“Mm-hm.” Piper poured ingredients into a mixing bowl, but kept her eyes carefully averted.
“Piper?”
She rolled her eyes. “I know. Shut up.”
* * *
“Gabi?” A little while later, Oliver swung out of the doorway of the admin cottage. “I have a thought.”
“Okay?”
“C’mere. I want to show you something.” He motioned for her to follow him up a pathway she hadn’t yet taken. It headed uphill from the beach area, toward a thick stand of pines, and it was cool as Oliver led her through the trees and up some stone steps that looked like they’d been placed in the hill a long time ago.
He paused halfway up, pointing out at the lake. “Best view on the property right here, don’t you think?”
She followed his finger, nodding at the view of tiny, colorful sailboats hopping along the whitecaps, but suspected his reason for stopping had more to do with catching his breath than showing her the scenery.
After a moment, he turned to climb the remainder of the hill, and it pained Gabi to admit she was huffing like an asthmatic by the time they crested the top. Before her was a large, flat expanse that looked like a former garden. To her left, over a split-rail fence, the view of the lake was incredible.
“Wow.” She tried to wipe her forehead subtly. “It’s gorgeous up here.”
“Yup. Maybe this is the best view on the property.” He nodded, then turned toward the grassy area. “Ever had a garden?”
“I tried doing herbs in a pot last year.” She shook her head. “It didn’t go well.”
He laughed. “Well, we plant this every spring, and whatever we don’t eat goes to the food bank in town. We haven’t had time to get to it this year, but I was thinking maybe you and the girls could use a little project. I hate to think of good growing land going fallow.”
“Really?” Gabi stared at the expanse of weeds and dirt. This looked like more than a little project.
“Really.” He shrugged. “It’s a little late to plant, but we could still get some good stuff out of it. Girls could pick out the seeds, and I’d be happy to show you how to make it all work.”
Gabi nodded slowly, picturing her four girls industriously hoeing and shoveling and exclaiming in delight as their little green sprouts appeared.
She rolled her eyes internally. Because yes, that’s exactly how it would go.
But still. It was a good idea.
“You know what? I think this is an excellent idea. Thank you, Oliver.”
Oliver laughed quietly. “Now, don’t go getting all starry-eyed about it. Gardens are a serious project. There’s a lot to it, but I’ll teach you, if you think your girls could benefit from the work.”
“Oh, they could definitely benefit from the work. Thanks, Oliver. This is great.”
He nodded, looking out over the lake. “Y’know, it might not be my place to say this, but if you’re willing, Luke’s been dealing with teenagers for a long time, and he’s been doing camp even longer. Boys, mostly, but the skills are pretty transferable. He might be able to help you, if you find yourself wishing you had some extra hands around here.”
Gabi frowned. “Am I giving off some sort of desperation vibe today?”
“Nope.” He shrugged. “We’re just used to working as a team here at Echo. We help each other out. Seems you’re now part of the team, whether you intended it or not, so we’re here if you need us. We can’t all be experts at everything. There’s no shame in asking for help, is all I’m saying.”
Gabi took a deep breath, her eyes catching on the sailboats. Oliver had no way of knowing her independent streak had already been six miles wide before she’d ditched her family, her home, and her trust fund ten years ago. Since then, she’d had exactly one person in her life that she could fully trust … one person she could rely on, no matter what the circumstance, and that was the only person she ever wanted help from.
Herself.
Yes, she watched rom-coms every weekend. Yes, she loved the whole knight-in-shining-armor shtick, just like the rest of Hollywood’s target audience. But she didn’t need one. She’d figure this out.
Because if she didn’t, she had a feeling Luke was going to step in and figure it out for her.
Chapter 7
“Luke! Luke!” Trina screamed. “Help!”
Luke ran toward the sound, his sneakers pounding down a hallway lined with gray metal lockers. Fluorescent lights buzzed above his head, and he started counting doors, trying to catch up to her.
