The Secret Thief

by Nina Lane

  I guess that means the only contact he plans to have with me is when he lets me in. I don’t know whether that’s a relief or a disappointment.

  “Okay.” I indicate my organizer. “I’ll keep a list of questions in here.”

  He strides through the door, closing it behind him with a sharp click.

  All righty then.

  His presence lingers like a ghost. I force my mind to the task at hand. The instant I open a nearby box, anticipation curls through me like a Christmas present ribbon. I take out a slender volume titled Fairy Tales by Hans Andersen, illustrated by Arthur Rackham.

  I open the book to my favorite story, The Snow Queen. I have always loved the devoted friendship between the girl Gerda and the boy Kay. At the story’s beginning, a wicked sprite creates a magic mirror that distorts the world for anyone who looks into it. The beautiful becomes ugly, and the good becomes evil.

  When the mirror breaks, one shard pierces Kay’s eye and the other freezes his heart to ice. His soul shrivels, turning him against his beloved Gerda. He is forced under the spell of the icy Snow Queen, who carries him off to her palace and kisses him until he forgets everything about home. But Gerda, impelled by a powerful love, sets out to find him. Scared and alone, she does not stop until she rescues Kay from the Snow Queen’s palace.

  The two children return home together, both changed for their ordeal yet still innocent and more devoted to each other than ever. “And they both sat there, grown up yet still children at heart, and it was summer—warm, glorious summer.”

  I gaze at a Rackham illustration of golden-haired Gerda, a large book spread open on her lap, and dark-haired Kay sitting in a shingled rooftop garden flourishing with rose vines. The buildings and spires of Amsterdam stretch out in the background, but the two children are deep in conversation, lost in their own world.

  And just like that, I’m a scholar again, an art historian who loves the authors and artists whose creativity blossoms through history. I set up the laptop on the desk, arrange the surface with a notepad, pencils, and sticky notes, and get to work.

  The hours melt away. I compile bullet point lists and an outline of my cataloging plan. I immerse myself in pictures of moon maidens, golden swans, sharp-toothed leviathans. I study publication dates, tables of contents, ISBNs, countries of origin. I examine access points, hierarchies, search fields. I write descriptions and make notes.

  At noon, I pull on my coat, taking my lunch bag and crossword puzzle book outside. I sit on the bench overlooking the cliff to eat and work on a particularly challenging puzzle.

  The air is salty, cold, and fresh. The secrets wall snakes up the hill to the cliff’s edge. Bits of paper stud the crevices of the granite stones, my own secret still hidden deep among them. Birds crest overhead, and waves splash against the rocks.

  For the first time, I’m glad I’m not in the smoggy, sunburned haze of Los Angeles.

  I toss my lunch trash into the recycling bin and return to the bench to spend the last fifteen minutes of my break working on the crossword puzzle. I’d forgotten how engrossing and meditative a crossword can be. Doctor Faustus novelist, part of an oven, Eureka!

  A shadow falls across the half-filled grid of the puzzle. I glance up, shading my eyes against the sun, and absorb the sight of Flynn—jeans, work boots, flannel shirt, navy parka. Messy hair so artfully tousled that male models probably pay a fortune in styling products to achieve the same look.

  On an aesthetic level, it’s not right to hide such masculine beauty away from the world. It’s like keeping a Michelangelo sculpture locked in a storage closet.

  “Hi.” My voice comes out a bit breathless.

  “Hello.” He gives me a short nod.

  “It’s such a beautiful day that I came out here to eat lunch,” I explain, in case he thinks I’m slacking off on the job.

  “Good idea.”

  He’s close enough that I catch a delicious whiff of spice and citrus, carried on the wind. I still have the handkerchief he lent me the other day. Even though I washed it, his scent still clings to the cotton.

  Do you know about what happened to me? Anxiety tightens my belly. Even though I barely know him, I don’t want him to think badly of me because of the rumors.

  “When you came after me last week,” I say slowly, “did you know… I mean, had you heard…” Cheeks heating, I can’t finish my sentence.

