Crush (Tainted Love Duet #2)

by Kim Karr

  ELLE

  Spring was in early bloom this year.

  The breeze was light and cool.

  The air fragrant.

  The landscape almost indescribably beautiful.

  From the rich, vibrant colors of azaleas, rhododendrons, and tulips bursting across the adjacent meadow to the fence separating this holy ground from the wildness beyond, with its overabundance of yellow daffodils growing against it.

  The grass, too, was picture perfect. Although barely green, it was still soft and welcoming. And each building had planter boxes outside its windows filled with hundreds of purple violets.

  Then there were the pathways. They were made of smooth gray stones that peeked out beneath a mat of leggy clover and dandelions. The dandelions. The reason I picked this location over so many others Michael had suggested.

  Green Meadows was a small cemetery on the west side of Boston in Watertown, and although Michael thought it was too small and too far, I thought it was perfect. It reminded me of my childhood, of my sister and me running through the fields, picking dandelions and blowing on them.

  Perhaps sensing in a way that I knew what Lizzy would prefer, Michael had conceded, and Green Meadows was the place we’d laid my sister to rest. The funeral gathering was small and nondenominational, the sermon short, and the gravestone marker was simple. It read:

  Elizabeth Sterling O’Shea

  In loving memory

  Anything else would have been hypocritical.

  To say loving wife and mother would have been a lie. Lizzy had deserted her husband and child for a life she had somehow found more fulfilling. A life filled with drugs, sex, and money.

  To say loving sister, well, since we hadn’t spoken in fifteen years. That said it all. The last time I saw my sister was when my mother died and I was lying in a hospital bed. She came to say goodbye and left me alone with our father, who by any definition was a monster.

  And to say loving daughter would have been a joke. I hadn’t talked to our father in twelve years, and when I finally found the strength to track him down and call him to let him know Lizzy had died, he told me, “She has been dead to me for years.” When I hung up, I knew that would be the last time I’d ever talk to him.

  After the casket was lowered, we all began to leave the cemetery. Michael took my hand and I tried to pull it away, but he just seemed to grip it tighter. I couldn’t wait to see Clementine, to hold her to me. Michael and I had both agreed she was too young to attend.

  Coming to a halt, I glanced back. I knew Logan was somewhere in the distance watching me, but that wasn’t why I stopped. I had a few things I needed to say and do. “Go ahead. I’ll catch up,” I said to Michael.

  “I’ll wait in the car,” he told me and headed that way with the dozen or so other people who had attended. Aside from his sister and her husband, and his father, I didn’t know anyone there.

  With the delicate silver bracelet I’d recently found gripped tightly in one hand, I closed my eyes. The bracelet was the one that my sister had given me on my tenth birthday. It was meant to bring me comfort on those nights my father would insist on having sex with my mother when it was clear she wasn’t interested. It was also the same one I had thrown at her when she told me she was leaving me alone with our father. The same one I’d found in her car. The dainty silver chain was a lot of things, but right now it was a keepsake I’d hold on to. I’d save it and give it to her daughter one day when thoughts of her mother might surface.

  My sister’s daughter would never know her mother. Never know she’d been abandoned. Never know the things mothers and daughters should share. I’d paint a pretty picture for her, though, of how wonderful her mother was, because there was a time she was. Still, I was certain there would be days she’d cry for her mother. And that broke my heart. At the right time, I’d give her this, and tell her a happier version of the story of how it came to be.

  Letting my tears fall, I picked a dandelion from the ground and clutched it in my other hand. With a gust of breath, I turned toward the heavens and whispered, “Blow, Lizzy, just blow.”

  As I walked toward the car, I breathed in a deep lungful of the spring air. The sweet scent of the just opening cherry blossoms was poignant, and I was content with the place my sister would lie forever more.

  “Are you okay?” Michael asked, handing me a tissue once I’d gotten into his car. He had driven himself, opting to forgo the formality of limos and the procession of cars following the hearse to and from the cemetery.

