Safe Harbor (16 page)

And in addition, in all likelihood, from everything that Stevi and the other members of her family had said to him, Crenshaw was probably going to stop by the celebration at some point.

With his luck, their paths would cross, or the man might see him while he didn’t see Crenshaw.

Either way, he was a dead man.

Again.

And this time, Stevi’s family might be made to pay, as well.

Any choice to stay he thought he had left was obviously gone. Because even if he lay low and didn’t attend the celebration, if this Crenshaw was a friend of Richard’s, he was liable to pop up at the inn at any time.

He certainly couldn’t stay in his room from here on until he either died or Crenshaw moved. That was impossible as well as ridiculous.

He had no choice, Mike thought darkly. He had to leave and the sooner the better.

That only made sense. He didn’t need to wait until the last minute. The only reason to hesitate for even another hour was because it meant that he had another hour left to spend with Stevi.

The thought surprised him.

It wasn’t like him.

He’d never gotten attached to a place or a person. Not for as long as he could remember. Attachments were nothing more than heartaches waiting to happen and he wasn’t about to be on the receiving end of something like that. It was too painful, too damaging to his self-esteem. He’d learned how to harden himself against attachments.

And yet, despite that, he could feel this yearning to linger, to squeeze out as much time as he could down to the very last second, because he
knew
he was never going to feel like this again.

Never feel anything for anyone again.

This was just a fluke and once he walked out that door, it was over.

Gone.

“Mike—”

He blinked, realizing that while he had gone off on a mental tangent, Richard had been talking to him and whatever he’d said, he was winding up now.

He did his best to replay the words he hadn’t been paying attention to and make sense out of what was now being said.

“—since we’re talking here, I wanted to ask you to dinner tomorrow night.”

Just how much had he missed? “What’s tomorrow night?” Mike asked point-blank. The man made it sound as if it was something special.

Richard laughed and said almost shyly, “Fourth of July Eve, if you will. I like to gather the family together for a private meal before all the chaos ensues the next day.”

What did that have to do with him? “But I’m not—”

Richard held up one hand. The other was holding on to his grandson’s hand.

“Save it. I know what you’re going to say. That you’re not part of the family. My answer to that is that it takes more than just blood and an ancestry chart to make a family. Say you’ll attend. It would mean a lot to me.”

“And me!” Ricky piped up, as if he didn’t want to be left out and had been quiet, in his estimation, far too long.
“Me!”
he repeated more loudly.

“And me.”

Mike turned to see that Stevi had returned, bearing a box of long nails.

If he demurred or tried to talk his way out of it, it would only draw out the discussion to persuade him to attend—and, short of just walking away, he’d lose anyway. He had no avenue open to him but to say yes.

“Well, put that way, how can I say no?” he asked.

Stevi smiled in response, but even so, she wondered if she was the only one who noticed that Mike
hadn’t
actually said yes to her father’s invitation.

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

“Y
OU
ARE
COMING
, aren’t you?” Stevi asked Mike as soon as her father and Ricky were out of earshot.

He took the nails that she had brought and tucking them into the front pocket of the jeans he had on, he climbed back up the ladder to nail hooks for the remaining lanterns.

“Like I said,” he repeated, his back to her, “how could I refuse?”

Holding on to the foot of the ladder, Stevi pointed out, “That’s not a yes, Mike, that’s just another question.”

Hanging up the lantern, he looked down at her. “Well, then, I guess I’d better say yes to set your mind at ease.” With that, he climbed down again. There were four lanterns left to hang. He moved the ladder over to the next pole.

“I know that they—that we,” she corrected, including herself in the group, “can be a bit difficult to take at times. We might seem as if we come on a little strong—or maybe a lot,” she conceded, “depending on what you’re used to—”

He paused, his eyes meeting hers. “What I’m used to,” he told her, “are people who don’t care. Discovering people who do takes a bit of getting used to,” he admitted, then smiled at her, “but it’s definitely worth it.”

She studied him, attempting to read between the lines. “So you’re not angry?”

The question appeared to take him aback. “Why would I be angry?”

She inclined her head, trying to phrase this just the right way. “Because it might have sounded as if my father was trying to pressure you into attending his private dinner tomorrow night.”

He was surprised at her reasoning, and then shook his head. “By telling me he considers me as part of the family? There’re a lot of ways to get on my bad side, Stevi, but that’s not one of them,” he told her. “I’ll be there,” he promised.

And he intended to keep that promise—then leave right afterward, when they were all asleep. He wasn’t much on goodbyes, couldn’t really remember the last time he’d actually said the words and felt anything. But he’d feel something this time, which was why he wasn’t going to put himself in the position of having to say them out loud. Slipping out quietly would be far better for everyone concerned.

Especially him.

Because if he had to say goodbye, maybe he wouldn’t—and that would ultimately be putting all of them in danger. He couldn’t repay their kindness that way, no matter how much he wanted to stay.

