The Enchantment of Emma Fletcher

by L. D. Crichton

  That means I will never work again.

  Mateo winks. “Have faith. It’ll happen before you know it. You’ve got a mean uppercut.”

  EIGHTEEN

  Tristan

  Emma gets in the car without speaking and for a moment, I worry that I’ve overstepped my bounds by arranging for her to spar with Mat. That is, until she leans back in the seat, turns her head, and flashes me her smile. That smile makes everything right in my world.

  “Thank you. I—” She pauses. “I needed that.”

  Perfect. “I worried maybe I’d be pushing my luck, but—”

  “No,” she says, stopping me. “Not at all. It was a good idea. Mateo said you didn’t tell him anything.”

  “I didn’t tell him much,” I correct her, “but I did tell him you’d been attacked in the past. No more details than that.”

  “Fair.”

  “Have you ever, you know, talked to anyone about it?”

  “Not really,” she says. “The police and my dad, but I mostly answered questions. I couldn’t talk about, you know . . . the details.”

  “You should try it,” I suggest. “I mean, you know you can talk to me about it, if you want to, but there are other people who care about you, Em.”

  She rolls her eyes. “Oh yeah, hordes of ’em.”

  “Maybe not hordes, but it’s better to have a few people who genuinely care about you than masses of them who just pretend to.”

  Emma picks at her fingernail and gives a slight nod. “I know.”

  “Think about how much better you felt after telling me. Like each time you talk about it, a piece of you is put back together, less broken somehow. That’s how I feel when I talk about Katie.”

  “Do you talk about her lots?”

  “I used to talk to Mateo about her all the time. Especially when it first happened. Couldn’t have gotten through it without him.”

  “That’s what best friends are for,” she says, then stops, her face twisting. Maybe she sees how hypocritical it is that she’s kept the most devastating secret about herself from her own best friend.

  I put my hand on her knee and give a reassuring squeeze. “You’ll be able to tell her,” I say. “When the timing is right.”

  “Right,” she says. “I think you’re right.”

  She’s quiet for most of the afternoon, losing herself in work. I hope I’ve at least given her something to think about. She has a movie date with Marley tonight, so rather than take her back to my place and prove to her how damned sexy she looks all sweaty and disheveled, I’m delivering her home, with plans to meet Mateo later.

  When we turn left on Rosemount, Emma’s street, Marley is sitting on the front of Emma’s blue bug, legs crossed, eyes cast down to her phone.

  Emma points to the digital clock on my dash. “Five o’clock on the dot. Marley is always punctual.”

  “No doubt.”

  I put the gearshift in park, get out of the truck, and walk to Emma’s side to open the door for her.

  Marley slides down the car until her heel-clad feet touch the ground. “How old-fashioned of you, Tristan.”

  “Yeah,” I say. “I like to think it’s a common courtesy.”

  “Whatever. Thanks for bringing my girl home.”

  Emma steps out and I wrap my arms around her waist, pull her in, and kiss her. “Later, Peaches,” I whisper so only she can hear me before pointing a finger in Marley’s direction. “She’s my girl, Scott. Don’t get any crazy ideas.”

  Emma laughs. “Call me later?”

  “Of course.”

  “’Bye,” she says.

  I head back to my side of the truck. “Make sure you miss me.”

  She laughs again, but it’s more of a charming giggle this time. “Always.”

  I start the truck again and as I drive away, I can’t help but think that leaving Emma behind at the end of the day is going to get harder the more time I spend with her.

  Emma

  Marley’s eyes scan me like laser beams. “You look rough,” she decides.

  “I am. I need a shower before we go anywhere.” What I really want is a run because I hadn’t gotten one in today. That’s not to say I didn’t get a workout.

  “I thought you were at work.”

  “I was only there for the afternoon,” I admit, digging around in my purse for the keys. “I’ll tell you about it after my shower.”

  “Fine, but first, boy, do I have things to tell you.”