  I drew in a deep, cleansing breath. “Yes, I am. What about you? Are you okay?”

  He looked at me. “I have no idea. Elizabeth seems like the wind, she blew into my life and out so quickly.”

  I wasn’t sure what to make of that.

  Remaining silent, he eased out of the parking lot and onto the main road. Once his tires were no longer on the gravel, he glanced over at me. “I will be . . . okay,” he said, reaching for my hand and squeezing it. “I just want all of this to be over, so I can focus on my daughter. She’s what’s most important to me.”

  Easing my hand out of his grip, I pretended to tuck a stray piece of hair behind my ear. “She’s going to be fine, Michael.”

  He nodded. “I know she will.”

  Catching the worry on his face, I had to ask, “What’s next?”

  He hesitated and then said, “We take one day at a time.”

  Whether purposely avoiding what the real question was or caught up in his grief, I couldn’t be certain but I had to know. “I mean about the drugs. Is all of that over? Are you and Clementine free from danger now?”

  With a thoughtful expression, he glanced over at me. “You know, I think we are. With the five million dollars’ worth of drugs now in the possession of the police, there’s nothing left for anyone to go after.”

  I blinked. Shocked that he was lying to me. “The news reported cocaine worth about half that was found.”

  “That’s what I said.”

  The blatant lie threw me for a loop. That was not what he’d said. Was he testing my knowledge of the situation? Did he know where the rest of the cocaine was? Was he hiding it? Did he have it? Was he keeping it for himself? And if so, what the hell was he going to do with it? Was Michael even more involved than I had thought? For Clementine’s sake, I had to hope not. Still, I had to put my faith in him that he’d do what was best for her. I didn’t have much of a choice. If I didn’t follow his rules, he’d cut me out of her life, and I couldn’t let that happen.

  From this point forward, though, my eyes would be more than wide open.

  We rode the rest of the way back to his house in silence. With my eyes focused out the window, my mind started to drift.

  I had two men in my life. Both had earned my trust. One was regurgitating the police’s theory that my sister’s death was the result of a fall after a self-induced drug overdose and, rather than dealing with the fallout, whoever she had been with at the time tossed her body in the river. The other believed my sister was murdered . . . by her husband . . . the very man sitting beside me.

  I didn’t know what to believe anymore.

  The police were still investigating but with no solid leads, their theory would hold true and the case would be closed in no time.

  Michael O’Shea was no longer my sister’s husband; he was now my sister’s widower. I wasn’t sure what I was. My sister and I had been estranged, and up until three and a half months ago, Michael and I had never met. Still, he’d been the one to call me upon Lizzy’s disappearance. Concerned, I came to Boston. Once I’d arrived, I met Clementine, my one-year-old niece, and after that I knew there was no way I was leaving. I fell in love with her the moment I laid eyes on her, and I wanted to be a part of her life. And Michael, not even knowing me, had let me into his daughter’s life. Something he didn’t have to do.

  Then there was Logan McPherson. He had entered my life just over two weeks ago by way of accompanying his father to deliver a threatening
message to Michael concerning the missing drugs. My sister had somehow gotten herself involved in a drug ring in which the Irish Mob played some kind of part. The details were sketchy, the facts unclear. What wasn’t confusing, though, was Logan’s concern for me.

  We were drawn to each other in the strangest of ways, and we came together in a way I’d never known with another man.

  I’d since come to trust him. To love him. It wasn’t that I thought Logan was lying about Michael; it was just that I thought his theory may have been a little tainted. He hated Michael for some reason, and I couldn’t help but wonder if that hatred was what was leading him to believe things that just might not be true. Until I could be certain, or, of more concern, in case Logan was correct, I had to focus on convincing Michael to appoint me as Clementine’s guardian.

  “We’re here,” Michael said, parking in front of his stately brick home.

  “I need to give you the spare garage door opener back. It’s in the Mercedes,” I said, snapping out of my reverie as I opened the car door.

  Stopping me, his hand went to the black hose below the hemline of my dress. “I need to talk to you about that.”

