“Fascinating.”
Nate appears in his doorway, hands behind his back, leaning against the doorjamb. I meet his gaze and offer a coy smile, holding up a finger that I’ll be a minute.
Virginia hooks her arm in mine and ushers me closer to the railing for privacy. “That man you like is afraid of what the truth might bring,” she whispers, holding the crown like it’s a newborn baby. I mimic her pose with my granddad’s letters, keeping them close to my chest.
“Do you think he’s dangerous?” I whisper back, looking over my shoulder at him.
“No, dear. He thinks you are.”
“Me? Why me?”
“That, you’ll have to figure out yourself.” She pinches my cheek and heads down the stairs.
Joss smacks her gum as Virginia approaches, but the two pass without exchanging words. Joss sits across from Jim by the fire, and Virginia retreats to the sitting room.
“Psst,” Nate prods. “You ready?”
I nod with a smile, running my hand across his waist as I step past him and inside. Without pause, the door closes and locks. “I thought you were gonna leave it open?” I tease, facing the bed, hearing him approach from behind. “Eager?”
“That’s putting it mildly.”
His breath emerges in gasps, fast and hard like when he was working out on the swings. He steps closer, moving the hair off the nape of my neck. “What are—”
“Shh.” His teeth nip at the sensitive skin of my earlobe, conquering me without any effort. “I want you, Salem. I can’t wait any longer,” he whispers. “Let me take you to bed.” It’s too damn easy to lose myself in his tender touch. “You’re so beautiful.” His hands wander down my hips and under my dress, my undies hooked and slipped to my ankles. “So, so beautiful.” His long fingers move smoothly up my legs.
“Nate”—I swallow hard—“we shouldn’t.”
“We should.” He takes the letters and places them on the dresser. Then. Slowly. He unbuttons his flannel shirt, tempting me with his gorgeous, muscular body. “Give me one good reason why we shouldn’t,” he says. He holds his shirt to the side and drops it on the floor. “Just one reason, Salem.” He steps forward. I moisten my lips and close my eyes. “Nothing? No answer?” A finger traces down the front of my dress and stops low between my legs. He can’t wait, not until after dinner, not until after we talk about the letters, not for another minute … and I can’t either.
But, I do love playing hard to get.
“One reason, beautiful. Tell me.”
“You’re leaving in four days.”
“And?” He lifts my dress over my head and moans at the sight of my body.
“Because I fall hard for men when I sleep with them.”
His lips pet my lips as he unclasps my bra. He slides his hand to my breast, caressing my nipple while his other hand unzips his jeans. “I don’t mind if you fall for me. That would be a good thing, wouldn’t it?”
“Not if you don’t come back.”
His thumb swipes my cheek, nudging me to look at him. “Who said I’m not coming back?” He lets a playful smile fly. “We’re neighbors, Salem. I own the land behind you. It’s not like you’ll never see me again.”
“God, don’t do this to me.”
“Do what?” he asks, lightly biting my chin.
“Make me fall for you.”
“Then tell me to stop. Tell me you don’t like it.”
“Dammit.” I grab the back of his neck and kiss him … hard. His tongue explodes, full and warm, slick and excited like he’s coming in my mouth. We kick off our shoes and recline on the bed, sharing closed-mouth smiles when our eyes lock.
This is crazy. I wanted to share one of my granddad’s letters with him, and what I learned about the treasure. Now I’m so worked up and wet between my legs—my heart pounding, belly curling—that all I want is to be with him, right here, right now. Everything else will have to wait. Everything.
“Salem!”
Except.
“Salem, where’s the fire extinguisher!”
“What?”
“Salem!” Joss yells.
I bolt out of bed and put on my dress, running down the stairs in a flash. Four of my guests follow, shrieking as they run out the door. “What the hell, Joss? What happened?”
“Where’s the fire extinguisher?”
“Where’s the fire?”
“One of the logs in the fireplace popped and spat out an ember. Your rug’s on fire.”
“Where is it?”
“Jim took it outside.”