  He studies me, tension lining his jaw. “You had an affair with a married professor and were fired from UCLA.”

  I shouldn’t be shocked all over again. If the whole town knows, there’s no reason he wouldn’t, but a fresh surge of disbelief, and regret, fills me. I must have thought—hoped—that loner lighthouse guy would be the one person in town who knows only what I choose to tell him. Not what everyone else also knows.

  “I might be the local recluse, but I still need to buy groceries and go to the hardware store,” he says.

  “Well, that whole mess is the reason I ended up here. The reason I had a hard time finding a job too.” I gesture to the workroom. “So you can see why I owe you a lot for hiring me.”

  “I owed your uncle a lot.” He shrugs and peers at the crossword book open on my lap. “But I hired you because you’re qualified. Not because I wanted to pay a debt. Or because I felt sorry for you.”

  “Regardless of why, thank you.”

  He nods again and indicates the book. “You like puzzles.”

  “I guess so.” I skim the list of clues. “I used to do crosswords when I was a kid. It’s like a little mystery, figuring out the clues and secrets of the grid. I found this book over at Jabberwocky and thought I’d give it a try.” I tap my pencil on five down. “Become rusty. Seven letters.”

  “Oxidate.”

  I lift an eyebrow and write the word. “Impressive. Historical accounting, including the I in oxidate. Wait, I got it. Memoir. Fanatics, seven letters.”

  “Zealots.”

  “Nice.” I write the word on the grid and gesture to the seat beside me. “Sit down. We’ll have this done in no time.”

  “I gotta go.” He looks at his watch. “Did you leave the door unlocked so you can get back inside?”

  “Yes. Where are…”

  He turns away to stride down the pathway to the parking lot.

  “…you going?” I finish to the empty terrace.

  Even if he’d heard me, I wouldn’t have expected an answer. In fairy tales, questions don’t usually have the desired response anyway.

  Mirror, Mirror on the wall, who is the fairest one of all? Can your name be Rumpelstiltskin? Do you love me, Beauty?

  Though my life is no fairy tale, it’s still better not to ask any questions at all. I watch Flynn until he rounds the bend and disappears from sight.

  I want to know him.

  The wish, the new secret, forms in my mind like watercolors flowing together. Given his reclusiveness, I can’t imagine it will ever come true, but it’s nice to feel curiosity again, to think about something else besides my own struggles.

  I close the crossword book and return to cataloging my uncle’s books and paintings.

  By the time four o’clock rolls around, my eyes are peppery with fatigue and my neck hurts, but I’m filled with an exhilaration I haven’t experienced in longer than I care to remember. I’m good at this, and I love everything about it.

  A tiny flame of warmth lights in my heart. I might even be happy again.

  After organizing my workspace for the following day, I pack up my things and leave through the side door.

  White-capped ocean waves shift and roll, splashing rhythmically against the rocks. The hiking trail stretches alongside the coast for as far as the eye can see.

  A perfect place for a run—yet another thing I haven’t done in a long time. I used to work out regularly at the gym and run the UCLA track, but I’d lost the motivation to keep myself in shape when my life circled the drain like dirty bathwater.

  Tomorrow I’ll pack running gear so I
can change and go for a jog after work, get the stiffness out of my limbs. I start back to the parking lot. A prickling sensation courses down my spine.

  I stop and turn slowly, lifting my gaze to the lantern room at the top of the tower. Again he stands behind the glass—a big, shadowy presence like an overlord looking down upon his kingdom. But this time, I know who he is and the powerful effect he has on me.

  I look up at him. Strange energy courses between us even from such a distance. What does he do up there in the tower?

  Despite my natural curiosity, there’s a strange freedom in knowing he’s forbidden. I can enjoy thinking about him, speculating about him, fantasizing about him, but without any emotional complications or fear about what he might be hiding. Lord knows I’ve had enough of that to last me a while.

  I walk to the half-filled parking lot. A heavy-set, bald man getting into a blue sedan looks vaguely familiar. For some reason, unease hits me. I pull out my keys and get into my car.

