Darby let out his breath. “Aye, I will. Do you want me to spy on her when I do it? See how she’s feeling concerning the finances?”

Grant shook his head. “We’ll know soon enough.”

“She’s not much like her father,” Enrick said. “I mean about the charts and graphs. He just took exception to the numbers when he didn’t like them, even though there was nothing wrong with them.”

“Aye.”

Everyone waited to eat until Grant gave the word.

Sitting on the other side of Enrick, Lachlan said, “Did she seem upset about anything when she was looking over the graphs?”

“Nay. She was mainly just charting the figures way back as far as she could go.”

“What will that tell her? The world has changed so much since the early days when the castle was first built,” Enrick said. “Not even her father cared about that. He only wanted to see the financial income and expenses for the two years before he inherited the properties.”

“Aye. She seemed enthralled with developing the charts, seeing the history. We have nothing to worry about.” Grant hoped.

Darby entered the great hall without the lass, but Grant assumed she was coming. Darby shook his head.

“Eat,” Grant said to his people. They had work to get back to.

Darby joined him and leaned over to whisper, “She isn’t in your study.”

Grant frowned. “What?”

“Aye. She had turned off the monitor, and she’s still got the files up, but she wasn’t there.”

“The bathroom?”

“I checked. Nay.”

Where the hell was she? Maybe…taking a nap? “Did you check the lady’s chamber?”

“Aye. She was not there, either.”

If she had forgotten about the time, he hated for her to miss the meal, but on the other hand, he didn’t want anyone else to have to miss theirs to search for her when there was no real need.

He pulled out his cell phone and called her. No answer.

His first thought was the seawall and her misadventure there. Then her running off to the village more than two hours away. Now what? He had to remind himself that she could do what she liked with her time. She was not a member of his pack.

Then he realized his men had returned her rental car, and she hadn’t asked for the keys to his car. She had to be on the property.

“Okay, thanks, Darby. Enjoy your meal.”

Enrick buttered a slice of bread. “So where do you think she is?”

Hell if Grant knew. “I have no idea.”

But he was determined to find out right after the meal, hating that he wanted to skip lunch to search for her right this very minute. Even so, he ate his chicken, baked potato, and broccoli faster than he’d ever done. He told everyone to finish their meals, not wanting them to think that since he was leaving the table, they also had to. As was usually the case.

“Do you want me to help you locate her?” Enrick asked, spearing another broccoli floret.

“I’ll come, too,” Lachlan offered, setting his fork on his plate.

Grant glanced at their meals. Both were only halfway finished with their food. “Nay, I’ll find her. It shouldn’t be that hard.”

That’s what he thought. He first went to the gardens, thinking maybe she’d stretched her legs out there, taking a break from the financial reports. Then he checked by the seawall, thinking she might be watching the waves break over the jagged rocks below, having forgotten all about the meal.

But she wasn’t in either location. That had him worried. Where was she?

***

Colleen loved dogs. She’d felt bad that she was still so wrapped up in the financial reports that she hadn’t seen Frederick yet. She headed out there to see if she could give him a couple of tips before she returned to her work.

She loved analyzing charts and seeing trends, even as far back as in the beginning, and could get wrapped up in them for hours. Some of the records that far back were spotty, but she was amused to see that one of her early ancestors, a countess, had a cat. Unusual for those times when cats just roamed freely to catch mice and rats and weren’t considered pets. But there was a detailed description of all the expenses the cat had incurred, including the cost of taking the cat on trips. Fascinating.

Some could only see the dollars and cents behind the math. She liked to see the human or, in their case, the lupus garou side of the expenditures and income.

She soon reached the kennels, which were fashioned in the same manner as the castle—gray stone with miniature towers gracing each corner. She entered and called out, “Frederick?”

No one was about. She hadn’t seen anyone anywhere, in fact. The meal. She hadn’t meant to get so sidetracked that she’d forgotten about the meal. She was used to eating when she was hungry, not with a pack and on a schedule. She sighed, not wanting to make a big scene by entering the great hall so late.

One of the dogs barked from a fenced-in yard, and she smiled as she headed for the dogs’ yard. If she got hungry later, she could just raid the kitchen, now with Maynard’s approval. She would just pay better attention to the time when it came to dinner.

She stalked toward their gate, noting that since the first feast—served with medieval flair—the wolfhounds had not been in attendance at the meals.

They woofed and jumped at the fence. “Down, boys, girl.”

She thought briefly of taking them to lunch, as if they had been forgotten for the last couple of meals and she was doing her duty by bringing them to join the pack.