by Jacie Floyd
His dad’s presence at the factory the night Lana Harris disappeared suggested a connection there, too. He’d rejected the idea of his father and Lana being lovers for as long as he could. But now, it was time to prepare for the possibility that he and Clayton could be related. Closely related.
A brother. The word rang hollow and alien inside his head.
He loved his mother and sister. But after his father had died and they’d settled into what passed for a normal life without him, he’d missed having another male in the all-female household. Even the household help ranged heavy on the female side.
Mother and Natalie had tried to understand his feelings, but they’d been unable to appreciate the traditional rites of male passage. Grandfather Bradford had picked up the slack on the big-picture issues. But in life’s smaller rituals, Dylan had turned to Uncle Arthur. His uncle had taught him how to drive, shave, and tie a necktie.
Funny how, even though Dylan had been included in outings with Frank and Uncle Arthur, the two cousins had never quite clicked. Frank had always been just a little too perfect.
He wouldn’t sneak out at night to meet girls. Refused to drink the twelve-year-old scotch Dylan smuggled out of the liquor cabinet. Never ditched school. Never snuck behind the boathouse to smoke. Never wanted to raise any of the hell Dylan needed to raise just to break out of the confining straight-jacketed life the Bradfords and Steadmans demanded. He wondered if a younger Clayton would have been more like him or a stuffed shirt like Frank. Probably like Frank. Another depressing thought.
And now, he didn’t need a brother any longer. He’d formed his own brotherhood with his two best friends over ten years ago. Brothers of his own choosing. Brothers who never let him down. If he ever got this place fixed up, he’d love to have them up for no-frills guy getaways. Similar to Wyatt’s mountain cabin in California, they could escape from the regular pressures of their lives.
From what Mrs. Lattimer had said, Gracie had been a little hellion who’d done her best to loosen Clay up. He could picture Gracie tempting Clay off the straight and narrow. Big-hearted Gracie with her high spirits, her disregard for dignity, her irreverence. Just thinking of her called up the memory of their kiss. If she were here right now, he’d kiss her again. And again. And again.
Kissing hadn’t been a primary goal of Dylan’s since he was fourteen-years-old and on summer vacation in Cannes. That was the year four young Parisians from the next villa had taught him everything they knew about the art of kissing.
By the next summer, the girls’ curvaceous new bodies invited more advanced explorations. The four girls took turns frolicking with him through the sultry evenings, offering him the variety and instruction that formed the sexual pattern of his life.
Women were desirable, plentiful, and interchangeable. But not permanent.
Now he‘d be happy to spend the entire summer doing nothing but kissing Gracie. Well, maybe not the entire summer. June, at least... which didn’t explain the jumbo box of condoms he’d bought that afternoon.
If he were smart, he wouldn’t even try to put them to use. Clearly, Gracie wasn’t the sort to have an affair lightly, and anything more permanent was beyond his experience—maybe even beyond his ability. Gracie obviously played for keeps, and he only knew how to play for fun.
Surely the idea of attempting anything more than fun sprang from the restlessness he’d felt in New York and not from anything he felt for Gracie. He should go back to the city and lose himself in the diversion of someone else’s body.
But at the moment, he didn’t want anyone but Gracie.
His longing went beyond the desire to taste her mouth, tangle his fingers in her hair, and feel her body arch with pleasure and splinter with completion beneath his. He wanted all of that, yes, but he also wanted to forge something stronger between them. A union brought about through more than the momentary possession of her in his bed. One that wouldn’t end with the usual vague and insincere promise to call her again.
No other desire in his life had scared him so much.
While his head whirled with frustrating contradictions, the darkness outside the cabin deepened. The harsh lighting inside created ghost-like shadows. Every board and timber in the building popped and creaked in an eerie symphony. The rev of a distant motor provided the backbeat to his edginess.
Time to hang up his dust cloth. After he finished cleaning one final cabinet.
He poked a broom into a pile of debris under the sink.
