The Secret Thief

by Nina Lane

  “Max showed me a photo of you,” Flynn says.

  I look up. “He did?”

  “He talked about you a lot. He was really proud of you. He had this photo of you in his wallet… said he’d taken it during a trip you and he took to the California redwoods. You were probably twenty, standing there in this forest of huge trees with your copper hair and green jacket. Like an elf or a wood sprite.”

  My heart increases in pace. “You remember that picture?”

  “I never forgot it.” He pushes his teacup aside and shoves to his feet. He starts toward the door, then turns back to me, his expression tense.

  “That bastard can’t destroy you, Eve. No one can. And that girl in the forest? She still believes in fairy tales.”

  He leaves the kitchen, the door clicking shut. Shock descends over me like a slow chill.

  Oh my God.

  He knows my secret.

  CHAPTER NINETEEN

  Run. Run. Run… shit.

  I slow to a walk on the coastal trail, my lungs bursting and my chest heaving. Pain shoots through my leg muscles. I rest my hands on my thighs and bend over to catch my breath. The fucking boulder looks like it’s a thousand miles away.

  I turn and walk slowly back up the hill to the lighthouse. Today, I left the workroom later than usual, needing to catch up on cataloging after my afternoon with Flynn got away from me in more ways than one.

  The granite secrets wall climbs alongside the cliff’s edge like a prehistoric snake. Bits of wet paper cling between the rocks.

  My thoughts tumble and crash. I’d given Flynn the full truth of what had transpired with David, only to discover yet another weird-guy quirk that I have no idea what to do with. Of all the things I’ve imagined Flynn to be (undercover FBI, lord of a sex dungeon, international spy), a secret thief is not one of them.

  Did he steal my secret after he saw me hide it in the wall? Does he steal everyone’s secrets or was it just mine? And why?

  I reach the terrace, my breathing still fast, and look up at the tower. He’s not there, and the smoky glass is smooth and empty. Even if I did barge back into the lighthouse and demand answers, they might not be ones I want to hear.

  I pause at the wall. A Forestry Department sign is printed with a history of the wall, as well as the statement that the wall is maintained to prevent the paper from damaging the environment. The implication, of course, is the lighthouse keeper clears the secrets out of the wall on a regular basis.

  But there’s nothing stating he steals them. Reads them.

  I no longer believe in fairy tales.

  The only secret I had left… which is now no longer a secret.

  I still love fairy tales, but as fictional stories to be enjoyed. I don’t believe they exist in reality. Certainly they don’t for me. In my story, the villain already won. Flynn knows that too.

  The more I think about it, the more it burns. This is just one other thing he knows about me, while I still know almost nothing about him. Hot sexy stuff aside, that particular dynamic in our relationship is starting to tick me off.

  I shake my head and stride back to my car. This weekend, I need to regroup. I’m getting too caught up in him and his mysteries. Losing focus with all our intimate little teas and that intense way he looks at me, and the heated kiss I still feel imprinted on my lips.

  Enough of that. I need to do what Juliette has been pressuring me to do—find an art history job somewhere else.

  I need to distance myself from Flynn. In addition to being a locked door, he’s a thief. And I’ve had enough stolen from me.

  Saturday morning dawns gray and drizzly, casting a pall over the old house. From the basement, the heater makes a rumbling noise like some great hibernating beast. It’s past time for me to call an HVAC pro in to check the heater, but I dread the possibility that he’ll tell me I need a whole new system.

  I let Ghost in the back door. He nudges his head against my leg before heading for his food dish. I’ve made a vet appointment for him next week—another expense that I hadn’t expected but am actually happy to make.

  Though the dog and I aren’t BFFs, he’s increasingly affectionate, and I like having him around. I see him patrolling the area around the house every day, and his presence makes me feel safer out here by myself.

  Especially after David’s horrible call.

  Leaving Ghost to his breakfast, I head upstairs to dress in yoga pants and a knit sweater. I drive downtown and park off Lantern Street. The main road is closed to accommodate the farmer’s market, which is held every Saturday through November.

