Weightless (36 page)

I pointed the flashlight to follow his gaze, illuminating something shiny and small near the back wall. Rhodes glanced back at me questioningly before taking a step toward it.

My heart hammered in my ears as we inched between the boats. When Rhodes and I rounded the front of the boat, he bent slowly, retrieving the object on the ground.

“What is it?” I asked, voice just above a whisper. Rhodes was staring at whatever was in his hands so intently I wondered if he even heard me.

“Oh my God.”

“What?” I leaned up to look closer. “What is it?”

He shook his head, forehead wrinkled between his eyebrows. “It’s hers.” He held the object out to me — a bracelet. It dangled over his pointer finger as his eyes found mine. “It’s Lana’s. She wore this every day.” He swallowed. “It was a gift from me when we turned sixteen.”

My heart stopped.

It was a small, dainty bracelet — a thin chain with one solo pearl charm. Their birthstone. Carefully, I reached out to touch the cool silver and rolled the pearl between my fingers, bringing away a film of dust with them. “It doesn’t seem like it’s been worn in a while.”

“What the hell?” He shook his head and I was at a loss for words, too. Nothing was making sense. “Do you think it’s the person who took her? Did it happen here?”

“Maybe,” I said, my stomach knotting at the thought. The soft click of the shutter sounded as I pulled out my camera and took a photo of the bracelet still hanging from his fingers. Every hair on my body was standing at attention, my fight or flight instincts kicking in. I hadn’t been scared before, but I was now. “It wouldn’t be weird for it to be left alone back here. These are the vacationer boats. The employees are lucky if they get sent down here more than once a year to pull one of these boats out.”

“And you’re positive that the note had to have come from here?”

I glanced around, trying to find one of the stationery pages stuck in the window of one of the boats around us. Scanning the windshields, I finally found a sheet four rows down. Peeling it from its careful placement, I held it up for Rhodes to inspect.

“See the bottom logo?” I asked. He nodded, and I pulled the note he’d found on his bike from my pocket. When I held them up next to each other, there was no refuting it. There was just a tiny little piece of the logo on the bottom of the note from Rhodes’ sister, but it was there. I snapped another photo.

Rhodes pinched the bridge of his nose. I knew his head was spinning, too. “What the fuck is going on?”

“My thoughts exactly,” a rough voice responded. Rhodes and I turned quickly and were met with a blinding white light. Instinctively, Rhodes threw himself between the offender and myself, serving as a human shield.

The light dropped, and my stomach fell right along with it when I realized who was holding it.

A cop.

“Shit,” Rhodes muttered.

The cop was young, maybe in his thirties, with caramel skin and a dark buzz cut. His eyes were shaded, but soft, as if he didn’t like busting us any more than we liked getting busted. My eyes adjusted to the light difference and I noticed his name badge read
MARTINO
.

“Do you two realize you’re trespassing right now?”

“I’m sorry sir,” I tried, maneuvering my way around Rhodes. “It’s my fault. I just wanted to—”

“And do you realize that because you climbed over that fence to get into a clearly marked no-trespassing property, you could face a first-degree trespassing charge?” He shook his head, almost like he was our parent, before calling out some sort of code into his radio along with our location. “Couldn’t even be smart about it. Flashlights? Really? I saw them from the road.”

“And do
you
realize you’re being a class A fuck boy right now?”

“Rhodes!” I warned, shocked at his disrespect. I was trying to talk us out of the situation, Rhodes was ready to make it worse.

“Wait,” Officer Martino interrupted. “Rhodes? As in William Rhodes?”

Rhodes didn’t answer. His jaw ticked and he kept his hard eyes trained on the cop, who was now looking at Rhodes in a completely different way. It was as if he recognized him, or as if he was seeing a ghost of his past rise right out of the ground. I knew Rhodes was in and out of juvie when we were younger, but had that reputation really stuck for this long?

“Copy. Calling the property owner now,” a woman’s voice called over the radio fastened to the officer’s hip, breaking the awkward silence stretching between us. It was my turn to add another twist to the night.

“Here,” I offered, reaching into my pocket for my phone. The officer pulled his gun, pointing it straight at my chest.

“Whoa whoa whoa!” Rhodes stepped in front of me again, scowling at the cop. “Are you fucking crazy?”

“Keep your hands where I can see them!”

I panicked, dropping my phone completely and letting it shatter on the ground as I lifted my arms above my head. “I’m sorry,” I said with shaky voice. I sounded weak, and in that moment, maybe I was. I’d never been in trouble with law enforcement. I didn’t know how to act. I didn’t understand why this man looked at me like a criminal. “I was just going to call him for you.”

“What are you talking about?”

Shifting on my feet, I glanced at Rhodes before answering. “I’m Natalie Poxton.” My eyes found the officer’s just in time to see recognition set in. “The property owner is my dad.”

I’d never stared at my feet for so long.

My eyes were tracing the stitches on my Keds, following the lining of the laces through each hoop and back. I could hear Mom tapping her finger on the edge of the kitchen counter and even though I hadn’t looked yet, I could feel Dale’s eyes on the point of contact where Rhodes’ hand held mine. None of us had said a word since Officer Martino left, and I definitely didn’t want to be the first to break that silence.

Disappointing Mom and Dale wasn’t something I was used to. Before now, my only offenses had been minor party incidents that they usually scolded me for before breaking out into laughter. It was child’s play. Something all teenagers in Poxton Beach went through.

This, however, was not.