  Castille is a small town. Of course I’ll see many of the same people in passing. I shouldn’t be so easily spooked. Still, I lock the car doors quickly and waste no time leaving the parking lot.

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  My first week of work falls into a welcome routine. I arrive at the lighthouse at eight sharp, and Flynn opens the workroom door before I even knock, as if he’s been waiting for me. After I set my things on the desk, he answers whatever questions I’ve written in my organizer.

  (What do you want me to do with books that need repairs? Make a list and set them aside. What about digitization? Finish the cataloging first. Do you want bibliographic as well as content descriptions? Yes.)

  While he’s still in the room, I indulge in a few minutes of privately unabashed gawking because every morning he looks so tempting—rumpled and rough around the edges like an abstract painting, but unbearably tangible at the same time. I’m seized with the urge to drag my fingers through his hair to discover if it’s as thick and coarse as it looks, to rub my palm over his sandpapery jaw, to feel all the hard muscles so evident under his T-shirt.

  I start to enjoy my hidden little fantasies, the thawing of my blood. My interaction with Flynn is so limited that I’m no longer worried that he’ll discern my attraction to him. Especially considering that he barely glances at me.

  Every morning, there’s a look, though. Sometimes I think I’m imagining it—the flash of heat, the electric crackle, the darkening of his gray eyes—but other times I swear I feel it right down to my bones. Then he turns away, and the moment disappears.

  When the cottage door clicks behind him, I focus on work, immersing myself for the rest of the day in stories of frog kings, resourceful princesses, powerful giants. I unpack boxes, study the books, input information into the database. I cross items off my bullet point lists one by one.

  I take a break at noon for my peanut-butter sandwich lunch and tea in a thermos. Aside from going into the cottage to use the bathroom, which is small but surprisingly elegant with a polished stone floor and gleaming fixtures, and sitting outside for lunch, I don’t leave the workroom. The ocean rumbles and birds call through the windows.

  At four, I change into track pants and a sweatshirt, leave my belongings in my car, and head out for a jog along the trail curving beside the coastline like a string of yarn. I’ve gotten out of shape in the past year, and at first my body protests the exertion. But the cold, damp air is delicious against my face, my heart beats heavily, and adrenaline floods my veins.

  I don’t get very far on my first run, but I push myself a little harder the next day, and harder still the next. Though remembering I used to run five miles at a time while now I can’t even manage one is rather discouraging, I like the soreness of my muscles, the strain and effort, the ache in my lungs.

  I like touching myself again too. I still have to smother shame about my sexual instincts, but relearning my body’s responsiveness feels good. In the shower—rubbing frothy soap over my nipples, down across my belly, lathering my pussy. Getting ready—smoothing lotion into my skin, brushing my hair, applying makeup. Dressing—adjusting my breasts in the cups of my bra, sliding my panties over my hips, rolling stockings up my legs.

  Alone in bed at night, I work my fingers against my clit, pushing my lower body up into the increasing pressure of urgency. Raw, uninhibited images of him, of us, flash behind my closed eyelids.

  Flynn stretched out on the bed in a white T-shirt riding up to reveal the ridges of his abdomen, naked from the waist down with his thick cock sticking straight up like an invitation. He beckons me toward him with a crook of his finger. His smoky dark eyes gleam with lust.

  And me, sliding my cotton panties off before climbing onto the bed and straddling his powerful thighs. Bracing my hands on his chest, spreading my legs, positioning myself over his mouth-watering erection.

  Easing down… slowly, so slowly… feeling him penetrate me inch by delicious inch, my body already slick and ready for him. A twinge of pain as he stretches me fully, his cock hitting that exquisite spot so deep inside me that only he has ever touched.

  His hands gripping my hips. His rough command. “Move.”

  I move… no, I writhe, squirm, bounce, curling my fingers into his chest, working myself up and down on his veined shaft, everything distilling into the sensation of our bodies slapping together, my clit burgeoning and pulsing, his cock throbbing. Groans and hoarse growls of encouragement fill the air. I splay over him, whimpering with need, my tender nipples rubbing against his chest, his mouth hot on my temple.

