Read Online The Ladies of Garrison Gardens by Louise Shaffer - Free Book Online
Authors: Louise Shaffer
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biological brother for most of your life. No matter how attractive Dr. Douglass was, noticing how well his jeans fit certain parts of his anatomy made Laurel feel like she was tiptoeing close to incest.
Chapter Ten
I F THE GUY at the Chevy dealership thought Laurel was strange for wanting her Camaro back, a check for twice what the parts could ever be worth quickly changed his mind. Mercifully she didn't do anything really embarrassing like kiss the car keys when he gave them to her. She handed them to Perry and drove the Viper home behind him.
Laurel lived in a cabin that had been in her family for generations—it sat, inconveniently for the Garrisons, in the middle of the Garrison Nature Preserve across the highway from Li'l Bit's antebellum home. As Laurel followed Perry up the dirt road that led to her little house, the sound of frantic barking greeted them. Peggy's adoptees were hungry.
Peggy had rescued stray dogs, “my furry babies,” she called them, and after she died Laurel had moved the poor things—all ten of them—to her own place because she couldn't face going over to Garrison Cottage to feed them. Now the dogs were crammed into her tiny two-room house, where they exchanged canine hostilities with Patsy Cline, the stray Peggy had once foisted off on Laurel.
Perry had already gotten out of the Camaro and was waiting for her when she drove up. As she opened her front door it occurred to her that this was the first time he'd ever been to her home. And it was the first time she'd been alone with him for any length of time—without talking about medications or nursing schedules—since he'd been old enough to shave. Fortunately, before she could start feeling weird, the dogs descended on them, and for the next half hour he helped her fill food and water bowls, let the dogs in and out of the yard she'd fenced in for Patsy, scratch tummies, and head off a potential fight.
“Your dog doesn't seem to like the others much,” he remarked.
“Patsy's strange.”
The dog wasn't the only one. Now that the canine contingent was no longer demanding her attention, she was feeling weird again. The Wiener, damn him, seemed perfectly comfortable. Of course it wasn't his turf that was being invaded, or his family history that was on display. She snuck a quick look over at the four shelves she'd put up in the center of her living room wall, defiantly placing them where they could not be missed. On those shelves was a collection of frayed, ancient books. There were paperbacks and hardcovers, old how-to manuals, murder mysteries,
Reader's Digest
Best of the Year anthologies, one-time potboilers like
Valley of the Dolls
, and classics like
The Complete Works of Shakespeare
all jumbled together. These books were the only inheritance she'd ever had from her father. He'd bought them at a garage sale before he was killed a few months before she was born. Not knowing if she was going to be a boy or a girl, he'd printed the name BABY MERRICK in pencil in a large childish scrawl on the first page of each book. Below that, in her own prissy penmanship, Laurel had written
Laurel Selene McCready
when she was seven. From everything she'd heard about her father, the man had never read a book in his life, but he'd wanted her to have these and she would probably insist on being buried with them. To hell with what anyone had to say about her notorious daddy.
There was one more relic of her childhood in this room. On the floor, propped up against the corner, was her ma's guitar. Drunk or sober, Sara Jayne could always make music, and no matter how mad Laurel got at her memory she could no more toss the guitar than she could ditch the books. The damn thing would probably be buried with her too.
“Sara Jayne sure could sing.” The Wiener was reading her mind again.
“When did you ever hear her?” The places where her ma did most of her singing would have been off limits for the young impressionable Wiener.
“Once, when you were
Chapter Ten
I F THE GUY at the Chevy dealership thought Laurel was strange for wanting her Camaro back, a check for twice what the parts could ever be worth quickly changed his mind. Mercifully she didn't do anything really embarrassing like kiss the car keys when he gave them to her. She handed them to Perry and drove the Viper home behind him.
Laurel lived in a cabin that had been in her family for generations—it sat, inconveniently for the Garrisons, in the middle of the Garrison Nature Preserve across the highway from Li'l Bit's antebellum home. As Laurel followed Perry up the dirt road that led to her little house, the sound of frantic barking greeted them. Peggy's adoptees were hungry.
Peggy had rescued stray dogs, “my furry babies,” she called them, and after she died Laurel had moved the poor things—all ten of them—to her own place because she couldn't face going over to Garrison Cottage to feed them. Now the dogs were crammed into her tiny two-room house, where they exchanged canine hostilities with Patsy Cline, the stray Peggy had once foisted off on Laurel.
Perry had already gotten out of the Camaro and was waiting for her when she drove up. As she opened her front door it occurred to her that this was the first time he'd ever been to her home. And it was the first time she'd been alone with him for any length of time—without talking about medications or nursing schedules—since he'd been old enough to shave. Fortunately, before she could start feeling weird, the dogs descended on them, and for the next half hour he helped her fill food and water bowls, let the dogs in and out of the yard she'd fenced in for Patsy, scratch tummies, and head off a potential fight.
“Your dog doesn't seem to like the others much,” he remarked.
“Patsy's strange.”
The dog wasn't the only one. Now that the canine contingent was no longer demanding her attention, she was feeling weird again. The Wiener, damn him, seemed perfectly comfortable. Of course it wasn't his turf that was being invaded, or his family history that was on display. She snuck a quick look over at the four shelves she'd put up in the center of her living room wall, defiantly placing them where they could not be missed. On those shelves was a collection of frayed, ancient books. There were paperbacks and hardcovers, old how-to manuals, murder mysteries,
Reader's Digest
Best of the Year anthologies, one-time potboilers like
Valley of the Dolls
, and classics like
The Complete Works of Shakespeare
all jumbled together. These books were the only inheritance she'd ever had from her father. He'd bought them at a garage sale before he was killed a few months before she was born. Not knowing if she was going to be a boy or a girl, he'd printed the name BABY MERRICK in pencil in a large childish scrawl on the first page of each book. Below that, in her own prissy penmanship, Laurel had written
Laurel Selene McCready
when she was seven. From everything she'd heard about her father, the man had never read a book in his life, but he'd wanted her to have these and she would probably insist on being buried with them. To hell with what anyone had to say about her notorious daddy.
There was one more relic of her childhood in this room. On the floor, propped up against the corner, was her ma's guitar. Drunk or sober, Sara Jayne could always make music, and no matter how mad Laurel got at her memory she could no more toss the guitar than she could ditch the books. The damn thing would probably be buried with her too.
“Sara Jayne sure could sing.” The Wiener was reading her mind again.
“When did you ever hear her?” The places where her ma did most of her singing would have been off limits for the young impressionable Wiener.
“Once, when you were
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