“Mr. and Mrs. Poxton,” Rhodes started, his deep baritone sounding so foreign beneath the blanket of silence we’d been under. “I just want to apologize for our actions tonight. Natalie had nothing to do with what happened. It was my idea.”

I snapped my attention to Rhodes, mouth open and ready to correct him, but he gave me a stern look that made me shut it, instead.

“Well that much is obvious,” Dale retorted. “But you’re notorious for bad ideas, aren’t you, Rhodes?”

“Dale!” Rhodes squeezed my hand tighter, but I refused to let Dale talk to him that way.

“Don’t raise your voice at us, young lady,” Mom warned. I couldn’t remember the last time she’d called me
young lady
.

“Mom, it wasn’t his fault. It was my idea to break into the boat barn tonight.”

“Honey,” she said the pet name with a hint of sympathy, as if I didn’t know what I was saying.

“It’s true! It was my idea. And I’m sorry. But look, nothing was taken, we didn’t break anything. We were just…” My voice trailed off when I realized I couldn’t exactly tell them what we were doing.

“You were just
what
, Natalie?” Dale probed. His brows were set in a firm straight line over his hard eyes.

“I can’t tell you.” I murmured the words, just barely audible over the hum of the refrigerator.

“Why?” Mom asked. She was heated, angrier than I’d ever seen her. I glanced to Rhodes, but that only fueled her fire. “It’s clear that whatever you were doing, it was something you didn’t want us finding out. And that won’t fly in this household.”

“I’m sorry. It won’t happen—”

“Again?” Dale asked, laughing a little. “Oh, you bet your ass it won’t. I don’t know who you’ve become hanging out with this delinquent,” he added, gesturing to Rhodes. “But stealing my keys and trespassing on a property you know you shouldn’t be on is absolutely unacceptable.”

“Stop talking about him like he’s not standing right next to me!”

“Bug, it’s fine,” Rhodes soothed, rubbing the pad of his thumb along my hand. “I’m just going to wait outside.”

“Oh no you are not, young man,” Mom said. She was shaking slightly, her face red and blotchy. “You are never to see my daughter again. Ever. Do you hear me?”

“Mom!” I choked on her name, my heart jumping to attention at her implication. It didn’t slowly accelerate. It jumped. It galloped. I felt it threatening to break through the confines of my rib cage.

“Do not argue with me, Natalie! Now I have had enough of this nonsense. Rhodes was your trainer and that was all he was ever meant to be. Clearly he has seduced you, that much is obvious, but that all ends tonight. I will not stand for this any longer.”

“Are you serious?” I cried incredulously. I dropped Rhodes’ hand, stepping toward her. “Do you
hear
yourself? Do you hear the way you’re talking about a human being who’s standing right here in your kitchen?”

“This isn’t up for discussion.”

“You don’t get to decide what I do with my life!”

“As long as you live under this roof, we do. Now stop disrespecting your mother and walk him out,” Dale demanded. He wouldn’t even say Rhodes’ name.

“Then I’ll move out!”

“And go where?” Mom asked incredulously. “You’re not enrolled in college, you don’t have a job, and you won’t have a cent to your name if you disobey us.”

“I’m not staying away from him.” I shook my head, my eyes blurring with tears that quickly bubbled and fell over my cheeks. Faintly, I heard our front door close, and I whipped around to find Rhodes gone. “Rhodes?”

“Just let him go, sweetie.” Mom reached out to touch my hand but I jerked back. I plead with my eyes for her to stop, for her to wake up and realize what she was doing, but she remained unmoved.

“You’re awful,” I whispered, my eyes bouncing between the two of them. “Just because you have your own fucked up shit going on doesn’t mean you have to drag me down with you.”

“Natalie!” Dale chastised, but I turned on my heel and sprinted out the door without another word.

I expected Rhodes to be gone, but he was still standing in the driveway, hands in his pockets, facing the road. The moon was barely a sliver that night, and the darkness only made me feel more helpless as I walked slowly toward him. My steps were soft, the night was quiet — such a contrast from the war raging inside me.

Sliding my hands through the space between his arms and his middle, I wrapped myself around him, pressing my forehead into the hard muscles of his back. He was shivering, just slightly, just barely enough to notice.

“I’m so sorry.”

He cleared his throat, lifting one arm to pull me into his side. “Don’t be.”

“I can’t believe them. If they think I’m going to listen to them, they’ve seriously lost their minds.”

“They’re right, Natalie.”

I lifted my head from his chest and glanced up at his stoic expression. “What? Rhodes, no, they’re not. They don’t know anything about you.”

“And you do?” he challenged, dropping his hold on me. I was suddenly so cold.

“Yes,” I whispered, though the way he was looking at me made me feel like I shouldn’t be so sure. His emerald eyes were wild, mouth pressed into a thin line, jaw set.

“I’m not right for you, Natalie. I don’t fit into this life. Into
your
life.”

“Stop, Rhodes. You know they aren’t me.”

“But this
is
your life, Natalie,” he said again. “This is how it’s supposed to be for you. It’s what you deserve. Great parents, a nice house, a rich husband with the means to take care of you.” He licked his lower lip, his brows knitting together. “You deserve a good life, one without the pain I’ve already brought you and that I know I’ll bring continually, over and over again. I’m trouble. I’m fucked up. I have baggage. I have weight.”

“You’re none of those things!” I argued. “You’re strong. And passionate. And you’ve pushed me to be someone I never knew I could be this summer.”