The debris whirled into life. A panicked family of mice squeaked and darted about, angry and frightened by the disturbance. Ten or so of them skittered in every direction. He swept them toward the door, but more of them escaped than allowed themselves to be herded toward freedom.
Dylan flung open the door to release the one tiny mouse he’d corralled. He pulled up at the crunch of a footstep on the porch. Against the backdrop of the starlit sky, a shapeless shadow loomed across the doorway.
“Aah!” His heart pounded, and he raised his little broom.
“Don’t swing!” Gracie lifted her hands in the air as if wielding a sword instead of a pizza box and a six-pack. “I come bearing gifts.”
Feeling relieved but foolish, he retreated into the kitchen. He leaned an elbow against the counter and pretended she hadn’t startled him. She looked not at all ghoulish in jeans and a denim jacket. The aroma of onions and pepperoni wafted toward him.
“Great. Food.” His stomach rumbled. “I’m starving.”
“I bet you worked up quite an appetite chasing vicious field mice, didn’t you?” When she laughed, the sound went straight to his heart. He’d been hoping she’d show up. “How many have you set free?”
“Not as many as there are in here.” He turned to the sink to wash his hands. “I’ve been working on it, but the kitchen’s nowhere near vermin-free.”
She handed him the pizza and placed the six-pack on top of the flat box. “Be right back.”
She returned in seconds with a folding tray table, paper plates, and napkins. While she was gone, he worked on banishing his fantasies about her. But that only lasted until she bent over to erect a tray table. As she shrugged out of her jacket, the sight of beautiful, voluptuous Gracie in hip-hugging jeans and a white T-shirt that fit like a second skin brought them back full force.
Unfortunately, she didn’t harbor any indecent thoughts about him. At least, none that he detected—until they drew a pair of wobbly, mismatched chairs up to the tiny table and bumped knees as they sat down. She blushed as if he’d flashed her, but she left her knee resting against his.
After they’d attacked their first slices of pizza, she questioned him about the investigation. He filled her in on the steps he’d taken since they’d separated that afternoon.
“You know…” She paused to loop a string of mozzarella into her mouth with a casual sensuality that left him salivating. “It seems like you’re warming up to the idea that Clay’s a Bradford. How do you feel about that?”
“I won’t believe it until I have no other choice.” He popped the cap off a beer and took a long swallow.
“That’s not fair to Clay,” Gracie pointed out.
“It’s more about being fair to my father. I don’t think I could ever accept the fact that he would behave dishonorably toward a woman—either wife or mistress—or an innocent child. That behavior doesn’t fit with my own memories or my mother’s description of him.”
Gracie munched thoughtfully. “Your father wasn’t the only Bradford who visited here in those days, was he?”
“No, but I can’t picture any of the others being Clay’s father either.”
“But it’s possible,” she argued. “Tell me about the other candidates.”
“Uncle Tommy,” Dylan suggested after a long moment. “He would have been in his late twenties, I guess. But it couldn’t have been him.”
“Tommy, the one killed in a hit-and-run accident about ten years ago?” Gracie tapped her fingers against her beer
. “He was gorgeous. Even in a family with looks like yours, he stood out. Women a lot more sophisticated than Lana would have drooled over him.”
She thought he was gorgeous? He’d file that nugget away for later. For now he needed to decide exactly how to reveal Uncle Tommy’s secret. She waited for his answer with her usual honest interest, and he decided to trust her. “Tommy’s, ah, sexual interests ran in a different direction.”
“What direction?” She peered at him over a pizza triangle, brown eyes wide with curiosity.
“Not women.”
“Men? He was gay?” She chewed on that fact for a minute. “Darn. Who does that leave?”
Dylan considered the question again. “Grandfather Bradford, I suppose.”
“I remember Gran saying he had a real eye for the ladies once upon a time.”
“If he was going to risk everything he’d worked his whole life for, it would’ve been with someone willing to play the game his way.” Of course, his legend had been built on tales of ruthlessness. But still, the theory just didn’t wash. Family meant everything to Grandfather. He was rascal enough to own up to an illegitimate son if he had one. And damn anyone who objected.
