RaeAnne Thayne - The Cottages On Silver Beach

“Any particular pose?”

“No. Just them interacting would be fine. It does a mother’s heart proud that her children enjoy each other’s company. I love seeing them together, even if they’re only comparing notes on cases.”

Was Elliot talking to Marshall about Elizabeth? Probably not. She could imagine they had scores of cases they could discuss. Their conversation didn’t necessarily need to involve her sister-in-law.

Still, nerves crackled through her stomach. Why did he have to come home and stir everything up again?

“Sure. I’ll just shoot the two of them being mad, bad and dangerous to know.”

“Exactly.” Charlene smiled. “Thank you, my dear.” With a vague air-kiss, his mother fluttered away to speak with McKenzie Kilpatrick.

Megan squared her shoulders and picked up her camera bag. She had worked hard to avoid Elliot throughout the wedding celebration but apparently that state of affairs couldn’t continue.

Sunlight glinted in the brothers’ dark hair as she walked across the impeccably manicured lawn of Bowie Callahan’s home on Serenity Harbor.

The two Bailey boys really were good-looking. Seeing them together, she couldn’t help thinking about the brother who was missing. Wyatt should have been here.

In the past year, three of the four surviving Bailey children had married. First Wyn, then Marshall, now Katrina. At each ceremony, Megan knew she wasn’t the only one who keenly felt Wyatt’s absence.

She shifted her camera bag higher on her shoulder, annoyed with herself for letting those sad feelings intrude on what was an otherwise lovely day.

Wyatt was gone. She couldn’t change that. She had grieved for him and the dreams they had only been in the beginning stages of building together and it was way past time she moved forward with her life.

She pushed away the little pang in her heart as she approached Wyatt’s brothers.

Marsh was the larger of the two—broad shoulders, square jaw, solid strength. That didn’t make Elliot appear any less predatory next to him. He was leaner, yes, but every bit as dangerous—the contrast between a shotgun blast or a precisely timed knife thrust.

Was it her imagination or did Elliot tense when she approached? She could read nothing in his gaze but she could swear his shoulders tightened and his head came up as if sniffing for trouble.

“Hello,” she said, trying for a casual tone.

“Hey, Meg.” Marshall smiled and she thought how much more mellow and friendly he seemed since he had married her friend Andie Montgomery. He had never been precisely un friendly, simply too focused on work to pay much mind to her.

Elliot, she noticed, said nothing. He only watched her out of those dark blue eyes that reflected none of his thoughts.

“How’s it going?” Marsh asked. “Are you finding the photos you need?”

“Good. It’s a beautiful day and Katrina and Bowie seem so happy together. Milo and Gabi just make their happiness sweeter. Chloe and Will are taking good care of them.”

“They’re great kids,” he said, smiling fondly at his stepchildren.

“Agreed. You hit the jackpot there.”

“You don’t have to tell me.”

They lapsed into a rather awkward silence and she picked up her camera and aimed it at the two of them. “Your mom sent me over here with orders to shoot a few pictures of you guys together.”

“Do you have to?” These were the first words Elliot had spoken to her that day.

She raised an eyebrow. “Do you want to be the one to tell your mother why I was unable to fulfill her simple request?”

Marshall chuckled. “Sure, Elliot. That can be your job.”

“It will only take a moment, I promise,” she said.

“Says every photographer, always.”

She had to smile. Elliot had a point. She wasn’t necessarily a perfectionist, but her photo shoots always took longer than she expected.

“You don’t even need to do anything. Just keep talking. She wanted me to photograph candid shots of the two of you together. The Bailey brothers in all their glory.”

Marshall rolled his eyes while Elliot gave her a look she couldn’t interpret.

He was frustrating that way. Spending so much time behind the camera lens reading and recording people’s facial expressions usually gave her some insight into their thoughts. Not Elliot’s. That whole stone-faced FBI agent thing again.

“What do you want us to talk about?” Marshall asked, clearly uncomfortable at having her lens trained on him.

“Doesn’t matter. Whatever you were talking about before I came over.”

The two men exchanged glances and the currents zinging between them made her even more suspicious about the topic of their previous conversation.

“Anything. Baseball. The weather. You can talk about the lovely dress that Samantha Fremont created for Katrina.”

The idea of these two masculine law-enforcement officers discussing their sister’s wedding dress almost made her smile.

Marshall played along. “There you go. Hey, Elliot, did you notice what Kat was wearing?”

“I think it was a dress or something. It was white or maybe yellow. Did it have lace?”

She sniffed at their teasing, though she still clicked away at her shutter. Charlene would probably love this tongue-in-cheek side of them.

“For your information,” she answered, “the gown is gorgeous, an original creation by up-and-coming local designer Samantha Fremont. It was tailor-made for Kat, specifically designed to highlight her shoulders and make her neck look longer and more graceful. Your sister is simply stunning in it.”

Both men gave her matching looks of incomprehension and she snapped away. “Sorry,” Elliot said, “but to us, Kat will always be the little pigtailed tattletale who hated being left out of anything.”

“Good thing she grew out of that,” Bowie Callahan drawled as he approached their group. “Though she still doesn’t like to be left out of things, particularly her brothers sharing such charming opinions of her. Hey, Megan.” He greeted her with a kiss on the cheek. Since he had moved to Haven Point, Bowie had become one of her favorite people. Not only was he gorgeous, rich, successful and talented, Bowie was always so kind to her and all the rest of the Haven Point Helping Hands.

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