“Good enough. Word is Riley’s scored us the boat and gear.”
“Has she?”
“She’s got some network. I want to take a look at the maps, but I’ve scouted out the general area, gotten the lay of it.”
“So you can get us back here from wherever we might go.”
Sawyer jerked a thumbs-up. “No sweat. More word is Sasha’s sketching from the notes you and Riley put together out of the journal, hoping for . . .” He circled his fingers in the air. “Don’t know how that’s going. And apparently you and I are on weapons detail, so since we’ve got the target area picked, we can set that up.
“After a beer.”
“Can’t argue with it.”
The fact was Doyle found it hard to argue with Sawyer about anything. The man was affable, canny as a fox, unbreakably loyal, and could shoot the eye out of a gnat at twenty yards.
They went in through the mudroom, into the kitchen that smelled temptingly of whatever Sasha stirred in the pot on the stove as Riley looked on.
“Wow.” As he had an interest in cooking as well as eating, Sawyer went over to her. “What is it?”
“Guinness stew. I found a couple recipes online, and I’ve been playing with them. I think it’s going to work.”
“Looks awesome. We’re after a beer. Want some wine?”
“I think it’s just about that time, thanks. I’ve been dealing with this, sketching. I think the cooking’s more successful than . . .”
She turned, saw Doyle had picked up her sketch pad.
“It’s hard to be sure I’m even close, considering I’m going on more or less general descriptions.”
When he said nothing, she moved to him, studied, as he did, one of her sketches of Arianrhod. “I can’t know if I made her beautiful because the journalist found her beautiful. I don’t know the shape of her face, or the length and style of her hair, shape of her eyes. I just went on instinct, I guess.”
“This is your instinct?”
The rawness in his voice had her looking up at him in alarm. She saw that same rawness in his eyes.
“Yes. What is it? What’s wrong?”
“Dude.” Sawyer stepped over, put a hand on Doyle’s arm. “You all right?”
“I read the way she was described myself. It’s from my reading Riley took the notes for you. And this is how you’ve drawn the goddess?”
“Arianrhod, yes. It’s as close as I can imagine. It’s—it’s just how I saw her from the notes. Why?”
“Because . . . you’ve drawn my mother. This is my mother’s face you’ve drawn in your book.”
CHAPTER FIVE
Bittersweet. That was the term used, wasn’t it? Doyle thought as he stared at the sketch. Those opposing sensations twisting and twining together until they merged into one shaky emotion.
He’d never understood it quite so well until now.
When he forced himself to look away, look up, he saw they’d surrounded him. Sawyer at his back, the women on both sides.
He had to fight the instinct to pull away.
“I won’t ask if you’re sure,” Riley said carefully, “because it’s clear you are. Sasha’s sketched your mother from the description of Arianrhod.”
Another internal battle—to hold Riley’s gaze, to keep everything steady. “My mother might have sat for this.”