“Wait for me okay?”
“Sure.”
Kirin pulled her visor down, so she wouldn’t stare at him while he put his motorcycle gear on. She caught sight of herself in the mirror. Good gravy. She looked as if she’d run a 5k after swimming the English Channel in winter.
She stole another glance at him. The world was unfair. He looked perfect. He noticed her gawking at him and shook his head, grinning as he swung one leg over his bike and started it. With the black visor lifted on his helmet, he mouthed the word “Friday,” smiled and pulled out.
Chapter Twenty
Will’s first research paper was due Friday, so right after Thursday’s taco dinner, she loaded the boys up and headed to the library. A win-win. She’d brought her notebook with the odd clues she’d found. She could do some research of her own while helping Will. Plus, she could keep an eye on the littlest turkey perusing through the children’s audio books, sitting on a Mickey Mouse bean bag with bright pink headphones on.
The Powell Library was best known for its floor to ceiling stacked-stone square fireplace. The crackling fire always made her want to curl up on one of the reading couches with a novel. It reminded her of the huge fireplaces in Hogwarts.
Kirin reserved two computers; one for her and one for Will. When everyone settled in, she typed in the numbers she’d found, but it took her nowhere. She studied them, added them together and even looked for a common denominator. She tried assigning each number a letter to determine if it spelled something out, but nothing worked. Giving up, for now, she’d move on to the name she found. She googled: Manfred Pitts, Savannah, Georgia.
When she was young, before her mama died, they’d lived in Savannah for about a year. Well, at least she’d been told they did.
The only thing she remembered clearly about Savannah was St. Patrick’s Day. Schools closed, and people everywhere were decked out in green, heading to the street parties downtown by the docks. Oh, and green Jell-O. To a six-year-old girl, green Jell-O was the bomb.
Kirin Googled the name but didn’t get far. She’d found a seventeen-year-old Manny Pitts in Texas, and a Manfred Pitts in South Dakota who recently celebrated his ninety-first birthday. Neither of those were right.
She used a few different search engines. One hit on a computer business in Savannah whose sole proprietor was a Manfred Pitts. Pitts Web Design and Commercial Recycling
Kirin jotted the information down on one of Will’s scratch papers, then typed in the website address.
The site had colorful graphics and eye-catching fonts. She searched through several screens, but no pictures of Mr. Pitts. Shoot. Looking at their rates she swallowed her tongue. Web design was not cheap. On her way home, she’d call the store and finagle more information.
Kirin helped Will find a few more information sources, checked out a few audio books for Little Jack and ushered everyone into the car. She dialed the phone number for Pitts Web Design
After three rings, a woman with a southern accent and a gravelly smoked-a-pack-a-day voice answered.
“Pitts Web Design, May I help you?”
“Yes, ma’am, can you tell me what your store hours are today?”
Her reply sounded as if she was bored. “Monday through Friday, eight to four and Saturday eight to noon and closed on Sunday.”
Next question. “Great, can you tell me if Mr. Pitts does the web designing himself or does he contract that out these days?”
“Yes, he does it himself. What type of business do you have?”
Crap, she didn’t have a lie ready. Think, Kirin.
“Um … a catering business in Tennessee, with a specialty in … apple pies.”
It was the first thing that popped into her mind.
“Oh, sure, dear, he can take care of that for you. Oh, and, honey, nobody ‘round here calls him Mr. Pitts. Everyone calls him Kidd.”
Her mouth dropped open. Yes.
Then the woman asked, “Can I have him call you, dear?”
“Oh, yes, please,” Kirin answered way too cheerily. Rein it back in. Kirin gave the woman her name and number, letting the woman know how anxious she was to get started.
“Alrighty, I’ll have him call you. Honey, you have a blessed day.”
“Thanks, you too.” She hung up and did a happy dance in her SUV.
