by BETH KERY
It annoyed her that he didn’t take it because her hand shook slightly, making the check tremble in the air. Erma had taken her off her guard by switching on that light, but Liam had shocked her to the core by embracing her. She’d thought she knew what she was doing by making this proposal, but apparently Liam wasn’t something to be quantified and controlled.
“How will you know if I’ve investigated the matter fully or not?”
“I’ve heard about your work ethic from Mari. I’ve read about your career. You’ve been a champion for victims of crime…for discovering the truth. If there’s anything relevant to be found, you’ll do your best to uncover it once you take this check.”
“Chances are I won’t be able to uncover anything. I want you to know that up front.”
“I understand. I still want to try,” Natalie stated, her firm tone belying the fact that she couldn’t meet his eyes.
Liam stared at the check uncertainly.
He’d run the gamut of emotion in the past few minutes, and now Natalie had the nerve to make him feel even more. He’d leaped at the opportunity to see her face, then experienced a rush of guilt for his curiosity…his hunger. It wasn’t seeing her scars that made him feel guilty, it was her palpable vulnerability.
The bone structure of her face was as finely made as her body. Natalie’s wasn’t a run-of-the-mill beauty, but the haunting kind. There were several smaller scars near her temple, but the most prominent was a half-inch-thick one that ran all the way from her eyelid and disappeared below her hairline. It only seemed to highlight the perfection of everything else about her.
It saddened him, that scar—saddened him on a bone-deep level. It was a reminder of the months and probably years of pain that a young, innocent girl had endured.
But his sorrow didn’t blind him to the beauty of the woman beneath that scar. In fact it only added to it.
His father had caused this; he’d been responsible for making this exquisite woman shrink into herself like she’d thought her face would actually harm an onlooker.
Seeing that had hurt him in a way he couldn’t quite put into words.
For a few tension-filled seconds Liam considered telling her to keep her money. Natalie Reyes was far, far from being the devil, but somehow making this pact with her intimidated him.
Accepting that check sealed the deal.
For sixteen years, Liam had struggled to create a cohesive image of his father. He’d loved his dad like crazy. All four Kavanaugh children had. He’d been charismatic, fun…someone he’d always respected. It’d been a trial for Liam to come to terms with the drastically different pictures of his father that he’d received after the crash: the laughing, powerful patriarch…the selfish, heartless drunk…
Who the hell was Derry Kavanaugh?
Part of him had always been curious about what had happened that night. He shared that same internal pressure as Natalie Reyes. Problem was, he’d been disillusioned by his father once—when he was fifteen years old. Taking that check from Natalie would set him on a path where he might discover even uglier truths about his dad.
He hesitated on a knife’s edge. Why did he waver now when he’d dived headfirst into drastically more risky and dangerous situations in the past?
The image of Natalie sitting behind her desk, cloaked in shadow, penetrated his awareness. For some stupid, incomprehensible reason, he wanted to walk behind that desk and undo the knot at the back of her head. He wanted to fill his hands with that glorious spill of hair he’d seen on the beach and here in her office the other night.
It irritated him, this dichotomy of feelings she inspired in him. He wanted to shake her sometimes. He also wanted to protect her. Most of all, he wanted to tear through her facade so he could lay bare that woman he’d glimpsed on the beach.
He must be losing his mind.
He reached out and swiped the check.
“I’ll make a report to you when…if I get anything of substance. Which I doubt very seriously,” he said pointedly before he walked out of the office.
A few days later Natalie was putting some groceries in her trunk when her cell phone rang. Her heart leaped with a mixture of anxiety and excitement when she noticed the identity of the caller.
Ridiculous. She really needed to get past this girlhood crush she’d had on Liam Kavanaugh. She wasn’t that girl anymore. Children had a license to dream, and Natalie knew how dangerous dreaming could be for a grown woman.
“Hello?” she said as she got into her car. She’d planned to drop by her brother, Eric’s, place and maybe make him some dinner with the groceries she’d just purchased.
“It’s Liam. I was wondering if you want me to give you periodic reports on what I’ve found.”
“Oh…I don’t know. I hadn’t really thought about it. Have you found something important?”
“No. Well…maybe.” He made a sound of impatience. “Problem is, I don’t know what you’d think is worthwhile or not. What are you doing right now?”
“I’m in the Shop and Save parking lot. I just finished some errands.”
“Why don’t you swing by my place? I stained the hard-wood floors earlier, but we could talk out on the terrace.” When she didn’t immediately respond, he added, “I won’t take more than twenty minutes of your time.”
She felt contrite. She was the one who had proposed a business arrangement between them. Why would she hesitate to meet with him? A voice inside her head taunted her, accusing her of being gun-shy because of that embrace the other day, but Natalie willfully ignored it.
“Of course. What’s your address?”
He gave it to her. Natalie had lived in Harbor Town her whole life, so she knew precisely which house he referred to.
“You bought the Myerson cottage?” she clarified.
“Yeah. I know what you’re thinking.”
“You do?” she asked in numb amazement.
“That I’m a sucker for buying a money pit like this? My mother keeps telling me I’m nuts,” he said, wry amusement in his tone.