“Shit.” I stamp out an ember on the wood floor before dashing to the front door. I pull it open and come face to face with Brad Brenner. “Double shit.” I slam the door, appalled, and turn back to Joss. “Did you call Brad?”
“Of course not. Why would I?”
“Because of the fire.”
“Salem, it just happened. He wouldn’t get here that fast. And no, I didn’t,” she says snappishly.
He opens the door and walks in. Nate appears on the balcony, his shirt off, hair messy like we just fucked. He glares at Brad. Brad glares back.
“What do you want?” I ask. “I have a full house tonight and don’t have time to talk.”
“Did you know you have a fire out front?”
“Yeah, Brad. I know.” My voice is fierce, my hand on my hip. “Joss, it’s in my kitchen.” She races to my private quarters to get the extinguisher. Brad looks up at the balcony. His legs part in a fighting stance. “Why are you here?” I ask, breaking the fixed stares.
“I wanna question your friend up there.” He nods at Nate.
“What about?” Nate says, walking down to the lobby.
Brad steps forward and places his hand on his gun, invading Nate’s space.
“What’s the problem, Brenner?” Nate asks.
“Just a hunch.”
“A hunch about what?”
“How come I can’t find any connection to you and Grady. Or you to the Murphy family?”
“Because my mom was adopted. I’m not related to Grady by blood.” His lips curl in disdain.
“Sure, that must be it.”
“Why the hell are you checking me out?”
“How about your mom?”
“My mom?” Nate’s voice is tense. “What about her?”
“There’s no record of her, not until she started school here in Tilford Lake. Where’s she from?”
“Get the fuck out of here.” Provoked, Nate flips his hand toward the door for Brad to get out.
“Wait. Wait a second.” I step between them. “Brad, what are you saying?”
“I’m saying it’s unusual that the Murphy’s adopted a kid without any record of where they got her from. And their adopted daughter has a son with the same background, no record of him before he started grammar school.”
“Means nothing,” Nate says.
“Okay. What hospital were you born at? I’ll check it out.”
“I wasn’t. She had a midwife.”
“That’s convenient. How ’bout a birth certificate?”
Joss tears through the lobby with the fire extinguisher. Jim walks inside, his hand up for her to stop.
“It’s out,” he says, turning to me. “You gotta keep a screen over the fire so this doesn’t happen again. The whole place could’ve burned down.”
“I have one.” I spot the fireplace screen set off to the side. “Whoever put the last log on forgot to put it back.”
Joss holds up her hands that it wasn’t her.
I spot the crocus crown on the hearth and wonder if Virginia did it. Then, with doubt, I wonder if it was an accident, or not.
Jim walks over to Nate as a backup for the situation with Brad.
“Brad, this is bad timing,” I say. “Call me tomorrow.”
“So you don’t care about Eli anymore?”
“Of course I do.”
�
�Then hear me out.”
“You’re talking shit. You know nothing about me or my mom.” Nate knocks Brad’s shoulder.
“Touch me again, asshole. Go on, touch me again.” Brad pushes back, fear evident in his falsetto voice.
“That’s enough,” I cut in. “Just be upfront with me.”
“I am. I’m telling you what I know.”
“What you think you know.” Nate’s words pierce the room. “Dumbass.”
“Dumbass?” Brad raises a brow. “Excuse me?”
“Fuck,” I mumble, pulling Brad by his coat sleeve to the front door. “I’ll ask him about it,” I whisper, “but I don’t need a fight in here after everything else.”
“It won’t be a fight. It’ll be an arrest.”
“Stop it,” I say through clenched teeth. “Call me tomorrow and we’ll talk about this in private, but not now. I’ve got guests outside.” He looks down at my chest. I’m braless from the mad dash, and my nipples are hard from the cold air coming through the front door. “Dirty pig.” I smack him. “Don’t you dare. I’ll call Chief and file a sexual harassment complaint if you do that again.”