He rounded a corner, caught a glimpse of her as Randall paused long enough to tighten his grip. Then Randall sprinted, Trina flung over his shoulder, her blond head bouncing as she struggled to get loose.
“Help me, Luke! Don’t let him take me!”
Luke ran faster, then felt the hallway lengthen before him. He turned right, turned left, turned right again, always just enough behind them to catch a quick glimpse of her hair before they disappeared. But he never got closer. He reached out like he could almost touch her, but she was too far away.
“Luke! Save me!” Trina pounded her tiny fists on Randall’s back, trying to break free of his iron grip as she screamed. “Help!”
Luke called up every ounce of energy, pumping his arms to catch up, but the hallway got longer, her voice grew fainter, Randall’s footsteps faded to a rhythmic, dull staccato as the sound of his own harsh breathing drowned everything else out. He was sweating, cursing himself, shouting for her, the sound of his own voice bouncing off cement-block walls.
“Trina! Trina! Triiiiina!”
* * *
“Luke. Luke. Wake up.” Piper’s voice startled Luke out of his nightmare the next afternoon, and he blinked rapidly, trying to center himself. Gone was the long hallway with endless corners, gone were the ugly metal lockers, gone were the buzzing lights.
Gone was Katrina.
“You okay?” Her eyes were troubled as she handed him a water bottle. Luke nodded as he closed his eyes, trying to bring his breathing back to normal. “Same dream?”
“Yeah.” He sighed, trying to focus on the chickadees twittering above his head, rather than the screaming from inside it. He was used to the damn dream attacking him in the middle of the night, but Jesus, the middle-of-the-day approach was new. He hadn’t slept for shit last night, so he’d decided to grab fifteen minutes in the hammock out in back of the cabin before facing the girls. Apparently that’s all it had taken for the demons to take hold.
“What was it this time?”
“Hallways. I couldn’t get to her.” Luke scrubbed both hands over his face. “I can never get to her.”
Piper put a tentative hand on his shoulder, like she wasn’t quite sure if he was far enough out of the dream to handle being touched.
“I’m worried about you, Luke.”
“Don’t be. I’m fine. It’s just a dream.”
“It’s a dream that won’t leave you alone. You should see yourself, Luke. When it’s happening, you’re terrified.”
“I’m not … terrified.”
Oh, who was he bullshitting? He woke up in a cold sweat once a week. Sometimes he could remember the dream, and sometimes he could only remember the fear.
“Fine. You’re not terrified, because you’re a big, strong he-man who doesn’t do terrified. I get it. But your dreams are telling you something, and I’m not sure it’s healthy to ignore them like you’re trying to do.”
Luke sighed, pushing himself out of the hammock. “I have way too many meddling therapists for friends. Have I ever mentioned that?”
“At least twice a week, yes.” Piper smiled, but it didn’t reach her eyes. “We just care about you. And this thing is eating at you, little by little. I just think maybe it’d be good to talk to somebody about it, you know?”
He shook his head and picked up the Red Sox hat that had fallen to the grass. “I don’t want to talk to anybody, Piper. These dreams are my penance, okay? I didn’t save her. I couldn’t. And
I’ll live with that guilt for the rest of my life.”
“Luke—”
He put up a hand. “It’s all I have left of her, Piper, okay? I’ll take the damn dreams.”
* * *
The next night, after the girls were asleep, Gabi wandered down to the beach and sat in an Adirondack chair, desperate for some alone time. She’d spent two days trying to stay one step ahead of the girls, but it had taken almost inhuman effort to find things for them to do, while preventing them from killing each other. Luke had kept a wide berth, only joining them for quick lunches, and she hated that her eyes had kept looking for him all day long, despite the fact that he was obviously trying to steer clear of them.
As she listened to the frogs and loons, she felt her breathing slow and her shoulders relax. Water lapped softly against the sandy shore, and the moonlight made a shiny path from the end of the dock to the other shore. It wasn’t Barbados, but she had to admit it was peaceful, and pretty.
