Read Online Blood Relations by Rett MacPherson - Free Book Online

no.”
    â€œDuh.”
    He just smiled. “You’re awfully cranky. More so than usual.”
    â€œGo sit somewhere else, thank you very much.”
    â€œDid I say cranky?” he asked, putting his hands up in a defensive posture. “Nope, no cranky people at this table.”
    â€œWhat do you want?” I asked. “Besides lunch.”
    â€œYour mother says you’ve been … distant the last few days.”
    â€œOh, well. If she’s concerned, have her call me.”
    â€œShe didn’t send me here to find out what’s up with you,” he said. “She just mentioned it in passing, so I thought I’d come see if you’re all right.”
    I just stared at him. Right. He was concerned for me. I believed that like I’d believe in a giant bunny rabbit leaving hard-boiled eggs all over my backyard.
    â€œOkay, all right,” he said. “I just want to know if there’s something I should know about. Found any bodies lately? Do you think your neighbor is really Jimmy Hoffa? Confederate gold in your basement?”
    â€œYou know what? When Krista gets back here with my lunch, I’m going to have her throw you out on your ear,” I said.
    â€œCome on, Torie,” he said, smiling. “I just want to know if there’s anything I should know about.”
    â€œNo. Nothing.”
    â€œOkay,” he said. He smiled at Krista as she came back with my food and a cup of coffee for him. “I’ll have the stew, Krista.”
    â€œSure thing, Colin.”
    â€œWhat do you make of the wreckage? You think Jacob Lahrs is going to find out what really caused the boat to sink?” the sheriff asked me.
    I shrugged, sipping my tea. “Maybe.”
    He looked at me long and hard for a moment. “Okay, snap out of it. The Torie I know would be down there in her own wet suit, looking for diamonds and daring anybody, including her ever-wise and all-knowing stepfather—me—to stop her. What gives?”
    â€œYou don’t like the new and improved, all grown-up and mature Torie O’Shea?”
    He took a drink of his coffee, contemplating what I had said. “I’m concerned,” he said. “Because this isn’t you.”
    â€œOh, well.”
    â€œI bought a new fishing pole in Wisteria the other day.”
    â€œOh yeah? Bet you can’t wait for spring.”
    â€œThis fishing pole is so nice, I’m thinking about putting on my battery-operated socks and going fishing this weekend,” he said.
    His stew came a few minutes later and we ate in silence for a while. He commented on the Rams; I mentioned the snowstorm we were supposed to get next week. He brought up a case he was working on over in Wisteria. I listened like I really gave a damn. I don’t know what came over me, but I just couldn’t hold it in any longer.
    â€œColin, if … you…”
    â€œWhat?”
    â€œHypothetically speaking,” I said. “If you found out you had a sister or a brother you’d never known about, how would you feel?”
    He just stared at me for the longest time. “I don’t know,” he said. “Weird, I guess.”
    â€œWeird?”
    â€œYeah, like I was somehow responsible for them.”
    â€œHuh?”
    â€œYou know, sins of the father sort of thing. My dad is dead. So if a sibling came to me and said that he was my dad’s son, I’d somehow feel responsible. Like I should do something to make it all right. And that would be weird.”
    â€œWho said it would be your dad’s child?”
    â€œI’m just assuming, since I spent every day of my life with my mother, that it wouldn’t be hers,” he said. “Of course, I guess she could have had a baby before she met my father and had me, but I just assumed, in this hypothetical situation, that it would have been my father’s. Why?”
    â€œNo reason.”
    He nodded, but