  “Mateo?”

  She nods.

  “I know. Sort of.”

  “What?”

  “I’ll explain that too.” I unlock the door and hold up my splayed fingers to Marley. “Five minutes. I swear that’s all I need.”

  She follows me into my bedroom, flops on the bed, and stares up at the ceiling. With a heavy sigh she says, “I’ve been keeping it to myself this long, what’s another five minutes?”

  I root around my closet for jeans and retrieve a T-shirt from my dresser before spinning around to face her. “I do have a phone, you know. You could have called.”

  “I wanted to see your face when I told you.”

  “All right,” I say. “Let me make sure it’s a clean face then.”

  As promised, I am in the shower just long enough to make use of soap and shampoo before I hop out. After my session with Mateo, I felt like I’d slept in the same clothes for a weeklong bender rather than spent five hours at a gym. Regardless, dinner and a movie with my best friend is waiting. As I run a brush through my hair, I give consideration to Tristan’s earlier comments about how talking over Katie’s death with Mateo helped him work past it.

  I want to tell Marley, I do, but she is such an upbeat person, and to spill such a dirty secret would hurt her soul.

  I head back to my room and Marley sits straight up and grills me.

  “Why weren’t you at work?”

  I grab my keys from my desk and nod for her to go. “We don’t want to be late.”

  She stands and leaves out my side door. I make sure to lock it behind us. “Why are you avoiding my question?” she asks as she gets into the car.

  “I am not avoiding your question,” I say. “I am avoiding missing our reservation. Besides. You have some news, do you not?”

  She nods excitedly.

  “So spill.”

  “I think I could fall in love with him,” she says.

  “Mateo?”

  “Duh.”

  I smile. Please, Marley, fall in love with him, I think. No one on earth will treat you better than he will. “So what happened?” I ask as I back out of the driveway.

  “At the fair,” she says, “when you disappeared to wherever with Tristan and Mateo took me to the shooting range, things got rather . . . flirtatious.”

  “No kidding. I hadn’t noticed your squeals in the photo booth.”

  She pauses, blushing as she recalls whatever it was that went on between them in the photo booth before continuing. “So fast-forward to when Tristan dropped us off at my place.”

  “You slept with him,” I guess.

  She shakes her head and scolds me. “You’re ruining my story.”

  “Sorry,” I say, focusing on the road, “I’ll shut up. Go on. Finish.”

  “He asked me if I wanted to go for a walk.”

  “Did you?”

  “Of course,” she says. “We walked down by the edge of the Hawkes’s property.”

  The Hawkes are Stonefall’s wealthiest family, their property encompassing nearly a third of the town. And all of it is manicured to the point where one might be fooled into thinking they were in some five-star, all-inclusive resort rather than a town that could be easily missed. The rumor mill says that Mr. Hawke benefited from the untimely demise of his father, who died tragically in a f
ire. That same mill also plays with the idea that Hawke Junior was directly responsible for the blaze, hoping to take over his father’s ruthless real estate development company.

  I lived in the city then, but Marley texted me pictures of graffiti on their home, their cars, and their property after it all happened. I’d felt sorry for them, especially because I knew Mr. Hawke to be a good man. He’d brought my mother home on more than one occasion from her blackout-inducing episodes. Once, when I was twelve and here for the summer, I remember him knocking at our door, helping Mom to the couch. He asked me if I’d eaten and when I said no, he left and returned five minutes later with a burger and a milk shake. He sat with me while I ate and told me if I needed anything to call. That I reminded him of his daughter.

  I never did call, but I didn’t forget his kindness either.

  “So you’re in the prettiest place in Stonefall,” I supply. “And then what?”

  “Well, we were walking, and naturally I was doing most, er, all of the talking. By this point, I was flirting relentlessly but he was being a perfect gentleman. Anyway, I like to look at people when I speak to them, even when we’re walking side-by-side, so I wasn’t really paying attention and my foot caught on a tree root that was protruding from the ground.”