  In an obvious attempt to remove his hand from my skin, I moved toward the door and turned sideways to look at him. “Sure, what is it?”

  “I hate to do this to you, but I’m going to need Elizabeth’s car for the new nanny. Unfortunately the engine in Heidi’s car died, and she’ll need a vehicle to be able to take Clementine places.”

  Surprised, I said, “Sure, of course. When did you need it by?”

  The careful politeness that had developed between us since the night he asked me to do the unthinkable seemed to be thick in the air. “No rush. Just as soon as you can figure something out. I have to go to work on Monday, but I can shuffle back and forth if I need to, and Heidi said she’s trying to figure something out. I wouldn’t ask, but I’m just worried that if something happens to Clementine, Heidi won’t be able to get her where she needs to. I really hate to throw this at you.”

  He had a point. Besides, I didn’t really need a car. The weather was nice and I lived close enough to the boutique to walk. The only issue would be coming to see Clementine, and of course, taking her anywhere, but I’d figure that out later. “No, it’s fine. Let me see if Peyton can pick me up later tonight and if so, I can just leave it.”

  “You’re not spending the night?”

  “No, I wasn’t planning on it.”

  “Oh, I just thought with everything going on today, you’d want to be close to Clementine.”

  That horrendous ache in my chest for that sweet girl who’d lost her mother seemed to be moving to all parts of my body. I had to shake it off or it would overpower me. Without explanation, I opened my door and then turned to him. “I’m sorry, Michael, I need some air.”

  The sound of my door shutting coincided with his door opening. “Elle, wait,” he called.

  “Michael,” someone who had parked behind us called at the same time. I turned back to see a man and a woman who I had seen at the cemetery walking toward him, with a younger man who looked to be around eighteen, possibly their son, between them. The woman had long black hair, the color of licorice. The man had dark brown hair, almost black as well, like Michael’s, but it was graying at the temples. His eyes, even from here, looked icy blue. The younger man was a cross between the man and woman, but he had dark brown hair like the man. All three of them were carrying armfuls of flowers.

  “Seamus, you didn’t need to come,” Michael responded in a clipped tone.

  Stepping up my pace, I tossed over my shoulder, “I’ll see you inside.”

  My body was trembling and I felt like the sky was falling down on me. But then as soon as I opened the door, I heard the pitter-patter of tiny feet and I felt like I could breathe again.

  “Mommy!” Clementine shrieked as she toddled toward me.

  My heart went into full-on arrest and panic wrapped around me. Snapping my head back, I saw that Michael was still outside and hadn’t heard her. The nanny, on the other hand, was standing in the entrance to the kitchen with a narrowed gaze.

  Clementine had been calling me that for almost two weeks now, but never had she done so in front of Michael. I wasn’t certain how to handle it. A part of me loved the very idea that I would get to call this beautiful, precious little girl my daughter. Another part of me knew she wasn’t mine, and that Michael wouldn’t approve. But the biggest part of me was worried he would approve, and that name would come with a price I couldn’t possibly pay. Not now that Logan had entered into my life.

  Keenly aware that I would most likely have conceded to such terms before Logan made me feel unbalanced in a way I couldn’t wrap my head around, I never wanted to have to choose between Clementine and Logan. I hoped it would never come to that. I’d tried to explain this to Logan this morning but I just couldn’t get the words out. If he had even an inkling that Michael had expressed interest in me, I wasn’t certain how he’d react. Or maybe I was certain. And I couldn’t take that chance.

  Besides, I rationalized, Michael had never openly made a play for me, or told me directly that he wanted me, Not yet, that small voice inside me stressed.

  Guilt pricked me for not mentioning my concerns to Logan. I’d been trying to shake my thoughts off as preposterous, but I just couldn’t because they simply weren’t.

  As of late, Michael’s desire had been written all over him. It was in his eyes and the way he looked at me, in his lips and the way they parted when he saw me, in his words and the way he spoke them. I think Logan had sensed Michael’s interest in me from the first time we met in Michael’s office, even though at the time, I was completely unaware of Michael’s feelings.

