by Aimee Laine
“What the hell? Where did you get that idea? Shit. Does Lexi think that?”
Emma shrugged.
“Why don’t you tell us what your plans are then—in detail?” Ian laid a hand on Tripp’s shoulder. “I mean, you ask me for an update every day. You tell me to keep her in my sight, but you still haven’t told me everything.”
“I didn’t tell you because I didn’t want you to accidentally tell her.” Tripp pinched the bridge of his nose. “No matter what happens, how Lexi responds to me, I’m not going back to Jill.”
“Pinky swear?” Emma held up her finger.
Tripp laughed. “Are you kidding?”
She stared at him.
“No, you’re not. Can we do this with a hand shake?”
She remained silent, cocking her head at him.
“How does a pinky swear ritual make it real?”
Ian snorted a laugh. “We ought to run out back, slice our palms and shake, man to man, too.”
Tripp linked his finger with hers. “Yes, I swear it.”
Emma let go first. “Now what?”
“I need to find her,” Tripp said.
At the trill of the phone, Emma left their group.
“You take care of Sloan?” Ian asked.
Tripp smiled. “Jill’s going to deal with him.”
Ian’s eyes grew wide. “Yet another revelation you didn’t share. That go along with your little plan, here?”
Tripp slapped him on the shoulder. “Not only that, I switched the paintings and submitted an anonymous tip to the liaison about Sloan. He’ll work his way through it and come out unscathed, but his reputation will take a hit, at least in the private sector.”
“What about Isabelle Reed?”
“As long as I get Jill what she wants, I’m free and clear. I don’t get it to her? She’ll rake me over the coals by my balls.”
“Ouch,” Ian said.
Emma re-emerged, Tripp and Ian both turning to her. “Well,” she said.
“That sounded like an I-know-something statement,” Tripp said.
Emma nodded.
“Well?” Ian held his hands out at his waist.
“That was Janine.” Emma waved a hand in the air. “Lexi is too safe to be a complete fool. I figured she’d tell someone something. Janine even said she was sworn to secrecy, but given she’s in on this scheme you’ve got—” Emma put her hands on her hips.
“Keep going.” Ian rolled his hands around one another.
“Janine said Lexi stopped by, told her she was heading to the beach for a while and took some food with her.”
Tripp sped off to his rental.
“Where are you going?” Emma’s smile reflected in her happy tone.
“I’ll be back with or without her, though not today and not tomorrow.” He slipped into the driver’s seat, shoved the car in reverse and rolled down the window. “Make sure you’re here, free, and available on the thirtieth.”
“Why?”
He yelled, “I’ll be in touch!” and hoped they heard him.
The car’s wheels kicked up pebbles as he sped onto the road, toward the ocean. What he needed to ask Lexi worked even better where it all started.
• • •
Lexi picked up her phone, speed dialed and waited for the call to go through. Outside, the ocean’s waves crested and retreated in a soothing rhythm that never failed to relax her.
On the fifth ring, the other end connected.
“Well, hi, sweetie. Where are you? Emma’s all frantic back home. Why didn’t—”
“I’m at the beach, Mom.”
“You sound down, Lex. Everything okay?”
“I’m conflicted.” She traced lines in the sand with her toes.
“Why?”
A man. “You and Dad always taught me to stick to my guns, right?”
“We did, certainly, though I admit you’ve stuck to them more than anyone I’ve ever met. What’s edging into your morals or philosophy?”
Her toe followed a path around a circle and back. “A guy.”
“Oh, honey. In love, it’s never a right or wrong. What did he do?”
“He pushes me to the edge of my limits.”
“Is this the guy Emma told me about? I was wondering when I’d get to meet him.” She must have smiled while she said it; the words came through with a touch of humor.
“I’m not sure you ever will.”
“Oh.” The little sigh reflected Lexi’s entire week. “Tell me why, Lexi. Get it off your chest.”
“He’s got …” the ability to lie, cheat or steal, and I’d never know it … “some baggage that he can’t let go of.”
“Lexi.” The mother-knows-all tone reached her with clarity.
Dammit for good cell phone signals.
“We aren’t here to live our lives based on what people might do. I’ve told you about the struggles your dad and I went through. He’s not like his father, but in some moments, he is. I live with knowing I can influence him but not change him. I chose him because I loved him, and he’s the right man for me.”
“But what if—”
“Lexi.”
“Mom.” Lexi’s shoulders drooped like they used to do when her mother called her out on a subject.
“Do you love him?”
“I thought I did.”
“Is he good to you?”
Lexi knew that answer. “He was.”
“Does he love you?”
“He said he does.” Lexi kicked up sand.
“Then let him prove it to you.”
“Shouldn’t I already know this stuff, Mom? I’m twenty-nine.”
Her mom laughed like a little girl. “Love affects us at all ages. It doesn’t matter how old you are, how many times you’ve been in love, or how long you’ve been married. You work through it together, but the more you’re apart, the more your mind will conceive of stories which aren’t true.”
“He bought my farmhouse, Mom.”
