Kiss of a Stranger (Lost Coast Harbor, Book 1)

by Lily Danes

  “I don’t need to.” Gabe’s eyes flashed, his mild exterior cracking. “You said it yourself. In Oliver’s office, you said you weren’t brave. I should have listened.”

  She couldn’t even argue. “I’m trying to change. To be someone different.” Maddie stood and took a step toward him, then winced as he moved away.

  “I don’t care.” He stared right at her, and she believed every word. “This isn’t about the future. That’s over. It’s the past that matters. Because the past I have, you were a part of that. The man I became? You helped create him.” His disgust for both her and the man prison made him shone through every word.

  Maddie glared. “There is nothing wrong with the man you are.”

  He gave a sharp inhale. “That’s up for debate, but it doesn’t matter. You were scared, and your fear helped ruin my life. I won’t stick around and wait for you to do it again.”

  “I told you I’m trying to change.” She tried to stay calm, but the words came out through gritted teeth.

  “Bullshit. You’re supposed to start school on Monday, right? Your big, beautiful business career because you’re too scared to do what you really want. You’re too scared to even admit what you really want. Maybe you don’t know. You’re off on dates with Declan Donnelly and counting down the days till you can get a proper, serious job, and both those things would make you miserable.”

  The words stung, because every single one of them was true.

  Maddie raised her chin. “And you’re the expert on what makes people happy? The man who insists he’s not okay but doesn’t try to fix himself? Who’s chasing some dream of revenge instead of going home to the brother he claims to love? I may be a coward, but so are you. You’re free, Gabe. You can build a new life, a good life, if you want to, but instead you’re dodging bombs and sleeping with a woman you obviously don’t respect.”

  “Don’t you dare turn this around on me,” he growled. “My life will look very different if I convince the world I’m not a felon, and you know it. I have good reasons for what I’m doing. What are yours?”

  She tried to reply, but every possible response felt weak and pathetic.

  “What you did, Maddie…” Gabe ran both hands across his skull, fingers digging hard into the bone. “I don’t want to hear excuses, because that’s all they are. I’ve heard enough of those in my life. You had a chance to stop this happening, if you’d decided to be brave just once in your life, but you’re not capable of that choice, are you? I don’t expect the criminals to hand themselves in, but I never thought the good people would screw me, too.”

  Maddie closed her eyes and began tapping her finger and thumb together. One. Two. Three. She stopped, almost laughing at herself. It didn’t matter how long she stood there, trying to find a bit of equilibrium. She’d lost that forever the day Gabe appeared in her life.

  “Let me fix this,” she insisted.

  Gabe’s laugh was short and ugly. “I think you’ve done more than enough.”

  Maddie stepped toward him, and she fought the sharp ache when he flinched. “I’ll go see Charlie. Whatever he knows, I’ll make him tell me. We’ll get proof. We can prove the Hastings were involved.”

  “Fuck the Hastings.” Gabe stalked toward her. There was nothing gentle in his eyes. He was a dark stranger, the bad boy she once believed him to be, and all she wanted was the real Gabe back. The one who smiled and teased and offered her unexpected truths.

  “This is about you, Maddie. You were part of this. How do I get revenge on you?”

  Gabe closed the distance between them and slammed his mouth across hers in a hard, bruising kiss.

  Gabe fisted her hair and yanked her head back, trapping her against his body while he ravaged her mouth. He made no effort to be gentle.

  When he pulled back, his cock was hard against her hip. “Will you let me use you? Use you like I wanted when we first met?”

  She wasn’t certain what he was asking. It didn’t matter. His rough touch didn’t scare her. Already, the heat rose in her cheeks, and his sharp eyes didn’t miss it.

  Maddie brushed her fingers across his cheek. “I need you,” she whispered.

  Something flashed in his eyes and was gone before she could identify it. “I don’t.” Gabe wrenched on a dark sweatshirt and pulled the hood tight, obscuring his face. He opened her front door.

