Seeking Sanctuary

by Annie Anderson

  “That sucks. Sure, my brother can be a huge pain in my ass most of the time, but at least he’s around, you know?”

  “I guess,” I shrugged. Family and their dynamics wasn’t something I was versed in. When I heard people complaining about their parents not approving of something they did, my brain just didn’t compute. I’ve never had a reason to consult with another person about a decision I made or a course of action to take.

  “So… What do you think? You want to rent this place? The lease term is six-months if that helps.”

  Six months. I tried to think of where I would be in six months. If I had my numbers right, then I would be about to deliver a baby. There was no way I would move then. I looked around, taking it all in. This could be my home. A real home. A safe home. A place I could bring my child into the world where nothing could touch it – nothing could harm it.

  I nodded to myself and said, “Make it a year, and you’ve got a deal.”

  * * *

  “I have a place, signed a lease and everything,” I said into the phone even though Smitty was almost full-out growling at me. He didn’t like that I was staying in a small town. At. All.

  Smitty also didn’t like that I was essentially living on my boss’ property. A fact he made clear already.

  “The house is nice, and the rent is cheap. Seriously, I couldn’t find a better place.” I was trying to persuade him to not fly out here and kidnap me because more than likely that was what he wanted to do.

  “I recall saying no small towns. I recall saying to stay under the radar. And with the shit already swirling, baby girl, this does not spell good things.”

  “What shit?”

  “Are you sitting down?”

  Given the fact that I was in the driver’s seat of my SUV outside of Connie’s ready to go get some food, I was, but I didn’t like his tone one little bit.

  “Yeah…” I said, drawing out the word to make sure he knew that I probably didn’t really want to know what shit was actually swirling.

  “Kid… I went back to check – to see if I could clean up the scene. Maybe keep you out of trouble. The whole building was up in flames. Whatever was there it isn’t there anymore.”

  Denial slapped me in the face harder than one of Cole’s fists. No one was going to be looking for me for Cole’s murder. Not if everything was burned up in a fire. But I didn’t start that fire.

  “Was it arson? Did they recover a body? Are people looking for me?” Questions spilled out of my mouth rapid-fire.

  “There wasn’t a mention of a body in the papers, but a burned down building wasn’t exactly what they were reporting on. The main story was the Montgomery’s tax evasion, embezzlement, and fraud claims. It seems their chickens have come home to roost, baby girl. I don’t think you’re one hundred percent in the clear, and I don’t like that we haven’t heard a word about a body,” Smitty delivered his news.

  I didn’t like that they hadn’t found a body either. Did they just not report it? Was it just sloppy reporting?

  “I don’t either, but even if he’s alive – and I’m not saying he is because I saw him – there is no way he’d find me. I have a new name, a new phone, new car. I dyed my hair. No one knows Isla Cooper here. They only know Isla Young.”

  “I know you’re right. I’m glad you’ve found a safe place to land, baby girl, but I want you checking in. Deal?”

  “Deal.”

  * * *

  “Jesus Christ, woman, what’s in this box?” Levi grunted as he hefted one of my boxes marked kitchen onto the counter.

  Levi probably thought once I signed the lease, he was off the hook, but when he made the probably insincere offer to help me move in, I grabbed at it. With my typically prickly attitude, he likely didn’t expect me to take him up on the offer, but even I knew there was no way I wanted to heft boxes by myself.

  “Don’t be such a baby,” I teased knowing full well that one probably weighed close to fifty pounds.

  “No. Seriously. What the fuck is in this box? It weighs a ton.”

  “Probably a cast-iron pan and stoneware if I had a guess.”

  I almost felt bad for the guy. The boxes with my Le Creuset cookware were not light.

  I loved cooking. So much so, when I packed up my stuff from Cole’s place, I took all my cooking gear – my Wusthof knife set, my marble rolling pin, my cast-iron pan and stoneware, my KitchenAid mixer, and my bamboo cooking utensils. I brought a few more bits and bobs, but those were the most important, slowly but surely spirited away each day accumulating in my storage locker until I could leave.