She took a deep breath and closed her eyes, leaning her head back against the chair, but she snapped back up when she heard soft footsteps in the sand.
“Mind if I join you?” Luke paused beside the other chair. In the darkness, his face was in shadow, which added delicious definition to its planes and hollows.
“Um, okay?” Her fingers flew to her hair, which she knew was already at its wildest and curliest since she’d arrived, thanks to lake water and organic shampoo. She didn’t want to care what he thought of how she looked, but she could be forgiven a tiny slice of pride, right?
“Girls asleep?”
“They were when I snuck out.”
He nodded. “Hard to resist the pull of a well-made Adirondack chair on a beach.”
“It’s quiet.” She pulled her knees up to her chest. “And as you may have noticed, the rest of my day generally isn’t.”
“Hard not to notice.” He smiled at her. “The lake ought to start warming up at some point, so at least the cold-water squealing might ease. Can’t speak to all of the other squawking that goes on.”
She sighed. Even though she’d spent the past three days resenting Luke for either giving her unwanted advice or steering clear of her altogether, right now she felt like she owed him an apology. She couldn’t imagine it felt like anything but a whiny, screechy typhoon had blown in, but wasn’t leaving anytime soon.
“I’m sorry. I know this isn’t at all what you expected your summer to look—or sound—like.”
They sat in silence for a long moment before he cleared his throat. “So tell me about the girls.”
“What do you want to know?”
“Well, I’ve got them a little bit pegged, having listened to them for the past few days…”
“They’ve not been at their best, just in case it matters.”
He shook his head. “Wouldn’t expect them to be. But I imagine they’re not acting too far out of character, either.”
She sighed. “Unfortunately, no.”
“Let me see what I can guess. Madison’s your ringleader, obviously.”
“Classic mean girl.” Gabi nodded. “Collects her posse, discards at will, rules by fear of being the discarded one.”
“Any redeeming qualities?”
Gabi sighed. “I think, deep inside, she’s actually a very kind person. But for some reason, she’s afraid it’s a weakness.” She put up a second finger. “Next—Waverly. Biggest fear is being cast out of the crowd, so she’ll pretty much do anything Madison asks, whether she likes it or not.” Gabi tipped her head. “And by my estimation, she rarely likes it. Basically, the girl needs to grow a spine, but it’s a long process.”
“We carry those here, if it’s of interest.” He winked.
“Good to know.” She put up a third finger. “Eve.”
Eve was Gabi’s second scholarship choice, straight out of another tiny apartment teeming with kids. Bars on the windows, six dead bolts on the door, and a frightening collection of young, sneering men sitting on the stoops up and down the street. After Gabi had gotten her settled at Briarwood, she’d placed a call to social services, since it had been painfully obvious that fifteen-year-old Eve had been more a parent in the household than the adults.
She sighed. “Eve’s a pleaser and a caretaker, though she’d be loath to admit either of those things. My suspicion is that she ended up on their little escapade because she figured the other three needed someone to make sure they stayed safe.”
“And that brings us to Sam. Is she your resident hotwiring expert?”
Gabi sighed, picturing the spunky, freakishly intelligent girl who’d come to Briarwood with her clothes in a garbage bag, despite the fact that Gabi had hand-delivered a suitcase to her foster home so Sam could pack her things.
Obviously her foster mother had had different plans for the suitcase.
“Sam’s a good kid. She’s got a ton of potential. She just got mixed up in the wrong thing this time around.”
“She needs a spine, too?”
“No.” Gabi shook her head. “She’s got more spine than anybody I know. Why would you pin the hotwiring on her?”
Luke leaned back, stretching, and Gabi struggled to keep her eyes from gluing themselves to his chest as his muscles tensed.
“I just pay attention,” he finally said. “Whenever that girl walks into a space, she has it cased within ten seconds. She’s got her escape routes planned before she commits to hanging out. I guarantee that kid knows three ways to get out of any spot, wherever you try to put her.” He nodded, but then his face grew serious. “Also suspect something in her history gives her good reason to do it.”