“I know. Emma told me. You should call more often. I hear from your sister all the time. On that note, I’m glad you headed to the beach. Let her run the office for a bit; take some time to yourself. But not too much time alone, because like I said, your mind will play tricks on you.”
“But, I thought absence made the heart grow fonder?” Lexi let out a sigh mixed with a chuckle.
“Yes and no, Lex. At some point, you need to define where you begin and end, what’s you versus him. And you will. Trust me, my girl. You will.”
“Thanks, Mom.”
“You’re welcome, honey. Call me again soon.”
“I will.”
Lexi meandered father onto the beach as night fell, chewing on the last bite of her sandwich from Dulces. The only sounds came from the constant crash of waves and the wind that hit her ears. She dropped to the base of a dune, dug her heels into the sand and breathed in the salt air.
She’d left her hair loose, wet from a long soak in the tub. It would curl on its own with the ever-present humidity and the breeze the ocean created.
A whisper of wind against her neck sent a chill along her back. With the promise of darkness, the heat dissipated, giving way to the cooler season. She smiled at the idea of a life on the beach despite the pull of her very favorite place—a place she could no longer claim with a man she should never have met. Yet, with the wind across her face and the ocean in front of her, the only person she wanted failed to find her.
“Need some help?”
Lexi whirled. So lost in her thoughts, she hadn’t heard Tripp approach. “What are you doing here?”
“I came to find you.” Tripp aimed a finger toward the spot next to her. “May I?”
“Sure.”
He sat beside her, bent his knees up and dug his shoeless toes into the sand.
“How did you find me?” The wind blew her hair across her face.
Tripp moved it behind her ear, a gesture Lexi recognized from their very first introduction. “Wasn’t hard,
what with my secret ability to find stuff.” He chuckled.
“You don’t find stuff, you just don’t get caught.” She turned back to the ocean.
“Janine was worried.”
Lexi huffed a laugh. “I should have picked someone with a stronger spine. You all probably scared her.” Lexi hid the smile with a quick turn into the wind.
“Nah. She called Emma. I happened to be there, took my newfound information and headed straight here. Took longer to get here than I figured it would, but then again, I don’t think I ever got to make that drive before.”
“Why would you have? Didn’t you fly into a local airport in your Gulfstream with Jill … your fiancée?”
Tripp booted up sand with his toes. “But the night I was shot, I’d planned to come here, get you and drive with you somewhere remote so we could just sit and talk for … oh … days.”
“Talk?” Lexi snuck a peek at him. With nothing but the light from her beach house, his grin should have been obscured.
“Okay, not just talk. We could have eaten, too.”
She laughed, bumping his shoulder with hers. “Not sure what we would have said to each other. For that matter, what do we say now? I mean, you’ve got your thing, I’ve got mine. I thought you were getting married. Janine mentioned something about a wedding she gets to cater in New York.”
He shivered but didn’t disappear. “Jill and I are not getting married. You and I, Lexi, we’re connected by a powerful force.”
“You don’t know the half of it.”
“I do, actually.”
She raised one eyebrow. “What do you know?”
“Pretty much everything.”
Lexi tucked her hair back over her shoulder. “The journal?”
“Ian made a copy, emailed it to me. I’ve read it in its entirety.”
She shifted toward him. “George and Marge’s real identity?”
“Missy told me the whole story.” He flicked up another clump of sand.
“The guy that came after me in the farmhouse?”
The muscle in his cheek worked overtime as he clenched and relaxed his jaw. “One of Jack Sloan’s guys from Savannah.”
“How—”
“Long story that’s part of the reason it took me so long to get back here.”
“Why’d he want the pendant?”
Tripp stopped. “Well, shit. I forgot to ask. I’ll have Jill find out. I’m sure—”
Lexi stood, wiping sand from her jeans. “I’m not going to be in the middle of you two … ever again.” She started back down the pier.
Tripp caught her wrist, drawing her into him. “Stop and listen for one damn minute.”
Lexi blinked at his commanding tone. “I—”
“It’s my turn now.”
She stepped away. “No, it’s not. I was attacked, and you didn’t come. You didn’t even call. If you know all the rest, then you know that.” Tears welled at the corners of her eyes. “I thought I heard you in my head.” She thumped her temple. “But it was my own imagination playing mind games with me. I even convinced myself it was you, that we’re connected by more than just the star—”
Tripp tugged her against him and crushed his lips to hers.
Lexi’s arms remained straight at her sides. She wanted to refuse the emotion he poured into the kiss. An internal plea, a scream to respond grew within her, yet she continued to stand limp until he pulled away.
“My turn,” he said.
She didn’t move.
“I was in Paris, in my bed at nearly midnight when that went down. I’d already slipped the proper Renoir into its owner’s home and returned to my hotel so I could come back to North Carolina. My heart felt like it was going to burst, and then all of a sudden, I could see what you were seeing, and I said—”
“Close your eyes, Lexi. I’ll keep you safe,” she said.
Tripp laid his lips against hers. “You didn’t make it up. I was with you. After that, I had no doubt what I needed to do, but it all took so damn long to get done.”
“Why didn’t you just call? Why did you sic the dogs on me and leave me to nothing but my thoughts?”
