Stones Unturned (Meade Lake Series Book 2)

by Taylor Danae Colbert

  “What the fuck…?” I gasp, covering my mouth.

  “I know this is...well, this is insane,” he says. “But we don’t have a lot of time. I came here to see if you would come with me.”

  “Come with you where?” I ask.

  “To Meade Lake. In Maryland. It’s where May has been all these years,” he says. His eyes are big and pleading. “I know this is crazy, Kaylee. I know it’s a lot, but there’s so much more you need to know. May didn’t want me to come down. She asked me to wait, but I know she needs to see you. I know she wants to before it’s too late.”

  “Too late?” I ask, my hands shaking as I try to hold the photograph steady.

  “She’s sick, Kaylee. She didn’t die when your parents said she did. But she’s...she’s dying now. Complication of her emphysema. I came down yesterday when we realized how bad it was getting. I’ve basically just been walking around Lenburn, hoping to see you. Good thing it’s a small town, I guess.”

  I stumble backward and lean against the cool brick of the building, my head spinning a million miles a minute.

  “I know you don’t know me,” he says, his voice quiet, “but I know about you. I know May. And I know you had a sister.”

  My eyes shoot up to his. Because no one—no one—knows about my sister. That day she was supposed to come into our lives, the day I had waited for, the day I was supposed to become a big sister, was the last day we talked about her.

  When I started kindergarten that following year, I didn’t mention her. I said I was an only child. I told everyone I had no siblings, just like Mama had told me to do.

  But now, almost twenty years later, this devilishly handsome man appears and seems to know about her? Seems to know more about me than I do?

  He’s looking at me, and I can see the want in his eyes. The hope. And even through this enormous wave of uncertainty he’s brought on me, I feel a little at ease when I look at him.

  “If you want, you can just follow me in your car,” he says. “I don’t want to make you uncomfortable. I just want you to come.”

  I can see in his eyes how badly he wants me to say yes. Only, I can’t figure out what’s in it for him. Why would May not want me to come?

  Why the fuck have I been told she’s been dead for almost twenty years?

  “I should call my mom––” I start to say, but his face immediately furrows into a frown.

  “Okay,” he says, “but you should know that she is going to tell you not to come.”

  There’s something about the confidence in what he’s saying, something about the certainty, that I know it’s true. I know he’s right. I just don’t know why.

  “Can I just...I just need to talk to my friend real quick,” I say, putting a hand to my head. He nods and scoots back, holding a hand out toward the door.

  “Of course. I’ll wait for you out here,” he says. I nod and slink back inside.

  Charlotte and Emma rush me as I walk through the door.

  “What happened?” Charlotte asks, lifting my arms like she’s checking for some sort of hidden injury or something. “Did he say something?”

  “Did he hurt you?” Emma asks, and my eyes zip to her.

  “You could see us the whole time,” I say. “You know he didn’t lay a hand on me.”

  “Well...what did he say?” Charlotte asks.

  “He wants me to go on a road trip with him,” I blurt out. Their eyes become saucers. And then Emma laughs.

  “Right,” she says between giggles. But she stops abruptly when she realizes I’m serious. “Wait...what?”

  “He knows...a relative of mine. That lives up in Maryland. Some little lake town,” I say. “He showed me a photo and everything. It’s definitely her.”

  “I don’t understand. What relative? Why didn’t this relative come down?” Charlotte asks. These are all good questions, and ones that I’m not so sure I really understand the answers to.

  “Wait a second...you’re not thinking of actually going, are you?” Emma asks. There’s something in her voice, something in her tone, that doesn’t feel as...concerned as Charlotte. It’s more accusatory.

  “I...I haven’t decided,” I say.

  “Kaylee, you’ve got to be kidding,” she says, crossing her arms over her BCBG blouse. “You just met him. Do you even know his last name? And besides, can you imagine the conniption your parents would have?”

  I lift my eyes to her again.

  “I know, they’d freak out. I don’t even know him, and he’s––”

  She takes a few steps closer to me.