  At the library, I search for updated job listings.

  Visiting professor, Indiana University. Adjunct professor, Spelman College. Instructor, Colorado State. Professor, University of Alaska. Assistant professor, Albright College, Professor, Santa Clara University.

  I apply to six more openings, personalizing my letter of introduction, pasting in a statement about my teaching philosophy, and attaching both my CV and the Maria Wood paper.

  Good. Another step toward rebuilding my career. Another step away from my growing entanglement with the lighthouse keeper and his unfolding of all my secrets.

  As I head back outside, I turn onto Lantern Street to visit the farmer’s market. Shop windows display remnants of Halloween decorations. Under covered booths, vendors have set up displays of fall vegetables, maple syrup, jam, and fresh-baked bread. Customers stroll along the street with cloth bags slung over their arms.

  A male voice calls my name. Jeremy waves at me from a coffee-stand, where he’s standing with his father.

  Side-by-side the two men look strikingly similar. Though William is taller and bigger, he and Jeremy share the same noble features.

  “Hello, both of you.” I approach, pleased to see familiar faces. “When did you get back from your trip?”

  “Last night. I was planning to give you a call.” Jeremy leans in to brush his lips across my cheek. “You look great, but that’s obviously a theme with you.”

  “Thank you.” I turn to greet William with a handshake and a smile. “Good to see you again.”

  “You too.” William slants an inquisitive glance toward his son. “I’ll leave you two alone, huh?”

  “Oh, that’s not necessary,” I reply hastily. “I’m just going to get a few more things and head home.”

  “Jeremy will show you around,” William says firmly, glancing at his gold Rolex. “I was glad to hear you let him take you on another date. Jeremy doesn’t go out nearly enough, and you seem quite suitable.”

  “Okay, Dad.” Jeremy nudges his father in the side and shakes his head at me in amusement. “He’s just here to pick up some lemon cake for my mother. Her appetite isn’t great, but she’ll eat the lemon cake made by one of the local bakeries.”

  “It must be delicious then,” I remark. “I’ll have to pick some up as well.”

  “Lemon cake is served in The Great Gatsby.” William looks down his narrow nose at me. “By Sinclair Lewis.”

  “F. Scott Fitzgerald, but who cares who wrote it if lemon cakes are involved?”

  He makes a harrumph of either amusement or indignation. Jeremy rolls his eyes and grabs his father’s sleeve, giving him a “go away, Dad” look. I can’t help grinning.

  “I’ve been ousted, Miss Perrin.” William gives me a nod of farewell. “Enjoy the morning. Jeremy, buy her a coffee and behave yourself.”

  Jeremy groans as his father strides off. “Sorry, Eve. You can imagine how embarrassing he was when I was in high school. I cringed whenever he met my dates.”

  “I think he’s charming.” I experience an old, almost forgotten longing for my father. Though I always had Uncle Max, he’d lived across the country for much of my childhood and wasn’t a daily presence the way a father should be. The way it sounds like William still is for Jeremy.

  “Okay if I walk with you?” Jeremy turns from the coffee vendor and hands me a lidded paper cup. “I can show you some of the best
stuff to buy.”

  “Sure. Thanks.” I accept the coffee and fall into step beside him as we start toward the market booths. “How was your trip to New York?”

  “Not great.” With a grimace, he lifts his coffee cup to his mouth. “We’re close to closing an acquisition deal, but now the other company wants to renegotiate. My father wasn’t happy with how I handled it. Especially considering that King Financial has taken a downturn along with the rest of the town’s economy.”

  “I’m sorry to hear that.”

  “Just means I have to work harder.” He shrugs and smiles. “How about you? Did you have a good week?”

  I nod, realizing I can’t tell him much of anything about my week. I’m working for the lighthouse keeper. I wrote a paper about a strangely beautiful drawing I found in my uncle’s collection. Flynn warned me away from you. Flynn kissed me until the world spun. We have tea together almost every afternoon at two.