“What about the current senator?”
“Uncle Arthur?” Dylan laughed out loud. Arthur had never embraced the exaggerated reputation with women the other Bradford men relished. “The idea of him with a mistress is almost as humorous as Uncle Tommy having one.”
“He’s not gay, too, is he?”
“One-hundred-percent hetero, as far as I know. He met Aunt Delia on Cape Cod when he was seventeen, and, as he always tells it, fell in love with her angel-blue eyes on the spot. I’d bet he’s been a one-woman man ever since.”
“Okay, let’s see who we’ve got.” Gracie put down her pizza, wiped her fingers with a napkin, and then ticked off names one by one. “Not your father. Not your grandfather. Not Tommy or Arthur.” She threw her hand up in exasperation. “I admire your family loyalty, but more than likely, one of these men is Clay’s father. We should try to eliminate them based on something more than your personal preference.”
A bit of pizza crust stuck in his throat, and Dylan washed it down with another pull on his beer. The only reason behind considering someone else to name as Clayton’s father was to clear his own, but that didn’t make it any easier. All of them were men he loved, admired, and respected.
“Would there have been anyone else?” Gracie asked. “Cousins? Nephews. Black sheep?”
Dylan started feeling boxed in by the direct questions, Gracie’s nearness, and the walls of the cabin. “I can’t think of anyone else, but I’ll ask Uncle Arthur.”
“Are you sure you want to ask one of the suspects who the other suspects might be?”
“Trust me, Uncle Arthur’s not a suspect.”
“Okay,” she said, clearly humoring him. “I’ll talk to David.”
“Why?”
“Of all the people left in East Langden, he knew Lana the best. And he knew your father.” Her eyes became guarded, leaving Dylan to wonder what she was hiding. “His health isn’t good right now, but have you noticed how he seems to be doling out information in bits and pieces?”
“Has he doled out something I don’t know about?”
“N-no,” she said, failing to meet his eyes. “But maybe there’s more.”
“Like what?” He nudged her knee with his when she remained silent.
“Maybe he knows something he doesn’t even know is important, like Granddad did. Or someone else might have information.” The tip of her tongue peeked out of the corner of her mouth while she concentrated, driving up Dylan’s temperature. “If your father was at the furniture factory the night Lana disappeared, maybe someone else saw him and knows what he was doing there.”
He dragged his attention away from her mouth. “Like who?”
“There used to be a night watchman, Henry Stillberg. He’s retired and lives in Florida part of the year. But he comes back to East Langden for the summer.” Gracie began filling the pizza box with assorted trash.
His hand on her knee grabbed her attention. “After you talk to David, we’ll find out if Stillberg’s in town and see what he remembers.”
“Okay.” A faint blush colored her cheeks as she stared at his hand.
He expected her to move it or stand or tell him to keep his hands to himself, but she didn’t. Raising her eyes, she looked at him. Cautious and uncertain, yet interested.
He returned the look until looking wasn’t enough. Hooking his hand behind her neck, he pulled her forward. “Come here.”
His mouth claimed hers, taking the kiss he’d anticipated all afternoon. This was it. No interruptions, no appointments, no responsibilities, no audience, and so much better than his wildest dreams.
Without moving his mouth from hers, he took the box from her and dropped it on the floor. He clasped her waist and lifted her onto his lap where she nestled firmly against him.
She groaned, or he did, as his hands crept up her sides. His fingers rested beneath the fullness of her breasts and his thumbs brushed her taut nipples. Raggedly breathing in her scent, he lowered his mouth to her neck and nibbled her earlobe, exercising every bit of control to keep from peeling off her clothes and losing himself in her body.
His earlier theory that a lengthy bout of kissing would satisfy him was soon shattered. He could practically hear the condoms in his glove box calling his name before he remembered that the timing for moving on to bigger and better things might be perfect, but the setting was not. When he got Gracie hot and sweaty between the sheets, he wanted there to be sheets.
