by Lisa Carter
Was he pretending, though? Had it gone far, far beyond that for him? Was he going after the truth for Honey’s sake? Or for his own?
He folded his arms across his uniform. “Where was Sawyer stationed before coming to Kiptohanock? And during that three-year period when he—”
“Dumped me.” Honey gave him a small smile. “It’s okay. You can say it. We were better for being apart for a while so we could be together later. Both of us needed to grow up.”
She tapped her finger on her chin, thinking out loud. “Kiptohanock was his first duty station. Then Miami. Followed by San Diego. A joint task force in the Caribbean. Then back to Kiptohanock.”
Charlie’s gut twisted. Miami. San Diego. In his line of work, he didn’t believe in coincidences. “Text me the dates of those assignments.”
“Those places mean something to Evy Shaw, don’t they? Have you found the connection?”
“Not sure yet. But I think I’m getting close.”
Honey touched his arm. “I’m worried about you, too, Charlie. Close is exactly what you seemed to be with that Shaw woman over the weekend. Too close. I don’t want to see you get hurt.”
Charlie stiffened. “I’m a big boy, Honey. I can take care of myself. No worries.”
But that wasn’t true. He was close. Close to losing his perspective. Beyond losing his objectivity.
Evy Shaw had managed to penetrate his defensive armor. He so wanted to believe in her. But he was afraid of another woman letting him down. Especially Evy.
He planted his hands on his gun belt. “I’ll take care of it. I promise, Honey. I won’t let you down.”
By not trusting Evy, was he letting her down? Was he letting himself down? But he reminded himself that he wasn’t the only one being secretive.
Honey patted his cheek. “You’re one of the good guys, Charlie. I hope you find your happily-ever-after.” She grimaced. “Just not with the likes of the secretive librarian.”
* * *
Evy couldn’t believe her eyes. Her Charlie and Honey Kole in the Four Corners Shopping Center parking lot. She made a face. He wasn’t her Charlie.
“Coupons?”
Evy refocused on the cashier. “Uh, no.” Her eyes cut to the plate-glass windows.
“That’ll be ten dollars and seventy-six cents.”
Evy watched as Charlie placed Honey’s groceries in her trunk. A seed of suspicion grew in Evy’s mind. Why were they together in the parking lot? What was going on? Had she been wrong to trust Charlie, to reveal as much of herself as she had?
“Ma’am? If you’d just swipe your card and punch Yes into the keypad?”
“What?” Evy dragged her attention to the cashier. “Oh.”
She fumbled inside her purse for her wallet. There were exclamations of annoyance from the customers behind her in line. Flustered, she dropped her credit card onto the floor.
Crouching, she stole another look at the parking lot. Honey and Charlie were talking beside Honey’s car. Really close. In that way people have when what they’re saying is private and they don’t want to be overheard.
“Any day, lady...” Judging from his accent, a ’come here. Like herself.
She scrounged for the credit card. Where—?
“Let me help, Evy.”
A pair of hot-pink sneakers moved into her line of vision. And Dixie dropped to her knees. She nudged Evy’s foot. “Under there, sugar. You’re stepping on it.”
“Oh.” Evy crab-walked a step and picked the card off the linoleum. Cheeks flushed, she got to her feet.
The cashier reached over the checkout counter and ran the card through the machine herself.
“Sorry,” Evy murmured to the line of customers.
“It’s about time.”
“Some of us got stuff to do, lady.”
Dixie rose with an ease that belied her forty-plus years and glared at the customers in line. “Some of us need to take a chill pill and get a life.”
Evy bit her lip and keyed the green button as instructed. Her gaze strayed to the window. Charlie was looming over Honey.
“Your receipt...ma’am?”
Evy took the slip of paper from the cashier. The woman thrust a plastic bag in her direction. But Evy’s gaze flew to the window again.
The man behind her, in Bermuda shorts and knee-high socks, groaned. “Do you mind, lady?”