  “I did some reading and research. Got a few more repairs done on the house. It was a banner week on the excitement front.”

  Jeremy chuckles. “You still haven’t found anything about that artist?”

  “Not yet. I’ll have to keep digging.”

  We stop at a couple of booths and sample the food—crackers with jam, pretzels and mustard. Our conversation shifts to Castille, and it becomes clear to me that the town and its environs mean a great deal to Jeremy.

  “It’s a fantastic place to grow up,” he says. “Which makes it even harder to see everything in decline. Used to be that we’d have a ton of tourists for the fall foliage season, but now we get maybe half the crowd we once did, if that.”

  “When will you find out about the sale of the lighthouse?” I ask.

  “When the Forestry Department’s lease expires at the end of the year. But first, the city council will vote on a change to the zoning law. To get that passed, we still have to convince the residents the sale is a good idea.” He puts his hand on my arm. “Excuse me a minute, Eve. One of my clients is over there, and I need to remind him to get me some signed papers by Monday.”

  “Sure, go ahead.”

  Promising to be right back, Jeremy hurries over to a gentleman studying the root vegetable offerings at another stand. I walk half a block, passing a bulky, bald resident whom I swear I’ve seen before. But where? His head is down, his fingers working at his phone. A chill rattles me.

  Pulling my coat more closely around me, I continue looking at the other wares. I splurge on a ten-dollar jug of locally made maple syrup.

  As I slip it into my bag, I catch sight of a tall man standing in front of a bakery stall. Worn jeans, black jacket, scruffy dark hair.

  Flynn. My heart thumps, my blood lighting up. I start to turn away, not wanting him to see me. He lifts his head suddenly, his gaze darting toward me like a laser homing in on a target. Electricity fires through the damp air, pinning me to the spot.

  You’re a thief. Confusion knots in my chest. The rational part of my brain knows well enough not to confront him right now in a public place, but… God in heaven, the man is an enigma. One minute he has me hot as a firecracker, the next minute I’m feeling all warm and cozy as we drink Darjeeling tea, and the third minute I think I’m falling into a trap, tumbling down a rabbit hole without knowing what’s at the bottom.

  I trusted a man once, and his secrets destroyed me. By trusting Flynn, am I walking into the same kind of nightmare?

  No. I still won’t believe my instincts about him or Max’s trust in him are misplaced. Though that belief doesn’t change the fact that I’m still mad at him.

  Flynn turns his attention back to the display of breads, muffins, pastries, and rolls. The vendor plucks four scones from a tray and puts them in a white paper bag. He hands her cash and waves away the change she tries to give him. He looks at me again and indicates the bag.

  I smother a surge of pleasure. Oh, no, Flynn Alverton. You don’t get to be all adorable buying scones for our teatime.

  “All set?” Jeremy stops beside me.

  Everything inside me tenses, like an overstretched violin string.

  Flynn’s gaze snaps to Jeremy and ices over, his gray eyes suddenly arctic. Jeremy stiffens and puts his hand on my back.

  “He bothering you?” He jerks his head toward Flynn.

  “No.” I muster some resolve and turn away.

  We walk half a block away to another vegetable stand. I glance back over my shoulder at the bakery vendor. Flynn is gone.

  “He’s bad news.” Jeremy’s voice is tight, his hands fisted deep into his coat pockets. “I know people think it’s all romantic or whatever, this weird guy living in the lighthouse, but whatever he’s hiding, it’s not good.”

  I bristle inwardly, my spine tensing. “How do you know he’s hiding something?”

  His expression hardens. “Because no one knows anything about him. Rumors abound, of course. He’s in witness protection, he’s grieving the loss of a dead wife, he’s an escaped convict. All bullshit, if you ask me. But people don’t act the way he does if they’re not hiding something. And I’m going to find out what it is.”

  “Why?”

  “Because he’s trying to stop me from selling the lighthouse.”

  Surprise ripples through me. It makes sense, of course, that Flynn would want to save his home from destruction, but there hasn’t been any indication that he’s publicly opposing Jeremy’s plan.