She smiled the entire way home. Proud she’d uncovered more of the puzzle her father had left her, but those numbers still eluded her. Then it hit her, she knew the exact person to figure it out. Uncle Dean, the man loved games, pranks, riddles, anything he had to figure out.
She laid her notebook on the passenger seat and dialed his cell.
“Kirin? Everything all right?”
“Yeah. I’ve got a quick question for you.”
“You still mad about the pranks?” Excitement bounced in his voice. She was sure this was payback for her teenage years.
“No. But if I find another slimy frog swimming in my bathtub, I’m going to start retaliating.”
Uncle Dean chuckled. “That’s not one I taught them. Good for them! Following in my footsteps.” He laughed even harder. Finally catching his breath, he said, “All right, honey, sorry. So, what’s up?”
She loved this man. He was fun-loving and ferociously loyal. For never having kids of his own and having an angry eight-year-old dropped in his lap, he’d always been kind, loving, and protective. He’d never treated her as a niece by marriage, but like his own child. She couldn’t have asked for a better substitute dad, which made it all the harder to lie to him.
“So,” she cleared her throat, “I’m reading this mystery and within the story, there’s a puzzle. I can’t seem to work it out. It’s a random set of numbers with dots between. And I thought since you love puzzles, you might help me figure it out?”
“Sure, I haven’t met a puzzle yet that stumped me. Wanna text it to me?”
She didn’t know how secure her cell might be. If they could text her, they might somehow read her texts.
“I’ve got it right here, can I read it to you?”
Grunting, he shuffled papers around.
“Yeah, sure. Hang on. Ah, okay, I got it, shoot.”
Kirin read the numbers to him and told him the avenues she’d exhausted so far, but none panned out. God, she hated to lie to him. Then again, the less he knew about it, the safer he’d be.
Now, she had only to discover who had the third torn out page. She prayed Kidd would call or message after dinner. Maybe then, she’d get some answers.
~*~
After putting the boys to bed and gathering everything she needed for work the next day, she ran upstairs and logged on to Messenger.
He was there waiting.
Kirin, you there?
I’m here.
How are the followers?
Haven’t seen ‘em in days. Maybe they gave up?
Not likely. Hey, an interesting thing happened today. A woman called my shop needing a website designed for her apple pie business.
Found a name in my artifact. Her rapid fingers sent another message: You know, this would be much easier face to face.
He took forever to respond. His message finally popped through.
Do you like baseball?
Who doesn’t?
Good answer. Braves game 1pm Saturday. Think you could get away?
Will you answer all my questions?
And then some.
Then yes!!
He replied. See you soon, KTL
See you MP, she typed back.
This was possibly more exciting than the pretend date with Sam Friday night.
Chapter Twenty-One
Friday night. She rushed home from work and ushered Rosa out the door early. The observant woman eyed her as if she’d stolen something. Rosa had prepared chicken and dumplings in the crockpot for their supper. While the boys ate, she ran upstairs for a quick shower. When she came back down, her phone flashed a missed text from her aunt, they’d be there in five m
inutes to get the boys. She’d asked them to babysit for a few hours while she went to Sam’s house, but they’d insisted on a sleepover.
The doorbell rang and within five minutes everyone was gone, and the house was quiet. She was all alone, staring into her closet fighting with herself about what to wear.
If she picked something too revealing, he might think it was a real date. Her stomach fluttered. This wasn’t a date. It was an ‘information-seeking-meeting.’ Right. Her mind needed to explain that to her heart. Plus, this was the guy who stood her up. She didn’t need to go overboard with the outfit.
But she needed to look pretty. She still needed information. With several failed outfits piled on the floor, she grabbed a lime green skirt that hung a few fingers above her knee and a sleeveless white V-neck button-down with a sweater over it. Cute lime shoes, earrings and a dab of perfume topped it off.
She checked the time. Fifteen minutes to finish hair and makeup before it was time to leave. She’d typed in his address into her GPS. Only a ten-minute drive. No wonder he followed her so easily.
