by Lily Everett
“I wanted to find you.”
“Well, you’ve found me.” The ice cream situation was getting seriously messy. Taylor gave up and started licking to control the damage. Maybe it made her look like a five-year-old, but at least it kept her from having to meet Matt’s gaze.
“We need to talk.”
Taylor controlled her flinch by sitting in one of the rocking chairs usually occupied by the town gossips, two old guys who pretended to play checkers at the table set up between the chairs but who actually used their vantage point in front of the hardware store in the middle of Main Street to make note of every interesting happening in the town.
“I said what I needed to say last night,” she told him, turning back to her ice cream cone. “I don’t want to pretend it didn’t happen, and go on like before watching you and Dakota ride off into the sunset together. So if that’s what you’re here to tell me—”
“It’s not,” Matt broke in. “And maybe you got to say what you needed to last night, but I didn’t. So when I said ‘we need to talk’ I misspoke. I meant, I need to talk and you need to listen. Do you want a napkin?”
“Nope.” Taylor met his stare and held it as she defiantly licked a dribble of green-tinged cream off her wrist before giving up and tossing the rest in the trashcan by the door.
She could see Matt’s Adam’s apple bob as he swallowed. “Okay then. Here’s the deal. My dad is an asshole.”
The raw disappointment in Matt’s voice drilled through the walls Taylor had erected around her heart. Emotion started to trickle out, sympathy and love and the desire to hold Matt’s hand and tell him everything would be all right, but Taylor plugged up the hole. She couldn’t afford any leaks. “I know. I saw his rap sheet.”
“He hit my mom,” Matt said, sinking in the rocking chair across from Taylor. He stared out across the town square, but Taylor had a feeling he wasn’t seeing the smiling people milling around buying cotton candy and getting their kids’ faces painted. Matt was lost in a memory of his life before he came to Sanctuary Island—a life he was suddenly viewing from a new perspective. “She never told me why we had to leave Charlottesville and come here, or why she didn’t like for me to talk to Dad … not that he made much of an effort to talk to me. Until I looked him up and told him exactly where to find us.”
The urge to comfort overwhelmed Taylor’s defenses. “Hey, I thought it was a good idea, too, remember? You couldn’t have known what he was really like.”
Matt turned his head far enough to catch Taylor’s eyes, and the misery she saw in his face shook her. “He had a gun. In a bag hidden behind the cottage, he had a gun. He brought it with him. Here, to Sanctuary Island. To my house, where my mother lives. The house I told him how to find.”
“Oh my—Matt.” Taylor clenched her hands around the rocker’s arms to stop herself from reaching out to him. “But he didn’t get a chance to use it. Everyone is safe. Nothing happened.”
“Because of you.”
Taylor felt her ears go hot with embarrassment at the way he was staring at her. “No, not really. I didn’t do anything. Sheriff Shepard was the one who—”
“I know, and I’m going to thank her, too, but Taylor. You were the one who put it all together and had the guts to tell my mom what was happening. She said the restraining order was your idea.”
“I wanted to keep him away from you,” she admitted softly. “And it didn’t work, anyway.”
“But because of you, Sheriff Shepard knew who he was, and she stopped him before he could come inside and do … whatever he planned to do with that gun. So thank you.”
A thank-you. That’s what Matt wanted to say. And Taylor got it, she did—what happened last night changed everything Matt thought about his past, and if it had gone another way, it could have changed his future forever. It made sense that he’d be preoccupied with that, and not with her dumb, blurted out confession of love.
So Taylor pasted on a polite smile and stood up. “You’re welcome. But I really didn’t do anything. It was mostly Sheriff Shepard. Now, if that’s all, I’d better go find my dad. I’m sure he’s looking for me.”
He wasn’t. The ferry wasn’t due to arrive for another hour, and that was when they’d agreed to meet up by the pier, but Matt didn’t need to know that.
“That’s not all,” Matt protested, lunging out of his chair to block her path. “I wanted to tell you that Dakota broke up with me.”
