Chapter 10
Ten
B ennett walked into the bar on Mill Street in downtown Lexington wearing a decades old T-shirt that he’d stolen back from Mia that morning. He’d told her she could have it back when she stripped it off of him. He was still grinning about her short and very blunt response to that while scanning the sea of faces. It was lunchtime and the crowd was thick, but he could see Matt Crawford’s shaved head standing a good six inches over everyone else’s.
“Bennett,” Matt called out unnecessarily. “Over here.”
Bennett sidled up to the bar and ordered a beer. At just twelve thirty, it was a little early, but it had been a hell of a night. “Hey, man! Thanks for meeting me.”
“No problem,” Matt said, clapping him on the back. “You piqued my curiosity. What the hell is going on in Fontaine these days?”
Bennett looked around casually. “I need a favor, it’s about Mia.”
“That can of worms needs to be closed, sealed, burned, and the ashes fucking scattered. Will you never learn?” Matt said.
Bennett didn’t argue the point. Matt wasn’t saying anything to him that he hadn’t thought himself a dozen times over. “Little too late for that, the thing is, Matt, she’s in some kind of trouble.”
“On a scale of ‘I need help moving a couch’ or ‘could be going to jail for something that will never allow me to vote or own handguns again’ what are we talking about?”
“I think someone tried to kill her.”
Matt set his beer down on the bar. “You’re gonna have to back up on that part.”
Bennett sighed. “Did you hear about the accident?”
“Yeah. Wet roads and a spin out. She drives like a bat out of hell. Always did.”
“I know that,” Bennett said. He explained about the car, the tracks at the scene, and Mia’s reports of a dark SUV. “Then I saw it. Parked across the street from Revision.”
Matt shook his head. “That’s all circumstantial, Bennett. Yes, it’s fishy, but it doesn’t mean anything.”
“I approached the SUV and they took off so fast they left half their tires behind. There’s something to this, Matt.”
Matt leveled a hard stare at him. “I’m not saying you’re wrong. But you could be reaching. You like to be the hero. More to the point, you like to be her hero.”
“That’s not what this is about,” Bennett said, his tone even and without heat.
On a heavy sigh, Matt asked, “So who am I checking out?”
Bennett smiled. “It’s nothing major. Her name is Erica McCoy. She works at Fire Creek and she’s dating, if you want to call it that, Samuel Darcy.”
Matt rolled his head on his shoulders. “Thanks for bringing this shit to my door. No one ever just calls me to go out for a beer.”
“We’re still having a beer,” Bennett said. “I’ll even buy.”
“In that case, I’m getting a better brand,” Matt said and signaled the bartender. After he’d ordered another round, he turned back to Bennett. “You know my sister was tangled up with a Darcy a while back. They have any relatives in Ireland as far as you know?”
Bennett laughed. “Don’t give me shit about this when you’re doing fishing of your own.”
Matt didn’t even bother to look guilty. “Loralei had it bad for this guy and he really did a number on her. I don’t have anything against Mia, Clayton, or Quentin, but they’re not a bunch you want to tangle with if you don’t have to.”
“Why is that?”
“Because they’re all still circling around Samuel like he’s the center of the damn universe,” Matt answered. “Milk curdles when that son of a bitch walks past it. Never did like him.”
“Tell me how you really feel,” Bennett said with a grin before taking a long pull from his beer.
At that point, Matt’s phone went off. He cursed. “Looks like you’re going to have to owe me that beer for a while longer. I’ll text you anything I find out about Erica McCoy, specifically any vehicles registered to her that might fit the description.”
Bennett thanked him and watched Matt go. While he was in town, he thought he’d swing by and see Loralei. Heading out of the bar, he walked the few short blocks to Loralei’s shop. Set between an upscale wine market and a jewelry store, it screamed “money.”
Opening the door, the little bell above it tinkled. Immediately, Loralei came from the backroom, holding some creature in his hand that might, if you stretched the imagination to the breaking point, be considered a dog. “What the hell is that thing?”
