by Lyla Payne
His eyes meet mine and the sizzle, this time followed by a hot gush of desire, returns.
“Challenge accepted,” he says softly, grinning with just the right amount of self confidence, and takes a big bite of his own food.
How am I supposed to eat now, with all of these lustful thoughts running through my head? Knox grins a second time, his eyes trained on my face, and I flush from my toes to my eyeballs because he knows exactly what I’m thinking.
Then I decide I don’t care, push my plate aside, and get up. By the time I’m standing beside his chair, we’re on the same page, and he pushes back from the table to give me space. My legs go on either side of his and I ease down, straddling his lap and letting my fingers slide through his thick, dark hair. It’s long enough to curl a little at the nape of his neck.
I take a brief moment and breathe in the salty smell of his skin, which combines with his aftershave to form an elixir that goes straight to my head. Then his hands are on my hips, strong fingers digging into my thighs. I lower my mouth to his, realizing as our lips connect that we’re both still smiling.
All rational thought fades away as our tongues twist playfully. It’s hard to breathe with his hands on me, dancing over my clothes but not across my bare skin, and a whimper escapes the back of my throat.
Knox stands up in one fluid movement, keeping our hips settled together and his hands locked beneath my ass as he carries me with very little effort into his bedroom.
The sheets are clean and puff up around me when he lays me down, stripping his shirt and mine before pressing against me.
Better.
We spend time getting reacquainted with the curves and skin and hot spots we found a couple of nights ago, and it’s not long until he’s got me basically panting and ready to beg for more. I don’t know if he went to school for this shit or what, but Knox MacArthur has some serious skills in the bedroom.
And the kitchen.
The rest of our clothes disappear and so does my ability to form rational thought. We move together and recapture the pleasure—and maybe escape—we’ve found in each other inside the rocking, creaking hull of his boat.
Maybe the blissful ability to not think is the White Whale we’ve both been seeking. Without a doubt, it’s what I’ve needed for weeks.
It’s nearly an hour later before the world around us comes back into focus. We’re stuck together by sweaty, slightly glowing skin and his fingers are trailing a path of sparks up my arm. Neither of us speaks, but that’s okay. After his weird response to my question in the kitchen, it seems like a safe bet that he’s using our chemistry to keep his problems at bay as much as I am.
Even though I won’t deny that I’m curious about just what has sent him running, there’s no way I’m ready to walk away from the wonderful hours of not-thinking he’s able to provide.
Not everyone’s secrets need to be mine. It’s a truth that’s harder and harder for me to remember now that so much of my time is spent poking into people’s pasts. Ghosts. My father, who introduced me to the Fournier legacy but died before he could give me answers.
“So what’s going on with Trent’s dad? Anything?”
Part of me thinks it’s not fair for him to ask me questions about my life when his is off limits, but Harlan Boone is kind of what brought us together in the first place.
And there’s not much to tell.
I snuggle closer. “I’m kind of at a loss. I don’t know about Trent and his brother, but I haven’t seen Harlan lately. The family had a big falling-out after he died and they’ve never come back together. Since there’s no proof Harlan was murdered, I’m inclined to think he just wants me to find a way to fix the people he left behind.”
“Family man?”
“Very much so. The Boones never had a ton of money growing up, but they had each other. And they protected that fiercely, with their teeth.”
“Sounds like Trent. He’s done nothing but work and spend time with his son since he found out about the kid.” Knox pauses, though his fingers continue their lazy sweep over my upper arm. “The falling-out had something to do with the brother you’re friends with?”
Knox is proving to be a good listener. A blessing and a curse.
I nod. “He was working with their dad when the accident happened. They blame him, I guess, for putting Harlan in that spot and for not being there that night. I don’t know.”
“Well, if anyone can help, I think it’ll be someone like you, Graciela. Someone who understands loyalty and family, and who cares about them.”
“How do you know I care about them?” I tilt my head back so I can see his expression, wanting more to go on than the tone of his voice.
“Come on. We may not share our deepest secrets and desires with each other, and that’s working out just fine as far as I’m concerned. But that doesn’t mean we’re blind or deaf or stupid.” He raises an eyebrow in a way that kind of makes me want to go back for round two. “You handled Trent with kid gloves during the whole him finding out he has a son thing, and it’s not like your lifelong friendship with his brother is some kind of secret. Is it?”
“No.” Not a secret, except he’s wrong about it being lifelong, maybe. My chest aches at the thought. “Thanks for the vote of confidence.”
“No problem. But you know, there are other ways you could thank me…”
I laugh and then so does he, and then our bodies are tangled up again in that way that locks the rest of the world safely on the outside of the White Whale. We solved nothing, and Knox remains as big a mystery as ever, but it doesn’t matter in the slightest for the next several hours.
Chapter Eighteen
The morning is chilly but bright, and on a whim, I decide to stop by Trent’s boat on my way out of the marina. If he’s home, he can tell me whether or not his father’s ghost has been scarce around here, too, or if he’s just miffed at me for some reason. It’s wishful thinking, but part of me wishes Harlan had just been here to check in on everything and has decided to move on. Because if I’m meant to solve the problem with the Boones…well, I’m not sure I can. They were broken long before I came back to Heron Creek.
