Down By The Water (20 page)

THIRTY EIGHT

Jenna was wrong.

Sven was not at home, sleeping off his sex and alcohol infused night. He was behind the counter of the shop, a pencil tucked behind one ear, his cell phone held to the other. He grinned when he saw us and held up his finger, letting us know to wait a minute.

Jenna leaned against the counter and watched him, her eyes roving the length of him. She reminded me of a lioness sizing up her prey. Sven's smile widened and he gave her a thorough once over with his eyes. I looked away, uncomfortable. I was pretty sure they were going to rip each other's clothes off the minute he hung up the phone. And that was definitely something I did not want to see.

He set the phone down on the counter and I spoke immediately. “I just wanted to come by and check on my car.”

His eyes flicked in my direction before returning to my sister. “It's not ready.”

I knew it wouldn't be. “Okay. But have you started on it?”

“
Yeah.”

“
And?” I asked, waiting for him to elaborate. When he didn't, I said, “Did you figure out what you need to replace? Have the parts come in from the Cities?”

He smiled at me. “Wow. You actually paid attention when I told you what was gonna go down.”

I tapped my foot impatiently. “Of course I did. It's my car.”

Sven shrugged and reached for the pencil tucked behind his ear. “Most chicks don't pay attention. Don't listen.”

I waited for my sister to frown at him, to call him out on his chauvinistic statement, but she just watched him, a perma-smile planted on her lips.

“
So?” I demanded. “Where are we at?”

“
We,” he said, emphasizing the word. “Are exactly where we were at the last time I talked to you.”

My mouth dropped open. “You haven't even started working on it?”

He rolled his eyes. “No. Jesus. I meant, we're on track. On schedule. You'll get your car. Good as new.”

“
Bet you'll have that engine purring,” Jenna said seductively. I wondered if she knew that she looked like she just rolled out of bed.

“
There was nothing wrong with the engine,” I pointed out, but neither of them were paying any attention to me.

Sven gave her another thorough once-over. “I'd like to get you purring, too.”

Jenna stepped closer to the counter and splayed her palms against the countertop. She leaned across and Sven bent down and kissed her. Not a “good morning” or “I missed you” kiss. This was a “let's fuck” kiss. And I was pretty sure they were ready to pick up where they'd apparently left off only a few hours earlier.

“
Knock it off, you two,” I snapped. I tugged on Jenna's arm. “Come on. Let's get outta here.”

“
But we just got here,” she said.

“
And he needs to work.” I glared at her. “On my car. Not on you.”

She rolled her eyes.

I turned to Sven. “I think I'm gonna hold my sister ransom.”

He raised his eyebrows. “Oh, yeah? How so?”

“You get her back when I get a real update on my car. I want the day—and time—that it'll be ready.”

A slow grin spread across his face. He picked up the pencil and twirled it between his fingers. “Fine. 5 pm tomorrow.”

I stared blankly at him. “Seriously?”

“
I told you Thursday, didn't I?” He brushed at his blond hair, lifting it off his forehead. “I'll have it done by then.”

I nodded, an odd mixture of relief and disappointment flooding me. I wanted my car because I could leave. I could floor the gas pedal and get the hell out of Pelican Lake and never look back. The sheriff had nothing on me and, as much as I wanted to figure out what had actually happened to me sister, the threat of Jorgenson pinning everything on me was too much. I felt like I was under constant surveillance, like he was just waiting for me to fuck up and make a wrong move. There were no wrong moves to make as far as I was concerned, but it didn't keep me from worrying. If he really was out to get me, and if he'd fabricated evidence to try to pin my sister's drowning on me, I wasn't sure what else he might be capable of doing. I felt like my best—my only option, really—was to simply leave.

But then I thought of Ty.

Yesterday had been rocky but I kept going back to the moments we spent in the truck. Not when I was hurling accusations at him but after, when we were in the driveway in front of the house, when he'd told me in no uncertain terms that he'd had nothing to do with either girls' disappearance. And later, when he'd looked at me, his eyes full of warmth and tenderness, and when he'd held me in his arms, crushing me to him like I was the most precious thing on earth. I didn't want to lose that. I didn't want to lose him.

