The Ashtons - Cole, Abigail & Megan

Jody’s not in L.A. anymore.”
    Something in Dixie’s voice caught his attention.She was looking down at a small patch of ground she’d absentmindedly denuded of grass. “What is it, Dix?”
    “She’s the reason I moved back here. Mom couldn’t take care of her by herself anymore.”
    A quick squeeze of hurt for her had him covering her hand with his. “That sounds bad.”
    “Pretty bad, yeah. She has Alzheimer’s.”
    Stunned, Cole just sat there. He’d met Dixie’s aunt just once, at the same time he met her mother. But Jody Belleview was the kind of woman who left an impression. He remembered her laugh and her quick, restless intelligence. “I can’t imagine…isn’t she younger than your mother? Only fifty or so?”
    “Fifty-four. I’m still in denial. Which is not as easy to do on this coast as it was while I was across the country.” She gave him a brittle smile, then gathered herself and rose to her feet.
    He stood, too. “Dixie—”
    She shook her head. “I’m sorry. I can’t talk about it.”
    When she walked away she was moving fast, not strolling, her back straight and stiff. And Cole just stood there and let her go, feeling as if the earth had shifted under him.
    She couldn’t talk about it? That didn’t sound like Dixie. Maybe she meant she couldn’t talk about it with him…but that wasn’t what she’d said. It wasn’t what he’d felt radiating from her with the kind of buried intensity he knew only too well.
    He was the one who stuffed things into compartments,banged the lid shut and sat on it to keep them there. Dixie had always possessed a terrifying honesty, with herself as well as others. She lifted lids and peeked inside. She didn’t turn away from painful truths.
    At least, that’s how he remembered her.
    Cole stood there a few moments longer, frowning at the path she’d vanished down. Then he went looking for his sister.

Chapter Four
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    A t ten o’clock that night, Dixie stood on a drop cloth in the center of her temporary living room, slashing color across a canvas. The light was lousy for painting, but it didn’t matter. She wasn’t really painting. She was venting. No one but her would ever see this.
    Red roiled with brown in a muddy whirlpool at the lower right, while a mountain of black and gray reared over a pale green center like a granite wave about to crash. It was lousy art, she thought, stepping back to look it over. But damn satisfying.
    The knock on her door brought a frown to her face. On the couch, Hulk lifted his head, lazily contemplating the possibility of company. To Hulk, companymeant someone who could be cozened into rubbing his jaw or chin. To Dixie, it meant conversation.
    She didn’t want to talk. She considered not answering, but it probably wouldn’t work. Scowling, she snapped, “Just a minute,” then poked her brush into the wire loop that held it in the cleaner. She grabbed a rag and wiped some of the paint from her fingers as she headed to the door.
    Cole stood on her stoop with a frown to match her own—and a small leather tote in one hand, like an overnight case.
    She eyed that tote, eyebrows raised. “Not exactly subtle, Cole.”
    “It doesn’t hold my shaving gear. No full-court press tonight. No moves, no passes, no fouls. May I come in?”
    She studied his face. It didn’t tell her much. “Why not?” she said at last, and stepped back.
    “I did some research,” he said as he entered. “Nothing you haven’t already read, probably, but…” Words and feet both drifted to a stop as he saw her easel in the center of the room. And what sat on the easel.
    In spite of her mood, his expression tickled her.
    “Interesting,” he said after a moment in a careful voice. “I thought you didn’t do that kind of abstract art.”
    She chuckled. “That isn’t art, it’s therapy. My version of smashing crockery.”
    “That would be why it looks like crap, then.”
    “Probably. I’ll scrape the canvas and reprime itlater.” She cocked her head to one side. “You aren’t here to inspect my visual therapy.”
    “No, I…” Hulk had abandoned the couch and was rubbing against Cole’s leg, making like a chain saw. Cole bent and rubbed behind his ears. “Hello, monster.”
    Dixie ambled over to retrieve her brush, which needed to be washed. She’d made the canvas about as ugly as it needed to be. Might as well shut down for the night and find out what Cole was up to.
    In the tiny kitchen, she turned on the tap