Summer's Song: Pine Point, Book 1 (16 page)

Summer leaned against the railing and watched him. The strong, thick fingers that usually wound themselves around a hammer now danced across the strings. The forehead that frowned all day in concentration smoothed. Damian sang, and when the song was over he played “Take It Easy” by the Eagles and sang again.

After the final chord he stopped. The music echoed across the grass, to the hills and back, and Summer let out a breath she didn’t know she’d been holding.

“You’re good.” No one had ever sung to her before. Nerves along her spine stretched and splintered. Her heart, over-full with the night and the music and the man beside her, began a jig.

Damian cleared his throat. “I’m not that good.”

“Are you kidding? You’re amazing. Do you ever write anything of your own?”

He turned toward her. The movement pressed his thigh against hers, and she thought for a minute he might kiss her. His gaze moved to her mouth and then to the place where the white skin of her breast met the vee of her sundress.

“Yes,” Damian said, his breath warm on her cheek. “Sometimes I write my own songs.”

He repositioned the instrument, curved his fingers into place and began to play. The melody was simple, a sweet tune that rose and fell without lyrics. It reminded Summer of a butterfly in the morning or dawn above the ocean. The notes dropped honey-like into an endless pool of longing. In the middle, it changed, became low and sensual with guttural chords that hovered and hung in the air. Damian’s shoulders hunched, and his arms tightened with intensity as he played on. A pause, and then the first melody returned, sweeter than the start, if that was possible. The sun coming out after a brilliant summer storm. A baby waking with a smile to a brand new day. It faded, grew, then faded again to nothing. With the final chord, the notes vanished into the night.

“God, that was…” Summer couldn’t find the words. “…beautiful,” she finished, but it wasn’t enough to describe the passion or the complexity of the song.

He smiled. “Thanks.”

“Does it have a title?”

He looked toward her and paused, opened his mouth and closed it again. “Summer’s Song.”

Damian set down the guitar and moved toward her, and this time Summer saw the kiss coming. She felt it, knew it and wanted it with every part of her. He brushed his lips against hers, reached up with one hand to cup her cheek, and the step fell away beneath her. Sweet lightness flooded her stomach, her chest, her mouth. He pulled away, whispered her name, pressed his cheek to her temple and let her feel the pulse that raced there.

“Summer.” The name sighed out of him, and he kissed her again.

Her fingers reached for him, felt the smooth, strong muscles of his chest and drew him close. Kisses moved along her cheek, her chin, down to her collarbone, until she moaned with a pleasure she couldn’t remember ever feeling before. One hand stroked the curve of her breast, and she shivered. Burying her fingers in his hair, she pulled Damian to her. Lips parted and tongues searched, until she could hardly tell where she ended and he began.

The days flipped backwards. She had come here wanting nothing, expecting nothing. Yet something—everything—had changed. First the house. Then dark memories. Then days of light and laughter, of Dinah and Hannah, of Rachael and Cat, strung together like stones on a string. Summer had never believed she might call Pine Point home again. Yet here she sat, wanting Damian Knight’s touch, his kiss, his songs, more than she remembered wanting anything in her life. Maybe coming home didn’t mean going backwards, after all. Maybe it meant growing up, making new discoveries, learning to forgive the past and finding that the future held myriad possibilities.

Her heart swelled as she took Damian by the hand and led him inside.

Summer moved under him in waves. Silent. Powerful. Damian pressed his lips to the expanse of her neck and the smooth skin there to keep himself from uttering words that made no sense. Her hips arched toward him and when he looked down, he felt himself slipping into the inky pools of her eyes.

“Damian.” It was an urgent whisper.

He lifted himself away from her slightly, missing the contact of skin against skin at once.

“What?”

She shook her head, and he knew it wasn’t his name she was speaking at all, but a word to hold onto, a handful of syllables to ground herself before she gave into the pleasure entirely. Through the curtainless windows, moonlight streaked the sheets, the floor, the curve of her shoulder. He ran his fingertips from her chin to her waist and watched her shudder. He loved it. He wanted to make her move like that all night long.

So many years it had been. Forever, really, since Damian had wanted a woman the way he wanted Summer Thompson in that moment.

She clutched at his back, her eyes dark with passion, and he surrendered. To lose himself inside her would be the sweetest way to end this day. To end every day. He met her tongue with his, drank her in, tasted wine and chocolate and the tinge of want beneath it all.

He had to stop. For a few moments, he wanted to prolong the pull of desire that stretched along his limbs. And he wanted to prolong hers.