“Nice, Salem. Real nice.” He storms out and drops into the driver’s seat of his patrol car, flipping me the bird. Snow and stones kick up from the car’s rear wheels as he speeds down the driveway to the main road.
I wave my guests inside and warm a pot of tea for them, apologizing numerous times.
“My quilts better not smell like smoke,” one says.
“That’s right. Better not,” says another.
“You all get half off your stay,” I say, settling their nerves. They take their tea and march upstairs to their rooms in a huff. I catch snippets of their whispered complaints…
Can you believe this place? … Nincompoops run it… It smells like wet dog and smoke in here … I bet they have bedbugs … You sure this is the only hotel in town?
“It’s a lodge, not a hotel,” I whisper. “Sparrow Lodge.”
“Hey, babe.” Joss strokes my arm. “Why don’t you finish your—”
“No, I’ll stay down here. You can hang out with Jim if you want.”
“Sorry,” she says.
“It’s not your fault. I’m the one who shouldn’t shirk my responsibilities for dick.” Jim laughs, but Nate’s definitely offended. “This is my family’s place. I can’t forget what that means and why I’m here.”
“Why are you here?” Nate asks.
“It’s my obligation.”
“Says who?”
“Says me.”
I’m not sure what’s happening here, but the sexual tension between us just wilted like a rotting willow tree. Is he angry with me? Or still irritated with Brad? Is he embarrassed by what he just said? Or insecure over what Brad said?
He looks down at the floor, his foot sweeping left, right. Whatever it is, he’s not the same confident Nate. Something just bit him.
Wordless, skin pale, he goes upstairs.
“What the hell?” I say, somewhat ambivalent. I turn to Joss and Jim who’re sharing a chair by the fire, entwined in each other’s arms.
“Bummer,” says Virginia.
I jump when she speaks, my heart lodging in my throat. Was she standing next to the reception desk the entire time?
“Is that still an expression?” she asks.
“Yeah.” I sigh. “Bummer.”
“What happens now?”
I shrug and walk behind the desk to bring my computer out of sleep mode, checking for new reservations. None. “I have some orders to place, and I need to dust the lobby.”
“And order a new rug.” She smiles.
“That too. I’ll place an old one down for now.”
She nods. “I’ll let you be.” She heads for the stairs, stooped over to convey her frail body carries the burden of the day.
“Virginia?”
She ascends the stairs one foot at a time, placing both feet on each step while holding the railing. Old age sucks.
My grandma used to complain that the older she got, the more invisible she became. She said people are blind to the elderly. I think that may be true in Virginia’s case. I haven’t seen anyone else talk to her since she arrived. It’s sad, really.
Jim picks up the crocus crown from the hearth, and Joss ducks for him to place it on her head. I’ve not only noticed the lust in her eyes but also a spark of magic between them. She plants a kiss on his cheek, a good omen of things to come.
“You make this?” he asks. She shakes her head no, and a flower falls from the bunch. The recent nightmare of feathers floating from Eli’s hand crosses my mind. Jim repositions himself and accidentally steps on it, a bad omen of things to come.
I turn back to the stairwell. “Virginia?” I call out.
“Yes, I’m listening.”
“You think Nate’s related to me? I mean…” That came out wrong. I look up at the dusty Christmas decorations on the beams, then back to watch her measured steps. “Do you have any idea who he is? Do you think he belongs here?”
She pauses on the top landing, using the railing for support. Her eyes roll back as if she’s conjuring up an answer from some deep closet of her brain.
“Where a person belongs is a decision they make on their own, it’s not about where you’re born or who your family is. That man is in the right place if he’s happy being here.”
Seeming to age another year with each stiff-hipped step, she crosses the balcony toward her room, resting before she enters the hallway. She stares down at me one last time, her eyes red-rimmed, pupils as dark as Eli’s were in my dream.
“But from what I’ve witnessed, Salem. I don’t believe any of you belong here.”
fourteen
The clock over the reception desk stands at midnight. Sleep has become a challenge since I held Eli’s key, examined Connor’s stash, found Granddad’s letters … since I fell for a guy who may not even exist.