  In my mind, he comes first, shooting so powerfully inside me that the vibrations send me over the edge. With a cry of pleasure, I rub my clit, shuddering and convulsing with bliss. I collapse on top of him, our sweat-slick bodies heaving together, his come dripping down my inner thighs.

  It’s the moment when he comes—hard and heavy, a growl tearing from his throat—that I bring myself to orgasm, one finger thrust into my channel and my other hand frantically massaging my swollen clit. I moan aloud, arching upward, the intense sensations stealing my breath.

  Then I lie back against the pillows for a long time, absorbing the lingering pulses and being thankful that I haven’t, in fact, lost my sexual desire. I’m still a woman capable of erotic pleasure, still allowed to revel in fantasies and to love having orgasms.

  After David, I’d been so ashamed of everything I’d done, of how needy I’d been both in bed and out of it. I hadn’t even wanted to look at myself in the mirror, humiliated by the idea that people were imagining salacious things about me. Maybe now I can finally let my shame die.

  If there’s a nagging realization that masturbating alone every night isn’t the same as being touched and fucked by a man who loves me… well, I can ignore that. I’m just grateful to be rediscovering the pieces of myself that had been so badly broken.

  Maybe one day I’ll even be whole again.

  CHAPTER NINE

  The silvery, mid-October dusk falls as I struggle through my after-work jog. Panting, I come to a halt at the bend in the trail. An icy ocean mist prickles my face like needles. My breath rasps through my throat, and my leg muscles ache.

  I remind myself that I’ve only been exercising for a week. I can’t expect to run a mile yet, much less two.

  I straighten and eye a large boulder jutting over the cliff at a curve. The boulder appears to be about three miles from the lighthouse. I’m nowhere near it, but one day soon I’ll run all the way there without needing to stop.

  Sea air sweeps across the rocky promontory. I trudge up the hill to the cliff’s plateau. The lighthouse windows are all dark.

  Where is he?

  He’s kind of like a crossword puzzle in and of himself, a grid of clues leading to the complete theme. A building on the coast, ten letters. Espionage objective, seven letters. Seductively attractive, four letters. Lacking transparency, six letters.

  Not nearly as solvable as the New York Times puzzles. And those suckers are tough
.

  I return home to shower and change, deciding to head over to the Jabberwocky Bookstore. A couple of hours reading or working on a crossword by the fireplace is a lot more appealing than trying to fix another old toilet.

  I drive downtown and walk to the bookstore, reaching the front door just as a tall man in an expensive cashmere coat approaches. He grabs the door handle, stepping aside to hold it open.

  “Beg your pardon,” he says.

  “No problem. Thanks.” I start past him when his voice stops me.

  “I’m sorry, miss. I haven’t seen you in town before.”

  I pause and eye him cautiously. “I just moved here about three weeks ago.”

  He’s in his early thirties, blond hair, brown eyes, noble features like those you’d see on the face of a Roman emperor.

  “That explains it.” He extends a hand. “I pride myself on knowing everyone who lives here, but if you’re new, we haven’t been acquainted yet. Jeremy King.”

  I shake his hand. Wary curiosity rises to my chest. “Are you any relation to Allegra King?”

  “She’s my mother.” He studies me with growing interest. “Why do you ask?”

  How much should I tell him? How much does he know about Max?

  “I’ve heard a lot about her,” I finally say. “I’m Eve Perrin.”

  “Pleasure to meet you, Eve Perrin.” He gestures to the interior of Jabberwocky. “I’m getting a coffee before heading to a city council meeting. Can I buy you one?”

  I hesitate, not wanting to give him the impression that I’m available.

  Except… am I available?

  My crazy-hot reaction to Flynn is evidence that I still have sexual urges and interests, even if intellectually I know I could never get involved with him. Aside from the fact that he’s my boss, he has a clear Keep Out sign in front of both him and his lighthouse. And my self-preservation instincts won’t let me get taken in by a man who is anything less than totally straightforward and honest.