by Nicole Snow
We follow the kids into the church.
It’s a small place, looks like it’s barely one room, but there’s a rustic charm to it.
It’s not made of the same weathered pine wood as the other buildings. Looks more like pale oak, polished to a shine that’s gone dull.
The interior rafters are carved into an arch, not just slotted up there with planks.
There’s real care in how this building was put together.
Not much left of the pews besides crumbling planks, and same with the pulpit.
But I’m wrong about the place being a single room.
There’s a small door in the back.
That’s where Andrea and Clark lead us.
Right to a tiny room I’m guessing used to be where the priest slept, but someone else has been here more recently.
The old iron bed’s been fitted with a mattress that’s definitely worn, but too modern.
The dusty equipment on the table’s not anything from the eighteen hundreds.
Little collapsing telescopes. Compasses. Microscopes.
Stacks and stacks of journals, books from the eighties about astronomy, cosmology. Even some philosophy texts. The old shit, the classics, Plato and Aristotle and the like.
Libby draws the same conclusion I do.
Judging by the crack in her voice as she whispers “Dad” and steps forward, brushing her fingertips over the top of one small journal, it hits her a lot harder than me.
She swallows like she’s got her heart up in her throat, staring down at the scattered things.
Even in the faint light trickling through the one tiny, high window up on the wall, her face goes pale.
I think we’ve had enough for one day.
“Hey,” I say, touching her arm—and giving Blake a significant look.
Blake turns to the kids. Whispering, he ushers them out of the room.
The second they’re gone, I pull Libby close.
She’s almost limp as she falls against me, but there’s nothing weak about the strength of her grip as she knots her fingers in my shirt and clings tight, clings hard, burying herself into me.
I wrap her up tight and bend over her.
“It’s okay,” I say. “If he was researching something, it makes sense he’d spend some time out here. Must’ve been before...you know. Bostrom.” I stroke my hand over her ponytail, hoping I can soothe her. “Let’s head inside. We’ve seen enough for today. I found a medical log that might be helpful later, but we need to come back with the right equipment to handle it. Gloves and plastic bags and shit.”
Her laughter is weak, forced, making her shoulders shake. “So you’re a forensic anthropologist now?”
“I Googled what not to do to ruin everything if we found anything worth preserving.” I laugh, too, but it’s tired. I pull back, grasping her hands, looking down into exhausted, worried sky-blue eyes. “Let’s head back before it gets too hot.”
“Sure,” she says, but then looks at the stack of mess on the table.
I know her mind’s got to be reeling.
We don’t get to talk more until later in the day.
The kids don’t want to leave the “cool-ass ghost town” yet, but it’s getting hot, and I’d rather not put my niece in the hospital with sunstroke.
We all mount up and head back to the ranch for lunch and some cold drinks. After hanging around and talking for a bit, Blake mounts up and takes the kids to return the horses.
Libby and I need to get to work, too. We’ve already put Frost and Plath away, but we’ve still got things to do around the ranch.
Right now, though, we’re just sitting on the back patio, taking in the day, both of us with our condensation-dotted cans of cold beer parked on the tiny table between our chairs.
The tiny table where both our hands rest, fingers interlaced so she knows I’m here.
For whenever she wants to unravel that knot between her eyebrows and spool it out, tell me what’s going on in her head.
It takes a while.
A few more pulls of beer.
“What was he doing there?” she asks, almost out of nowhere.
She sounds so quiet.
So lost.
So young, more like a confused little girl on the verge of shattering than the brassy, confident woman I know.
It’s her old man’s secret place.
She’s been holding on to her memories of him for so long, and now they’re conflicting with reality.
I capture her hand.
“Remember what that report said? The geographic formations of the area around town are probably an impact crater? Probably what drew him out there,” I say.
She tears her gaze from the horizon and looks at me, nodding mutely. I squeeze her hand and offer an encouraging smile.
“Your Dad always loved learning, right? He knows star shit, knows all about meteors and craters, and maybe he noticed the shape of the depression where the town is and realized it looked like one. What if he went out to study it?” I hold her eyes. “That’s all it has to be, Libby. It was a quiet place with stuff he enjoyed. He started messing around Ursa and the hills beyond and found that rock.”
“I wish he hadn’t.” She bites her lip. “Oh God—what if it’s radioactive? What if his cancer—”
I’m out of my chair in an instant, rounding to hers, dropping to my knees so I can gather her close.
“Stop right there. The rock didn’t curse him,” I say firmly, rubbing my hands against her back. “And it didn’t give him cancer. If it was radioactive, those people at the lab place would’ve said something in their letter. And he wouldn’t have had it in the house with his girls all these years.”
She makes a soft, whimpering sound and buries her face against my neck.
“Okay. I’m being ridiculous. But how is it you have less doubt about my dad than I do?” she asks with a half-hearted laugh.
“I don’t have a horse in that race, honey,” I tell her. “Your old man and his memory mean so damn much to you that you can’t even look at stuff head-on to parse it. I can. What I’m looking at tells me he wasn’t a bad guy, and if we had all the facts, we’d see there was an explanation for everything.”