Nathan Harlow.
Sexually speaking, my desire to be with Nate is more than it ever was with my ex-husband. But should I be suspicious of him like Brad is? Brad, a guy I’ve known my entire life. Brad, who’s becoming a dirty smarmball. Or should I trust my instinct with a guy I barely know, a guy who could be hiding something.
I look up at him. He’s drunk. Nate is. Drunk and gawking at me, sitting cross-legged on the opposite end of the grungy rug I lugged out of the storage closet. The rug with juice stains and edges frayed—the moth-eaten, dust-laden rug that needs to be placed over the clothesline and beaten with a broom. It’s making my nose twitch, but looks a touch better than the scuffed wood floors, which are sooty from the minor fire.
“Stop staring at me,” I whisper.
He hasn’t said a word. Besides taking a drink from his beer every so often, picking at the label, and scattering tiny scraps across the rug, he’s close to stone-still. Like Virginia said—a fly on the wall—observing without interacting. If he’s adamant about staying down here, so be it. Whatever his deal is, I’ll act like I just don’t care.
My focus turns to the spread on the rug. I have it all laid out: the stash, Granddad’s letters, three sparrow keys, Virginia’s flowers, and a glass of red wine—my aid in the detective work.
I pick up Eli’s key, his tiny sparrow the last thing I ever expected to see, not to mention the sentimentality I feel when placing it with the other two. I put them in a line below the three crocus flowers, the fire casting an amber glow on the brass keys and painting the flowers a sunny yellow-orange. My fingers run across the lot, back and forth, trying to awaken the past.
“I understand your part now, Connor.” I take a sip of wine. “Wunderkabinett.”
I never knew he wanted a display case full of his discoveries from the property. I have my granddad to thank for sharing Connor’s plan for his nature collection, and for filling me in on how it came about.
I flip through the letters and slide one t
o Nate. He unfolds it without preamble. He hasn’t bugged me to read them since the walk back to the lodge, but I can tell by the way he dives right in that the wait has been driving him mad.
His face is all shadows except the fire that lights his eyes. I notice slight changes in them as he reads, from hope, to surprise, to grief.
• • •
Grady,
Good to kick back with you last week. You look healthy, better than old Felix Whitfield. Goddamn, I feel ancient. Did you notice my stomach? Carol bought me a pair of them pants with the elastic waistband. Have you seen the commercials? They’re on late at night when only us gray-haired men whose minds won’t turn off are awake. Two pairs for $19.95. Two pairs, Grady. The shipping and handling were outrageous, but they fit all right. Call me gullible, go ahead, I’ll let ya!
I told Carol about your bone project. She said you should’ve been an artist. She remembers you were good at it back in high school. Still could be one, you know. She’s sending you the pamphlet for next year’s craft festival at the Post. Do show off your work. Does no good sitting in that root cellar of yours. No good at all. You have talent, my friend. Don’t keep it hidden. People should know of your gift. You hear me? Come out and play with the rest of us. We’re not dead yet. We’re smack dab in the middle of it all. The beginning may be over, but we’re still far from the end. Ever think about that? What’s left? Decades, years, or only days? I’m hoping for decades. I know you, though. You’d say we’ll all be dead tomorrow. Cranky pessimist is what you are.
I’m teaching Connor all about it. Life and death. I told him about your project. The bones, the pretend tags you made with obscure animal names, how you pieced them together—the entire display of mythical creatures. What craftsmanship. It piqued the boy’s curiosity. I mentioned it takes more than one to have a collection, more than one to start a Wunderkabinett like yours. Not one bone but a pile of them. Whatever he collects, I suggested starting with three, the number of good fortune. But knowing Connor, he’ll take it to an extreme. He has one of them heavy-going science brains, a bit of a mystery at times. Not sure what’s stirring in that head of his, but I do know he loves finding oddities on the property. A hunter. Unlike game hunters, a different mindset I’d suspect.
The Release of Secrets_Littlest Sparrow Gone Page 11