She wagged her finger at him. “Haven’t seen you in a month of Sundays and the first thing you do is insult my dog?”
Bennett grinned and then hugged her, ignoring the disgruntled huff from the creature in her hand. “Baby, I hate to break it to you, but whoever told you that thing was a dog—well, they just lied.”
“This is Churchill,” she said, pointing to the tiny, black pug that was snuggled in her hand.
Against his own better judgment, Bennett gave the little thing a scratch on its head. Immediately, its tongue dropped out of its mouth and it was panting happily. “All right. It’s a dog. I wouldn’t call it a smart dog, but it’s a dog.”
“Oh, no. Churchill isn’t smart,” she agreed readily. “He’s a dumb as a box of rocks. It’s part of his charm. And speaking of charm, what brings you to town? You never come here!”
He lifted the pug from her hand and cuddled it. It couldn’t be more than a few months old. “Why on earth did you slap a dignified name like Churchill on this poor ignoble creature?”
“He isn’t named after a prime minister,” she stated, moving behind the counter. “He’s named after the cigars that belonged to my stepfather. After he chewed up the last one, Franklin told Mama that he had to go.”
Bennett winced. “That had to be ugly.”
“Oh, it was. Franklin was shouting down the roof, but that’s the benefit of being somewhat less than brilliant like Churchill here. People yell and scream and you just don’t care,” Loralei added, with a cheeky grin.
That smile took him back to days of cutting school and cruising around in an old beat-up car with her and Mia and whatever boy Loralei was crushing on at the time. She’d never settled on any one of them for long, though. Still, he missed those days. Sunshine and giggling girls in short shorts. “I’ve missed you. You ever coming back to Fontaine?”
“As long as my mother remains married to Franklin Bell, that would be a big no. She comes to town, we have lunch. She tells me I’m fat and should only order a salad. I cry. She gets offended and goes home. It’s our monthly routine,” Loralei added. “What about you? You can come to Lexington anytime you want. I keep telling Savannah whenever I see her that she needs to think about opening up another store here.”
“It’s on the table,” Bennett said. “We need to build up our stock a little more, but the damn stuff sells quicker than we can make it or find it. Speaking of siblings, I just had a beer with your brother.”
Loralei rolled her eyes. “What was he bitching about now?”
“He’s not real fond of your ex-boyfriend. Wondered if maybe there was a family connection between your ex and mine.”
“Matt needs to learn how to keep his mouth shut,” she said quietly. “I don’t know if Ciaran has any connection to the Darcys or not. We’re not exactly on speaking terms these days.”
“Did you ever wonder?”
She shrugged. “He was very good at distracting me whenever I asked questions about his past. Now, I’ve got a question for you, Bennett! Why are you suddenly so interested in the Darcys again?”
Bennett considered telling her, but then thought better of it. Loralei would be nothing but a cheerleader for him and Mia, but there was no point in getting her hopes up just to dash them. Mia had made it very clear that whatever was happening between them at the moment was only temporary.
“Just curious,” he hedged.
“I have never, in all my life, seen two people who belonged together more than the two of you.”
“She left me, remember?” There was a little bit of anger in his voice, a little bit of the hurt pride still rolling under the surface.
Loralei looked at him archly. “She had reasons. Good ones that you don’t understand yet. Hopefully, someday you will.”
He shook his head. “You still stick together on everything, don’t you?”
“I might not see her often anymore, but I’ll always have her back. And vice versa. Don’t break my girl’s heart, or I’ll make you pay.” Loralei picked up a necklace from the display stand he’d been staring at, a confection of sheer ivory ribbons and amber beads. She put it in a gift box and handed it to him. “Give that to her when you see her. I thought of her the minute it came in.”
He didn’t deny it. There was no point in even trying. Instead, he kissed Loralei’s cheek, then headed for the door. “I’ll be seeing you,” he said softly before exiting her shop and heading home.