for his