“No…no that’s not what I was thinking at all.”
She told him she’d be there shortly and hung up the phone. Less than ten minutes later she pulled past an old mailbox—even that was rich in character and craftsmanship—and drove down the long, weedy gravel drive. It was late August, the time when nature was at her ripest. The Victorian-era cottage blended almost seamlessly into the overgrown landscape, thanks to the thick surrounding foliage and blooming vines that covered the stone exterior. Flowers were everywhere—bluebells, wisteria, daisies and roses.
It had stunned her to hear he’d bought the cottage, but understanding slowly started to mute her incredulity.
This place was as wild and untamed as Liam himself.
She heard the sound of the waves breaking in the distance as she got out of the car. Of course. She hadn’t been far from here that night when they encountered each other on the lake-front. The Myerson cottage was just south of White Sands, the public beach where Liam had come upon her in a private moment. Perhaps like her, he hadn’t been able to sleep that night.
She started toward the door but paused when Liam came around the corner of the house, poking his arms into a short-sleeved button-down shirt. She froze at the sight of him. He was far enough away that she was granted several seconds to study him through the lenses of her dark glasses. He wasn’t bulky muscular, but he was ripped. There wasn’t an ounce of fat on his torso, just lean muscle and smooth golden-brown skin. He wore a pair of casual cargo shorts that fastened low on his narrow hips. The omnipresent braid of leather encircled his wrist. The white shirt he threw on looked delicious next to his tan. His legs were long and well-shaped and dusted with light brown hair. From the light sheen of sweat on his abdomen and chest she guessed he’d just come from doing some physical labor.
“Hi,” he greeted as he approached, buttoning his shirt with fleet fingers.
“Hello,” she replied, mentally damning her breathles
sness. She slammed the car door and walked toward him, glad that he closed the shirt over his bare chest. He was almost indecently gorgeous. She noticed a small smile pull at his mouth when he came to a halt.
“What?” she asked warily.
“I’m not used to seeing you in your civilian clothes.”
She glanced down at her attire—jean shorts, canvas tennis shoes and a blue-and-white-striped tank top.
“Strike that,” he said. She lifted her head. Her breasts tingled beneath his flickering gaze. “You weren’t in civilian clothes that night I saw you on the beach. You weren’t wearing much of anything, were you?”
Heat rushed into her cheeks. It confused her to the core, this tendency he had to say things and make it sound so warm…so intimate. It shouldn’t surprise her, of course. Liam Kavanaugh was a born flirt. He probably just didn’t know how to shut it off, even with an unlikely candidate.
“I wasn’t expecting anyone to see me on that night,” she said, trying to sound matter-of-fact. It wouldn’t do to let him believe their chance meeting on the beach had meant anything to her.
“Obviously.”
She inhaled slowly. It certainly didn’t take him long to make her feel like she was floundering.
“Accountants deserve downtime as much as police officers,” she said stiffly.
“More so,” he agreed with a shrug. “If I had to wear a suit every day to work I’d go nuts. I’d dive into my jeans the second I walked out of the office.”
He looked surprised when she laughed, but she couldn’t seem to help it. “Or your board shorts, no doubt.”
His smile was like sex distilled. Her laughter faded at the sight of it.
“I think you might be getting the hang of me, Natalie.”
“Heaven forbid.”
He chuckled appreciatively as he waved for her to follow him on the ancient stone path that circled the cottage. “Is it all right if we sit out here?” he asked, waving to the shaded terrace at the back of the house. “The fumes from the stain are fading—I’ve got almost every window open in the house—but they might still bother you.”
“Of course, it’s lovely out here,” Natalie replied, meaning it. She followed Liam up some stairs, appreciating the view of a sparkling, light blue Lake Michigan.
“Something to drink?” he asked. “I have iced tea, soda—”
“No, I’m fine. Please get something for yourself, though,” she said as she sank down onto a cushioned deck chair.
“I’ll be right back.”
Natalie nodded and leaned back in the chair. It was hot today, but the humidity had dropped. The view was amazing from there on the stone terrace—the tall prairie grass and colorful flowers in the backyard swaying in the gentle breeze, the waves hitting the rocky beach. She envied Liam. It was two years ago that she’d almost bought the Myerson cottage. She’d fantasized once about taming these surroundings into a cottage garden. Well, not taming, really—who would want to cultivate such a wild, glorious place? Her brother had been very uneasy about the idea of Natalie living in such a secluded spot though, and Natalie hated the idea of him worrying about her. In the end, she’d bought her cozy town house instead.
It was the practical thing to do, but sitting there on the terrace, she couldn’t help but feel a very illogical longing.
“If I didn’t know I was in Michigan, I’d swear I was on the English coast,” she told Liam with a smile when he came through the screen door. She automatically took the iced tea he offered her, momentarily forgetting she’d said she didn’t want anything to drink. “It looks so similar.”
“Does it? I’ve never been,” Liam said as he plopped down in the chair that faced hers. His blue eyes were fixed to her mouth. She suddenly felt foolish for saying something so whimsical and took a sip of her tea.
“So what it is it you wanted to talk to me about?”
