by Lane, Nina
Fuck.
I react on instinct, my fists clenching and every muscle in my body contracting in defense. She pauses to look inside her purse, then she glances up and meets my gaze. To my grim satisfaction, she wavers a little.
“Oh, hello, Dean. I thought you were gone already.”
“When are you leaving?”
“Not sure yet. I’ve been enjoying the time with Liv, and helping out at her café.” She puts on her sunglasses. “I might stay for the grand opening.”
Dislike spears through me. I don’t bother trying to suppress it. This woman hurt my wife in ways I can’t comprehend. I’ll never come close to forgiving her.
“Why did you come here?” I ask.
“To see my daughter, of course.”
I wish I could believe her, for Liv’s sake if nothing else.
“I know you don’t believe me,” she continues. “I don’t know if Liv does either, but I’ve been hoping we can put all the crap behind us and move on.”
An image of Liv appears in my head. I can almost feel it, her secret wish that it might be true. That maybe, somehow, Crystal can still be the kind of mother she has always wanted.
I step closer to Crystal.
“Look.” I lower my voice. “I don’t care if you want money. How much? I’ll write you a check right now. But if you do one fucking thing to hurt Liv again, you’ll regret it.”
Crystal’s eyes harden. “Your protective streak is all very touching, Dean, but trust me on this. Liv doesn’t need it.”
“You don’t know what Liv needs.”
She looks at me for a minute. “Why did you leave her after the miscarriage?”
My jaw tightens against a new wave of anger and guilt. Goddammit, but the woman knows how to hit a weak spot.
“Leave her alone, Crystal,” I say through gritted teeth. “Just leave her the fuck alone.”
She shrugs and turns to walk away.
I shake off my rage, inhaling a deep breath. I know my anger is exactly what Crystal wants, that she likes the idea of coming between me and Liv because…
The truth slams into me. Crystal doesn’t want money. She wants Liv.
Unease twists in my gut.
I can’t leave Mirror Lake again. Not now.
Pushing thoughts of Crystal out of my head, I yank open the door of Java Works and find an empty table. After getting a coffee, I distract myself with checking email.“Professor West?”
I glance up to see my grad students Jessica and Sam approaching from the back of the room. They stop beside my table.
“Hey, we didn’t know you were back,” Sam says.
“Good to see you both.” I gesture for them to sit. “I’m leaving again on Monday. How’s your work going?”
They sit down and give me updates about their research, and we talk about city planning and architecture. Within a few minutes, I can already feel the tension slide from my shoulders. Discussing medieval history with grad students is, at least, one thing I can still do well.
I look toward the door when it opens again, feeling Liv before I see her. She shoots me a smile, then pauses to order a coffee at the counter. She’s wearing a blue skirt and sweater over a white blouse with a little collar. She looks like the sky.
Her hair is down, loose around her shoulders and messy from the wind. She pushes it back with one hand as she walks toward me. It’s one of her sexiest moves—even more so because she’s unaware of how beautiful she is.
I stand to pull out a chair for her.
“Sorry I’m late.” She reaches up to press a kiss against my cheek. My head fills with her peaches scent.
“Oh, hey, Mrs. West.”
“Hi, Jessica. Sam.” Liv puts her satchel on an empty chair and sits down. “Nice to see you both again.”
After exchanging small talk, Sam and Jessica get ready to leave. As they pick up their backpacks, Sam pauses.
“Uh, don’t mean to pry, Professor West,” he says, “but did Maggie Hamilton ever change advisors?”
Wariness floods me. “No. Why?”
Sam glances at Jessica. “She’s been… well, she’s been complaining to the other students about you.”
“Has she?” I try to keep my voice even, though anger claws up my throat. “What’s she been saying?”
“Just crap about you being unfair and too tough on her and showing favoritism,” Jessica says. “The rest of us know it’s not true, but it’s kind of shitty, you know?”
I can feel Liv bristling. I wish Sam and Jessica had brought this up before my wife arrived. At least they don’t seem to know anything about the sexual harassment charge, but it could only be a matter of time before Maggie spreads lies about that.
“Thanks for letting me know,” I say.
“Sure.” Sam pulls his backpack over his shoulders. “It’s especially lousy that she’s doing this when you’re out of town and all.”
They say goodbye and walk outside. I turn toward Liv, hating the dismay in her brown eyes. I change the subject to a far more pleasant one.
“The café,” I say. “How’s the remodeling going?”
“Really well. Did I tell you Brent is going to leave his job at the inn to be our general manager? He has a ton of great experience.” Liv stirs a packet of sugar into her coffee. “What did you do this afternoon?”
“Looked at a house up in the Spring Hills neighborhood.”
Surprise flashes in her eyes. “A house?”
“Nancy Walker emailed me about it, and since I’m in town…” I shrug. “Figured it wouldn’t hurt to see it.”
“I didn’t know we were still looking for a house.”
“I didn’t either. Seems to make sense, though.”
Total bullshit. Of course it makes no sense to look for a house when my career is in danger. I have no idea why I even bothered.
