Chapter 33
Chapter Thirty-Three
Layla
F rantic knocking woke me from a deep sleep. It took me a second to get my bearings. The room was still dark because the curtains were drawn, but daylight seeped around the edges. I’d gotten to bed late. Nash and I had a hard time parting. We’d talked until nearly dawn, until a hazy gray light had started to creep into the eastern sky, then Nash walked me home and kissed me goodnight … or good morning, I supposed.
Ella wasn’t in her bed, which didn’t surprise me. She was with Rhett, and Isla and Ava had stayed out all night, too. There was another knock, which reminded me why I woke from the deep sleep in the first place. I pulled on my shorts, a sweatshirt and flip-flops and walked to the door. A moment of terror struck me. What if it was Dustin on the other side? Nash and I’d had such a wonderful day together, I’d all but forgotten about Dustin’s unwanted visit.
I stopped at the door. “Who is it?”
“It’s me, of course,” Emily said in exasperation. “Didn’t you get my message?” My phone was on the charger in the kitchen, and I hadn’t looked at it yet.
I opened the door, and Emily burst in. She looked me up and down and rolled her eyes. “Seriously? Armageddon hits the town, and you’re still sleeping? It’s nearly nine.”
“And my day off and one of the few days I get to sleep longer than the sun.” There was enough chill in the cottage for me to zip up my sweatshirt. If anyone else had used the word armageddon, I would have been alarmed, but to Emily, the end of the world was always just around the corner, and it was usually something far below the catastrophe level—like she broke the strap on her favorite purse or dropped her phone in the gutter.
“You didn’t get my message? Where are your sisters? Surely, they’ve heard since Isla’s bakery and Aria’s café were hit.”
“I’m the only one home. What are you talking about?”
Emily grunted in frustration, but I sensed she was thrilled that she had some major news to break. “Someone walked through town last night and broke a bunch of shop windows. The bakery and the café got hit.”
“That’s crazy. Are you sure?”
“Saw the damage with my own eyes.”
I hurried into the kitchen and yanked my phone from the charger. There were five messages from Isla, Aria and Ella combined.
I flicked my finger across the screen to listen to the voicemails, but the front door opened and Ella walked in. “Have you heard?” she asked.
“Emily was just telling me.”
“I had to wake her up,” Emily said.
“Tattletale. I didn’t get much sleep.” It wasn’t a lie. I just didn’t fill in the details of why I lacked sleep. “How bad is the damage?” I asked. “Do they know who did it?”
“The damage was to front windows, and I know both Aria and Isla have insurance to cover it, but there’s glass everywhere, and everything in Isla’s front window will have to be thrown away. I talked to Officer Tuttle.”
Emily giggled. “I’ll bet he was more than happy to give his favorite Lovely sister a few details,” Emily teased. Owen Tuttle or Officer Tuttle, as we all called him even though it felt weird, had had a long running crush on Ella.
Ella ignored Emily’s comment. “A few cameras picked up someone dressed in black pants and a black hoodie. They’ve concluded it was a male by the way he walked and carried himself. He kept his face well-hidden, and it was dark. He was carrying a baseball bat. When I was talking to Owen, outside of the café, he got a call from the precinct that they’d had an anonymous tip come in about the suspect’s identity, so he rushed off to learn more about it.”
“You were at the café?”
“I was helping Aria and Dex sweep the front sidewalk. Isla is over at the bakery with Luke and Rhett. I was chosen to go home and find out why our little sister wasn’t answering her phone.”
I smoothed my hair back. “I sleep in one morning, and the whole world unravels. So typical.”
Ella turned her head. “Who’s that? Someone just pulled into the driveway.”
“Probably Ava,” I said as we headed to the door.
Ella pulled it open. “It’s Owen.” The police car had pulled into Audrey’s driveway. “I wonder what he’s doing.”
Emily gasped. “Do you think Nash is the culprit?”
I shook my head. “Boy, you sure are ready to throw your true love under the bus fast. I’m sure it’s a mistake. Nash didn’t do this.”
“How can you be so sure?” Emily asked.
And there it was—my giant blob of a lie back to remind me it was still lurking around. “I just am,” I said dismissively.
Officer Tuttle hadn’t seen us come up behind the squad car. He straightened his belt, walked up to the door and knocked. Nash didn’t answer right away, and I knew why. He’d only just gotten to bed a few hours earlier.