If I’m right about him, though, he won’t be able to rest until things are set right. In some ways, he’s given me my biggest task yet.
I stand on the dock next to the Angel Face, wondering if the proper protocol is to, like, knock on the hull or holler, and if he’ll even hear me. Questions I should have asked Knox, I guess, or maybe I should know all of this after boarding his boat more than once…so to speak.
I’m about to clear my throat and go with the shouting option when Trent steps out onto the deck and squints down at me in the blinding sunlight. And he’s not alone.
“Leo?” I manage, my voice too loud in the morning that’s silent but for the chirp of birds and the lap of gentle waves.
His gaze sweeps over me, and I see myself through his eyes—rumpled clothes, day-old ponytail, purse stuffed with last night’s shoes because I found a pair of boots in Amelia’s car that promised to be warmer. He’s not close enough to smell my breath, stale because I extracted myself from the warmth of Knox’s bed without stopping by the bathroom first.
There’s no way this man who has known me for so long can’t read the situation. To his credit, he says nothing about where I might have spent the night. He doesn’t even give me a judging look. That’s Leo.
Next to him, Trent stands rigid, his beefy arms folded over his chest. He’s dressed in waders and a raincoat that looks like it has a bunch of warm layers underneath, so he’s probably up early and getting a jump on his day. Leo looks like Leo, wearing loose-fitting, worn jeans and a flannel shirt, a warm pair of work boots rounding it out.
“Mornin’, Bugs.”
“What are you…” I trail off before finishing the question, realizing that it’s actually none of my business what he’s doing here. And vice versa.
Nevertheless, Leo shoots a glance toward his brother. It’s hea
vy with conflicting emotions—too many for me to parse from so far away. “We were talking about Dad.”
“He was talking about Dad,” Trent clarifies through clenched teeth. “I was telling him to get the hell off my boat.”
I sigh, and I hope it’s loud enough for them both to hear. “I was coming by to ask if you’d seen him lately.”
It’s Leo who answers. “Not as often, but he’s there. Lingering. Like he’s watching. Waiting for something. And it seems…he seems frustrated.”
Trent stuffs his hands in his pockets and stays stubbornly silent.
“He hasn’t shown up for me since I came to see you the other night,” I say.
“Wow, you really get around, don’t you, Graciela?” Trent’s words are as hard as his gaze, which travels down to Knox’s boat before it returns to me.
Leo follows it, then stiffens. Maybe I should, too, but I let the insult roll off my back. I’m a woman, after all. This certainly isn’t the first time some jackhole has made assumptions about my personal life—the first one being that it’s any of his goddamn business.
“Watch yourself.”
“Sorry, bro. Thought you might want to know what you’ve gotten yourself into, that’s all.”
Now it’s Leo’s teeth that are clenched. “You haven’t thought about me in years, no reason to start now. I especially don’t need your opinions about the people who have stuck around to have my back.”
There’s a warning in his voice that’s impossible to miss. A warning that, combined with his words and protective stance, promises that we’re still friends. That whatever is between us is still something worth defending.
That means something. A ton, actually.
Trent shrugs, not taking things further. He doesn’t answer my question about whether or not he’s seen Harlan lately, but it doesn’t matter. If Harlan’s hanging around Leo, there’s still something not right with his world. Something that needs to be done.
But maybe he doesn’t need my help any longer. I don’t know. If these ghosts could just start acting in a uniform manner, it sure would make it easier for me to figure out some kind of protocol.
Leo hops down from the Angel Face and grabs my elbow, steering me down the dock and toward the parking lot. Once we’re out of earshot, he lets go.
For some reason, I want to apologize for how we’ve met this morning. I shake off the feeling. Leo isn’t and never was my boyfriend. I don’t owe him or anyone else an apology for spending time with Knox. It’s my time and my body, and I’ll use both how I see fit.
Leo, of course, doesn’t say a word about any of it. Knowing him, he’s probably not even considering saying a word about it. For a guy who’s grown up in a small Southern town, he’s pretty darn open-minded and progressive.
“You okay?” he asks when we’re standing by the driver’s door to Amelia’s car. “Give me your keys.”
I drop them into his outstretched hand, fighting the urge to cry. Where did that come from? Tired, probably.
Leo leans in and starts the car, cranking the heat all the way up, then closes the door. He gives me a wry smile. “You didn’t answer me.”
The tears spill over without warning, warm on my cold cheeks. His expression goes from wary and slightly amused to worried, and despite everything, the familiar weight of his arm falls around my shoulders.
“Bugs. Tell me.”
“I’m not…I don’t even know.”
“Is it what happened with your car?”
It takes me a minute to get control of my tears. Leo waits for me to be able to breathe without shaking, keeping me tucked warm in his armpit despite the fact that I’m wearing a coat and hat and he’s got neither.
“Glory Jean thinks someone did it on purpose.”
The words take a moment to sink in, but when they do, Leo stiffens. His arm tightens around me. “Tried to set your car on fire?”