  The words were a knife to her heart, tiny stab wounds that would bleed and scar until she was never the same again.

  Somehow, she managed to stand straight, and her voice didn’t waver when she called to him. “I may be a coward, but you’re the one walking away.”

  The door closed behind him.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  Bree’s truck made the kind of sounds that would normally indicate demonic possession. Maddie ignored them, keeping the accelerator pressed flat to the floor. Erin’s Jeep would have been the more reliable choice, but it had been low on gas. Maddie refused to waste time filling the tank.

  Bree warned her the truck could be a little temperamental, but she didn’t argue when Maddie asked to borrow it, and she only asked once if she wanted company for the ride. This was a long-overdue confrontation with her ex, and Bree knew Maddie had to do it on her own. That was the thing about best friends. They knew when you needed them, they knew when to press, and sometimes, they knew when it was time to butt out.

  Especially since she planned to spend the drive enjoying a state of righteous anger. She knew despair would come soon enough, but she planned to hold it off as long as could.

  Gabe was wrong. One mistake couldn’t define her whole life. She wasn’t a coward. She was cautious. That wasn’t the same thing.

  Caution was smart. Paying bills on time and giving herself a cushion meant she was far less likely to be blindsided by life. Planning for the future meant she wouldn’t wonder what could go wrong.

  Except it hadn’t been working so well lately. The next twenty years of her life was planned out, but that meant nothing when Gabriel Reyes appeared. He’d screwed up everything—and no matter how awful she felt, she had no desire to return to who she used to be.

  This was life. It was messy and unexpected and full of pain, but she thought it might be better to be a survivor in this world than a coward in her old one.

  Maddie looked at the digital clock on the dashboard. If she hurried, she had time to make a couple stops before she drove to the prison.

  She swung the truck around and headed back to Lost Coast. There was something she needed to make right.

  Twenty minutes later, the truck shuddered to a stop outside Farrows’ Nursery.

  It looked as it always had. The main building was a single-story wood structure that held various gardening tools along with the plants that needed to stay warm. There was a covered patio filled with fountains and other garden ornaments. A small gnome by the door smiled at her, welcoming her to a place that always felt a little like home. There were four large greenhouses housing plants that had no business growing in January, and another half-acre was filled with all the outdoor plants that thrived in this part of the country. Hardy winter vegetables grew in large garden beds. One held enough kale to keep a juice bar going for a month.

  Despite how difficult the day had been, Maddie felt some of her tension evaporate. Just seeing all the plants growing so healthy and strong was a balm to her soul.

  The parking lot was empty. No one else was shopping for plants in the middle of winter.

  Maddie smiled as she entered the cozy shop and resisted the urge to do a bit of shopping. Instead, she walked to the register, glad to see that both husband and wife were working that day. Though they had no customers, they both sat behind the register. Over the years, Maddie noticed that they were seldom far from each other.

  She didn’t bother with small talk. She had a busy afternoon, after all. There were a lot of things she planned to fix in the next three hours. “I want to help save the nursery.”

  They blinked at her. Mr. F
arrows leaned forward. “I’m sorry?”

  “I know you only have another week to buy this place before the Hastings deal goes through and the nursery gets demolished for some fancy tourist and commercial center this town doesn’t need. I can help. I have money.”

  The box did have her name on it, after all.

  This was most likely the stupidest thing she’d ever done, and that included marrying Charlie. But it felt right. No—it felt brave, and that felt right.

  She could get used to this.

  “But my dear,” said Mrs. Farrows, “we’re retiring.”

  It was Maddie’s turn to be dumbfounded. “But this place is perfect. How can you possibly give it up?”

  Mrs. Farrows leaned against her husband, and the old man dropped a soft kiss on her head. Something inside her twisted at their obvious affection.

  “Because Palm Springs, my dear.” She sighed in pleasure. “A wondrous, dry land for our old bones.”