“So...” Sven said and I looked up, trying to shake my mind free of the memory. “We good?”

“
Uh, sure,” I said.

Jenna smiled. “So maybe I should stick around here, then?” She wasn't talking to me.

Sven licked his lips. “I gotta work, sweetheart.”

“
I know,” she said. She kissed him again. “But you'll have a couple breaks, won't you?”

I watched them. There was no tenderness in their conversation or their gestures. It was just pure, unadulterated sex.

“For you?” He nuzzled her ear. “Absolutely.”

I cleared my throat. “Uh, I think I'm gonna go. You sure you want to stay? Don't you want to go back and sleep? And maybe sober up?”

My sister shook her head. “The clock is ticking. If you're out of here tomorrow, I am, too. And I'm not done with him.”

There was absolutely nothing to say to that. I just nodded and mumbled a goodbye and headed back outside.

I climbed back into Kyle's car and jammed the key into the ignition, adjusting the vents so the AC was blasting me. I stared out the windshield, at the entrance to the auto shop. Even with the glare from the sun, I could still make out my sister hoisted on top of the sales counter, Sven in front of her. She'd wrapped her legs around his waist and his hands were in her hair and all I could think was that I hoped they moved into the back of the shop before another customer walked in. Or before the sheriff drove by and decided he'd charge them both with indecent exposure.

I looked away and shifted the car into reverse. I navigated the car out of the parking space and pulled up to the edge of the road, waiting to merge. An opening appeared but I made no move to ease into traffic.

I sat there for a good ten minutes, watching the cars go by, unsure of what to do.

Because I had nowhere to go.

THIRTY NINE

“
Hey, stranger.”

I glanced up from the book I was reading. Ty was in the doorway to my room. Shirtless, a baseball cap backwards on his head, a fine sheet of sweat covering his chest. I swallowed hard and tried not to stare.

“Hey.”

“
What are you doing?”

I lifted up the paperback book I was holding. “Reading.”

“Uh. Why?”

I smiled. “You have an aversion to it or something?”

He answered with a smile of his own. “Nah. But that kind of book?” He jerked his head in my direction. “Wouldn't touch that if it was the last book on earth.”

I turned it in my hands so I was looking at the cover. “What's wrong with
Little Women
?”

He wrinkled his nose. “That's school reading. Required crap. Not the good stuff.”

“Hmm.” I closed the book and set it in my lap. “I like it.”

He nodded. “Figures you would.”

“What's that supposed to mean?”

Ty shrugged. “I dunno. You're the schooly type. I mean, you're headed to college and stuff. You're book smart.”

I laughed. “Hardly.” I didn't want to tell him the real reason I was reading it. That I'd come back from A Plus Auto, anxious to find something to do, something that would keep me out of trouble and out of sight for the next day and a half until my car was ready. I didn't want to drive aimlessly around town and I didn't want to sit by the pool. And I sure as hell didn't want to dig up anything more about Annie or Rosie. With limited options, and an even more limited library available at his house, I'd found a familiar book on one of the bookshelves in the living room and had made a beeline to my room.

“
Everything okay?” he asked.

It was my turn to shrug. “Sure. I guess.” I hadn't told him about the sheriff's visit the previous morning or my conversation with his dad. There'd been no reason to bring it up. Ty wanted me to keep digging and the other two men wanted me to behave and answer questions. And I wasn't willing to do anything any of them wanted.

He spun the basketball on his finger. “Dad said he talked to you yesterday. Said the sheriff came by, too.”

I sighed. Apparently it hadn't mattered that I'd decided to keep my mouth shut.

“My dad...” His voice trailed off. “I hope he wasn't too much of an asshole.”

I shook my head. “No. He wasn't.”

Ty nodded. “Okay. Good.” He stepped into the room, the hesitated. “Is it okay if I come in?”

I sat up a little, made room for him on the bed. “Yeah, of course.”

He dropped the basketball to the ground and it rolled across the hardwood floor, bumping into the nightstand. He sank down on the bed, close to me but not touching.

“
What did the sheriff want?”