“There sure are lots of people sleeping late today,” Emily said with a sideways glance.
“Nash Ledger, this is the police,” Owen said sternly through the door.
“Maybe Emily’s right,” Ella said. “It sure doesn’t seem like a cordial visit.
Rocky started barking wildly, and Tuttle backed up a step. The door opened a few seconds later.
“Oh, he looks so sleepy,” Emily whispered. “But still incredibly handsome.”
Nash stepped out on the stoop, and his puzzled gaze instantly found me. I shrugged to let him know I had no idea what was going on. Ella moved closer to the scene, so Emily and I followed.
“Nash Ledger?” Tuttle asked.
“That’s right. What’s going on?” Nash’s face smoothed, and he looked worried. “Did someone get hurt?”
“No, but there was some significant damage in town to the shops, and we had an anonymous tip that someone saw you smashing windows with a bat.” Tuttle pulled out his notepad and opened it. “They said it was the singer with the viral song. They recognized you from the video, apparently.”
“Oh wow, he did do it,” Emily whispered. “So disappointing.”
“I’ve been here all night, so the tip was wrong,” Nash said.
“Then you won’t mind if I have a look around,” Officer Tuttle asked.
“Go ahead.”
Tuttle turned around and realized we were close by. “Excuse me, ladies, I’ll need you to step over to your property. This is official police business.” He gave Ella an apologetic smile, and at the same time, I got the sense that he was enjoying getting to play the important officer with dangerous business.
Nash looked at me.
“You’re wrong about this, Owen. I mean Officer Tuttle.” Owen kept up his search of the landscaping around the cottage. For a second, he paused with a serious look. He pulled on a latex glove, pushed his arm into a shrub and pulled a baseball bat free.
Nash’s chin dropped. “That’s not mine. I’ve never played baseball. I didn’t do this.”
Officer Tuttle placed the bat in his car. “Nash Ledger, I’m going to take you in for questioning.”
I raced forward. “No, he didn’t do it. He has an alibi. I was with Nash until early this morning.”
Behind me I heard Emily suck in a gasp-y breath. Officer Tuttle turned around and looked at me. “Are you telling the truth?”
Ella stepped forward now with her arms crossed. “Did you just ask my baby sister if she’s a liar?”
Tuttle’s face turned red. “Uh—no—I mean, I’m just making sure he has an alibi. After all, I just found the bat used in the attack in his shrubs.”
The cat was certainly out of the bag and the box and whatever else a cat might get itself into, so I walked across to stand next to Nash. “I was with him all night. We were right here in this cottage.” I avoided looking in Emily’s direction. This was my fault for not telling her earlier. Now I’d had to drop the news like a bomb.
“Layla and I were here all night. Someone is trying to frame me.”
And as he said it, I figured out who. “Your anonymous tip—was it a man?” I asked.
“Yes, he wouldn’t give his name.”
“That’s your culprit,” I said. “Start with Dustin Iverton. He might just be your man.”
Officer Tuttle looked disappointed that he hadn’t caught the vandal, but something told me there’d be an arrest soon. “I might need a signed statement from both of you,” Tuttle said.
I nodded. “Just let us know.”
Officer Tuttle got in his car, phoned something in on his two-way radio and drove away. I finally found the courage to look at Emily.
She scowled at me, turned and stormed over to her car.
Ella watched her peel out of the driveway. “I take it Emily still didn’t know you two were seeing each other?”
“No,” I sighed. “Me and my stupid blob.”
Both Nash and Ella looked at me.
I shrugged. “It’s a long story. I’ll give her a few hours and then go see her. She probably won’t talk to me for a week, but we always find a way to patch things up.”
“That’s true,” Ella said. “I’ll let you two talk. I’m going back to town to help with the cleanup.”
“Tell Aria and Isla I’ll be there soon.” I turned back to Nash and immediately walked into his waiting arms.
“Thanks for that and I’m sorry about Emily,” he said.
“Nah, she’ll be fine. I’m sorry that I got you into this. If not for me, Dustin wouldn’t have come up with this diabolical scheme.”
“Hopefully, a few months’ jail time and some serious legal bills will knock that guy on the noggin. He really needs it.”