She looked at the last three lanterns in the box. They could easily be put up tomorrow. Because of Mike’s help, she was comfortably ahead of schedule.

“Listen, I’ve been ordering you around for a good part of today. What do you say we just knock off now, enjoy what’s left of the evening?” Dusk was beginning to creep in, creating a very romantic ambiance.

That was fine with him, but he was surprised that she was the one suggesting it. “I thought you wanted to finish decorating everything?”

“We’ve still got tomorrow,” Stevi pointed out. Suddenly, adhering obsessively to timetables wasn’t all that important anymore. Enjoying the evening with Mike was.

“Yes, we’ve still got tomorrow,” he agreed. And that was all he had, he thought.

About to say something else, Stevi stopped and looked at him. Maybe it was her imagination, but there was something in his voice, a finality, for lack of a better term, that made her very uneasy. It was as if “tomorrow” wasn’t one more day, but one
last
day.

“You’re looking at me strangely,” Mike observed, wondering why. “What?”

“Nothing,” Stevi said, shrugging off his question and looking away.

“No, it’s definitely something,” Mike countered.

He’d never been the type to push personal issues. A person’s reason for behaving a certain way was their own business. But there was something in her eyes, something so sad that it touched him and he felt he needed to get to the source of it. Needed to make her stop looking so sad.

Leave it be. The less you let her pull you in, the better it is for both of you. If you connect, leaving’s going to be that much harder. Use your head.

He almost laughed at himself. All those thoughts would have carried a lot more weight a couple of weeks ago. But now? Now it was too late. Stevi had already pulled him in. He was
already
entangled with these people. With her family.

With her.

Leaving them was going to be the hardest thing he’d ever done. And probably the most decent.

Shivering, she ran her hands up and down along her arms. “Ever feel a chill? The kind that means someone just jumped over your grave?”

“I’ve felt a chill,” he replied. “But that was usually because the jacket I had on—
if
I had a jacket—was threadbare. And for the record, I don’t buy into superstitions,” he said. “They’re just fairy tales with a creepy angle.” He looked at her for a long moment, wishing he could hold her. Knowing how unwise that would be. “If you’re chilly, maybe we should go inside.”

“No, I’m okay,” she protested. She wasn’t ready to go inside, to be around other people. She wanted to be with just him. “What I’d like is to take a walk with you on the beach, like we did that night you couldn’t sleep.”

“If that’s what you want,” he said gamely. “Sure, why not? Let’s go.” If she didn’t want him to finish hanging up the lanterns, there was nothing to get in their way.

Taking his hand, Stevi began to draw him away from the ladder and toward the beach. She wanted him for herself for a little while especially since something was telling her that this could all go away before she knew it.

But as she began to draw him toward the beach, he said, “Wait, don’t you want to put everything away first?” She looked at him as if she didn’t know where he was going with this. “So that nothing gets stolen,” he explained.

She laughed softly and shook her head. “This is Ladera. Nothing ever gets stolen here.”

“Yeah, right,” he said, humoring her. Every place had some sort of threat of theft to reckon with. Ladera wasn’t some fairyland and for the most part, people always acted on their worst impulses—at least they did in his experience.

“No, really,” she stressed, putting her hand on his wrist. “This has to be one of the safest towns in the country. People trust one another here. Nobody locks their cars or their houses. And everyone looks out for everyone else,” she added. “We’ve got a police department, but frankly, they’re just for show.” At least that was the conclusion she had come to. “That and for finding lost pets and an occasional kid who wanders off.”

“Like your nephew?”

She laughed. “What’s Dad been telling you? Ricky has more energy than any two kids put together and if one of us isn’t watching him 24/7, he tends to get bored and goes off exploring—not always where he can be all that easily found.”

“He wandered away from your father when Richard was talking to that guy.”

“Who?” she asked idly.

“Crenshaw, I think his name was,” he said, watching her reaction. What he hoped to learn he wasn’t sure, but maybe there was something to be gotten out of this simple exchange. “Know him?”

“You mean Larry Crenshaw?”

“That might have been his name,” he allowed, feeling that if he came on too intensely, he might alert her to the real reason he was probing her for information.

“He and Dad have known each other for years, and I think Dad said he’s a native to the area—just like Dad. From what I can see, Larry’s not a good friend of Dad’s or anything, but they do go way back. I think they were in high school together. Frankly,” she said, lowering her voice as they walked, “I’m glad he’s not one of Dad’s good friends.”

He was instantly alert. Maybe this was something he could use. “Why?”

Maybe she was being unfair to the man, Stevi thought. But he made her flesh creep sometimes. “Nothing I can put my finger on, but there are times when he seems kind of, I don’t know, icky.”

He gave her a highly skeptical look. “That’s not a really very helpful description unless you’re talking about something that you just stepped in or that just melted.”

Stevi shrugged. Ordinarily, she didn’t like talking against anyone. But there was something off-putting of late about her father’s onetime friend. “I’ve caught him looking at times.”