I set the book on the bedspread. “He just wanted to ask more questions. I said no.”

Ty nodded his approval. “Good. You've already told him everything.”

We sat in silence for a minute. I hated that I felt so conflicted with him. About him. After everything that had happened, I was pretty sure he was on my side. But we hadn't talked after our conversation in the truck, hadn't really spent any time alone together. I felt all kinds of jacked up around him—it was like I was a dozen different people when I was with him, depending on my mood and situation. I thought back over the course of the last couple of days—the amazing night we'd spent together in bed, the file he'd insisted we look at, the fight we'd had about it afterward. And then the making up. There had been nothing sexual in the way he'd held me, the way he'd comforted me. I remembered the look in his eyes, the sound of his voice as he spoke to me. We might have only known each other for a few days, the same as Jenna and Sven. But there was definitely something between us. Something more than just sex. And something more than the incidents that had fatefully intertwined our lives.

“Where did you go this morning?” he asked casually.

“
To Sven's. To check on my car.”

A frowned creased his brow. “Is it ready?”

I shook my head and his expression cleared and my heart somersaulted a little. He'd looked relieved. “He thinks he'll have it done by tomorrow. Five o'clock, he said.”

The frown returned. “That soon?”

“That was his original estimate,” I reminded him.

He nodded. “I know.” He looked at me for a minute, his hazel eyes flecked more green than gold today. “But I might have been hoping it would take him a little longer.”

My heart fluttered some more. “Yeah?”

“
Yeah.” He reached his hand out, hesitating for a second before placing it on top of mine. His fingers were warm, comforting, and I wanted him to squeeze me and hold me and never let me go. “You're ready to go, aren't you?”

I didn't respond. Not because I was avoiding it but because there wasn't an easy answer.

“I get it,” he said gently. His fingers caressed my hand. “This is a shitty place for you to be. And I'm pretty sure I've just made it worse.”

I looked at him, my eyes wide. “What? No!”

He shook his head. “Not the sex part.” He grinned. “I think I know how we both felt about that.” He stroked my hand some more and continued. “But being back here has been hard. And then I started making noises about accidents not being accidents. Pushing you with the file shit. And I'm sorry.”

“
Don't apologize.”

“
I have to.” He threaded his fingers through mine. “It wasn't my place. I shouldn't have pushed. I should have just let things be.”

I knew what he was trying to do and I appreciated it. Hell, part of me felt the same way. Part of me wished he would have just kept his mouth shut and not brought up his suspicions. Not because they weren't valid or worth looking into, but because doing so was only going to get me in more trouble. At least that's the way it looked with Jorgenson sniffing around me like a dog in heat.

“So, anyway, I just wanted to apologize,” he said. “And to make sure you know that I'm not looking forward to you leaving.”

“
No?”

He shook his head hard. “Nope.”

“I don't know that I am, either,” I said, my voice low.

A smile tugged at his lips. “No?”

It was my turn to shake my head.

“
I'm glad I was that good,” he said, smiling smugly.

I swatted at him with my free hand. “Says who?”

“Well, I didn't think you'd be sad about leaving my mom's cooking.”

“
She's not that bad,” I told him.

“
And you are a horrible liar.”

We both laughed and the sadness was more poignant than ever. I wished that Ty existed outside of Pelican Lake, that I could somehow pull him out of that location and bring him with me, keep him separate from all the things that haunted me from my past and from the very real present.

“You know,” he said, his fingers loosening from mine a little. I thought he was pulling his hand away but he didn't, just ran them lightly along the sensitive flesh on my palm. “Madison isn't that far away...”

It was as if he'd read my mind. “I know.”

“I mean, if you want me to visit...” He smiled. “If you want me to, I will. I'll find a way.”

I didn't know what to say so I didn't answer him with words. Instead, I shifted closer to him on the bed and reached my free arm up so that I could wrap it around his neck. I drew him down toward me and brushed my lips against his, a soft, sweet kiss. His lips were warm and he answered me hungrily, shifting so that he was hovering over me, his weight coming down on me and pressing me into the bed.

“I think that's a yes,” he murmured.

I answered him again. And again, I didn't use a single word.