  “Exactly,” she says, almost in a whisper. “It’s one thing for you to run off with a guy you barely know. But if your dad found out he was... Can you imagine?”

  I take a step back from her, my eyes trained on hers. Then I look out the window at Derrick.

  I didn’t even realize he was black.

  I saw his eyes. I saw his arms, his smile. I heard the words he spoke. I saw the fondness in his eyes when he talked about my grandmother.

  In this moment, while some massive family secret has just been revealed, and I’m on the verge of making a pretty risky decision, my thoughts are all on my friend. And how we were raised similarly, and yet, turned out so different. And my heart breaks a little, because I know that we can’t come back fully from this. She’s just confirmed another major difference between us.

  “If my dad found out he was what, Emma?” I ask her. I want her to say it. Out loud. She stumbles backward, blinking wildly. Charlotte clears her throat, trying to get rid of some of the awkwardness.

  “Oh, I don’t mean— I mean, you know I don’t care, I just...you know how your dad is. How both of our dads are. I mean, they would never say it, but—”

  “But you did, Emma,” I say.

  I turn on my heel and walk out the front door of Richie’s. Derrick pops off the wall, his eyebrows raised.

  “Kay,” I hear Charlotte say. I pause and turn back to her slowly. She walks toward me and lifts my hand into hers. Then she pulls me into a long, warm hug. “Please be careful.” She lets me go and walks toward Derrick. She sticks her hand out.

  “I’m Charlotte,” she says. He nods and takes her hand.

  “Derrick. It’s nice to meet you,” he says. She smiles.

  “I’m her best friend. I need your license, please.”

  He looks at her, perplexed, then looks to me. I just shrug. He pulls it out of his wallet and hands it to her. She snaps a picture of it on her phone.

  “Just in case I need to come find you.” He smiles and nods.

  “That’s my car, too, if you want to snap a picture of it,” he tells her. She smiles back.

  “Ya know, in seventeen years of being her best friend, never have I ever been left out of something. I know all of her secrets. So, if she’s keeping yours, consider yourself lucky.”

  He nods nervously, and I swallow.

  Because I don’t think he’s keeping his own secrets.

  I think he’s keeping mine.

  3

  Luckily, I have a bag in my car packed for what was supposed to be a stay at Charlotte’s apartment, but what has now turned into me taking a ten-hour road trip to figure out why everyone in my life has lied to me since I was five. No big deal.

  “Do you need anything else?” he asks. I think for a minute about driving back to my parents’ house, storming through the door with the picture of May, and demanding answers.

  But something tells me that, after twenty years of keeping secrets, they probably won’t be too eager to tell them right now. So, instead, I’ll do the more prudent thing and follow this handsome stranger to God-knows-where in search of answers that they won’t give me.

  “Nah,” I tell him. “You have washers and dryers up in Meade Lake, right?” I ask him, holding my bag in the air. He smiles and nods.

  “Nah, we just wash everything in the lake,” he says with a shrug. I stare at him wide-eyed for a second before I realize he’s kidding. �
�Okay, then, you ready to head out?”

  I turn back to Richie’s for a minute, looking through the window.

  I nod, and we exchange phone numbers.

  “We can pull off for gas and food in Charlotte,” he tells me. “I’ll call you, and we can find a place to stop.”

  “Cool,” I tell him. He turns to walk to his car but pauses and turns back to me.

  “Hey,” he says. I look up at him. “We’re gonna make it. Don’t worry.”

  I’m thrown off by his sensitivity, his social awareness of what’s going on in my head right now. I smile at him and nod.

  I get in my car and reach for my duffel on the backseat. I pull out a pair of jeans and slide them on up under my skirt. I pull on a t-shirt then unbutton the rest of my blouse and slip it out from behind me. Then, I put the car in reverse and pull out behind him.

  We’ve been driving for about two hours, and I’m suddenly very aware of the fact that it’s eleven at night, and I’ve been up since the crack of dawn. I didn’t really think this through when I opted to drive from Georgia to Maryland.

