12. Chase
12
CHASE
“ I need a fucking beer,” I grunted as I stormed into Will Solomon’s basement. Someone stuffed a bottle into my hand.
Isaac wrinkled his nose. “What crawled up your ass and died?”
Luca raised his eyebrows. “Damn. And I thought my woman was crazy.” He stared at me like I had rainbows shooting out of my ears. “You alright, man? You look like?—”
“Looks like he hasn’t gotten laid,” Steve snickered from behind his beard.
I pinned him with a sharp glare, but it did nothing to erase his shit-eating grin. What I wouldn’t give for him to go back to being a broody asshole…
That wasn’t completely true. No one should have to go through the pain of losing a spouse. Losing Heather nearly killed him.
“I was gonna say he looked like shit, but yeah. Also celibate,” Luca said with a laugh.
I chugged the beer and tossed the bottle in the bin. “I’ll remind you of that when you’re up at two in the morning changing diapers that are actually covered in shit.”
“How’s Maddie?” Steve asked. “She’s in her second trimester now, right?”
Luca shrugged and ran his hand back through his hair. “Moody as fuck, but at least she isn’t throwing up at all hours of the night anymore.”
“Ay, yo,” Will called from the door. His hands were resting on top of the frame as he leaned in. “Steve.” He jerked his head in the direction of his office.
Steve got up to see whatever it was that Will wanted. Figuring that it was about the case against Kingsley, I followed.
“You’re off this one,” Steve said as he passed me.
“Solomon’s not even a cop,” I argued.
“Civilian consultant brought in to consult ,” Steve said. “Go drink another beer and talk about how cold your bed is.” When I didn’t move, he said, “If there’s something actionable, I’ll let you know.”
Good enough for me. I walked back and dropped down into the recliner that Steve fancied. Served him right.
Jason walked in, looking worse for the wear. Isaac tipped his chin up. “Hey, man.”
Jase nodded as he snagged a Cheerwine out of the fridge. “Glad your pilot landed when he did. Looks like we’re gonna get a few days of shit weather.”
“How bad is it looking?” Luca asked.
“Tropical depression. It’ll dump rain for a few days, but nothing we’d have to evacuate for,” Jase said. “Why? You traveling?”
Luca smirked. “Nah. Mad and I just have a thing for hurricanes.”
“Yeah, I know,” Steve muttered as he walked back into the room. “Next time it rains, remember that your house faces mine.” He shuddered as he grabbed a beer.
Luca looked quite pleased with himself.
“Cheers to working out,” Jase said as he popped the top on his Cheerwine and took a sip. “And a break from insane women.”
The first time we invited Jason to one of our workout sessions, he thought we were actually serious about breaking a sweat.
“Whom we love very much,” Will clarified as he walked in and sat on the couch. He looked at me. “How’s Bee?”
I shrugged. “Ask her brother.”
Jase raised an eyebrow. “She still being frosty with you?”
“Frosty as a snowman’s tits,” I muttered.
“Is she doing alright?” Luca asked, getting everyone back on track.
Jase shrugged. “She came by the airfield yesterday. We talked for a while.”
That was news to me. She must have gone while I was at work.
Apart from a few appointments to get her life back on track like opening her own bank account, she had gone to work and stayed home. The fact that Luna was over at the cottage more than she was at my house prevented me from demanding proof of life from Bee.
“She’s looking better,” Jase said, “But her head’s fucked up.” He balled up his fist as he stared a hole in the floor. “I pray to God that the cops find him before I do.”
“I’ll post your bail,” Isaac said. “And if I kill him, Solomon will post mine.”
Will nodded in agreement.
“I’m just gonna pretend like I’m not hearing any of this,” Steve muttered.
“What does she need from us?” Luca asked. “Maddie went to the cottage a few days ago to take her some meals from the restaurant, but Bee wouldn’t open the door. Mad took it to the bar and had Wanda hold it in the cooler for her.”
“I dunno,” Jase sighed. “She says all she wants is space, and I’m trying to give it to her. But at some point, she’ll isolate herself even more than she was before.”