  “Of all the things you could pack, you picked pans?”

  “I love cooking, okay? And that set of ‘pans’ as you so ignorantly call them, are worth over a grand. There was no way in hell I was leaving them behind. Do you realize how long it takes to get cast-iron seasoned right?”

  I watched as Levi’s eyes glazed over once I mentioned how much the set cost. Excessive? Possibly. But I wanted the best tools for the job, and other than reading I didn’t have many other hobbies. Plus, some of those bargain brand pans heated about as even as a goddamn microwave.

  “You paid a thousand dollars for pans?”

  “Maybe,” I offered, slicing open the tape on the box with a box cutter. I wanted my babies.

  Growing up, I didn’t have much in the way of good role models. I didn’t remember my mother ever baking me cookies or making dinner. I cannot recall a single time where someone other than myself gave a shit about what was put into my belly. In foster, it got worse. Sure, there was the odd housewife who appeared to have it together, but I never stuck around too long in those homes. Before too long, it was the group home, and other than a few caretakers who gave a damn, the food was typically less than ideal.

  My first cooking lesson came from a battered and food-splattered Joy of Cooking book I found in the group home library. Like with most things, I taught myself the basics by reading. After a while, I was allowed to hijack the TV remote even when it wasn’t my turn at living room time because my housemates knew if I saw something I liked, I would make it for everyone. My attempts at cooking were typically fruitful, and for a while, I considered being a chef. Eventually, my love of numbers surpassed my love of cooking, and the rest is history.

  “You any good? At cooking, I mean. If you’re a shit cook, paying a grand for pans is the dumbest fucking thing I’ve ever heard. But if you’re Julia Child, well, that’s a whole different story.”

  “I love that your chef references are from the sixties,” I giggled as I tore away swaths of packing paper from the stoneware and set each piece aside.

  “That’s not an answer.”

  “Is this a challenge? Do I need to school you on my cooking expertise? Because I can,” I sassed, climbing up on the barstool so I had the height to heft the butcher block from the box. I freaking hated being little. Half the time cooking was a workout all on its own because everything was typically out of reach.

  I reached into the box, but I didn’t stay there for long. The barstool that I thought was stationary turned out to be on a swivel. I canted my body just wrong and nearly went down. But Levi’s strong hands found me before I could take a header, lifting me by my waist and setting me back on my own two feet.

  “Whoa, there. I think you might just be a little clumsy, Sugar,” Levi’s voice hit me like a soft blow. It had been a bit since I’d been in someone’s arms and my skin didn’t crawl. And it didn’t. Crawling skin wasn’t even in the same realm of where I was. I couldn’t decide if it was the smell of his skin or the heat pouring off him, or maybe it was a mix of the two, but my belly dipped more from his hands on me than from the fact that I almost biffed it off a barstool.

  But I couldn’t lift my head to look at him. His hands were burning their way through the thin cotton of my Pink Floyd t-shirt, and I couldn’t do anything but let my eyes slide closed so I didn’t pounce on him.

  Hormones.

  This has to be som
e weird pregnancy symptom, and no one told me. Yes. That had to be it.

  “How about I unpack the box, and you decide where you want your stuff to go, hmm?”

  “Good plan,” I murmured, taking the knife block and finding a place for it in a corner. I needed to find my cutting board.

  “You were just trying to get out of answering me. I’m onto you.”

  “Of course. I totally almost took a header off a barstool to get out of your little challenge,” I deadpanned. “Fine, I will cook you a sumptuous meal to thank you for helping me lug this stuff. Happy?”

  “This equates to you cooking for me, and I don’t have to show you the dumpster fire that is my cooking skills?” Levi confirmed, “Yes, ma’am this makes me very happy.”

  “You eat at the diner for every meal, don’t you?” I accused.

  “No. Sometimes I eat at the Antler Pub.”

  I couldn’t help it, I busted out laughing. For the first time in a long time, I felt at home.