A tiny bomb exploded in Taylor’s head. She blinked, dizzy for a second, but when the smoke cleared she narrowed her eyes on Matt’s hopeful face. What did he think, that now he was single, Taylor would be happy to step in as replacement girlfriend? “I’m sorry,” she said stiffly. “That sucks.”
“No, it doesn’t.” Matt scrubbed both hands through his hair, blowing out a frustrated breath. “Man, I’m messing this all up. I knew she was going to when I called her this morning, because I told her I decided to go to Stanford instead of UVA.”
“Oh.” Taylor managed a genuine smile, even as her heart turned to stone. Stanford. Three thousand miles away. “I’m really happy for you. It’s what you’ve wanted for a long time.”
Matt laughed darkly, a manic light sparking in his eyes. “What I’ve wanted for a long time … Tay, you have to know that’s you.”
She stiffened all over in disbelief. “Dating someone else for the last year was a funny way of showing it.”
“I didn’t know you wanted me back,” Matt protested. “That night we almost kissed, down at the cove—you told your dad we were just friends. And I thought, fine. I can do just friends. You’re my best friend.”
Taylor swallowed and crossed her arms over her chest. “Right. And Dakota was your girlfriend. Until she dumped you and now suddenly you’re telling me you want me? How dumb and desperate do you think I am?”
“Tay, please. I don’t think that at all. Look, Dakota was a mistake. I see that now, but I thought love was about making a commitment and sticking to it. The way I used to wish my parents had done.”
He leaned his hands on the wrought-iron railing that bordered the hardware store’s front stoop, his back a long, tensed line of unhappiness. The walls around Taylor’s heart shook with the force of emotions trying to escape. At this point, the raging torrent was only held back by fear.
“And now?” she managed to ask.
Matt hung his head, and Taylor’s fingers itched to brush through the short, bristly hairs at the nape of his neck. “Now … I think love is about putting the other person’s needs before yours. Like when my mom let me blame her for the divorce so I wouldn’t have to know how bad my dad is.”
He turned to prop his hips on the railing and gave her a smile. “Or the way you encouraged me to follow my dreams,” he said. “Even when you knew they’d take me away from you.”
Taylor closed her eyes. She could feel the dam about to break, to drown her in the rising tide of feelings. “So what. Any decent friend would have done the same.”
With a rueful laugh, Matt said, “That’s probably true, and maybe I should’ve read the signs when Dakota did the opposite.”
Taylor couldn’t help but give him the side eye for that one. “Duh, you think?”
“I know, I know.” Matt held up his hands, distracting her with the way his shirt sleeves were rolled to the elbow, exposing his strong, tanned forearms. “I’ve got a lot to learn about love. My point is…”
He cleared his throat. Then with a determined set to his mouth, he stepped away from the railing and clasped Taylor’s ice-cream sticky fingers in his. “My point is, I want to learn about love with you. If we’re together, we can figure it out. And…”
Taylor didn’t give him a chance to say what else he wanted, because inside her the dam had finally broken. Love, longing, giddy happiness, and the culmination of a lot of daydreams came spilling out and all she could do was lean up on her toes and kiss him.
With a groan, Matt untangled their fingers and curved his arms around h
er back, pressing her close. His kiss was confident but still searching, as if he really did want to learn her by heart. Taylor melted faster than homemade ice cream on the first day of summer.
When the need for air finally pulled them apart, Matt gasped, “You didn’t let me finish.”
“There’s more?” Taylor tucked her nose into his neck, right where it sloped into his broad, muscled shoulder. She’d had her eye on that spot for a long time.
“Yeah.” She could hear him swallow. What could he be about to ask that he’d be uncertain of now? Curious, she tipped her head back to catch him licking his lips nervously. “I want to defer my Stanford admission for a year and go backpacking around the world with you. If you’ll have me.”
“Matt!” Taylor wasn’t proud of the squeal she made just then, but it couldn’t be helped. “Of course I’ll have you! Every time I pictured the trip, even when I knew I’d be walking the streets of London or climbing the Spanish Steps in Rome alone, I always imagined you at my side.”