He rolled away from her and slid into the sheets. She looked at him in wonder. He pressed one finger against her lips. Outside, an owl sounded a long, haunted hoot. She smiled, and the movement of her mouth against his hand nearly undid him. He swept the hair from her forehead and studied the scars along her temple, reminders of the accident that had torn her life apart.

Pain, he sensed, still coursed through her veins. It hung around her eyes and turned down the corners of her mouth from time to time. When she looked at the cemetery gates. When she talked to Rachael sometimes. But there was none of that now, and he imagined there was no worry on his face as well. For once. She ran her fingers over his jaw, catching on the rough stubble, and all he saw in her gaze was want.

Second by second, he slipped down the length of her. He moved from her neck to the smooth skin in the center of her chest, to her navel. She reached for him. Pressing her hands to the sheet, he moved again. To the ridge of her hipbone. To the crease between belly and long, slender thigh. To the damp curls of hair that parted her legs. Then lower, until his tongue met velvet, and he could have stayed there all night long, just tasting her.

She called out his name as she came.

Chapter Eighteen

When Summer woke, the moon had crested in the blue-black sky. She rolled over and reached for Damian. Nothing but empty sheets. Her heart thudded against her breastbone and she sat up suddenly. Something had woken her. A car driving by? An animal rummaging in the bushes? She pulled the sheet to her shoulders, chilled despite the humid night air. She still wasn’t used to sleeping in the countryside. The sounds and the heaviness of silence after sundown were so different from San Francisco. She closed her eyes, thankful for the bed beneath her and the man who’d helped her christen it. A glorious warmth still clung to the curves of her skin, and she could feel his hands and his mouth moving over her. Inside her.

The bathroom door clicked open. She opened one eye and tried to think of a clever comment, a teasing remark. But all she really wanted to do was tell Damian to hurry back because she wanted him next to her again.

“Hey.” A crack of light glimmered across the floor. “You okay?”

“Bad dream, I guess.”

“I know. You were moving around a lot.”

“I was?” She tried to catch the fragments of dream still slipping around her head. She couldn’t.

“And talking.” He slid back under the sheets. When he reached for her, she shivered.
Again,
she thought.
I could do that again. Every night.

“You kept saying ‘No’.” He nuzzled her ear. “I was hoping you weren’t talking about me.”

“Never.”

He stopped kissing her and sat up. “What was that?”

“What was what?”

“Thought I heard something.”

She looked outside. “Yeah, me too. The wind, maybe. Or ghosts.”

“You think this place is haunted?”

“No. I was kidding.” She ran her fingers along his arm. “I think we’re all haunted, in some way.”

He didn’t relax. “I wonder if—” He pulled his watch from the pocket of his shorts, tossed on the floor. “I should go home.”

“It’s two in the morning.”

“I know, but…”

“They’re fine.” She whispered the words along his chest and let her hands drift below the sheet.

“I guess.” He bent his head to catch her mouth again, and she looped one leg over his. Her skin burned in all the places he touched it.

* * * * *

Close to dawn, a cell phone rang.

Summer reached in the direction of the bed stand. She still wasn’t used to having furniture in this room. Heck, she wasn’t used to this room, period. Damian’s hand drifted over her thigh, and she smiled.

“It’s mine,” he said. “Hello? What? Mom, wait—” Panic filled his voice. “How?” He sat up and threw off the sheet. “What did he say? Are the police there? All right, I’m coming home right now.”

“What is it? What happened?” Dread froze Summer to the bed. She couldn’t move. She could only stare as Damian pulled on his clothes. His shirt ended up inside out.

“T.J. was at the house. Sonofabitch!” His voice shook. “He took Dinah.”

“Wait—what? How?”

“I told you.” He grabbed his shoes and headed for the front door. She still hadn’t managed to crawl to her feet or find her clothes. “I told you I heard something last night. He was probably sneaking around—” His voice broke. “I told you I needed to be at home with them.” He punched the doorframe. “I never should have stayed here.”

The words sliced through her, white-hot.

“But how—I don’t understand how he found them. I thought you said he was…”

Damian didn’t answer. Her stomach turned over, wanting him, wanting to help him, not knowing how.

“Let me do something.” She found a T-shirt and shorts and pulled them on with shaking hands. “Let me come with you.” She reached for Damian’s arm, but he pulled away as if she’d burned him.

“Goddamn Theo James Braxton.” He blued the air with curses. “I’ll fuckin’ kill you when I find you. I swear to God.”

“Wait—what did you—”

“I knew it,” he said, his breath coming in pants. “I knew—I should have left—I should have gone home.” He turned, long enough for her to see the emotion splashed across his face. “You said it was nothing. You told me to stay.” He pulled open the door.

