No Gentle Giant: A Small Town Romance

by Nicole Snow

  I wonder if this is what closure feels like.

  What it feels like to be ready to move on.

  To sort the good from the bad with the past, to bury it honorably, to start over with a woman who’ll bring the sunny days back to us, and who won’t blow our world to kingdom come like my dead ex-wife.

  Eli’s hand grips at my arm and he leans his lips to my ear. “Uh, you don’t really have to stop calling me that. I just...you know. I like to remember the fun stuff, Dad.”

  “Yeah?” I look up at him with a smile and squeeze him closer. “Me too, polecat. Me too.”

  I also want to get them home, fixed up, and find that girl I’m aching to forge fun new memories with like nothing else.

  I want to make it right with Felicity and let this latest scare be our last big disaster.

  23

  Gold Digger (Felicity)

  It’s been hard pretending everything’s normal today when it’s anything but.

  What does normal even look like when we’ve got two missing kids?

  Most of my customers are coming in for top-ups on the caffeine they need to keep themselves sharp and moving, all compliments of The Nest when I feel like it’s the only thing I can do to help.

  Lunches, too, help make sure everyone participating in the search stays well fueled. Half of my part-timers are brewing huge vats of extra-strength joe and the others man the sandwich assembly line with me, working their fingers to the bone.

  Then, sometime in the early afternoon, Blake comes busting in.

  So breathless, so tense, for a moment the blood leaves my face.

  But I realize he’s grinning...isn’t he?

  He’s panting with the rush of relief as he proclaims, “We found ’em, folks! Tara’s got a nasty sprain, but they’re just fine.”

  The Nest is almost too small to contain the explosion of euphoria that rips from every mouth in the room.

  People who’d been as grey as the rain light up in awesome technicolor, grabbing each other, hugging, some of them even crying with relief.

  I’m in the thick of it, my staff jostling me and each other with pure joy. Even I’m close to breaking into tears.

  But you’d better believe I can’t stop grinning.

  I’m glad.

  I’m so glad.

  Especially since it means I was wrong, and Paisley doesn’t have Eli. Hasn’t hurt him. Won’t ever get the chance to hurt him or Tara.

  What I’ve set in motion now can’t be stopped.

  It’s still the right thing to do, a way to stop the danger I’ve inflicted on the town.

  I can’t exactly text Paisley and say, Oops, never mind. Turns out you didn’t have the kids after all. Deal’s off, stay home, forget what I said about payback. Ha ha, just kidding, please don’t kill me.

  And even if I know Eli and Tara are safe...

  It still needs to happen.

  No more excuses.

  No delays.

  I can’t explain how Eli’s come to mean so much to me. This sweet, attentive kid who loves photography like magic. I care about him like he’s my own family, and it finally makes sense.

  So does this town.

  That’s what places like Heart’s Edge do.

  Once you’re here, once you’ve put down roots, you’re family, and they’ll throw everything they have behind you when you’re in trouble.

  Which only reminds me that I don’t belong here.

  I know—I know there are people here who care for me just as much.

  And despite the nasty things whispered behind my back, more people than I believed up until recently see me as much a part of the town as those darling kids.

  I’m not so self-centered I can’t see that.

  Not so tangled up in my own misery that I think there’s no one who loves me at all.

  I know they exist.

  And I love them, too.

  Which is why I need to make sure the troubles haunting me can never touch them again. So I can make sure I’m not the reason crisis visits Heart’s Edge again.

  For the moment, though, it feels wonderful to be a part of something bigger.

  One with the collective happiness filling my café as people celebrate—and we’re quick to go from passing out sandwiches to passing out desserts until it’s almost a spontaneous party.

  It’s almost dark before people start dispersing.

  Now that the kids are safe and sound, everyone has permission to go back to their lives and their small concerns like tomorrow’s breakfast. To rest.

  I wish I could join them.

  But I have destiny waiting, and it definitely can’t wait.

  Not when I can feel Paisley coming at me like a heat-seeking missile, and two messed-up daddy’s girls have a date to keep.

  If anything, I’m more determined now that I know Eli’s safe from Paisley’s clutches.

  I’m damned well going to keep him that way.

  I’m already exhausted by the time I chase the last of the part-timers out and close things up, flipping the sign on the door to CLOSED and drawing the blinds. It’s just past sundown.

  I’ve got a vehicle full of gold bars and only two hands.

  Time to roll.

  It takes me almost an hour just to drag everything inside, using a cart and the industrial-strength tarps Alaska first brought the gold up in. I haul it across the parking lot one inch at a time, then bump it over the stopper at the bottom of the door with a heave that nearly bursts my lungs.

  Then, sweating, I try to glide it across the floor, off the cart, thinking the smooth surface will make it easier.

  Actually, all I do is make my floor look like a tiger ran across it.

  If I screw this up, I won’t be around to care.

  So I leave scratches in the floor, hauling that mess of gold into the back storage room.

  I can hardly feel my arms by the time I manage to let it go and stop for breath, but I’m going to need my strength for a little longer.

  At least now, though, I can lift the bars—which are still heavy as hell on their own—one at a time, stacking them along the upper shelves.