  Before now, I had the illusion of his marriage to my sister to hide behind. Now that Lizzy was dead, though, I was worried that once the grieving widower was done mourning, the subtleties would be done, too.

  God, I hoped not.

  For now, I could handle this. I just had to keep Logan and Michael apart. As much as I wanted to tell Logan how Michael made me feel, it wouldn’t help anyone; in fact it could jeopardize my relationship with Clementine, and she was the one thing I couldn’t bear to lose.

  “Up,” that sweet little voice urged.

  More than happy to comply, I lifted her and cradled her in my arms. “Have you eaten your lunch, sweet girl?” I asked.

  “I was just preparing it,” the new nanny, Heidi, said in her German accent.

  Heidi was in her mid-twenties and at almost six feet tall, she looked like she should have been a supermodel, not an au pair from Germany who’d just moved in with Michael and my niece.

  “Great, I’ll sit with her.”

  As I walked toward the kitchen, I glanced at the photos around the house. Michael’s mother, his sister and her family, him and Clementine, just Clementine, but there were none of him and Lizzy, or Lizzy and Clementine.

  Out of nowhere, but not for the first time, it struck me that Michael and Lizzy might not have been happily wed. I’d never asked. Yet, there were no pictures of the two of them in the house, no wedding mementos anywhere, and he very rarely talked about her. When he did, she was Elizabeth, a name I know she’d have never allowed, as that was the name our father called her.

  “Where’s my girl?” Michael called from the front door.

  I looked over at him and pushed all of my craziness aside. Today was a day to mourn my sister. Tomorrow, I’d worry about what came next.

  “Daddy. Daddy!” Clementine yelled in a burst of excitement.

  Right there was the problem. The hex to all the negative theories I had about Michael. He loved his daughter and she loved him. No matter what he was, he was a good father.

  And what I wouldn’t have given to have had a father like him.

  LOGAN

  I had a teacher in the sixth grade who used to nag me about my lack of focus.

  If only she could see me now. Every fiber of my being
was focused on figuring out what the fuck had happened to not only the rest of the stolen cocaine, but also where the hell the five million dollars in cash was. Gaining this knowledge would help me prove or disprove that O’Shea was way more involved than he let on.

  In addition, I still had to figure out what Patrick was really after when he made the demands on O’Shea.

  The money?

  The drugs?

  Lizzy?

  The connection?

  Everything?

  If he was after Lizzy, she wasn’t in the picture any longer. Had he taken her out, not O’Shea?

  Or was my gut right and there something—someone—else also involved?

  Obtaining this information was key to keeping Elle safe, on all fronts. It would not only take Tommy and Patrick out of play for the rest of their natural-born lives, but could possibly implicate O’Shea. Fighting fire with fire was my game, and my hope was that Tommy and Patrick were the ones who would get burned. It was also going to help me see just how involved O’Shea was.

  Agent Meg Blanchet had gone freezer on me. She hadn’t spoken a word to me since she blew a gasket over the hotel fiasco. Of course, she was still also pissed about my lack of delivery and follow-through in the cocaine bust. I wasn’t certain whether that was good or bad news. Sure, part of the drugs had shown up right in the Blue Hill Gang’s backyard, and as hard as they tried to deny the connection, the evidence was hard to negate, but still the pipeline was unknown. The source a mystery. The kingpin missing.

  My cell rang.

  “Yeah,” I answered.

  “Hey, you’re never going to believe this,” Miles said excitedly.

  “What is it?”

  “One of my guys at the BPD said a gang member has agreed to turn state’s evidence.”

  “RICO?”

  “Yes, sir.

  I slammed the wheel in excitement. “No fucking way.”

  “Keep it to yourself but I wanted you to know the charges will be filed soon, and then Blanchet will be able to try Patrick and Tommy for the crimes they ordered other members of the gang to commit. Murder, torture, robbery.”