Dixie steered Evy toward the exit. “Come on, sugar.”
But when Honey touched Charlie’s face, Evy put on the brakes. She couldn’t go out there. Not while they were...while he... Evy’s heart pounded.
Though Honey had moved on with her life, had Charlie? Was he still nursing his broken heart? Would he ever be able to move on? Especially with someone like Evy, Honey Kole’s polar opposite?
“When she first met Sawyer Kole, Honey worked at the Sandpiper. Did you know that?”
Dixie stared out the window, having followed the direction of Evy’s gaze.
Evy lifted her chin. “You two must’ve been friends.”
Dixie laughed. “You make it sound so improbable anyone would ever want to be friends with Honey.”
Evy remained silent.
“Honey’s a nice person. As are you.” Dixie wrapped her arm around Evy’s tense shoulders. “When the two of you aren’t working at cross-purposes. But I understand. I remember what it’s like to fall in love. The terror. The—”
“I’m not falling in love.”
Customers veered around them. The electric doors whooshed open and shut. Evy’s hand knotted around the grocery bag.
Dixie sniffed. “I never believed those two belonged together. And I was right. Only thing they had in common was a desire to remain on the Shore.” She cocked her head. “Charlie’s one of the good guys. Just like Sawyer.”
Evy fidgeted.
“Charlie got his pride hurt with Honey, not his heart.” Dixie wagged her finger. “But I’m thinking since he met a certain librarian, he’s moved on in more ways than one.”
Evy studied her shoes. “Doesn’t seem that way to me.”
Dixie squared her shoulders. “Appearances don’t always tell the whole truth, sugar.”
Charlie left Honey and strolled toward his patrol vehicle. Honey pulled out onto the highway, headed south toward Kiptohanock.
Dixie readjusted the strap of her purse over her shoulder. “Ready for book club tonight?”
Evy let out the breath she hadn’t realized she’d been holding. “I’ve kept you from making your own purchases.”
“I’ll head down the aisle in a minute. But when I spotted you in line, you appeared to need help.”
“Thanks for being my friend.” She watched Charlie’s cruiser head north. “Sometimes, though, appearances are exactly what you believe.” She sighed.
Dixie shook her head. “Don’t give up on our handsome deputy yet.”
Later at the library, Evy toted the metal can to the front door to water the red geraniums on the porch. Careful not to spill anything on the hardwood floors inside, she stepped over the threshold. But the spout wobbled.
Droplets spattered the wide-planked porch. She’d filled the watering can too full. She tottered over to the first step and bent over the urn. She needed both hands to hold the watering can steady. Footsteps thudded on the sidewalk.
“We’re closed,” she called out. “We open tomorrow morning at ten.”
“Good to know, but that’s not why I’m here.”
She raised her gaze. Slowly. Onto a pair of scuffed, well-worn boots. Cowboy boots.
“Miss Shaw.”
In a flannel shirt and jeans covered in what appeared to be wood shavings, Sawyer Kole stood on the sidewalk. Her sidewalk. The library sidewalk.
Her mouth went
dry. “M-Mr. Kole.”
She remembered then that he worked weekdays at the construction site of the new aquatic center on the outskirts of Kiptohanock.
His eyes twinkled. “Maybe you could call me Sawyer?”
She nodded. Her head bobbed like a marionette on a string. And he, the puppet master.
“Evy,” she whispered.
His eyes were the same light blue she remembered. She’d been afraid he’d remember her. But he didn’t. She told herself it was okay. Better for him not to remember.
“Evy it is.”
She swallowed. Tried not to stare, but she couldn’t seem to look away. She wanted to memorize his features. Commit them to memory. Because all too soon, she’d never see him again.
Which was the way it should be. Tears burned at the backs of her eyelids. She’d need to live off these moments with him for the rest of her life.
He tilted his head. “You seem to have a heart for what we’re trying to accomplish with the foster kids.”