“Right. To business,” Liam said drolly.
“That is why you called me, isn’t it?”
His small shrug seemed to say that the reason would have to do.
“I don’t know how much you know about my father, but you knew that he was a lawyer,” Liam began.
She nodded. “He was the legal counsel for Langford, a defense contractor and publicly traded company. He’d worked there for over twenty years.”
“You’ve done your homework.”
She lifted her chin to face him. It must seem odd to him to know she’d gathered as much information on his father as she could over the years.
“I’ve told you how curious I was.”
He nodded slowly, his eyes steady on her face, before he took a swallow of tea and set down his glass on a wrought-iron table.
“Then you might know that for a half year before the accident, the Securities and Exchange Commission had been investigating Langford for fraudulent financial statements. As chief counsel for Langford, my father was a major part of that investigation.”
Her pulse began to throb in her throat. She’d wondered about this very issue. Was Liam saying that his father had acted so irresponsibly on that night sixteen years ago because he knew he might be implicated in Langford’s fraudulent practices?
“I had heard about it,” she said quietly. “Just an occasional reference here and there in some old news clippings about the crash. The SEC came out several weeks after the accident and announced that no charges would be made following an investigation at Langford. I thought no wrongdoing was found.”
“There wasn’t any wrongdoing,” Liam said soberly.
“Then…why are you telling me this?”
He paused to take a sip of his tea before he continued. Natalie found herself admiring the muscular movement of his tanned throat as he swallowed. She guiltily met his gaze when he spoke.
“I’m telling you because I figured that you, like most people, would have come up with some sort of conspiracy angle when they heard about the SEC’s investigation. It goes something like this, I can imagine—Derry Kavanaugh swindles thousands of honest shareholders with fraudulent financial reports. When he gets caught by the SEC, though, he can’t stand the prospect of his family and the public knowing he’s nothing but a dirty criminal. He’d rather die than face the music. So he gets smashed one night and in the process of offing himself, selfishly takes three other lives as well.”
Her cheeks burned at his seemingly casual recital. Maybe he’d stated it bluntly to make a point, but what he’d said was true. She had wondered if something akin to that was behind Derry Kavanaugh’s erratic actions that night. Despite her embarrassment, she refused to be cowed by Liam’s subtle sarcasm.
“I’ll admit I wondered about the SEC’s investigation. Even if he’d been innocent, your father might have been over-wrought. The investigation had gone on for months. That’s a terrific amount of pressure to live under, especially when he had to keep working and putting up a brave front. Many people would crack under stress like that.”
She paused, feeling self-conscious when Liam said nothing but just studied her, his long legs bent before him and his arms sprawled on the sides of the chair. Beneath his seeming insouciance, she sensed a diamond-hard edge, however, a tension that belied all that relaxed male brawn.
It made her wary, this difficulty she had in reading him. Was he angry?
“How do you know that wasn’t the case with your father?” she persisted, despite her uncertainty.
“Because my father knew that the SEC wasn’t going to level any charges at the time of the accident.”
“What?” Natalie asked, sitting forward. “But the SEC didn’t announce that until weeks after the crash.”
“True,” Liam said briskly. “But I accessed Langford’s financial disclosures. The details of the investigation are in the files. The SEC had finished their investigation and made their determination weeks before the accident. The announcement just wasn’t made to the public until a stockholders’ meeting several weeks later. As chief legal counsel, my father knew the SEC’s
decision as soon as it was made. I have a dated memo that proves that fact. My father definitely knew Langford was cleared of any wrongdoing at the time of the accident.”
“I see.”
“Disappointed?” he asked.
“No. No, of course not,” she said, irritated. How could he be so warm at times, and at others, downright confrontational? “I want the truth, not easy answers.”
Something about the tilt of his mouth before he took another swallow of his tea made her think he doubted her.
“Can I ask you a question?” she asked impulsively.
“Sure.”
“Did you already know what you just told me, or was it news to you?”
He shooed a buzzing fly away with a lazy flip of his hand before he answered. “I knew, but in a family-knowledge kind of way. I wasn’t sure of the facts.”
“What do you mean?” Natalie asked. She leaned forward even farther in her chair. She couldn’t help it. She was sitting with a man who had known firsthand the secrets of the Kavanaugh house. Things that Natalie had wondered about incessantly were common knowledge to Liam.
Something sparked in his eyes when he noticed her curiosity…her eagerness.
“So this is the part where it’s handy to have an inside man for your investigator?” he asked softly.
“It’s not bizarre that I would want to know what you know.”
His nostrils flared slightly as he studied her, but then he sighed and glanced toward the lake. The sunlight reflecting off the water seemed to make his eyes even more electric blue than usual.
“True. But your interest makes me uncomfortable. People tend to keep family stuff close. Until Mari Itani came back to town a year ago, we hardly ever mentioned the crash amongst ourselves. Hell, my sister Deidre took off after the crash and hasn’t been back to Harbor Town since, let alone sat around for chats about our father getting bombed one night and killing himself and three other people.”
Guilt seeped into her awareness. She wasn’t the only one who carried open wounds. For a few seconds, she wasn’t sure what to say.