“But you’re leaving again on Monday,” Liv says.
“So?”
“So how can you buy a house now?”
“I didn’t say I was buying a house. I said I looked at one.”
She frowns in confusion. “So why did you look at one?”
For some reason, irritation grips me. “If you want to have a baby one day, Liv, we’re not staying in that apartment. We’re going to have a house with a big yard, in a good school district. I made the plans when you were pregnant, and I’m not changing them.”
She blinks. “That’s why you looked at a house? Because you want to follow through on the plans you made when I was pregnant?”
I sit back. My heart is pounding. I hate fear. Hate letting it control me.
“I just looked at it, Liv. I’m not making an offer.”
“But one day you will?”
“One day we’ll have to.”
The admission settles in the air between us. Liv stares at me, as if she doesn’t know what to make of that statement. I don’t know either. She reaches across the table and puts her hand over mine.
“It’s probably best if we wait to think about a house anyway,” she finally says. “We don’t know what’s going to happen.”
My shoulders tighten again. I can’t stand the thought that my wife would ever doubt my ability to escape this harassment fuck-up alive.
Even if I doubt my own ability to do that.
“Come with me.” Liv pushes her chair back and reaches for her satchel. “I want to show you something.”
We go out to where her car is parked, and she gets in the driver’s seat. It’s nearing dusk, the sky holding a few reddish clouds, but the air is warm. Liv drives in the direction of the university, turns onto a street winding toward the mountains, and parks at the base of a dirt road.
“What’s up here?” I ask as we get out.
“You’ll see.” Liv takes my camera case out of the trunk. “
I found your camera in the closet. I didn’t think you’d mind if I borrowed it.”
“Not at all. But for what?”
“Come on.”
We walk up the dirt road to where an old, abandoned house sits in a clearing. It’s a huge, spectacularly irregular Queen Anne-style house with a polygonal tower, a wide front porch, and patterned siding. Reminds me of a once-beautiful actress who has been long forgotten. Half-surrounded by trees, the house overlooks a view of the lake and downtown.
“It’s called the Butterfly House,” Liv tells me. “The Historical Society is launching a campaign to save it, but it’s been in limbo for a long time because of zoning laws. I’m helping with the campaign, and I wanted to take some pictures.”
She tells me the history of the place as we circle the grounds. The house is a disaster. The gabled tower is punctured by broken windows, the doors boarded up, graffiti scrawled over the walls, the porch balustrade falling apart. Liv stops to take a picture of the back of the house.
“Have you been inside?” I ask.
“I don’t have the key.”
Ah, Liv. My good girl never had a typical rebellious phase. Neither did I really, though I got into some scrapes in high school and had some rowdy nights out with friends that involved seeking out deserted places to party.
Liv was different. She rebelled against her mother when she was thirteen years old. There’s no way in hell Crystal Winter can manipulate her anymore. And I know I need to let Liv deal with her mother alone, even if not shielding my wife goes against every instinct I possess.
I watch Liv take a few more pictures of the house. I approach the side door and pull on a loose board nailed into the doorjamb.
“Dean, what are you doing?”
“Getting into the house. Don’t you want to see what’s inside?”
“Well, yes, but it’s not our property.”
I pry the board away from the nails. “This wood is so rotted it’s about to fall off anyway.”
“Dean.” Her voice is worried as she approaches me. “Really. This is breaking and entering.”
“You have a right to be here, don’t you?” I pull harder on the board, and it yields with a screech of rusty nails. “You’re doing research for the Historical Society.”
“That doesn’t mean I’m allowed to break in.”
“You’re not.” I shoot her a grin. “I am.”
I’m gratified when a faint smile appears on her face. I push the board aside to reveal a narrow hole in the door, edged with splintered wood.
“Come on, beauty.” I peer through the hole into the darkness. “Let’s live dangerously.”
“Well, for us, I suppose this is about as dangerous as it gets,” she mutters. “Dean, please be careful.”
I push my way through the door, then extend a hand to help Liv through. We find ourselves in what was once the kitchen—now a mess of broken chairs, a rusted sink, and shattered tiles. A layer of dirt covers everything. Dust motes swim in the faint light.
Liv tightens her hand around mine as we walk into the other rooms. A musty smell clings to the air. The front rooms are no better than the kitchen—torn, filthy rugs, peeling wallpaper, pockets of mildew. Drop cloths cover some pieces of furniture. The fireplace is coated with soot. But even through the grime, the historic beauty of the place is evident in the decorative trim, the ceiling medallions, and paneled wainscot.
“Can you imagine how beautiful it once was?” Liv says.
“It’s a shame no one took care of it.” I let go of her hand to take the camera from her, then angle the lens and take a picture of the room.
We explore the other rooms on the lower floor, all in disrepair with broken plaster, scarred wooden floors, and a million cobwebs. I snap a few more pictures of cool, architectural details—crown molding, the arch of a door, a carved newel post—before we go upstairs.