Gabi stared at him. For a camp handyman, he had some pretty serious observational skills.
“Sam’s a complicated kid,” she conceded. “I think there’s probably a lot we don’t know.”
“You know she hoards food? I caught her in the dining hall last night when you guys were swimming.”
“That I do know, yes.” It was something Gabi’d noticed as soon as Sam had arrived at school. And despite having easy access to as much as she could possibly eat for nine months now, the poor girl still acted as if her next meal wasn’t guaranteed. “I’ll speak to her. I’m sorry.”
Fear suddenly clutched Gabi’s gut as she realized if Luke turned Sam in to Priscilla, the headmaster wouldn’t hesitate to send her right back to a place where apparently she couldn’t even depend on having food … or safety.
“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t say anything,” she said, almost in a whisper. “Priscilla’s not the most understanding type. She’s also fairly committed to seeing Sam’s backside as she heads out the Briarwood gate, so any excuse might be enough of an excuse for her.”
“I’m not going to say anything. To anybody.”
“I had no idea she was doing it here, too.”
“It’s all right, Gabi.” He looked at her like she was out of line for apologizing. “She’s got her reasons. And if the girl’s hungry, the girl needs to eat. I just showed her where everything is so she can grab food if she needs something.”
Gabi swallowed. “Thank you.”
“I also gave her a cupboard so she can keep her own stuff in there. It’s got a lock on it.”
“You did?”
He shrugged like it was no big deal. “I’ve seen the type. Odd to see in a rich kid like her, but the behavior’s similar. I just figured maybe having a locked-up spot where she can hoard her treats might ease her mind a little bit.”
Rich kid—ha. If he only knew.
Gabi looked at him for a long moment. Here he sat in a backward baseball cap and a Red Sox T-shirt that had both seen better days, but he spoke like a psychologist. She wasn’t sure what to make of it.
She tipped her head, studying him. “You know, it occurs to me that Priscilla never had a chance to fill me in on your … history.”
“My qualifications, you mean?” He winked.
“Sure.” She tipped her head. “We’ll go with that.”
“I’ve been working summers here for ten years. During the school year, I do some work at a couple of the local high schools. That’s me.”
“Handyman stuff?”
He shrugged. “This and that.”
“I have a feeling you’re a little more complicated than that.”
“Nah. I strive to be uncomplicated. World’s tricky enough. I don’t need to add to it.” He turned toward her. “How about you? What’s your story?”
“My story? Far too long and mesmerizing to tell.”
“Ah.” He smiled, turning back toward the lake, his hands behind his head. “A woman of mystery.”
“Yup, that’s me.” Gabi rolled her eyes.
“So tell me. This housemother concept is new to me. What do you actually do there?”
“I didn’t put you off with the long and mesmerizing thing?”
“Nope. And I’m serious. It’s … an unusual career choice.”
“If it saves my reputation, I didn’t actually set out to be a housemother.”
“What did you set out to be?”
Gabi took a deep breath, picturing her freshman-year classes, back when her trust fund had been intact and her future had seemed solid.
“I started out wanting to teach math, actually.”
“So what changed that?”
“My calculus grade.” She laughed bitterly. “My professor hinted that perhaps I might be a better fit for the English department.”
“Ouch.”
“He was right, unfortunately. And then … I took a year off, got my bearings, and went back. Bypassed the English department building—thank you—and double-majored in psych and sociology.”
No need to talk about why she’d taken that year off. No reason Luke needed to know about her older brother, who lived life like he was entitled to whatever he desired, be it money.… or women. No reason to talk about how his actions had led to her complete and utter split with her family … and consequently, her trust fund.
No need to detail her year of scrabbling to find an apartment, two jobs, and her dignity.
“So you’re yet another overeducated, underpaid minion of the American education system.”
She's Got a Way Page 6