He kissed her again and a wave of happiness washed over Taylor, nearly knocking her off her feet. Or maybe that was the way Matt weakened her knees by skimming his hands up the sides of her neck to cup the shape of her head in his hands so he could gaze down at her.
“And when we’re done seeing the world,” he said, “and we get our degrees, we’ll come home to Sanctuary Island.”
“This place will always be home to me,” Taylor agreed, turning in Matt’s arms to gaze out over the crowd walking, talking, laughing, living under the ‘Welcome to Sanctuary’ sign that stretched across Main Street. “No matter how far we travel, it will be here for us, waiting with open arms.”
“You helped me learn to love it here,” Matt said, pressing a kiss to her hair, right above her ear. “But I wouldn’t be surprised to find out that no matter where we go, I’ll feel at home—as long as I’m with you.”
Taylor savored the feeling of pure happiness, like bubbles bursting in her chest, until the buzz of her phone distracted her. “Who’s calling me now?” she wondered, frowning down at the screen.
Andie Shepard. Thumbing the answer button, Taylor said, “Hi Sheriff. What’s up?”
The conversation lasted only a few minutes, but they were enough to widen Taylor’s eyes and get her adrenaline jumping. When she clicked the phone off, she raised her eyebrows at Matt. “So. You wanted to thank Sheriff Shepard? I’ve got the perfect way.”
*
Sam parked the truck he’d borrowed from Windy Corner as close to the pier as he could get it, which wasn’t all that close since the festival in the town square was directly in his path. This would have to be good enough.
He ran around to the back to let Queenie out of the trailer, praying that she stayed calm through the walk down to the docks. His work with her over the last two months had definitely helped, but she was still skittish and easily startled. And, of course, being ripped away from her soul mate, Lucky, had already riled her up.
“I’m sorry, girl,” Sam said, unlatching the trailer door. “But we have to leave now and Lucky’s not ready to come with us.”
If Sam left it any longer, he might not be able to force himself to go, and damn the consequences.
“I wouldn’t do that, if I were you.”
The steady voice from behind him made Sam lean his forehead against the cold metal of the trailer door for a brief moment. “Andie. You found my note.”
“I did.” Her hand appeared beside his head, gently relatching the trailer door and sliding the bolt home. “Talk to me, Sam. Where are you going and why are you taking Queenie?”
The ferry horn sounded again, closer this time, and panic shot into Sam’s bloodstream. “Please, Andie, you’ve gotta let me go. I need to get Queenie away from here before—”
He stopped, the lie sitting on his tongue like a rock. He clenched his fists, unable to bring himself to lie any longer.
“Before her rightful owner arrives and finds her here,” Andie finished, still in that calm, steady tone.
Sam’s brain exploded. He gaped at her, probably looking like a landed fish gasping for oxygen, but honestly. “Well, damn. Is there anything you miss?”
“Plenty,” Andie said, with a wry shrug. “For instance, the fact that you’re a fugitive from justice.”
Defeat wanted to drag him down, but Sam squared his shoulders under the burden of his own brutal choices. “I know you’ve got no reason to trust me, but I swear to you, I had to take her. In the eyes of the law, she’s property—not a living, breathing creature with the ability to feel pain and fear. There is no justice for an animal like Queenie, not without my help.”
The words ground out of him like shells crushed underfoot, but Andie only smiled. It was a sad smile that didn’t reach her gorgeous eyes. “I’ve got the best reason in the world to trust you,” she said slowly. “I love you, and I know you love me, too. And more than that, I know you. Queenie’s legal owner abused her, didn’t he?”
“Yes. He found out she has a heart murmur, which isn’t life threatening but would make it almost impossible to sell her and recoup the hundreds of thousands he paid for her. She’s insured for millions, though—worth more dead than alive, unless anyone finds out about the heart murmur. So he bought off the vet who did the exam, but thank God, the vet had second thoughts.”
“And he came to you.”
Sam nodded briskly, flooded with urgency to get away, get gone before the bounty hunters showed up and endangered everyone he held dear. “The vet told me about the heart murmur. And he also told me he’d filled a prescription for Queenie for a medication that would be deadly for a horse with her condition.”
