Renegade Read Free Page B

“Now. How about calling Rory in?”
    The commandant knew when an interview was over. He smiled back. “Okay.”
    Â 
    R ORY CAME INTO THE commandant’s office breathless, flushed with excitement. Two boys had come down the long hall with him, but they stopped outside the office, and stood watching from across the hall.
    â€œMr. Grier,” Rory greeted, breaking into a wide smile. “Gosh, it’s nice of you to come pick me up! Sis and I usually take the train!”
    â€œWe’re driving,” Cash said, smiling with a little reserve. “I hate trains.”
    â€œOh, I like them, especially the dining car,” Rory proclaimed. “I’m always hungry.”
    â€œWe’ll stop and eat before we start up to New York,” he promised the boy. “Ready to go?”
    â€œYes, sir, I’ve got my kit right out here in the hall! Sis is beside herself,” he added gleefully. “She’s cleaned the apartment three times and polished all the furniture. She even cleaned out the guest room, so you’d have a place to stay!”
    â€œThanks, but I like my own space,” Cash said easily. “I’ve booked a hotel room near her apartment.”
    The commandant chuckled when he heard that. The Cash he’d known had always been a stickler for protocol. He wouldn’t spend a night in a single woman’s apartment, no matter how many people thought it was acceptable.
    â€œMy sister said that you probably wouldn’t stay in the apartment,” Rory said surprisingly. “But she wanted you to think she’s a good housekeeper. She’s practiced cooking beef Stroganoff, too. Judd Dunn told her you like that.”
    â€œIt’s my favorite,” Cash confessed, impressed.
    Rory grinned. “Mine, too, but I’m glad you like it.”
    â€œDo I have to sign him out?” Cash asked Gareth.
    â€œYou do. Come on out and we’ll take care of the formalities. Danbury, have a good holiday,” he told Rory.
    Cash was shocked to hear the boy’s last name. He’d assumed the child’s last name was Moore, like Tippy’s.
    Rory saw the surprise and laughed. “Tippy’s real last name is Danbury, too. Moore was our grandmother’s last name. Tippy used it when she started modeling.”
    That was curious. Cash wondered why, but he wasn’t going to start asking probing questions right now. He signed Rory out, took time to shake hands with Rory’s fascinated friends, and escorted the boy out to his car.
    Rory stopped dead when he saw Cash push a button and the trunk of a flashy red Jaguar popped open.
    â€œThat’s your car? ” Rory exclaimed.
    â€œThat’s my car,” Cash told him, smiling. He tossed the boy’s bag into the boot and closed it. “Climb aboard, youngster, and let’s be off.”
    â€œYes, sir!” Rory replied, waving frantically to the two spellbound boys at the front door of the office. Their noses were actually flattened against the glass when Cash roared out of the parking lot and onto the street.

CHAPTER TWO
    C ASH STOPPED BY HIS HOTEL to check in before he drove Rory to Tippy’s apartment in Manhattan, in the lower East Village.
    Tippy was waiting at her door after she buzzed Cash and Rory up to her flat on the second floor. She looked like a stranger, in jeans and a pullover yellow sweater, with her long red-gold hair flowing down her back. With the casual attire and minus any makeup, she didn’t look like the elegant, beautiful woman Cash remembered from the premiere of her movie, the month before.
    She fidgeted nervously as she opened the door, smiling. “Come in,” she said quickly. “I hope you’re both hungry. I made beef Stroganoff.”
    Cash’s dark eyebrows rose. “My favorite. How did you know?” he added with wicked dark eyes.
    She cleared her throat.
    â€œIt’s my favorite, too,” Rory