“I’ll show you why once a few more pieces and parts are settled.”
“Like?”
He shushed her with the touch of a finger to her lips. “Do you trust me, Lexi? Will you, just for a moment, or a few days, even a week, set aside the moral compass against which you measure me day in and day out and just trust me?”
She bit at the side of her lip. Can I? Wasn’t that exactly the problem that brought me here?
“I’ll try.”
27
They spent two days at the beach, surrounded by no one. A few permanent beach-goers remained, but they stuck to their decks or homes, leaving the entire beach space to the two of them.
Tripp called Ian and Emma, assured them he’d found Lexi and all plans should continue as instructed. Their responses included questions and groans since he still hadn’t explained all the details—only enough to keep them interested. To Lexi, he said even less.
Rather than spend two full days of the weekend in talks about Tripp’s ex-fiancée, the alignment of the stars or even the farmhouse, Tripp pushed it all aside and focused on Lexi’s happiness. The moment would come when he’d make his last request of her, and he hoped she’d trust him enough then to agree.
He sat on the deck, a beer in his hand, a wine cooler in hers.
“This is really nice,” he said. “We should come out here on a regular basis, get away from the whole rat race.”
Lexi laughed. “Rune and races have nothing in common. It’s southern territory, where five o’clock is the end of the day, and Friday means everyone leaves at three.”
“Hear, hear.” He held up his beer bottle until she clinked hers against it.
“Though, I guess I do have to go back.” Her tone wavered into saddness.
Tripp threaded his fingers through hers. “I’ve got some work I need to attend to, and I hope you’ll go with me.”
“But I have the business—”
“Which you and I both know Emma is more than capable of handling. I even thought of a way you could be involved from … anywhere.”
Lexi held interest in her eyes. “How?”
“Remember in Savannah, I showed you a picture of the documents, and it gave you enough to find them?”
“Yeah.” She sipped her over-sugared strawberry drink.
“Think you could do the same thing with an image of the people? I mean, if Emma asks them a few key questions, you could look at them, read their profile details and then dig into your system, or whatever it is, to find the right house?”
Lexi’s head bobbed to the sides. “I don’t know.”
“Be open to possibilities, Lex.”
“That sounds like a pickup line or the opening to a far greater request.”
Tripp nearly spit out his beer. He didn’t expect her to catch the nuance, though he had run the idea by Emma, and she thought it would work. “Okay, I’ll admit, it was pre-thought out, but I still think it’s something to think about.”
She sat back. “I’ll … consider it. But, why aren’t I going to be at my office to handle my own work?”
“Don’t know that you won’t but not in the next couple of days, at least. A week, maybe.”
She slid her feet off the chaise, faced him straight on. “Why?”
“That depends on you.”
“If it’s up to me, we stay right here. Sign me up for long-distance treasure hunting.”
Tripp took a pull from his bottle. “You like working with people and finding their homes, right?”
“Yeah, but it’s gotten—”
“Stale?”
“A bit.”
“But the human side. You like them—finding their next adventure in life and … whatever?”
Lexi nodded. “I do. I like making people happy, helping them down a path they aren’t planning and seeing where it leads.”<
br />
“Good. I want you to focus on that when I ask the next question.”
“So all this was a lead up?” Lexi moved to stand against the deck rail. The floodlights backlit her. Pinpoints, like stars, twinkled through her hair.
Tripp stood. “God, Lexi.”
“What?”
The innocence in her eyes lured him forward. “You’re beautiful.”
He tucked a strand behind her ear, fisted his hand around a bundle, and followed its line down to the middle of her back. He breathed in her scent, the same lavender he’d wanted so much more of only a few short weeks before.
“I love you, Lexi.”
She stiffened under his touch, relaxed a moment later. Her hand found his cheek, rubbed against stubble he hadn’t shaved in three days, and their noses tickled each other as his lips sought to taste.
“I love you, too, Tripp.”
“Will you help me with one last thing?”
“What do you mean one last thing?”
“I know how we get around the paradox.”
She jerked back. “I thought the journal and Marge and George being together means our gifts just keep on going, right? We just have to trust each other enough not to let it bother us.”
Tripp laid a kiss against her lips, so soft and pliable. “Yes, but there’s more.”
“But—”
He stopped her with another kiss. “I asked you to trust me, remember?”
“Yes, but—”
Her lips opened for his tongue as he teased. She shivered with what could only be erotic sensation as the air enveloped them in warmth.
“I want to make love to you, Lexi.”
She chuckled as he tormented both her and himself. Tripp brushed around to her ear, bit at her lobe. She laughed as he licked his way along the nape of her neck.
“On the beach.”
“In the sand?” She turned as if to look out into the dark.
He grabbed her hand, tugged her forward. “Yes.”
• • •
Lexi followed Tripp past the dune to the water’s edge. “The ocean’s cold, Tripp.”
“We’re not going in, just staying close by.” He wrapped his arms around her.
Lexi leaned her head to one side as he nibbled his way down her neck. His hand swept away her hair as hers slid over his chest. She feathered muscles taut under her touch, thankful he walked out without his shirt.
