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“The war’s over,” Lake said evenly

The look he gave Betty made her clamp her lips shut and furunt She’d forgotten about the ribs, and even though they were both bandaged and strapped, they were still fragile She patted the cable knit ju at him instead of the shop, because she honestly didn’t kno she was going to get up in the hed heavily She would deal with it the way she’d dealt with everything else—one thing at a time That was all she could ever do Lake kissed the top of her head and her heart warmed At least this time she wasn’t alone This time she had her s were looking up

As Lake watched the s mess that was Kirsty’s shop, he badly wanted to beat Brandon all over again Unfortunately he was locked up in Invertary’s only jail cell and Officer Donaldson had been clear about Lake not being on the visitors’ list He shook his head gri to be one helluva clean-up and he had no idea how they would rebuild without insurance uys he could call for help People owed hi dent in the refurbishment, at least

The door to the shop crashed open and Alastair rushed in, out of breath and frantic

“What is it?” Lake called to him

He knew this wasn’t going to be good Kirsty shifted in his ar to

“Have you seen Rainne?” Alastair said

The women turned As soon as they set eyes on Alastair their smiles turned to frowns of worry

“No, I haven’t,” Lake said “I thought she ith you”

“She was” The boy spat out the words

He stalked across the shop floor and thrust a piece of paper at Lake As Lake read it his anger grew Kirsty stilled beside him as she realised what the note meant

“She’s run away,” Lake said

The woasped

“Oh oodness!” Kirsty’s mum said

Alastair threw up his hands in despair