  11

  LEVI

  I turned the volume dial on the radio up and rolled the windows down. The day was warm enough that I wouldn’t freeze Isla out. We were on our way to the grocery store to pick up all the ingredients for ‘the best thing I’d ever eat’ – or at least that’s what she called it.

  Isla asked me what kind of food I wanted, and like any smart man would, I’d said Italian. Isla nodded her head, thought on it a minute and then an evil sort of smile hit her face. I was already gone over the woman, and that smile pushed me over the edge of sanity. Whatever crazy dish she wanted to cook, I was ready. Even if I had to choke it down and smile while I did it.

  “Who is this?” Isla asked referring to the raspy woman’s voice belting out a bluesy rock tune on the radio.

  “Dorothy.”

  “As in, The Wizard of Oz?”

  “No, as in the band,” I chuckled, turning the wide white wheel of my 1976 Ford F100 to hug the curve of the mountain. I’d restored this truck a few years ago from the rusted-out heap she used to be. I’d found her at a junkyard, just sitting there pitiful – rusted out rims sitting on concrete blocks, upholstery torn up or disintegrating altogether in places, dash cracked. But amazingly enough, the potential she carried far outweighed the cosmetic damage.

  So far, I’d retooled or replaced almost everything on her, and made a few modifications to the sound system so I didn’t have to rely on spotty mountain radio stations. Some might call it sacrilege, but adding an aux cable to my day-to-day truck just made sense.

  “Again, why couldn’t I drive? If I’m going to learn the roads here, I’m going to have to drive them.”

  “It will be close to dark by the time we get back. Some of these switchbacks are sharp, and a little tricky to navigate in the dark if you’ve never driven them.”

  “I guess. You’re really just holding me hostage until you get your meal, aren’t you?”

  I shrugged, sending a good-natured grin her way, and we lapsed into silence while we listened to the radio.

  Grocery shopping with Isla was an experience. She had a three-page list of things she needed to stock her kitchen, half of which I didn’t think she could consume in a week, let alone a month. But she was dogged and determined to find everything on that list.

  But I knew better than to argue after she agonized over the seafood section before giving up and settling for frozen shrimp because she just didn’t trust it to be fresh enough. The way she looked at the poor kid manning the counter after he couldn’t answer when the catch had been delivered told me all I needed to know, and there was no way in hell I’d be wading into that one.

  And I’d probably wait to tell her about the ritzier market the next town over that got a fresh catch flown in daily and spare myself the death stare. Isla was serious as fuck about cooking, that was for damn certain.

  We were perusing the bakery section, and Isla was trying to decide between ciabatta or French bread when her head popped up, and her eyes searched the ceiling for a bit.

  “What?”

  “I forgot the heavy cream,” she sighed.

  “And that didn’t make it onto your War and Peace novel of a shopping list?” I kind of loved giving her shit about it even though she was doing most of the bulk shopping just so she could cook me dinner.

  “Zip it, or I will eat my yummy food in front of you and not let you have any,” she teased, but the look on her face said she meant business, and I believed her. Isla would totally make me watch her eat yumminess and not share.

  The wench.

  “How about I go grab the precious heavy cream, and you finish making your bread selection.”

  “Thank you.”

  “No problem, Sugar.”

  I watched her roll her eyes good-naturedly before setting out to hunt down said heavy cream. I had an inkling of where it might be, but since I didn’t really know exactly what it was, I knew I’d have to ask someone. I managed to find a stocker near the dairy case who pointed me in the right direction. Unfortunately, there were five different brands with two sizes each. I picked a giant size of the most expensive brand because there was no way I’d go back to Isla with budget brand anything. At least not food-related. I may not be a smart man sometimes, but I knew better after the shrimp.

  I made my way back to the bakery section, spotting Isla with a familiar and unwelcome hulking shadow. My brother. It wasn’t just the way he stood, but it was the look on his face. The interest there. I’d seen all the moves before, and there was no fucking way I’d let him poach on Isla.

  Orin had already slept with damn near every eligible woman under the age of thirty-five – except for Pippa, the fucker – in this whole damn town. Probably half of Denver, too. For being a pillar of the community, he sure did get around.