He wasn’t wrong. When Bee was still with Kingsley, she would come to poker nights. She worked every waking moment at the bar. She would attend girls’ night and go out to lunch with whichever one of the ladies was free.
But since gaining freedom, she had voluntarily locked herself in a smaller cage.
“You know, if she wants to get out of Beaufort for a little while, she can use my condo in LA or my place in New York,” Luca said. “I’m not traveling much since Maddie’s pregnant.”
“Hannah Jane is going to the city with me next week,” Isaac said. “So if she wants to go to New York, she won’t be alone.”
I hated all of that.
It made me a selfish asshole, but I didn’t want Bridget to leave. Hell—the cottage was farther away than I wanted her to be, and it was spitting distance from my porch.
I left the porch light on every fucking night, hoping she’d come over. The ball was in her court the after I walked away from her. But instead of making a play, she left the game.
It stung.
I couldn’t count how many times I’d picked up my phone to text her. Hell, I had almost tied a note to Luna’s collar and sent her over there like a carrier pigeon.
But I didn’t. Just like all the years I wasted not telling her how much I loved her. How much I wanted her.
I shouldered some of the blame for what she had been through. I had been more concerned with not fucking with the dynamic among our friends than going after the girl I really wanted.
For years, everyone speculated what would happen if Bee and I got together. What would happen if we broke up? Would we both still come to poker night? Would people take sides?
Instead of being straight with her, I had been a coward and let her fall into the hands of a predator.
“Where’s your head at?” Steve asked as we left Will’s house and walked down the long driveway.
“Wondering why I’m not on the Kingsley case,” I clipped. “I can fit another one in my caseload right now, and it’s fucked up that you and chief are turning down an extra set of hands.”
“Dude, you’re a good cop. I know that. Chief knows that. The whole damn precinct knows that,” Steve said as he lingered by my car. “But if I had to guess, Bee is trying to forget about what she’s been through rather than dealing with it. She’s gonna lose it sooner rather than later, and when she does, you need to be available to her. Not buried under a shitload of dead leads.”
Unfortunately, that had already happened.
When Bridget let me hug her after I stopped her from committing minor arson, I thought that maybe she and I had made some progress.
But I was wrong. She only pushed me away harder.
“Have I been wasting my time?” I asked in frustration as I stared at the sky.
Ominous gray clouds loomed on the horizon. The Atlantic was brewing one hell of a storm. I was thankful that Jase had helped me re-shingle the cottage.
“She won’t even fucking talk to me.”
“Would you say I wasted my time with Heather?” Steve asked. “What if I told you that back in third grade, I knew that Heather would die before her thirtieth birthday? What if I decided to love her anyway? Would you have told me I was wasting my time?”
“Hell no,” I blurted out. “You and Heather?—”
He clapped his hand against my shoulder. “Loving someone is never a waste of time.”
I swung by my parent’s place on my way home from Solomon’s mansion. They lived in a fifty-five-plus community not too far inland. Conjoined townhomes dotted the lane. Professionally maintained landscaping kept the neighborhood pretty as a picture.
My mom had already busted out her fall decorations. It didn’t matter that we would still battle ninety-degree heat for another month. As soon as pumpkin spice lattes came back, she put her autumn wreath on the door and made my dad go to four different pumpkin patches to find the right ones .
I rapped my knuckles on the glass storm door and waited as their puffball of a Pomeranian lost its mind, yipping and scratching. It was about the size of the hairballs Luna shed.
Spotting an opening when their dog started chasing its own tail, I artfully dodged the oversized rat and let myself in. “Knock-knock,” I called out.
I followed the warm scent of pumpkin bread and found my mom in the kitchen, pulling a loaf pan out of the oven.
“Hi, sweetie!” she exclaimed as she set the pumpkin bread on a cooling rack and yanked off her oven mitts. Her silver hair looked like she had just come from the beauty parlor. She had probably been catching up on all the latest gossip while her rollers set. “How’s Bridget doing? ”
Suspicion confirmed . My mother was about as subtle as a Times Square billboard.
“She’s getting there,” I said, poking at another cooling rack filled with snickerdoodles.
Mom smacked the back of my hand with a spatula.
“Geez, mom!” I exclaimed, yanking my hand back. “What was that for?”