  “Oh.” Maddie was deflated. Her first big, bold gesture was supposed to go better than this. Particularly since she still had two hundred thousand dollars in Bree’s glove compartment. “So that’s it? Another week and the nursery’s gone?”

  “I’m afraid so. Unless…” Mrs. Farrow paused, and Maddie could only describe her expression as sly. “We could always buy it, then sell it to someone else. Do you know someone who might be interested?”

  She hesitated. This wasn’t being brave. This was being a freaking idiot. It was one thing to help an elderly couple hold onto their livelihood. It was another thing altogether to spend the money on herself.

  But if she didn’t, the nursery would be gone in a week. And really, her name was on the box. If she had to sleep here to justify calling it a living expense, then she would bed down with the plants and call it a victory.

  Maddie checked her watch. She had a little time. “You know, I just might.”

  Gabe could barely see where he was going. Heavy rain had started the minute he left Maddie’s house, thick sheets that blurred everything around him. He supposed the weather was a blessing. There’d be fewer people out, and the hoodie drawn tight around his face wouldn’t look out of place in this weather.

  A blessing. Right. Cause his life was full of those.

  Gabe didn’t even know where he was going. He just needed to get away. Get away from Maddie’s pleading eyes. She’d looked so lost, standing there in the house paid for with blood money.

  His entire life, he’d only ever trusted his family. That was it. Mateo and his parents, and now it was just Mateo. What was he thinking, that some woman he met two weeks ago would change all that just because she was pretty and kind?

  And she was kind. Generous, too—but that hadn’t made her brave when he’d needed her to be.

  Gabe pushed harder against the wind, needing to feel the sting of the rain against his face. The cold climbed inside his sweatshirt, and he wrapped his arms tight around himself. For the first time since he got out, he didn’t enjoy the walk. The weather bothered him, and it seemed pointless, walking with no goal in mind.

  And every step is taking you farther from Maddie, whispered that traitorous inner voice he could never shut up.

  He still wanted her. There was no point denying it. The kind of desire he felt didn’t vanish because of one terrible revelation. She was the same woman she’d always been, but now he saw her with different eyes.

  He turned toward a hiking trail not too far out of town. It was empty, and he walked for hours. Every time it split, he chose the longer path, until he had no idea where he was going. The trees blocked some of the rain and wind, and soon the exercise began to warm him a little.

  After a while, the trail curved upwards, and he followed it. His muscles worked harder as he headed into the high trees, his breath coming hotter against the freezing night.

  When he emerged from the redwoods, Gabe wasn’t surprised. Of course. This was where he’d been heading all along.

  The Hastings mansion.

  It always came back to them. Everyone else was a cog in their machine. Not just him. Adam, Maddie, even her wretched ex, they were all tiny parts in these bastards’ schemes. They ruined lives, and they did it just so they could live in some fancy house and throw lavish parties. So they could be the big men in town.

  Six years ago, they ruined his life. That afternoon, they’d done it again, without lifting a single finger. For a few brief moments, he’d dared to believe he and Maddie could be happy, and they took even that.

  It was his turn to take from them.

  Halfway to the prison, Maddie began to regret that she didn’t have wealthy friends, or at least friends with a better quality of vehicles. The truck was able to consistently move forward down the highway, but that was the best she could say about it.

  The prison was almost two hours away, and Maddie needed to get there before visiting hours closed for the day. The truck didn’t share her sense of urgency.

  The trip to the nursery had taken a bit longer than expected, but she couldn’t regret the time spent with the Farrows. She would have some serious explaining to do if Oliver turned out to be innocent, but she’d worry about that later.

  At least she knew she was on Charlie’s list of visitors. In the first couple years, he sent her one message after another, begging her to visit. She burned every last one of them.

  She thought she was burning her past. Burning all the stupid decisions she made so she could build a new life on the ashes. Well, better late than never.