  Then I rearrange the empty five-gallon glass growler jugs on top of them until it looks like a pretty, glittering product display.

  I hope the dazzle will be enough to distract Paisley and her goons so much they won’t even notice a few other little surprises I’ve put into place.

  I want to test it, give the cord I’ve strung across the roof and down to the door a tug...but it’s a one-time deal.

  Once I spring this trap, there’s no putting it back together again.

  I’ll have to trust I’ve done it right.

  I’ll have to trust I’m doing something right for the first time in my life and making up for my father’s wrongs.

  Honestly, I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel, staring at the rows and rows of gleaming bars that have caused so much trouble.

  I’ll never understand what Dad was thinking when he stole from the Lockwoods. How did he think blood money was ever going to help us?

  We’d have been so much better off if he’d just...

  I don’t know.

  I hate how confusing it is.

  I hate guessing exactly what he was thinking. A former heroin addict, clean, but all anyone saw was someone who couldn’t be trusted.

  Every door slammed in his face, again and again, until the only way to survive and care for his family was to go right back to the world that destroyed him in the first place. A sick cycle.

  One that killed him.

  One that left my mother and me struggling with his legacy hanging over our heads, these pariahs who brought misfortune wherever we went. I’ve done my best to get Mom out from under that dark cloud, but it’s very much alive if I don’t do something decisive.

  Even if Alaska and Eli are safe for now, they won’t be in the future.

  Neither will this town.

  I remember when a certain bad man everyone trusted h
ad his stranglehold on this place with his drugs. I was one of the only people who knew what he really was, thanks to Paisley’s little undercover visits to keep an eye on his operation and point that little knife of hers under my chin.

  I still have so many regrets that I wasn’t able to help Warren when that maniac almost killed Haley, but by the time I knew what was going on, what the stakes were, it was over.

  It was all over, and I no longer had to watch a fat drug spider weaving webs around Heart’s Edge with not him, but Paisley Lockwood at its center.

  Those threads were still there, all this time.

  Only now they’re twisted into a noose.

  I just hope I can slip the knot and keep my own neck out of it.

  Leaving the storage room, I step into my office and unzip the duffel bag I’ve left there. It’s sweltering and sticky tonight, but I pull myself into thickly padded snow pants, an even thicker jacket, all fluffy down inside puffed out around me.

  I’m already a sweaty mess from hauling the gold, so the heat from the insulating layers makes a bad situation worse.

  I’ll deal with it because I have to.

  A little flying ceramic nearly cut the ligament in Alaska’s knee, although it looked like a shallow wound on the surface.

  I’m not about to risk worse from a lot more broken glass—though if things are as explosive as I hope, the padding probably won’t protect me that much.

  Deep breath.

  It’s okay.

  I can handle pain.

  I’m used to hurting.

  It’s joy, happiness, pleasure, and certainty that are unfamiliar to me. For just a little while, I had them in my grasp.

  For just a little while, I had him.

  There’s a wax envelope on my desk. My throat closes as I flip it open with my thumb and run my fingertips over the glossy photo on the surface. A stack of Eli’s pictures he’d developed at the pharmacy, only to shyly give them to me and tell me to pick out the ones I like best so he can have them blown up into prints.

  So many great shots at The Nest.

  Sometimes when I hadn’t realized he’d been watching me.

  Watching us.

  The majority of the photos are of me and Alaska together—him perched on a barstool watching me work, me calling something over my shoulder to him with a smile I didn’t even know I knew how to make when Ms. Wilma was right.

  My smiles are always sad.

  But not around him.

  Not when he’s teasing me, offering his warmth, his understanding, lighting my world until I forget how to be afraid.

  All the hollow places that pain and loss carved inside me were filled with him, remade in his image until there was no denying how I felt.

  Whole.

  As I slowly flick my way through the photos, I stop on one.

  The night of the festival. I knew Eli was there, hanging around with Tara and the Fords, but I hadn’t realized he had his little camera spying on me and his father yet again.

  My heart falls apart.

  My fingers tremble.

  There we are.

  Just a little ways off from the rest of the crowd, looking up at the sky full of fireworks.

  Like there’s nothing in the world but me, Alaska, and those vivid glowing lights bursting against the stars, shedding rainbow shades down our faces, highlights along the edges of fingertips fiercely tangled together just like the way we’d entangled our lives.

  I’m not going to burst out crying. I’m not.

  I don’t have the time or the will or the energy.

  With what’s in front of me, I can’t waver.

  That’s why I haven’t let myself answer Alaska’s calls or listen to his voicemails.

  His apologies, his joy at having Eli back, could only make me second-guess what’s about to happen.

  They’ll tempt me to be weak, to turn back, to go to him and take the safe route like I’ve always done.

  And the irony is, this safe route will just prolong this torture and endanger God knows who else.

  I can’t start thinking too much about everything I want to cling to, the things I’m afraid to lose, or I’ll lose my nerve. I won’t be brave enough to finish the job I desperately need to close out forever.

  My phone vibrates in my pocket, an ugly reminder of exactly what’s ahead.