  Poor Marley. “You fell?”

  She giggles.

  “Marley, did you fall?” I turn to look at her after I pull up to the restaurant and put the car in park.

  “No, his reflexes are insane. I swear, Emma, I didn’t even register that I was falling before his hand shot out to grab me and set me on my feet.”

  Okay. Didn’t seem like that big a deal. “So why are you blushing ferociously? ’Cause he’s now your knight in boxing armor?”

  “Kind of,” she says. “It was more what happened after that.”

  “What happened after?”

  “Have you ever noticed how deep his voice is when he’s whispering?”

  “Mateo has no reason to whisper to me!” I say. “You’re withholding details. C’mon, I’m dying here!”

  “Okay, okay,” she says. “So he rights me on my feet and asks in this raspy, ridiculously sexy voice, ‘Are you okay, mamacita?’ I told him I thought so, and then he suggested he should check just to make sure.”

  My eyes widen; now I can see why she’s the same shade as a raspberry. “What happened next?”

  “He pulled down the side of my top so it fell from my shoulder. He said it looked good, perfect even, then he kissed it!”

  “And?”

  “He did the same thing to my wrists, my arms, my neck, my stomach . . .”

  Okay, that was pretty hot. “And did he ravish you in the bushes?”

  “Not exactly, but we went back to my place and did everything but.”

  “So, the verdict is you could fall in love with Mateo?”

  “He’s so . . .” She pauses in search of words. “Oh God, I don’t know, Em. No one has ever made me feel like that before. Ever. He’s surprising.”

  “I’ve been trying to tell you that all along.”

  She shrugs. “Yeah, well, maybe I was blind . . . or stupid. All I know is this: I want him so bad it hurts.” She gets out of the car, giggling like a schoolgirl as she clasps her hands under her chin. “Oh God! I almost forgot the best part. When things were getting all hot and heavy last night, you know what he said to me?”

  “I’m sure you’re going to tell me.” I get out and lock the door behind me.

  Marley makes her voice deep in her best impression of Mateo as she leans over the hood of the car toward me. “I was born for you, Marley Scott. The first time I saw you, I thought I saw an angel. I’d have waited a hundred days to touch you, a hundred months to hold you, a hundred years to kiss you.”

  My heart skips just listening to her tell it. “Did he actually say that?”

  She nods. “Every single word. I died.”

  I don’t blame her. I’d have died too. Suddenly, more than anything, I want Tristan. I try to shake him from my thoughts to revel in Marley’s joy, but she seems perfectly satisfied to be love-drunk in her own world.

  The restaurant is busy, but we are seated in no time at all, proving that it pays to call ahead. Marley doesn’t even look at her menu, obviously knowing exactly what she wants. She rests her chin on folded hands and leans across the table.

  “So,” she says. “Why weren’t you at work today?”

  Tristan

  Mateo is working on his bike when I pull up to his place with a twelve-pack of beer and Chinese takeout. He stands and wipes grease from his hands onto a towel. “Hola,” he says. “You brought food.”

  “Food and booze,” I clarify. “I figure it is the least I can do for everything you’ve done for me today.”

  “You don’t need to bribe me,” Mat says, reaching for some chow mein noodles, “but I’ll take it. Those tacos sucked.”

  “Which is precisely why I never get Mexican food. I shouldn’t have tried to be adventurous earlier,” I reply. “It all sucks compared to your mother’s food.”

  Mateo nods. “True.”

  “I play it safe: Chinese food, pizza, subs. All safe. Mexican? Unsafe. Comprende?” I take a seat on the couch in his garage that I happen to know he has had for entirely too long. The thing is stained with as much grease as the cloth Mateo just wiped his hands on. This sofa has been here since we were about ten, its dominant pattern being crushed Cheetos.

  “Comprende this,” Mat says, flipping me off.

  I smile and dig into some lemon chicken. “How was Em today?”