“I hope you’re right,” she murmurs, wrapping her arms around my neck. “I hope we find answers in time to save the ranch.”
I smile then, tracing her jaw nice and slow.
She never had any intention of hiding Bostrom’s body. We both know it’s not the right thing to do.
I just wish I knew what the right thing was.
Because that clock keeps ticking, and our little break in paradise hasn’t slowed it down one bit. With half the summer gone, we’re down to a couple weeks at most in Reid Cherish’s tax countdown.
Time waits for no one.
My phone buzzes in my pocket, and I stiffen.
Even though it’s Sunday, it’s the ringtone I set for work calls.
Libby and I both groan before she laughs, shoving at my chest.
“Go on,” she says, smiling sweetly. “Answer it. Duty calls, Mr. Builder.”
“You come first,” I remind her.
I’m rewarded with a sugary smile that does my insides in before I reluctantly fish my phone out and check the name.
Alaska.
My mouth turns down at the corners.
Dammit, he wouldn’t call unless there was something important. I’d trusted him to handle some deliveries coming in today, too.
I swipe the call and lift the phone to my ear. “Silverton.”
“Hey, boss,” he says. Normally slow-talking and blunt, right now Alaska sounds ready to strangle someone, a harsh edge in his voice. “Can you get down to the site? I’ve got a trucker here with an entire semi full of our shit—won’t sign off on delivery because it’s marked COD, like any damn body would ship out this much rebar COD. It’s already paid, but he ain’t listening.”
Cash on Delivery? Is he joking?
“The fuck?” I growl, fro
wning and already standing, then grasping Libby’s hand for one more squeeze. “I’ll be there in a few. Don’t let him leave with our rebar.”
I hang up quickly, pocketing my phone.
Before I can say anything, Libby smiles and rests her cheek to my hand, her soft skin so warm.
“Gotta go be an adult, huh?”
“Unfortunately.” I grunt but let myself smile just for her, resting my knuckles against the high crest of her delicate cheekbones. “I shouldn’t be gone long. Some invoicing and supply crap, probably. Alaska needs me to come be an asshole with authority over contracts instead of just an asshole in general.”
Libby lifts both brows mock-innocently.
“Hey, when you’ve got natural talents—”
“Don’t you even start.” Chuckling, I lean down and steal a quick kiss, then disentangle myself and head for the door.
“Back soon,” I throw at her.
But I’m not sure I will be.
Something smells fishy about this.
That trouble that’s been brewing like a far off thunderhead?
It might be about to break and rain down hell.
I was right to be suspicious.
Funny how this tough-talking trucker was giving Alaska hell, but when I show up he’s all contrition. Some kind of mix-up in the paperwork, everything’s fine, here’s your rebar.
I’ve never seen the man before in my life, but he looks at me like he’s seen a ghost.
I can’t help lingering on the faded bruises peppering his burly forearms.
Sure, bruises aren’t much reason to accuse anyone of anything.
Being a trucker is rough work, and they get banged up all the time.
Still, something seems weird about it, especially when he avoids my eyes and practically hides in his truck while my crew offloads everything. Most truckers would help so they can get back on the road quicker.
All those stories about Declan swindling other truckers into doing his dirty work...
Nah.
They can’t be dumb enough to try something like this, right?
Scamming me out of money with a fake-ass invoice mess?
By the time it’s over, I’ve got a headache from working in the glare of the hot Montana sun. Once we’ve got everything secured, I send the guys home to enjoy the last of their weekend and head back into town myself.
I’m not quite ready to go back to Libby. I’m pissed off, irritable, and wondering if I’m being overly paranoid about this shit with the oddball delivery.
Don’t wanna give her more to worry about.
I also don’t want to keep her uninformed if Declan’s still skulking around, planning to make a move, either. She can’t find Sierra soon enough.
On a whim, I stop by The Nest to grab a coffee. Felicity’s brew should ease my headache and give me time to think before I go back home.
Home.
Shit, I’d always wanted to build my home from my own blood and sweat.
Now there’s something appealing about putting my blood and sweat into helping Libby make her home stronger.
I’m still brooding as I order up, hardly even noticing Felicity’s pleasantries. Though I manage a smile for her and ask how she’s doing when she calls me up for my cup of thick black double-caff.
I’m so preoccupied by all this shit running through my mind that I don’t realize there’s someone standing behind me. Not until I turn and bump into her, nearly splashing coffee over both of us.
“Dammit, sorry,” I growl out, grappling at my cup.
It’s not really clicking who’s in front of me, my focus more on keeping scalding hot liquid off my skin and hers, until she speaks.
“So I finally run into you,” she says. “I’d almost think you were hiding from me, Holt. That’s so cruel.”
I blink. What in the...?
I look up from my coffee cup at the woman in front of me.
Sally Jenkins.
Oh.
Shit.
I haven’t seen Sally since high school. She was a pretty girl then, and she’s a pretty woman now. Tall, curvy, with wheat-blonde hair and soft, curious brown eyes and a delicate, almost pixie-like face with long lashes and a pert little strawberry of a mouth.