  She pulled into the prison’s visitor lot. It was full of cars as old and beat-up as Bree’s truck. They belonged to the other people visiting friends and family who’d made a bunch of stupid choices. Some of them were straight-up criminals, she knew, but a lot were just trying to get by the best they could.

  This wasn’t a fair world. When life offered a shortcut, a way to make things a tiny bit better, a lot of people took it.

  That’s what she’d done. No, she wasn’t Charlie. She would never willingly deal in drugs and guns—but when she saw an easier path, she chose not to read the fine print.

  For the first time in four years, she wanted to see Charlie, and not only because he had information that could help Gabe. Maddie wanted to hear his story. She wanted to understand.

  It didn’t take long to process her. Soon, she sat at a round table, surrounded by three or four other felons meeting with their families. Despite their size and tattoos, they didn’t look threatening. Their expressions were bittersweet, the looks of men treasuring every second they got to spend with those they loved—and knowing those seconds would be over far too soon.

  That had been Gabe’s world for six years. Six years where bittersweet was the most he could hope for…and most days were just bitter. Was it so surprising that he needed a bit of time to settle into life without bars?

  “Maddie?” Charlie said her name so tentatively, as if by acknowledging her presence he might scare her away.

  She rose to greet him, but the guards tensed at the movement.

  “No touching.” Charlie took the plastic seat across from her. “Though I somehow doubt that’s what you planned.”

  When they first started dating, Charlie had been playful and full of life. By the end of their marriage, he was dark and tense, always watching the shadows for threats she’d chalked up to paranoia.

  This man was like neither the Charlie she’d dated nor the one who was carted off to jail. He was just tired, and though he teased, the mocking tone in his words was directed at himself rather than her.

  “Hello, Charlie.” She kept her hands in her lap and twined her fingers together, trying to hide her nerves. During the two-hour drive, she considered all the questions she needed to ask him, all the information that might help Gabe, but now that Charlie sat before her, there was one thing she needed to know. “Why did you do it?”

  He didn’t pretend to not understand. “Because I was an idiot. You don’t know how much I wish I had a different
answer. Tell you I had no choice, that I owed someone money and they were threatening you. Something to make what I did a little less awful. But I did it because I was stupid. I was selfish.”

  Maddie bit her lip, fighting tears. For five years, she built this man into a monster. She imagined visiting him and accusing him of destroying her life, and each time she pictured him laughing at her, unconcerned about the lives he’d ruined.

  But he was still Charlie, if not the same one she’d known when she was sixteen. He looked older now, like he’d lost more than four years in prison. He wasn’t a monster. He was just a guy who made one hell of a mistake, and a lot of people paid for it—including him.

  “I’m sorry, Maddie. I know that doesn’t mean much, but it’s all I’ve got right now.”

  She needed more. “But you knew what you were doing. I mean, this wasn’t just pot, which is practically legal these days. It was heroin. You couldn’t pretend that was something harmless.”

  Charlie sighed. “You know the stupid thing? That was the first time I had heroin. For years, I thought by sticking to pot, I was drawing a line between me and the ‘real’ drug dealers. It’s amazing how much you can lie to yourself. After a while, that line didn’t seem as important. Someone had to make money off people’s addiction, and it might as well be me. I told myself you needed the money, Maddie. That was the biggest lie of all. I pretended I had to provide for my wife, like a real man, when I just wanted to make some easy cash. I dragged you into it with me, and I’m so sorry. I’ll never stop being sorry for what I did.”

  Maddie said nothing for so long that Charlie began to fidget. At last, she gave a rueful laugh. “You were a pretty terrible husband, Charlie.”

  He managed a smile. “I really was.”

  Without thinking, she reached for him.

  The guard cleared his throat. She drew back, dropping her hand into her lap.

  She watched her ex-husband, waiting to feel the rage she’d known for years, but it simply wasn’t there.