“What do you mean, ‘looking’?” Mike asked. “Looking at what?”

“At me, at Alex, at Cris and Andy. He used to be a really nice guy, but in the last couple of years, he’s been different. There’s something in the way he looks at you that makes you want to take a shower.”

How had they gotten on this topic? Crenshaw and his creepy stare was
not
what she wanted to talk about tonight.

“Oh, don’t mind me,” Stevi told him in her next breath. “I’m probably just imagining it.” She rolled the thought over in her head and decided she didn’t want Mike thinking that she was delusional. “But I have to confess that I’m glad he doesn’t come around much. He just comes by to check things out.”

The tide was coming in and the water flirted with the edges of their shoes as they walked along.

“Check what out?”

“If anyone’s got any complaints, anything gone missing, things like that. Most of the time, the guest has just misplaced whatever it is they think is missing. But it gives Larry something to chase down. I think he wanted to be a cop in Los Angeles and he just couldn’t make the cut. Ladera isn’t exactly the liveliest place if you crave action and I think Larry really does.” As far as she was concerned, they’d spent more than enough time on Larry Crenshaw and his mode of operation. “Why are we talking about him, anyway?”

Mike shrugged off the question. “No reason. Ricky said he thought Crenshaw was boring and that just made me curious.”

“Okay, explanation accepted,” she teased. “While we’re at it, you have any other questions you need answered?”

He slanted a glance at her before asking, “Now that you mention it, there is one, but it’s not about Crenshaw.”

Even better, she thought. She didn’t want to waste the evening talking about the police officer. “Shoot,” she said.

“Why did you stop running?”

She wasn’t sure what she was expecting, but it wasn’t this. She wasn’t sure she’d even heard him correctly. “Excuse me?”

“That first morning we met,” he elaborated, “you were running along the beach. That’s something people usually do on a regular basis. But you haven’t been running since I landed on your beach. I was just wondering why.”

Before she answered that, she had a question of her own.

“How did you know I was running?” she asked. “You weren’t conscious when I found you. Your eyes were definitely shut and it took me a couple of minutes to get you to respond, so how did you know I’d been running?”

“I felt the rhythm. You were running and coming toward me at a steady pace. I could feel every one of your footfalls telegraphing themselves through the wet sand.”

He’d been lapsing in and out of consciousness and he had realized that? “I’m impressed.”

“Don’t be,” he told her. “The mind does funny things to you when you’re at death’s door.”

The phrase brought with it a very real shiver down her back. “I’d rather not think about you being at ‘death’s door,’ thank you.”

He didn’t dwell on her response. It would only take him in a direction he’d already barred himself from taking.

“Nevertheless,” he told her, “that’s where I was. At death’s door. If you hadn’t come along, I would have died. You saved my life.”

The phrase made her smile. She’d never been so glad to have been in the right place at the right time. “You know, in some ancient cultures, my saving your life would mean that your life was mine to do with as I wanted.”

“And if it was,” he asked her, “if my life was yours to do with as you wanted to, what would you do with it?”

“Easy. I’d set you free,” she said without hesitation. “The only thing one person should own of another is their heart.”

He laughed softly. “Now, there’s a romantic notion.”

She smiled up at him as she felt that warmth that only he could create spreading inside her. “I suppose that it is.”

Mike looked at her for a long moment, hopelessly tempted to recreate that wondrous, singular moment from the first time they walked together on the beach when his lips touched hers.

But he held himself in check, knowing that to give in wouldn’t be fair. Not to her.

So he did what he could to hold himself at bay, tamping down the desire that kept insisting on rising to the surface.

What surprised him was how hard that was to do.

A good deal harder than it should have been. Emotions used to be nonexistent for him. That wasn’t the case anymore.

“You didn’t answer me,” he said.

Was that her heart beating so hard? Stevi wondered. It was almost as if she was waiting for something to happen, something to sweep her away from this reality to another, far more tender world.

“About what?” she asked him quietly.

Why was it so hard to keep his mind focused on what he was saying? Why did he keep envisioning taking her in his arms, losing himself in her kiss? He was acting like some lovesick puppy, not the hardened law enforcement agent he was.

“About why you stopped running,” he finally said.

“You,” she told him, breathing out the word.

That didn’t make any sense. “You stopped running because of me?”

She nodded, then jumped when the cold water came rushing back to shore again, overlapping her feet as it went.

“Yes,” she answered.

Mike shook his head. “I don’t understand. I didn’t ask you not to run. I don’t have anything to do with your running,” he pointed out, unable to follow the logic she’d used.

“Yes, you do,” Stevi countered, then explained to him how the process worked so that there would be no doubt in his mind.

“If I’m running, I can’t spend that time with you. And the first couple of weeks you were here, you needed a lot of care, a lot of looking after. I couldn’t ask anyone else to do that. I didn’t want anyone else doing that,” she confessed.

He looked at her, surprised by the intensity in her voice and further surprised by what she said next.