  I fumble to get it out of the padded snow pants, but when I do, my blood chills.

  Yes, I’ve been expecting it, but that doesn’t mean I’m ready.

  I’ll never be ready for this.

  If you’re playing a game with me, Paisley texts, First your boyfriend dies. Then his sweet little boy. I’ll save your mommy dearest for last. And I’ll make you watch me carve every last one of them up before I cut you to itty bitty pieces so small they’ll never identify your scraps.

  Welp. Can’t say she doesn’t have a knack for dramatic threats.

  No games, I send back. I’ve finally figured this entire mess out. What my father did. The gold’s all yours. Every piece he took from you. Come get it, and then get out of my life. We’re square.

  There’s a long pause.

  I’m waiting for a long message full of expletives, mocking baby talk, or just whatever batshit crazy thing stampedes through her evil pixie head.

  Instead, I only get back one line. Three words.

  Square? Not yet.

  My breaths turn into stabbing icicles in my throat.

  Jesus. Even offering her the world isn’t enough.

  Knowing her, she’ll still want her pound of flesh for whatever trouble she thinks she’s gone through to keep terrorizing me for years.

  Fine.

  She can take anything she wants.

  But one way or another, if she wants my life so bad, I’ll make sure it’s the last thing she ever takes from anyone.

  For the rest of her own brief existence.

  24

  The Gold Touch (Alaska)

  Right now, I should be pounding back a beer in celebration, feeling like I’ve just splashed down from the moon.

  Instead, I can barely crack a smile.

  I’m in the hospital waiting room with Eli, staring down at my silent phone. Haley and Warren sit across from us with their kids, leaning against each other, and goddamn if it doesn’t just make me miss Fliss even more.

  She’s still not answering her phone or my texts.

  It isn’t like her, knowing if she was that done with me after I was a colossal jackass last night she’d tell me to my face...wouldn’t she?

  No, she wouldn’t.

  She’d run.

  She’d run because she wouldn’t want to burden me, and she’s so used to taking everything on herself that she’s afraid to trust someone else to listen.

  And I’m worried as hell I might’ve proven her right.

  I let my own fears overwhelm me till I shut her out after she put her full faith in me, blaming her for something that wasn’t her fault.

  We need to talk.

  We need to talk like I need air in my lungs.

  Too bad I promised Eli we’d stay through Tara’s X-ray to make sure her ankle’s only sprained, and not broken. He’d have gone into the room for the X-ray with her if they’d let him, but that wasn’t an option.

  Still. My boy’s got the right idea. I could learn a thing or two from a twelve-year-old.

  Stand by your girl.

  Always, always stand by your girl.

  I told Felicity I wanted her to be mine. I wanted to see what we could be.

  I said I’d stand by her through anything—and then I walked it back on the first savage test of my conviction.

  How many ways can you spell idiot? I think I’ve added a few new synonyms for it with Alaska and Paxton.

  What the fuck am I doing?

  Either I’m strong enough to protect her and Eli both, or I’m not. And if I’m not strong enough for her, then I don’t deserve Eli, either.

  Yeah, I need to make this right.

/>   I need to drop to my knees and beg like a starving raccoon if that’s what it takes.

  “...Alaska.”

  “Huh?” I lift my head and realize Eli’s dozed off against my side, while Warren and Haley keep watching me with quiet sympathy.

  It was Warren talking, I think. I totally zoned out.

  He smiles at me wearily, his blue eyes flashing, holding his wife closer. “You’ve been staring at your phone without blinking for ten whole minutes, man. Wondered if you fell asleep with your eyes open.”

  “Probably. It’s been that kind of day.” I offer them my own tired smile. Here in this waiting room, even though we’ve just started getting to know each other better, we’re practically family.

  We get each other in that special agonizing way only people who fear losing their kids do.

  I crane to look down at Eli and rest my hand to the top of his head. He doesn’t even move.

  “Amazed he lasted this long,” I say.

  “A little stubbornness goes a long way. Bet he got it from you.” Haley watches me with a knowing smile. “You guys should go home. Sleep. You pushed yourself harder than any of us out there and you carried them back on your own. Still don’t know how you managed that. You might have to arm wrestle this guy.”

  She elbows her husband playfully and gets back a grumpy smile.

  I shake my head.

  “Rain check. We’ve got to stay a little longer. If Eli misses Tara when he wakes up, he’ll be upset.”

  “You can leave him with us,” Haley says—and I instantly bristle. She raises a hand. “Hey—hey, calm down, Papa Bear.”

  I groan, running a hand over my face. “...did Felicity tell you about that?”

  “Much to your detriment.” She chuckles. “But seriously, you can trust him with us. They wouldn’t dare wander off again. We’re taking the kids to sleep at the big house with Ms. Wilma tonight, so we’re just going to bring Tara up there to join the puppy pile. I think she’ll find the company comforting after what she’s been through, and Eli probably will, too.”

  I look down at my sleeping son.

  Our voices haven’t stirred him in the slightest.

  He’s just that wiped out.

  Curling my hand against the back of his neck, I feel his warmth, his beating pulse, those special reminders that he’s real and safe and here with me.