  Typically, I was a laid-back kind of a guy, the funny, easy-going yin to my gruff lady-killer yang of a brother, but when it came to Isla, I wasn’t going to go quietly. I wasn’t going to shrug, make a joke, and let him steal her away. Not this woman. Not this time.

  No fucking way.

  I clapped my brother on the shoulder, not startling him per se, but stopping him mid-sentence. Orin knew it was me behind him, but it was unlikely he knew I was claiming Isla as mine, so the unrepentant squeeze of his shoulder was probably more vicious than it needed to be. Oh, well.

  “Levi. Have you met the newest member of our community?” Orin asked, not realizing who she was to me.

  Dumb ass.

  “Yep. She’s my new accountant,” I replied as I moved to circle my brother, edging him away from her. I didn’t want to offer more details to him. Not her name, not that she lived on our family’s property. Nothing. Knowing Orin, he’d make it his mission to butt in, or worse. “And as soon as we check out, she’ll be cooking me dinner. Is this what you needed?” I asked Isla, producing the heavy cream.

  She took it from me, and put her nose right to the cardboard carton and took a sniff. Odd, but okay. Could she smell it through the packaging?

  “Yep. This works,” Isla acquiesced, plopping it precariously on top of her mountain of groceries.

  “Dinner? And I’m not invited?” Orin accused, feigning insult.

  “She’s cooking for me, not you,” Asshole, I wanted to tack onto the end of that sentence, but didn’t because I didn’t want Isla to think I was a raving fucking lunatic.

  “If you two are going to fight, might I suggest you whip your shirts off first? I mean, y'all are drawing a crowd already, you might as well give them a show. I think I saw some olive oil in aisle five. I could rub you down, and you could go at it,” Isla offered, her face a mask of complete seriousness, but her blue eyes sparked with mischief.

  I’m a dick.

  Isla’s deadpan had Orin giving her an odd look for a second before he realized she was being sarcastic. Me, on the other hand, felt like an asshole once I realized my brother and I were drawing a crowd.

  “I think I’ll pass. Wanna get out of here, Sugar?” I offered, ge
sturing her to lead the way as I turned the cart away from Orin to head to the checkout lanes.

  Orin muttered something under his breath at the ‘Sugar’ endearment, but I didn’t think Isla heard him. Either way, I still elbowed him in the gut as I passed.

  “Dick,” he hissed, but I didn’t stop. Because I was following the sexy woman in the Pink Floyd t-shirt like a lost puppy.

  After checking out and us having a pay-for-groceries tug of war – she won – we headed back to the barn house where we had another tug of war over who would carry in said groceries. I won that one, but only under the condition that she got to put them away immediately and start dinner.

  Isla did not mess around with that in the least. Before I knew it, she had a beer popped for me on the island, a pot on the stove full of water for the pasta, and a full glass bowl full of warm water to thaw the shrimp. Then, she whipped out her cutting board and chef’s knife and started dicing tomatoes, basil, and green onion.

  I watched her dance around the kitchen sautéing the shrimp and then making the sauce, I was enamored. Isla was in her element, commanding the kitchen in such a way that if she weren’t so fantastic with numbers, I could see her ruling a kitchen with an iron fist.

  “Okay, I’m sold on your skill. If this tastes even half as good as it smells, I already know it will be the best thing I’ve ever eaten,” I conceded, bowing to her culinary greatness.

  “Good to know I haven’t lost my touch,” she murmured, and I had a feeling she didn’t expect me to hear that.

  “Why would you have lost your touch?” I asked and watched as her bright eyes dimmed for a moment.

  “It doesn’t matter,” she waved my question away with a rueful smile and shook her head before testing a noodle and then draining the water. I didn’t like it that her eyes dimmed, and my brain made the leap that maybe her ex didn’t just take his hands to her. Likely, he broke her down, made her feel like she couldn’t do the things she loved – things she was good at. I’d seen it with Graham’s mom, how she used to be the awesome mom who made cookies and helped with football snacks to the shell of a woman she was today.