“Her owner was going to poison her for the insurance money.”
“Gradually, bit by bit,” Sam agreed, the sick cruelty of it twisting his guts. “He was killing her.”
“Okay, I completely see why she needed to be removed from her owner’s custody,” Andie said, putting her hands on her hips. “But why not go to the authorities?”
Sam snorted. “You mean, like the ones who trumped up charges and had me imprisoned for a crime I didn’t commit?”
“That was a different situation,” Andie argued. “A wealthy, connected family, corrupt police…”
Weariness weighed down Sam’s soul. “Queenie’s legal owner is Garry Wallace.”
Andie froze. “The lieutenant governor of Virginia,” she clarified weakly. “Well. Crap.”
“Exactly.” Sam pressed a hand against the closed trailer door. “I couldn’t risk it. I know how these things go. It’s hard enough going through proper channels to get an abused animal rescued—in most states, horses are still regarded as livestock. Their owners can basically do whatever they want to them. Even when the abuse is flagrant, it can take months to get the official wheels turning. Queenie didn’t have months.”
Andie nodded to herself, as if he’d confirmed something she already believed. “Okay, that’s what I needed to know.”
Stepping up close to Sam, Andie put her hand beside his where it rested on the latched door of the trailer, then banged it loudly, twice. With a rumble, the truck’s engine roared to life. Startled, Sam darted around the side of the trailer only to see Jo Ellen give him a cheery salute through the open driver’s window before she pulled the trailer away from the curb, taking Queenie with her.
Chapter Twenty-Four
“What the hell are you doing?” Sam snarled, his big body going tense.
“I’m proving to you that you don’t have to go it alone anymore, since you obviously don’t believe it yet.”
“You mean…”
“I’m not confiscating Queenie to turn her over to the authorities.” Andie faced him down, head held high and voice sure. “I’m helping you steal her.”
Sam’s jaw dropped, then clenched tightly as his eyes darkened with regret. “This is exactly why I tried to leave. Andie, don’t do this. Don’t let me ruin your life.”
Some last bit of worry
or doubt that had lain coiled in Andie’s belly melted away. “You left to save us,” she said, aware of the huskiness of her own voice and not even trying to hide it. “But Sam, we don’t need to be rescued. I’m not an abused horse you have to save. I can make my own judgment calls and my own choices, and I’ll stand by them.”
The muscles of his shoulders bunched under his faded black T-shirt. “This is a bad call,” he said baldly. “You have Caitlin to think about—what if your brother never comes home? You’re all she’s got. You can’t get involved in something like this, Andie.”
Andie went toe-to-toe with Sam, poking a stiff finger into his chest. “Don’t tell me what I can’t do. You think I could look Caitlin in the face if I let the horse she loves get sent back to certain death? If I am going to be her only parental figure,” she said, voice breaking, “I’m sure as hell going to try to show her how to be strong, to stand up for what she believes in, and to protect those who can’t protect themselves.”
Visibly conflicted, Sam frowned. “Where is Caitlin, anyway?”
“She’s with Taylor and Matt.”
The ferry horn blew again, piercingly loud. Sam looked around, apparently just now noticing that the town square had cleared out completely. Only a few stragglers remained, tidying up their booths and tables before hurrying down the hill to the docks.
Sam turned back to her, and from the grim determination hardening his jaw, Andie knew he was about to make one final appeal. “Please,” he rasped. “Call Jo back. Let me take Queenie and get on the ferry, and get her out of here before the men who are looking for us make it to Sanctuary Island.”
“It’s too late for that, I’m afraid,” Andie told him, aching to take his hand and squeeze it for reassurance. “I pulled in a few favors and got in touch with the ferryboat captain. Along with the crowd of graduation guests, most of whom are related to Sanctuary residents, there are three large gentlemen who don’t appear to be part of the onboard graduation festivities. According to the ferry’s records, there are three names I don’t recognize as being connected to Sanctuary Island in any way—but when I got Ivy to run them through the system, they popped up.”