As the crow flew, it wasn’t far, but navigating curvy backroads would take the entire ten minutes. She finished her hair and makeup, then changed purses to one large enough to fit the book.
Staring at it in her hands, she knew the safest place would be a safe deposit box at the bank or even a safe inside her home, but she was constantly looking through it. And somehow, it dawned on her, it comforted her. She shook her head, stuffed it inside her purse, and set off toward his house.
After several stops and turns, she was convinced her GPS was on meth. She locked her doors at a deserted crossroads. Thick trees lined all sides of the intersection. No street signs, and no signs of life. Her phone repeatedly told her to turn right, indicating she’d “arrived.”
Her head spun side to side, as if she followed a tennis match. There was no flippin’ driveway to her right! She was in the damn twilight zone. The woman’s voice on her GPS repeated, “Arrived” until she told her to shut up, pressed end and tossed it in the seat next to her.
She inched closer to the intersection, still squinting. If she hadn’t noticed bits of gravel in the road, she’d have never seen it. A long gravel driveway emerged, hidden by two overgrown bushes. She had to back up and swing wide to navigate her SUV between them. She winced, anticipating a scraping sound down both sides of her vehicle, but it never came. Those bushes had to be less than an inch away from her paint.
The gravel turned into two wide strips of dirt, with a neatly mowed line of grass down the center. It looked as if it’d been made by a covered wagon. She hoped she was on the right path, because there was no room to turn around.
She drove slowly, not entirely convinced she wasn’t driving into deliverance. She checked the door locks again in a spot where the forest grew so thick it looked like nighttime.
A few hundred feet ahead, the trees thinned out to reveal a quaint rock bridge over the top of a small stream. From afar it looked old, as if she was being transported into another time, but upon closer inspection, parts of it were new.
Off to her right were trees covered in moss and to the left sat a bright luscious field with horses and a small barn. A few feet past the bridge stood a fence with a locked gate.
She crept toward the gate, rolled her window down and searched for some way to get in. Cleverly hidden behind a bush were a camera and a speaker. Both were invisible until you were right on top, like the driveway.
She leaned out the window and pushed the button, ready to turn around if this was the wrong place. Without a word the gate opened. She hesitated, then drove through.
The gate slammed closed behind her. She stared at it for a second in her rear-view mirror, with a sinking feeling of being trapped. This place was locked down like a prison. She wondered what sort of people Sam dealt with to keep him holed up on the side of a mountain.
The dusty road curved to the left ascending the side of the steep mountain. Spring clung to everything around her and the air smelled sweet. As she rounded the last turn, the ground leveled off and out from the top sprung a rustic cabin snuggled by trees and grass. Twilight settled in over the clear mountain range, and the view was spectacular. It was like something from a dream.
Thanks to getting lost, she’d arrived a few minutes late. She parked to the side of the cabin, shut off her engine, and opened her door.
The cabin glowed from lamps next to the windows. Thanks to the open front door and raised windows, she had a clear line of sight straight into the cabin into a large living room and behind that, his kitchen. The cabin was anchored in the front by a wrap-around porch. One side of the porch held a wooden swing draped in a red blanket. God, she hoped she was in the right place.
Leaning on her car door she strained to listen. A radio played soft country music. Romantic country music. Crap. Sam’s low, smooth voice sang along, and she giggled. Finally, something he hadn’t perfected. Through the window she saw him moving around and making dinner. Even being domestic he commanded respect. The muscles in his back contracted as he bent over to put a pan in the oven. She raised up on her tiptoes like a prairie dog.
Lord get a grip, Kirin.
He stopped singing and strode through the living room, then pushed open the screen door and stood, legs wide, wiping his hands on a small towel. His worn blue jeans hung low and he’d traded his usual T-shirt for an untucked white button-down that hugged his chest. No shoes. He looked so relaxed. As her eyes swept up to his face, a sexy, heart-dropping smile spread across his lips.