  Finally, my phone lights up.

  “Hello?” I say.

  “Hey,” he says, and my heart does this little skip at just the sound of his voice.

  “At this point, most places are going to be closed. But there’s a twenty-four-hour rest stop off the next exit. We can get gas and some snacks to hold us over, if that works for you?”

  A rest stop. With a stranger. Should be totally safe.

  “Sure,” I say. “That’s fine.”

  A few minutes later, we’re pulling off the highway and pulling into the gas station. As I’m digging through my purse for my wallet, I hear the thump of my gas tank being opened and unscrewed.

  “What are you doing?” I ask him.

  “You’re following me up the whole east coast,” he says. “The least I can do is pump your gas for you.”

  The chivalry almost knocks me back into my seat.

  “You don’t have to do that,” I tell him.

  “I’m just glad you’re here,” he says with this absolute killer of a smile. I can’t help but smile back.

  “Well, I’ll go grab us some snacks. It’s the least I can do. What can I get you?” I ask.

  He thinks for a minute.

  “How about something sweet for now, and something salty for later?” he says. I smile and nod.

  “You got it,” I say.

  I’m back out in two minutes with arms full of chips, chocolate bars, and gummy candies. He laughs when he sees me, but as he reaches out to help me, his phone rings. There’s a look of concern in his eyes as he lifts them to me.

  “Sorry, it’s my mom,” he says.

  “No, please,” I say, waving him off as I set everything down on the roof of my car and dig for my keys. As I’m fiddling with my key fob, I hear a scream that chills me to my bones.

  I turn to see Derrick storming across the parking lot, kicking a giant dumpster at the back corner. He clasps his hands behind his head then backs up against the building, sinking slowly toward the ground.

  I stand behind him, wide-eyed and wondering what the fuck I’m supposed to do next.

  Then, I see him drop his head between his shoulders, and I see his shoulders start to shudder. Hesitantly, I take another step closer to him.

  “Derrick?” I say.

  He brings his hand to his face, swiping it down before he looks up at me slowly. He brings himself back to his feet, but he can’t bring his eyes to mine.

  “She’s dead,” he says just above a whisper.

  “What?” I ask. He takes a step closer to me so we’re just inches apart. I can feel my heart rate accelerating, and I don’t know if it’s the news of my grandmother’s death, the fact that I thought she already was dead, or the devastatingly beautiful man in front of me who is so broken up about it.

  “My mom just called. I’m so sorry, Kaylee,” he says, his voice cracking and broken. “I really thought I could get you there in time. I’m so sorry.”

  I step toward him, and without thinking about it, I step up on my tiptoes and wrap my arms around his neck. To my misery, he smells like...I don’t even know. Aftershave and...pine, maybe? Whatever it is, it’s not conducive to me being consoling.

  “Hey,” I whisper, “it’s okay. It’s not your fault. You tried,” I tell him, but while I say the words, it hits me how fucking weird this is. I’m standing in a gas station parking lot, hugging a stranger, consoling him over the death of my grandmother.

  What the hell is happening?

  We stand like this for a few more minutes, but then he pulls apart slowly.

  “I can’t believe she’s gone,” he says. And now that I think about it, I can’t believe it, either. After all this time…

  I don’t remember a whole lot about my Gran May, but I do remember that I loved her. I remember feeling so heartbroken that she had died. I should probably feel like that now, but I don’t, and I feel guilty about it.

  I step apart from him after I become increasingly aware that my arms were still around him.

  “Look,” he says, “if you want to go back, I totally get it. But if you still want to see Meade Lake, you’re welcome to follow me back. My mom mentioned, too, that you’ll be getting a summons soon anyway to go over May’s will.”

  May’s will?

  I think for a minute.

  I came with him in the first place for answers.

  Answers that I still don’t have.

  In fact, I think, at this juncture, now I have more questions.