There are five rooms on the second story, with windows overlooking each side of the house and half-filled with broken furniture. The walls are patched with slats of wood, the ceilings discolored with water damage.
“I can see why the Historical Society needs a huge fundraising effort for this,” Liv says as she peers at a rusted light fixture. “It’ll cost a fortune to renovate.”
“It would be well worth it, though, if it were done right.” I pause beside a door leading to a narrow staircase. “Let’s see what’s up here.”
Liv follows me up to the tower that rises above the front porch. She stops and sucks in a breath when we reach the top. It’s an octagonal tower with windows on each side, cluttered with a few old chairs. Most of the windows are boarded up, but the one facing the lake is clear and unbroken.
“Wow.” Liv crosses to look out the window. “This must have been amazing, once upon a time. You can see all the way past the lake to the other part of town. What a view.”
I pause to take a picture of the cathedral ceiling. I examine the furniture, brushing the dust off a parlor chair that has a detailed engraving on the back.
“I can understand why medieval towers were used for defense,” Liv continues. “You can see so far away.”
“Sometimes they were used for other things too.” I angle the camera for a picture of the chair. “Chapels, prisons, libraries.”
“Cool place for a library.”
I lower the camera just as Liv turns to face me. My heart slams against my chest. For a second, I can’t speak. Can hardly breathe.
She blinks. “What’s wrong?”
“Don’t… don’t move.”
Sweet mother of God, my wife is beautiful.
At that exact moment, a reddish sunbeam shines through the window, painting Liv’s skin with a rosy blush. Her dark hair is loose around her shoulders, and light weaves through all the thick strands. Behind her, the window glows and town lights sparkle against the expanse of the lake.
I may not be all that great at the romantic stuff, but sometimes the world sure gets it right.
I lift the camera again and focus the lens on Liv before snapping the shutter.
“Dean, I don’t even have any lipstick on.”
“You don’t need any.” I pause to check the picture. Even in the small window of the LCD display, it’s incredible. “Stay right there.”
Liv pulls her hands through her hair in an attempt to straighten it out. I take a few more pictures, zooming the lens in and then back again. I move to the side and keep photographing her, not wanting to miss any angle of the perfection that is my wife.
Finally, I lower the camera and just look at her.
“What are you going to do with all those pictures?” Liv asks.
“Plaster them on the ceiling like stars so I can look up at them at night.”
“Aw.” She smiles. “Good one.”
I don’t know how it is that this one woman can both bring me to my knees and make me feel like the greatest knight in history.
I click through the photos on the camera, pausing at one where a shadow falls across her neck and into the open V of her shirt.
A thought hits me like lightning. “Take your shirt off.”
“What?”
I lift the camera again. “I want a picture of you with your shirt off.”
“Me topless in an old tower?” Liv asks. “This sounds suspiciously like a rather kinky medieval fantasy, professor.”
“Too bad I don’t have any manacles, huh?”
She smiles again, but shakes her head. “Dean, I can’t undress here.”
“Why not? No one’s around. I bet not many people even know about this place.”
“Florence Wickham does.”
“I guarantee you that Florence Wickham isn’t going to break in through the side door and come up to the tower.”
“I wouldn’t put it past her,” Liv mutters.
To
ease Liv’s mind, I shut the door leading to the staircase and turn the rusty lock. “Okay?”
She’s watching me, wariness and… curiosity appearing in her brown eyes.
“Live dangerously,” I suggest.
She lets out her breath and slowly sheds her sweater, tossing it over the back of a chair. My heart kicks into high gear when she reaches for the buttons of her blouse. She unfastens two buttons and glances at me.
“I don’t have sexy lingerie on,” she admits.
“Good.” I don’t want her in sexy lingerie. I want her exactly as she is.
Liv unfastens another button. Even from a short distance, I see her hands trembling. Warmth floods my chest. Finally she gets all the buttons undone and pulls the shirt off her shoulders.
Ah, God. Just the sight of her cleavage cupped by a plain white bra has my blood heating. I focus on adjusting the aperture setting.
“Now I’m kind of nervous,” she tells me.
“Liv.” I lift the camera and focus on her. “You have no reason to be nervous.”
I snap the shutter. She fidgets at first, crossing her arms, winding a strand of hair around her finger, shifting from one foot to the other, but when I start to tell her how beautiful she is, she begins to relax.
A series of photos follows that I swear would win awards in photography competitions, for no other reason than the fact that Liv is a subject like no other—all at once sexy, sweet, assured, shy, and captivating. The light changes as the sun descends, painting her in shadows.
I look at her again.
“Take it off.” My voice is hoarse.
Liv’s gaze shifts away from me. After a heart-stopping second, she reaches back to unfasten her bra. All the breath leaves my lungs at the sight of her naked breasts, her nipples hardening in the cooler air, her long hair falling to curtain them.
So fucking beautiful.
I try to pull my attention from my lust as I adjust the camera again and get back to taking pictures. At my instruction, Liv moves to different areas of the tower—against a boarded-up window, near the door, in the center of the room, beside a rocking chair—and does what I tell her to.