“Did you say Theo James…?” Something clicked inside Summer’s head. Nausea washed over her.

You know the way to County Route 78?

I’m lookin’ for an address. Old buddy of mine.

Name’s Theo.

“Is he—” Oh God, she didn’t want to ask. “He isn’t…six feet or so, muscular, greasy dark hair? Grayish eyes?”

Damian stared at her. “Yeah.” His voice was flat. “Why?”

“He was downtown yesterday. Outside Flo’s.” Suddenly she felt like Alice in a black, black wonderland, with everything she thought she knew turned upside down. “He asked me for directions, and I…”

Damian froze. Still as stone, his mouth twisted in anguish, he waited as she stammered on.

“I didn’t—oh, God…” What had she done?

“You told him where we live?” His eyes changed from sky blue to almost black.

“No, I—he said he was looking for a friend.” Repeating Theo’s explanation out loud sounded even more ridiculous than she could have imagined. “I didn’t know who he was.” Damian couldn’t be blaming her for this. Could he? “Let me come with you. Let me help.”

“Don’t bother.” His face was as empty as his voice. “You’ve done enough.”

He paused for an awful second at the bottom of the porch steps, and then he broke into a run, heading through the trees toward the farmhouse as fast as he could. He didn’t look back.

* * * * *

Summer crept back to the bedroom, stunned. Minutes passed. Maybe hours. She bent at the waist and dry-heaved. She could barely process what had just happened. Her vision blurred as the room wheeled around her.
Dinah—gone. Hannah—betrayed. Damian—furious, and with good reason.

“My God.” She dropped her head into her hands. Yesterday, brilliant and cloudless, had begun like any other. How had it wound its way to this ending? She curled into a ball on the bed and let the tears drip between her knees. T.J., or Theo, or whatever his stupid name was, had taken Dinah. He’d broken into the farmhouse, into all of their lives, and ripped away a child. And she’d given him directions to the front door. Then told Damian not to worry when he heard a noise in the middle of the night. Her heart ached, and she thought she might throw up.
It’s my fault
. She crawled to the bathroom and hung her head over the toilet bowl.

“Do you like my brother?”
Dinah’s cricket voice echoed in her head.

“
How much do you like Gabe?”
Donnie used to ask her. “
Do you like him? Or really, really like him?”

Summer wept harder. They sounded so much alike, more than she’d ever realized.

She pressed her fingertips against her eyelids. Again she saw Donnie in the back seat of the car. Then Dinah dancing in the circle under the oak trees. Donnie teasing her with a garter snake. Dinah handing her a bouquet of flowers. Their two voices whispered inside her head, over and over again, until another voice rose above them and the memory shifted yet again.

“Let me drive. Please?”

“No. You can’t. I will.”

“But you’ve been drinking.”

“Only one beer. Maybe two.”

He laughed, and in that moment she thought she’d probably let him do whatever he wanted.

“No, I’ll drive.”

“You’ll get in trouble.”

“It’s only five miles. And it’s clear. See? Full moon. Lots of stars.”

He kissed her, right there, in front of her brother, until Donnie made gagging noises and pleaded for them to stop. Summer didn’t care. She wanted to kiss Gabe—love him, breathe him in—for the rest of the night.

“Let’s go.”

“Okay. But be careful.”

“I will…”

Summer sat up and pressed her hands to the tile floor to stop them from shaking. She’d never remembered that part. Never. Her mind had always stuck on the minutes just before and after the accident. It had never rewound far enough for her to see earlier in the night.

Until now.

Now—oh, God—now she remembered everything about the accident. Everything about the crash, Donnie’s death, the whole amazing loss of that night—and it wasn’t Gabe’s fault at all.

“It was mine.”

* * * * *

Damian ran down the path as fast as he could. He gagged and a single string of saliva escaped his lips. Somehow, he wished he could drop to his knees and be sick as a dog to rid the terrible feeling in his stomach.
T.J. found us. He took Dinah
.
It’s my fault.

Like a rhythm, the words beat a terrible staccato against his skull. In the half-light of dawn, shadows surrounded him. A branch caught him across the cheek, drawing blood, but he barely noticed. Moments later, he burst from the trees where the path met the stone driveway of the farmhouse. An officer stood on the porch, one hand on his holster.

“Whoa! Hold it right there.” He drew his gun.

Damian froze, hands in the air. Gravel sprayed around him as he slid to a stop. “I’m—” For a minute, he couldn’t catch his breath. “Damian Knight. Hannah’s son. Dinah’s my sister.”