Evy couldn’t let this chance go by without conveying a small sense of what she thought of Sawyer Kole’s character. “But it takes a special person—like you—to have created a place for them to reconnect with their families.”
The late-afternoon sun glinted off his blond hair. “I did what I had to do. What I felt was right. After everything God has done for me. Kiptohanock. Honey. Now the baby...”
His eyes bored into Evy’s. “To help someone else the way I wish my sister and I had been...” A vein pulsed in his clenched jaw.
Though he didn’t recognize her, Sawyer hadn’t forgotten his sister. Evy imagined her heart might burst. Out of the pain of the past, something good like this foster kids’ camp had come.
And Evy reckoned if she died right now, she’d die happy. ’Cause she knew at long last Sawyer was okay. More than okay.
He’d found a real home here. Everything she ever wanted for him. She clutched the watering can.
It was time. Time to go. But because of Charlie, it was going to be harder than she’d bargained for. But still the right thing for her to do. The only thing for her to do.
Sawyer stuck his hands in his jeans pockets. “Guess Honey’s not the only one with prenatal hormones.” He blew out a breath, as uncomfortable with emotion as a certain Accomack County deputy sheriff she knew. “Anyway...”
Those two had far more in common than they supposed. Both were good men. Honorable. Admirable in their vocations and callings. And she loved them both.
She sucked in a breath. That couldn’t be true. Could it?
“I didn’t like seeing you so afraid of horses, Evy. Did something happen when you were younger to make you scared of them?”
She set the watering can onto the top step. For once, almost eye level with Sawyer. “No. Just haven’t been around them much.”
“Horses were my best friends for years.” He grinned. “Until I met a honey-blonde innkeeper.”
This was surreal. For so long, she’d imagined herself and Sawyer talking. As if nothing had ever come between them.
“Could you come out early on Saturday, Evy? I could give you and the other kids who are afraid a private lesson.”
This was not a good idea. She gulped. For more than one reason.
“Me? Why?”
He blinked. Her question had thrown him. Confusion flickered in his eyes. “Maybe because I hate to admit defeat. And I hate for you not to know the pleasure horses bring to life.”
“Why does it matter? About me?”
He kicked a pebble with the toe of his boot. “I’m thinking if we did a smaller group, by the final camp weekend, it’d make a difference for us.”
Us...and he hadn’t answered her question.
“You don’t need me to accomplish that with the children.”
He stood there a moment, framing a reply. “Latasha and the others really bonded with you. If they saw you overcoming your fears, it’d be an example for them to move past their own fears. And move past more than their fear of riding.”
Accepting his offer could prove to be a huge mistake. Who was she kidding? Would prove to be a huge mistake. But he’d chosen to ignore her attempt to offer him an out. Which told her a lot.
While he might not remember her, he felt the connection, too. Didn’t understand it. But felt it nonetheless.
She had committed to spearheading story time for the duration of the pilot program. And she’d never been the kind of person to renege on her word. Especially concerning something she believed in with all her heart.
An excuse? Sure. But she’d seize any reason to justify delaying her departure by a few more weeks.
She took a breath. “I can be there before the library opens for the day. Seven-thirty.”
“Really?” As if he hadn’t believed she’d do it. But as if he hoped... He leaned against the pillar. “Thanks, Evy. It’ll be fun. I promise.”
What it was, was incredibly foolish. And selfish on her part. Increasing exponentially the chance of exposure. But despite what her good sense shouted, she wasn’t ready to say goodbye.
Not to Kiptohanock. Not to Sawyer. Not to Charlie.
Which made Evy Shaw perhaps the biggest idiot of all.
Chapter Eight
Thursday afternoon, outside the Sandpiper Café, in what had become a habit of late, Charlie peered across the square toward the library. At Sawyer Kole and Evy on the library steps.