I know that mouth a little too well.
I know all of her.
She’s the girl my brother crushed on in high school.
With how fucked up things were between me and Blake back then, I just had to have her because he wanted her first.
I’d been having wet dreams over Jenna Ford, Warren’s sister.
But Jenna was older and never looked twice at me, so it wasn’t a big deal to keep dating Sally off and on during the feud with my brother—for attention, for status, for anything we could turn into a fight like the juvenile hotheads we were.
Back then, Sally was catching feelings like the kids say now.
I just hadn’t really thought anything about it because I was a callous little teenage bastard.
From the way she’s looking at me now, though, I think one of my oldest chickens is coming home to roost.
“Hey, Sal,” I say, offering a neutral smile. “Long time no see. I’ve been real busy since I’ve been back in town.”
“So I hear, rebuilding half of Heart’s Edge, aren’t you?”
She arches a pointed brow, folding her arms over her ample chest.
Deliberately, I realize.
Plumping up her tits and pushing them up against the low-cut neckline of her tight-fitting shirt.
I nod slowly, numb to her charms.
Funny how just a year ago, I’d have pounced on all that cleavage and the clear display meant to pique my interest—among a few other things.
Not anymore.
I feel like I’m doing something wrong just by noticing it.
And I keep my eyes fixed firmly on her face as she continues, teeth toying at her lower lip. “A man of few words, huh? Guess it comes with the territory when you’re trying to be a hero builder. And sleeping around with everyone, of course...”
I start to growl, to tell her I haven’t been sleeping around with anyone but one sweet girl, period, but she’s still talking.
“...everyone but me,” she finishes.
There it fucking is.
Right between the eyes.
Hell.
That spidey-sense that told me I was in trouble the second I saw her was too right.
I try to hold on to an awkward smile as I glance around the coffee shop helplessly. There aren’t too many people around. Most folks are out enjoying their sunny evening, but there are enough.
Gossip spreads like fast-moving poison ivy in this town.
Which is why I can’t believe she’s choosing to pull this crap right here, right now.
Okay.
Fuck.
I take a deep breath, then say neutrally, “I’m not really looking for a hookup, Sal. I’m not on the market right now.”
She rakes me up and down with a cat-like look, toying with her lower lip in a sulky pout.
Sally remembers the little things that get to me, my own personal kryptonite in a woman.
They’re just not working anymore.
All I can think about is Libby.
“Oh, stop. You’re always on the market, Holt Silverton,” she says, and although it’s whiny, there’s a bit of justified accusation, too. “So, what? Suddenly you start hooking up with Libby Potter and you’re a changed man?”
“If you really wanna put it so bluntly, yeah,” I admit.
It’s making my face burn something fierce to say that out loud, but it’s true.
Libby’s changed me.
Made me realize the man-whore I was before isn’t who I want to be.
A complete dick like Sally wants.
I stare her down.
Sally snorts, rolling her eyes. “You’ll come to your senses. You ain’t a one-woman kinda man,” she says, stepping closer.
I lean back instinctively,
but I can’t go far with the coffee bar at my back and a cup of hot black coffee steaming in my hand, waiting to scald us both with any sudden movements.
Smirking, Sally reaches out to run her fingertip along my forearm. “I bet I could accommodate you. Don’t you remember how good we were?”
I grimace. “That was high school, Sal. Twenty damn years ago. Everything seems better than it was with that much time passing.”
She lets out a flirty laugh. “Not for me. I remember everything.” Stepping closer still, until I can smell her light, floral perfume, she looks up at me through her long lashes. “I remember how you made me feel, Holt. I remember every day. I don’t know how you did it, but you ruined me for anyone else. And when I heard you were back...”
No. My eyes pinch shut. Don’t fucking say it.
She nibbles at her lower lip, her fingertip against my wrist, hooking the curl of her finger over the wrist bone. “Well, I was hoping you’d come see me. Hoping you thought of me as much as I thought of you.”
Oh.
Oh, fuck.
Sally Jenkins has been in love with me since high school.
And she’s still in love with me now.
Funny thing is, I’d rather kick my own ass a hundred times than hers for this tease.
I’m worse than a player leaving my mark on half the women in town. I’m a reckless douchebag who deserves everything he has coming.
Now it comes down on me like a fucking avalanche.
There’s no denying, all those years ago, I used her.
Used her to get at Blake by making her love me. Making her need me. Making her think we had something special so she’d always choose me over Blake.
Sure, there was always collateral damage from the way Blake and I used to fight, always competing for our screwed up mama’s love.
Thing is, nobody’s heart should ever be collateral damage.
Not from two broken, bitter boys trying to duke out their way to adulthood.
I gotta fix this.
I gotta make this right, but I don’t know how.
Not when, beneath the coy look she’s giving me, I can see hope there, too.
And that’s not even touching the hurt.
I think deep down, she knows.
She knows what a shit I was, and I think she sees I can’t feel anything for her now.