He spent a moment banishing the lust from his brain and other body parts. Dylan sighed against her neck and took a deep breath. While he shifted the rest of his body into neutral, he tried to talk himself into believing his decision was for the best.
Graffiti decorated the walls, piles of rubbish sat around them like kindling for a bonfire, the rickety sofa smelled like piss—he probably didn’t smell much better than that—and an animal rustled through the trash...
A what!
Dylan leaped to his feet with Gracie in his arms. Damn! At his feet, a raccoon gnawed on leftover pizza. This place resembled a petting zoo more than a house, but the interruption accomplished the trick of killing the mood for seduction.
“Thanks for the pizza.” He pressed a soft kiss against her mouth and lowered her feet to the floor after the scavenger scooted away.
“You’re welcome.” Her eyes clouded with confusion at his change of direction. “I guess.”
He hugged her tightly against him. “I should get back to work.”
“I’ll help.” She looked around the room, and he could see her assessing the greatest need.
Just like Little Miss Efficiency to pitch in, but he knew she’d already had a long day. And so had he. Rolling his head from side to side, he stretched the tight muscles in his back.
“Let’s pack it in for the night.” He took her by the hand as she tried to pass by him on her way to the sink.
“There’s still a lot to do, and you’ll need a place to sleep tomorrow.” She removed her hand from his, opened cabinet doors and inspected inside.
“Nah,” he said. “Tomorrow night, I’ll be in New York.”
“Oh. Right.” Her features turned into a blank slate as she cleared supplies off the counter and placed them on a shelf.
He hated that look. He hated having to explain himself more. “I told you yesterday I’d be going to the basketball playoffs.” He took a bottle of cleanser from her and turned her to face him. “I’ll be back on Monday.”
“Good.” She shrugged and returned to her straightening.
Although he’d only be gone for a few days, he’d miss her perpetual motion, her bossiness, her smile. He missed her smile already.
“Would you like to go with me?” The question bewildered him even as he asked it. Good God, from what oxygen-deprived section of his brain had that su
ggestion come from?
“You’re inviting me go to New York with you?” Gracie perked up momentarily. But in the blink of an eye her look changed from intrigued to indifferent. She slumped against the counter. “I can’t go to New York.”
“Sure, you can.” He was determined to convince her, although he sure didn’t know why. “We can fly there tomorrow afternoon and come back on Saturday morning if you want.”
“I can’t.”
“Why not?”
She crossed her arms firmly over her chest. “First, I can’t fly anywhere. Second, the festival starts tomorrow. And third, Granddad might get to come home in the morning.”
“Those are excuses, not reasons.” Dylan shook his head. “You could go with me if you wanted to, but you won’t fly.”
“Same thing.” Her jutting chin had stubborn written all over it.
“You don’t trust me,” he accused.
“Not a bit,” she agreed, cheerfully.
“I’m a great pilot. Careful. Knowledgeable. Experienced.”
“Don’t take it personally. I wouldn’t get in a small plane with you even if your last name was Lindbergh.”
He concealed his disappointment with a shrug. “A Gulf Stream G-V isn’t exactly a small plane.”
“I don’t care if it’s Air Force One. I’m not going anywhere in an airplane.”
“Right, got it.” No chance he could talk her out of a lifelong phobia before morning. That was clearly a task for another day. But New York wasn’t all that far away. “Let’s drive instead. It will take about six hours. We’d have to leave earlier, but it’s doable.”
“I can’t do that either.”
“Why not?”
“See reasons B and C.”
He could argue his point, but he’d lost this round. She didn’t want to go to New York with him, and maybe she was right. They didn’t know each other that well. “Have it your way.”
She sprayed the counter with disinfectant and grabbed a roll of paper towels. He took them from her and tossed them toward a mound of trash. With his hands claiming her shoulders, he demanded her attention. “We’re supposed to be finished here.”