The officer eyed him but kept his hand on his gun. “Lemme see some ID.”

Damian reached for his wallet with shaking fingers. It fell to the ground. “Shit.” He scooped it up and pulled out a dog-eared license. He stayed where he was and held it out.

“Slowly.” The officer beckoned Damian forward.

Damian climbed the steps. “Please. You gotta tell me what’s going on with my sister.”

The officer took an eternity reading his license before handing it back. “I’m Officer Burdick.” He shook Damian’s hand in introduction and with the other pushed the door open behind him. “My partner’s inside taking your mother’s statement.”

“How is she?”

“Holding up.”

“And Dinah?” He almost couldn’t ask, didn’t want to hear the response.

“We’ve issued an Amber Alert and closed the roads out of town.”

“Mom?” Damian barreled down the hallway. Every lamp in the house burned, filling the small rooms with brash, unnatural light. In the living room, an end table lay on its side with magazines scattered across the carpet. Broken glass crunched under his feet.

Jesus Christ
. The last six years, all he’d worried about was this, T.J. tracing them to New York, to Pine Point, and hurting his mother and sister. He’d been so careful. He’d locked the doors and lain awake at night tense with listening. He’d warned his mother again and again. Yet somehow, T.J. had broken through the cracks of their life anyway.

Hannah sat at the kitchen table with another police officer opposite her. He looked to be twenty-five at the most, and Damian wondered what kind of experience the kid had. Writing a few traffic tickets? Checking for underage drinkers at the town bars? Pulling a drunken husband off his wife? He couldn’t imagine anyone in Pine Point was equipped to deal with a kidnapping. He sure as hell wasn’t.

The baby-faced kid with the dark blond crew cut stood and offered his hand. He spoke in the same clipped tone as his partner on the porch. “Mornin’, sir. My name’s Officer Wallace.”

Damian didn’t answer. “Are you okay?” He hugged Hannah’s thin shoulders and tried to stop them from shaking.

She remained silent. A crumpled tissue in her hands twirled around and around her fingers until it shredded and fell to her lap. Her left cheek, red and swollen, was beginning to purple. Tears tracked a path to her chin and dripped off onto the table.

Damian forced himself to pull open a drawer and find a frayed towel. He dumped some ice cubes into it and wrapped it closed at both ends, the way he had so many times in the past.
Sick
.
I’m going to be sick
. “Mom?” Frightened, he leaned down and stared into the depths of her gaze. He held the towel to her bruised cheek and stroked the back of her hair with one hand.

“Mom? I’m right here.”

After a long minute, Hannah blinked, and her eyes readjusted to the light. Her head leaned into his touch, seeking comfort. Pupils swelled and saw him. “Damian.” The word fell from her mouth and bounced onto the floor, void of expression. With an unsteady hand, she reached up and took the makeshift ice pack from him.

“She hasn’t said too much since we arrived,” Officer Wallace began, “but she was able to give me a brief statement.” He flipped the pages of a small spiral notebook. “She was in the kitchen making breakfast, heard something out back of the house…” He frowned at the notepad. “When she looked out the window, she saw the suspect. She attempted to secure the door—”

“It was unlocked?” How many times had he told his mother to keep the deadbolt fastened? Not that it mattered. T.J. could have broken it off with one hand.

“I’m not sure if it was locked or not,” the officer answered in a neutral tone.

Not judging, Damian thought, just doing his job. Gathering and reporting the facts.

The man kept his face down and continued to read. “She attempted to secure the door, but the intruder forced it open before she could. He threatened to hurt her if she didn’t tell him where Dinah was, and when she didn’t—”

Good girl
.

“—he pushed her out of the way and went through the house looking for the girl. Did some damage in the living room and hallway—”

“I saw.”

Officer Wallace cleared his throat. “He found Dinah upstairs in her bedroom and carried her out to the car. According to your mother, she appeared to be a little confused but not frightened. Happened approximately…” he looked at his watch, “…forty-five minutes ago.” He closed the notepad.

Tears continued to drip down his mother’s face, and every so often she raised a hand to wipe them. Under the kitchen lights, the moisture on her fingernails gleamed, like an odd manicure painted by grief.

“I’m sorry.” She pressed the towel to her cheek with a weary hand.

“Don’t you dare apologize. You didn’t do anything wrong. It’s not your fault.”
It’s mine. I wasn’t here to stop him
. Enraged, guilty, helpless with grief, he wanted to cut his own throat, tear out his hair, run to the roof and jump off into blackness, as if the pain would somehow bring back his sister and punish him for his negligence all at once. He couldn’t believe he’d been careless enough to spend the night at Summer’s.