All the breath went out of Charlie. Something familiar about the pair of them niggled at the back of his mind. Some similarity between them. The hair? The eyes? Were they—?
No, he was being fanciful. And deputy sheriffs didn’t live long on the job by being fanciful. Still, the notion shook him.
He was the one losing it. Unable to trust his legs, Charlie leaned against his truck. Couldn’t be. But what was up with Evy’s fascination with Sawyer Kole? Was Charlie being used to further some secret agenda?
Charlie flung the white bakery box through the open window of the truck. He scrubbed his hand over his beard shadow. What was wrong with him that he always wanted what he couldn’t have?
Detoured from his mission by Honey at the grocery store parking lot, as a last resort he’d placed a call to Dixie. Who met him at the closed diner, which only served breakfast and lunch. Where he purchased a homemade coconut cake. His contribution to book club tonight.
Evy Shaw was going to make him crazy. He hated secrets. After their Sunday afternoon together, he’d started to believe this relationship would be different. That she would be different.
Which only proved he was a bigger idiot than he’d believed possible. Therefore, he wasn’t in the best of moods. After an hour of pacing inside his house, he changed into comfortable jeans and his Virginia Tech sweatshirt.
Cake box in hand, he stalked around the square toward the library. Trying to work off misplaced energy. To no avail.
In truth—something Evy Shaw apparently knew nothing about—he was spoiling for a fight. He clomped up the steps.
He was reaching for the door handle when, midmotion, Evy threw open the door. Her cheeks lifted. Her eyes brightened.
Charlie scowled. To look at her, you’d have thought she was tickled to see him. Which proved just how wrong appearances could be. How wrong a guy like him could be.
“Hey, Charlie.”
She almost made him believe she’d been watching for him. But he was on to her. What kind of a chump did she think he was? He clutched the box to his chest.
“You brought dessert. Aren’t you going to say hello?”
She twirled a strand of blond hair around her finger. The picture of wistful insecurity. Unsure of herself.
But she knew exactly what she was doing. It was a game he was tired of playing.
Charlie thrust the box at her. She staggered a step back in those heels of hers. She had such pretty ankles, he thought, not for the first time.
He glared. She’d probably worn the fluttery pink blouse on purpose. Calculated its effect on him.
She gave him a nervous smile. “Are you okay, Charlie? You seem, uh...”
“Wound a little tight?” he growled. “Wonder why.”
She stepped aside to let him pass. Holding the box in the crook of her arm, she closed the heavy oak door behind him. He marched past the reception desk, beyond the staircase to the meeting room.
“You’re the first to arrive.” She staccato-stepped to keep pace with his long strides. “I’m glad.”
“Why?”
Evy inhaled as she placed the box on the burgundy tablecloth. “Is that coconut?”
She lifted the lid and frowned. “Did you have an accident with the cake, Charlie?”
His gaze moved from her face to the cake. One lop-sided layer had slid halfway off the bottom layer. A victim of an up-close-and-personal encounter with the floorboard of his truck.
“Maybe we’ll leave the cake as-is in the box. People can serve themselves. I’ll get the plates.”
“Why are you glad to see me?”
Evy headed to the small kitchen. “I hoped it would give us a chance to talk. I haven’t seen...” The timbre of her voice changed. “I mean, we haven’t talked since Sunday.” She blushed. “I had a wonderful time. A great afternoon.”
It had been a wonderful day. The best. Or so he’d believed until about five o’clock this afternoon.
He’d spent far too many sleepless nights this week thinking about seeing her again. But conflicted by the secrets he sensed she kept.
Not sure if he should trust her. Not sure if he should trust any woman again. Not sure if he wanted to open himself to further hurt.
Because in the short but intense time he’d known Evy Shaw—whoever she was, whatever she was after—he’d come to realize she possessed the power to truly hurt him. In a way Honey had never been able. Like getting shot while not wearing any Kevlar. A deathblow from Evy from which his heart might never recover.