“He does. And I take back what I said about starting to feel sorry for him.” We stepped into the house. Rocky was waiting for us at the door. His tail wagged wildly when he saw me. “I guess someone is waiting for a walk. What did you decide about the song?”
“We’re going to sell it to the record company. I already let Becky and Mom know the operation was a go, and they’re nervous and excited. I sure hope this helps.”
“I think it will. I can feel it in my bones.”
Nash laughed and pulled me to him. “You can feel it in your bones?”
“Yep, it’s something Nonna always said, and she was always right.”
Nash lifted my chin and kissed me lightly on the lips. “I think I’ve found the most beautiful good luck charm in the world.”
“Or maybe I’m your lucky penny.” I pointed at my hair.
“Definitely my lucky penny.”
A ll of us spent a good two hours cleaning the shattered glass from the sidewalks and the shops. I sat in the café, staring glumly at the plywood Rhett and Dex had used to cover the ugly gaping hole left behind by the broken window. Ella and Isla were busy grilling Nash about our new relationship and I sat with Rhett and Jack, talking about mental health and the things that caused people to go this far off the deep end. Rhett knew too well about that. We all did. His ex-wife tried to murder Ella by locking her in Rhett’s coach house and setting fire to it. We all still shuddered knowing how close our dear sister came to a grisly end.
“Bacon and tomato sandwiches coming right up,” Dex yelled from the kitchen. The comforting smell of bacon had already helped bring us all back to earth some after the crazy start to the day. Ella had spoken to Officer Tuttle. When pressed, Dustin confessed to all of it. He told Tuttle that our breakup had pushed him to the brink of a nervous breakdown. It was hard to believe the whole thing had been so hard on him, but then like Jack had explained—everyone deals with problems differently. Some people just don’t have the right coping mechanisms to keep things in perspective.
My phone rang. It was Emily. “Excuse me, guys, I need to take this.” I hadn’t spoken to Emi since she’d stormed off from the house. Frankly, I was pretty nervous about it. “Hey, Em.” I said gently.
“You should have told me. I feel like a fool after going on about Nash and talking nonstop about my dream of being his wife and the whole time?—”
“No, it wasn’t the whole time. And I’m sorry, Emi. I’m a coward. A terrible coward and I let a big blob of lies grow into something so big, I couldn’t get control of it.”
She giggled. “Like the horror movie? Remember when we watched that and we laughed through the whole thing because the special effects and acting back then were so campy?”
I released such a long sigh; I blew some napkins off the table I stood over. “Will you forgive me?”
“I guess so, but I want full access to all the details of your romance.”
“Well, I don’t know about full access, but I’ll fill you in when appropriate. I have to say, Em, I was sure you’d give me the cold shoulder for a month. I’m glad that’s not the case.”
“I figured you went through enough with that creepy stalking act from Dustin, and there’s nothing I can do if Nash prefers you. Plus, well, I’ve sort of been keeping a secret of my own.”
Dex carried out a tray of bacon and tomato sandwiches and plates piled high with fries. We’d all worked up a big appetite.
I refocused on the phone call but those fries weren’t making it easy. Aria spotted me across the way and waved and pointed at the food as if it needed pointing out. I waved to let her know I was coming.
“What’s the secret?” Emily’d had lots of big ta-da announcements that turned out to be less than awe-inspiring.
“I’ve been texting back and forth with Connor, the guy working at the fish and tackle store.”
“Really? He’s cute and very sweet. I’m happy for you.”
“He’s no Nash Ledger, but we made a date to have a drink next week.”
“Fun. That sounds promising. Hey, Emi, Dex just made some delicious sandwiches so I’m gonna eat. I’m really glad you’re not mad.”
“You know I can’t stay mad at my bestie,” she said.
“Love ya.”
“Love ya, too.”
I hurried back to the food tables. Nash patted the chair next to him and winked. I sat down beside him. Isla lifted her glass of soda. “I’d like to welcome the newest member of our group, Mr. Nash Ledger. I hope we don’t scare you off, because I’ve seen the way my sister looks at you, and I think you’re a keeper.”
Nash nodded with a shy smile.
“To the newest member of the group,” Ella cheered and everyone followed.
And just like that, I was no longer a third wheel or a ninth wheel or a spare wheel, in general. Plus, I got a really cool dog out of the whole deal.