  “I want to come,” I tell him. And if I’m not mistaken, there’s a hint of a smile playing on his lips. “But I think I need to get a room for the night. I don’t think I’ll make it the rest of the way. Not with that news.”

  He nods.

  “Yeah, of course,” he says. “I saw signs for a hotel right down the road. Let’s head that way, and we can take off early tomorrow.”

  I follow him another mile or so down the road to a shady-looking hotel, but at this point, I’d sleep in my damn car. We check in at the front desk, and the woman looks at him peculiarly when we tell her we need two rooms.

  He sticks out his card, but I jump to yank mine from my wallet and offer it up. He holds his hand up.

  “Let me, please,” he says. I start to protest, but he shakes his head. “The first leg of this trip has not turned out as planned. Please, at least let me get the rooms.”

  I swallow and take a step back.

  The woman behind the desk turns around to the keys, and when she turns back, she hands them to us with a smirk.

  “They’re adjoining—ya know, just in case,” she says with a wink. Derrick nods slowly and thanks her, and as we turn down the hallway toward the elevator, I can’t hold in my laugh any longer.

  “‘Just in case,’” I mock her as the doors close, and we both start laughing. His laugh is warm and hearty and makes my whole body stand at attention. I clear my throat as I think again about what she was suggesting and how, if these were any other circumstances, I would definitely not be opposed to knocking on that adjoining door.

  As Derrick bends down to grab my bag for me when the doors open, I realize that I might not be completely opposed to it right now, either.

  “Well, this is us,” he says as we walk down the hallway a bit to rooms 304 and 305.

  “Great,” I say, unlocking my door and taking my bag from him. “Thank you, Derrick.”

  He smiles and nods.

  “Goodnight,” he says.

  “Night,” I say back.

  I strip down to my underwear and my tank top, brush my teeth in the stained sink, and slip onto the sheets after I’ve taken the comforter off with one finger and thrown it on the floor. I’ve seen those blacklight reports. No thanks.

  But just as I’m settling in, I hear the sliding glass door to Derrick’s balcony open. I stand back up and tug on the pair of sweatpants I had in my bag. I move toward the door that
connects our rooms, but when I press my ear against it, it opens slightly. I swallow, take a breath, and make my way in. When I walk across his room, I see him, standing out on his balcony, staring out over Charlotte. And to my pleasant surprise, he doesn’t have a shirt on. His rippling back muscles are tight and flexed as he hunches over the railing. The moonlight bounces off his beautifully dark skin. And although I want to drool over the sight, I can tell, just from his stance, that he’s hurting. I make my way to the door and tap gently on the glass. He jumps as he turns to me.

  “Hey,” he says, raising an eyebrow and crossing his arms over his chest in modesty. My eyes dance across it, big and broad, the curves of his muscles putting me in some sort of trance.

  “Turns out the adjoining door is just a facade,” I tell him with a shrug.

  “Is that so?” he asks, a smile tugging at one corner of his mouth. I nod.

  “You okay?” I ask as I step up closer to him, gazing out over the city lights. He nods.

  “Yeah, yeah,” he says. He pauses for a moment. “I just can’t believe I wasn’t there.”

  I look up at him.

  “Mama, she’s heartbroken, and...everyone else. And I didn’t get to say goodbye.”

  I take a step closer to him without even noticing it.

  “I’m sorry,” he says, turning to me. “I can’t believe I’m sitting here whining about this to you of all people.” He lifts his eyes to mine. “I know things don’t make much sense right now, but I’m so sorry for your loss, Kaylee.”

  I swallow as I take another step closer to him. That aftershave-pine combo is kicking all of my senses into high gear, and my eyes meet his.

  Slowly, I reach my hand out to his and grab hold of it.

  “I thought she died twenty years ago,” I say with a sad smile. “So, I’m sorry for your loss.”

  He reaches his hand out and takes my other hand.

  “I know it’s only been a few hours, but I can tell that May missed out on so much by not knowing you,” he whispers. He looks down at our hands intertwined and quickly drops mine. I feel my heart rate kick up.