She shook her head, opened her back door, and took her time grabbing the bottle of wine and movie. She took a deep breath, shut her car door and walked toward him.
“Hello, beautiful,” he said as his eyes swept over her. “You look nice.”
Sam had a slight redness to his face as if he’d sprinted around his house.
“Nice place,” she responded lightly.
“Thanks. Did you have any trouble finding it?” His eyebrows raised, hopeful as if he took great pains to make it hard to find.
“Nah,” she lied.
He rolled his eyes and propped open the screen door with his backside. She turned sideways to slink between Sam and the door but didn’t judge the distance well enough. Her chest brushed up against his abs as she passed him. Electrical currents almost stopped her in her tracks. He placed his free hand on the small of her back as she passed. A chill ran up her spine.
Holy Jesus, this was not gonna be easy. His entire house smelled like him. That intoxicating spice and manly smell permeated every crack in the walls. How was she going to stay aloof with all this maleness everywhere?
“Want me to take your sweater?”
She knew he’d be able to tell exactly how much his touch had affected her if she took the sweater off.
“No thanks, I’m good.”
The smell of dinner wafted in over the manly smell and her stomach growled.
“Something smells amazing. What is it?”
“Dinner,” he answered, eyebrows up.
She shot him a glare and one side of his lips curved, showing the dimple. “Baked chicken, potatoes, and green beans from last year’s garden.”
She nodded, then Sam led her through the comfortable living room and into his kitchen.
“The chicken has about twenty-five minutes left, wanna open the wine and I’ll give you a tour?”
“Sure, point me toward the glasses?” He pointed to an upper cabinet. She pulled down two tall wine glasses and poured them each a full glass of sweet Pinot Grigio. She hadn’t meant to pour so much. Then again, some liquid courage couldn’t hurt.
Without warning, Sam stood right behind her. He leaned in, brushing her back with his hand while picking up his glass and taking a generous swig.
Lord, her knees shook. Something about him—his clean smell, this place, standing close…she couldn’t put her finger on it, but every few minutes, she couldn’t breathe. Even after his hand was g
one, electricity pooled in the spot where he’d touched her.
Kirin picked up her glass. Her fingers trembled. She turned, pretending to look at something interesting outside.
“Ready for the tour, madam?” Sam held out his hand.
“Sure, lead the way.” Sipping her wine, she put her hand in his. He stilled for a second and took another gulp. Maybe he felt the zing too?
Kirin followed Sam through each room, one by one. The living room with its two comfortable couches, massive flat screen TV and an old roll-top desk in the corner facing the front porch. It looked perfect to watch a game or read a book. Warm lamps gave off a glow in every corner, which made the room feel spacious yet homey and inviting.
Next, they headed up a dark, back staircase. Light illuminated from a nightlight, but she still couldn’t make out what kind of room it was. Sam pulled her to stand in front of him on the top step.
As her eyes adjusted, she realized it was a loft with a half wall overlooking the living room. Sam flipped the light switch to reveal a long room with two sets of bunk beds, a toy box shaped like a baseball and a TV mounted on the faraway wall. It was a boy’s room.
“What do you think?” he said in her ear. His chest leaned against her back, leaving her trying to remember why she didn’t want to be near him.
Her first thought was he’d had kids with someone. He said he’d never been married, so maybe out of wedlock? Unwelcome, jealous thoughts of an ex somewhere spiraled through her. She shook her head and recovered her senses.
“It’s nice. I didn’t know you had kids.” She turned. He hadn’t budged backward an inch, which left her standing inside his arms and staring at his mouth.
“I don’t. I’ve got nephews…” his voice was husky as it trailed off and then he added, “and maybe the hope of kids someday.” His eyes pierced hers.
She swallowed hard.
Poking him in the chest she said, “Well, you better get to it, Mister, you’re no spring chicken.”
Sam laughed and put his hand on her waist, with the tips of his fingers squeezing a few of her ribs to tickle her.
Entangling: Book One of the Kirin Lane Series Page 16