I nod. “And maybe sabotaged my tire last week.”
“Gracie…” He trails off before the complaint takes shape. “Who would want to do that? Do you think it has anything to do with my dad?”
“I don’t think so, but we won’t know for sure until we figure out why he’s back.”
“Tell me what happened yesterday.”
I spill the entire story at his feet, and to my amazement, it begins to seem less scary. Or, at the very least, like it’s not only my mess now. Which is silly—it wasn’t only my mess to begin with, not when Travis and Glory Jean and Will and basically everyone else I know was already on it.
There’s no reason to feel better now. And yet I do.
“Who knew you were going to be in Charleston Monday?”
I go still. “You think I’m right? That if it was a nest, it should have caught fire on the way there and not on the way back?”
“Of course. It makes sense. Which means that whoever put it there did it while you were in Charleston at the restaurant. How many people knew where you were going and when?”
“Me. Millie. My aunt and probably my uncle.”
“No one else?”
“Maybe Mel…”
“There has to be someone else. Either that, or you’re being followed. Or tracked.”
“Well, Travis texted me while we were there and I told him I was at lunch with my aunt.” I pause, then shrug. “I think I mentioned it to LeighAnn when she stopped by the library on Saturday, because we were talking about places to eat in Charleston.”
“None of those people seem like viable suspects, right?”
I chew on my lower lip. “No. I’ll have Will check my phone and ask Glory Jean to check out my car, make sure I’m not being tracked. Otherwise, I don’t know. There’s no telling who my aunt mentioned it to, and it’s not like the library was empty when I talked to LeighAnn.”
Basically, the entire town of Heron Creek and half of Charleston’s upper class could be suspects.
Leo pulls away so that he can look me in the eye. Without him close, I’m colder than I was when I first stepped outside this morning.
“Make sure you do both, Graciela. I know you enjoy your devil-may-care image, and believe me, it has its appeal. But your life is so much more important than anything else.” His voice dips low on the last word, and his blue eyes hang onto mine as tight as his arm was squeezing my shoulders a moment ago. “Losing you isn’t an option for me.”
I don’t know what to say. Maybe I don’t need to say anything.
After what feels like a full minute of just watching each other’s faces, Leo bends down and sweeps a kiss over my cheekbone, then turns around and heads to his rusted truck. His hands are in his pockets, probably in an attempt to thaw them out.
I climb in the car, rubbing my own hands together and thinking, of all things, that I need to reconsider my previous assessment regarding Knox and his blue jeans. Because Leo has definitely just thrown his ass into the ring.
Instead of going home to change clothes before work, I pick up the phone and do something I haven’t done in weeks.
“Hey,” I say when Mille answers, my voice wound tight. “Could you maybe pawn Jack off on LeighAnn or Mel and cover my shift at the library today? I’m just…I don’t want to wait any longer to run down some of these leads for Harlan.”
Telling Leo what happened has made everything come to a head, and it seems impossible to go to work and answer questions and read stories like there isn’t someone out there trying to, what? Kill me? Discourage me? Ruin my car?
Like Harlan Boone, a man I respected and cared about in life—to say nothing of how I feel about his son, now—doesn’t need something important. Like I don’t have a bag full of raw garnets attempting to lure me out into the North Carolina wilderness.
No. It’s time to do something productive.
“Actually, it’s funny you should call, because my mom decided to show up before dawn and inform me that she’s watching Jack for the day.”
“Really.”
“Yeah. So I’m free and I would
actually love to spend the day at work.” She pauses. “And also, Grace, I was just about to text you, but you’re not going to believe what I found in the attic.”
“What were you doing in the attic?”
“My mom was up there looking for some silver she swears Grams promised her or something. She hasn’t stopped moving since she breezed through the door at five a.m.”
“So did she find the silver?”
“No. But while I was trying to steer her back downstairs before her clomping woke up the baby, she stumbled across a trunk of old newspapers. Mom wasn’t interested but I started thumbing through them—I was thinking how you would love them—and one of them had a story cut out of it.”
My mouth falls open. “Was it…?”
“Yes. I went into your room and grabbed the story you were left about your mom’s disappearance. It definitely came from the paper in our attic.”
I’m not sure what to make of the revelation, except for this: before I was, say, ninety percent sure that my mother left the article and the garnets, but now I’m convinced. Our alarm system is top of the line and we’re more than diligent about setting it. Odds are, no one alive could have gotten into our house and stolen the clipping. More than that, who else would have even known there was a trunk of old editions of the Creek Sun up there, anyway?
We didn’t know, and we live there.
It must have been Felicia.
“Grace?”
“Yeah, I’m here.”
“You definitely think your mom left it for you, huh.”
“I do. I just wish I knew why.”
Neither of us says anything for a minute, and in the background, I hear Jack crying and my aunt yelling for Amelia to come give her a hand.
“Gotta go, Grace. We’ll talk when you get home, but I’ve got you covered at work.”
Since Amelia agreed to man the reference desk, my visit to the Folly Beach Police Department is a go.