  “She did good,” he said. “She needs to be more confident.”

  “I know. I’m hoping that learning to fight from you might help her with that.”

  “I’m not teaching her to fight,” he corrects me. “I’m teaching her to survive a worst-case scenario.”

  I nod, grabbing a bite with my chopsticks.

  “Can I ask you something?” he continues.

  “Ask away.”

  “Was she . . .” He stops. “Did he . . . ?” It’s as if the words are protesting against coming out of his mouth. “Did whoever attacked her . . . ?”

  I know what he’s getting at. Part of me doesn’t think I should tell him, but part of me wants to for two reasons: one, it’ll arm Mateo with more information to use when teaching Emma to defend herself; and two, I know if I tell him, I’ll have someone who will strike first and ask questions later if ever the need arises.

  “She was raped,” I say. Rape. It’s an ugly word. An ugly act. It’s so fucked up and the word so taboo, even though it shouldn’t be, that I have a hard time just saying it out loud.

  The carton of chow mein in Mateo’s hands shakes.

  “Don’t tell her I said anything.”

  He shakes his head. “I figured it was something like that, but I also thought you’d tell me if you thought I needed to know.”

  “Then why’d you ask?”

  He shoves more noodles into his mouth and shrugs. “To know what I’m up against, I guess.”

  “Well, now you know.”

  We eat in silence for the next few minutes before Mateo grins. “In happier news, any guesses what else I’m up against?”

  “Is she a gorgeous blonde?”

  “Yeah,” Mat says.

  I arch a brow. “Named Marley?”

  He nods.

  I want to hug the guy. Truly. I want to freaking hug him. I’ve listened to Mateo speak of Marley Scott for what feels like a lifetime. A lifetime of listening to all the ways that she is the most perfect female on the planet.

  “Was she everything you thought she’d be?”

  He shakes his head. “No.”

  This surprises me. “What? No?”

  “My imagination didn’t even come close to the real thing,” he s
ays. “Not even close.”

  “Better or worse?”

  “I couldn’t have dreamed up how perfect she actually is,” he says. “I didn’t give her enough credit.”

  I beg to differ with him there. “Congratulations.”

  “Save the congratulations for the day I make her my wife.”

  “One date, huh? You know after one date? That seems pretty cocky.”

  “Not cocky,” he says. “Truth. She will be my wife.”

  “Okay.” I’ll give him that. Problem is, I’m going to have to spend the next ten years listening to Mat talk about his bride-to-be. “Hey, do you think Emma can get past it?”

  “Her attack?” Mat asks, chewing noodles. “I think she’s doing a pretty good job so far.”

  “Not her attack,” I say. “I mean her lack of confidence.”

  “Yeah,” he says. “I think so. With you telling her you’ll worship her and me makin’ her a weapon, something’s gotta give, don’t you think?”

  “God,” I say, “I hope so.”

  NINETEEN

  Emma

  I realize I’ve got to either come up with a believable excuse or bite the bullet and tell her the truth about where I’d spent the day. I’m struck with tremendous guilt. For not telling her, for wanting to tell her, for things I can’t even explain.

  Our waitress, who is a girl with alarmingly purple hair, saunters to our table. “Can I take your drink order?”

  “Just a Caesar for me,” Marley says. She closes the menu and looks at me expectantly.

  “Diet Coke, please.”

  Marley looks surprised. “Diet Coke?”

  The regret I feel is almost immediate. If I am going to tell her, liquid courage isn’t the worst idea ever. The waitress hovers, waiting to see if I have changed my mind.

  “With rum.”

  Marley beams.

  “Sure thing,” the waitress says. “I’ll give you a few minutes to browse the menu.”

  I decide to order pasta. Not something I would normally indulge in, but it’s been a long time since I felt so famished. The air-conditioning is blasting but my body is on fire, a combination I’m sure of my day with Mateo and the nervousness I feel at the prospect of telling Marley.