“I’ll pack you some cookies in a Tupperware bin, but I expect you to take them to Bridget. You will return the container when you bring Bridget by for a meal.”
“Mom,” I said gently, not wanting to poke a mama bear. “I don’t know if she’ll be up for that.”
“Well, I didn’t say it had to be today,” she guffawed. “You’ll bring her by when she’s feeling up for it. Sunday works for me. I’ll make chicken fried chicken, snaps with bacon, candied yams with marshmallows, and creamed corn.”
My stomach growled at the thought. She wasn’t holding any punches today. Momma was fighting dirty to get my girl over here for a meal.
“I’m thinking maybe a pecan pie for dessert. Or a coconut cake,” she mused, raising an eyebrow at me. The woman knew my greatest weakness.
I loved my mother but damn her.
“I’ll see when Bee is feeling up to it,” I said agreeably. “But if I happened to show up on Sunday alone, what would I find?”
Mom narrowed her eyes. “Liver and onions. And okra—boiled, not fried. Cottage cheese and mandarin oranges for dessert.”
I dry heaved as she turned around with a victorious smirk on her face.
“I was just stopping by to make sure you and dad have gas for the generator in case the power gets knocked out. ”
“We’ve weathered storms before, Chase,” she tut-tutted. “And we’ll have more after.”
I rolled my eyes. My parents were the live-and-die-on-the-coast types who scoffed at the notion of evacuating.
“When you realize that storms are just raindrops, they aren’t so scary.” She donned her oven mitts and flipped the pans of pumpkin bread. “And as much as I appreciate your visit, you have a lovely woman living in your backyard when she should be in your bed.”
Sheesh!
“Mom!” I exclaimed. My face burned. It didn’t matter how old you got; hearing your parents talk about sex was the worst.
“Well,” she jeered with her hands on her hips. “I’m not getting any younger, and I’d like a grandbaby or two before I die. Bridget is a lovely girl.”
Thirty-three-year-old woman, but okay.
I pinched the bridge of my nose to ward off the matriarch-induced migraine. “For the love of God, Mom,” I groaned. “Do not say any of that if I bring her over.”
She mimed zipping her lips.
“Are y’all good with the storm? Need any groceries?”
She put her hand on my cheek. “We’re fine, honey. But thank you for checking.”
I gave her a wary look.
She rolled her eyes. “If you want to check our storm provisions, be my guest. You know where the pantry is.”
Just to spite her, I went to check. And probably just to spite me, they had actually gone to the Piggly Wiggly to stock up on shelf-stable food and bottled water.
When I walked back into the kitchen, my mom was holding a grocery bag. I took it from her and peered inside. There was a plastic container of cookies and a loaf of pumpkin bread. She had even made it with chocolate chips—the way I liked it. A get-well card was on top.
“Are you psychic?” I asked. “Dad hates when you put chocolate chips in pumpkin bread. And you just happened to have that greeting card on hand?”
She patted me on the arm and walked me to the door. “A mother never reveals her secrets.”
“Love you, Mom,” I said as I leaned down and hugged her.
“I love you, too,” she said as I walked out the door. “And don’t even think about returning those containers if Bridget isn’t with you.”
I shook my head as I jogged out to my car. The rain had picked up, smacking me with hard pelts of cold water. It was a momentary reprieve from the heat that was sure to come back twice as bad in the form of suffocating humidity.
My truck was parked in the drive when I got home, and the lights in the cottage were on.
At least I didn’t have to worry about her driving home in this mess.
My windshield wipers barely made a dent in dispersing the downpour as I threw my car into park and jumped out.
She probably wouldn’t answer the door even if I knocked, so I bolted for my house. I’d walk over there and take her the cookies when the rain broke.
I let Luna out into the yard, and she did her business at record speed. She was a bit of a high-maintenance diva who didn’t like to get her hair wet. I was grateful that she didn’t fancy eau de wet dog .
I stood on the porch, watching Bridget’s shadow move about the cottage as I waited for Luna to bolt back inside. When Luna smacked my shins with her tail on her way in, I did what I always did.
I regretted walking away from her four days ago, turned on the porch light, and went inside.