  “He doesn’t own the lighthouse,” I say. “I assume it’s not his right to say what should be done with it.”

  “No, but that’s not stopping him. He signed a contract with my mother… I don’t know, fourteen, fifteen years ago? My father opposed it, but the lighthouse was in a trust belonging to my mother, so she could do what she wanted. I don’t think my father even knew the terms. Alverton pays rent on time, usually early, and he has a certain number of tenant’s rights, but he has no say in whether or not we sell it.”

  “So how is he trying to stop you?”

  Jeremy gives a derisive snort. “He wrote a letter to the Castille Times, some eco-friendly crap about the coastline and environment. He was also supposedly trying to get the lighthouse and lands into protected status, but there’s not much else he can do. He can’t rally the residents to his cause, that’s for sure. They like that he’s the local recluse, but no one around here is stupid enough to trust him.”

  That remark twists inside me like a knife-point. Juliette’s voice echoes through my head. “I suppose people believe that a woman who chooses to have an affair with a married man is stupid enough to repeat her mistakes.”

  “Hey, I’m sorry.” Jeremy turns to me, regret shadowing his eyes. “I didn’t mean to go off like that. Obviously I don’t like the guy, and I really don’t like the way he was looking at you. Let’s go grab some lunch and talk about something more pleasant.”

  Regret cracks through me. No matter how much I think dating Jeremy would be a good step on the road to rebuilding my life, I can’t do it. The animosity between Jeremy and Flynn runs deeper than I realized. It’s way too messy. I didn’t get out of one mess only to get right back into another.

  Asserting my autonomy is one thing. Getting in the middle of a deep-seated rivalry while being hot for one man and trying to date the other… yeah, that’s something else entirely.

  “Jeremy, I’m going to head back home.”

  He presses his lips together. “That doesn’t sound good.”

  “I really like you,” I say honestly. “And I’d like to stay friends. But I’ve had a rough time of it recently, and being new in town with a reputation that preceded me… well, I need to keep a low profile for a while.”

  He regards me for a long minute, then nods shortly. “If that’s what you want, I guess I have to live with it, right?”

  “I need more time to settle in,” I explain. “I’ve only been here for a month, and it was unfair of me to think I was ready to date again.”

  “All right, Eve.” His tone is co
ol, his shoulders stiff. “Let me know when you are ready, okay?”

  Before I can respond, he walks away, disappearing into the crowd. My insides twist.

  Did I just make another mistake? One that will come back to haunt me?

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  After leaving the farmer’s market, I drive to the lighthouse, my fingers clenched on the steering wheel. Winter is in the air, the crisp red and gold leaves strewn like a carpet over the road.

  Tension grips my entire body. Only Flynn’s truck is parked in the lot, the gray cold keeping everyone away from the coast. I hurry up the path to the workroom door, rapping my knuckles against the weathered wood.

  Flynn opens the door, a book of Hans Christian Andersen tales in his hand. No expression shows behind his stoic mask, which angers me all the more. I push past him, my heart pounding and my blood hot. The accusation bubbles into my throat like lava.

  “You stole my secret.”

  He closes the door and turns to face me. “I told you not to see King again.”

  “He has nothing to do with this!”

  “Why were you with him?” A muscle ticks in his jaw.

  “Because I thought he’d be a good person to casually date.” A faint dizziness washes over me, like I’m standing on the deck of a rolling ship. “I wanted to get my bearings again. And because I’m tired of other people, you included, dictating what I can or can’t do. I signed your stupid contract because I want and need this job desperately, but I never agreed to do whatever you dictate outside the bounds of work. That’s why I was with him.”

  I can almost see him processing that revelation, a slight crease appearing between his brows.

  “What if I ask you not to see him again?” he finally says.

  “Well, you might have tried that tactic the first time around.” I sigh, pressing a hand to my temple. “But it doesn’t matter because I’ve already decided I’m not going to see him again.”

  “What made you decide that?”

  I have nothing to give him but the truth.