18. Chapter Eighteen
MATT
Matt spent a quiet evening in. He helped his younger half-siblings with their homework, and then he and Kass watched a docudrama on Netflix about serial killers—which might have been disturbing if Kass wasn’t thinking about studying criminal psychology.
Afterward, he sparred with Kieran and talked about what to include in the martial arts classes Matt was going to teach at BodyWorks.
Then, he went into the study, pulled up a search engine, and typed in the names from that article Anna had been looking at in the library.
One of them was running for governor. The other two were the candidate’s personal bodyguards. All three were rumored to have mob ties.
What possible interest could Anna have in them?
Matt stepped outside, wanting to clear his head. The air was crisp and cool, but no longer bitingly cold. His hoodie was more than adequate.
He paced back and forth, appreciating the quiet and stillness of the neighborhood. Grass was already growing, tips peeking through the quickly disappearing snow. Soon, the trees and flowers would be budding, and they’d be hitting the home center for his mother’s annual haul of foliage for her landscaping beds.
He’d missed the changing of the seasons when he was in Central America. The turning of another page every three months. The different weather, different scents, different things to do from one quarter to the next. He would make a point of appreciating it while he was home. Depending on where he was sent next, it might be a long time before he got the chance to experience it again.
With an exhale, he called Ian and relayed the information he’d discovered, pacing the stone walkway that ran around the house as he did.
He was on his third or fourth lap when he felt it—the sensation of being in someone’s sights. Not just someone. His enigmatic new neighbor.
He stepped into the shadows and discreetly looked up to Mrs. Campbell’s place. Yep, there she was. Standing before the kitchen window, backlit by a bright light so that she appeared as a dark silhouette, but there was no mistaking who it was.
“Matt. Yo. You still there?” Ian said through the speaker.
“Yeah, sorry,” Matt said, resuming his pacing.
“You’re watching the pretty girl next door, aren’t you?” Ian said with a dark chuckle.
How could he?—
Matt looked up at the outdoor security camera and sighed. “Does Kieran know you access his security feed?”
“Who do you think asked me to install the system?” Ian asked. “For the record, I almost never abuse the privilege. Now, as I was saying, I’ll look into those names, flip a few rocks, and see what crawls out, but if we’re talking mob connections, it wouldn’t hurt to talk to some people too.”
“Like who?”
Ian replied in his best Italian accent—which was actually quite bad—“I know a guy.” He followed that up with, “Let me make some calls. In the meantime, keep your eyes on the pretty girl. You know, just in case she decides to do something villainous.”
Ian was still laughing when Matt disconnected the call and shoved the phone into his pocket. He could take the ribbing from his uncle, but what he absolutely could not shake was this growing obsession with Anna Black.
Did he believe she was up to no good, as Eddie Campbell seemed to suspect? Not really. She just didn’t seem the type. Then again, those who were truly good at their craft—like him, for example—were skilled in creating and maintaining false personas. Was the quiet, reserved woman who’d sat across from him at the diner the real Anna Black? Or just what she wanted people to believe?
She did have secrets. Of that he was certain.
Matt looked up at his neighbor’s house again. All appeared to be dark now, except for the low-level light in the kitchen. The sense that he was being watched remained, however.
The question was, why? Did she, despite her earlier rebuff, secretly find him attractive? Or was she learning as much as she could about the people around her for, as Ian had jokingly said, villainous purposes?
He wouldn’t get answers to those questions tonight, but tomorrow was a different story.
Matt stepped back into the house, surprised to find his mother still awake.
“What are you still doing up?” he asked.
“I had a sudden burst of inspiration and wanted to sketch it out before I lost it,” she said.
He glanced at the open sketchbook. “Gardens?”
“Yes! Did you know that garden design was a celebrated art form during the Hellenistic period? Aidan’s expanding the resort again, and he wants to add luxury villas that contain lush year-round gardens. Mary and I are meeting tomorrow to go over ideas.”
Aidan was Aidan Harrison, owner and CEO of the Celtic Goddess franchise—the five-star restaurant and luxury resort where Faith worked as an interior designer—and a very close friend of the Callaghans. His wife, Mary, ran a nursery and flower shop in Birch Falls and was known for doing fabulous interior arboretums and botanical displays.
“Mary’s handling the greenery,” Faith continued. “I’m trying to come up with a room design that complements it.”
“You’re off to a good start. These look fantastic.”
“You’re a good kid,” Faith said, beaming. “I just made some hot chocolate. Want some?”
“You read my mind.” When she went to get up, he said, “Sit. I’ll get it.”
After topping off her mug and pouring one for himself, he joined her at the table.
“What were you doing outside?” she asked.
“Nothing really. Just taking it all in.”
Faith nodded knowingly. “I do that, too, sometimes. It’s important to know where you are. Even more so to remember where you came from.” She sighed. “Twenty years ago, all I wanted was to get to a point where I could put food on the table, a roof over our heads, and clothes on our backs. Never in a million years did I think we’d ever have all this.”
“Or that you’d have six kids,” he said with a smile.
She laughed. “Very true. But I’m certainly not complaining. You guys keep me young.”
She was young, only fifteen years older than him, thanks to his piece-of-shit sperm donor. Thankfully, his biological father wasn’t part of his—or her—life and hadn’t been for many years.
“So …” she said, and he braced himself for whatever was going to come out of her mouth next. “What do you think about Anna?”
Why did everyone keep asking him that?
“Mrs. Campbell’s personal caregiver?” he asked, as if there was another Anna she might be referring to. He shrugged. “She seems nice. I don’t really know much about her.”
“Is that why you asked Ian to look into her background?”
Matt wondered if Kieran had said something, but Kieran wasn’t the type to share that kind of information. Ian was. Croies talked, and Ian’s wife, Lexi, was co-owner of the Goddess. They knew a hell of a lot more than the guys gave them credit for.
So, Matt told her about Eddie Campbell hiring a PI. He didn’t mention that he’d seen the PI tailing Anna in town because then he’d have to admit that he was doing some investigating of his own. When he finished, Faith was frowning.
“What?” he asked.
“I saw Eddie tearing out of Mrs. Campbell’s driveway a few days ago. I was getting ready to head out myself and had to slam on my brakes to avoid getting hit.”
“Was Anna there yet?”
“I think so. I’m not exactly sure when she started, but I bet that’s when Eddie found out about her.” Faith was quiet for a few minutes, then sighed and said, “You know, if we want to know more about Anna, maybe we should try to get to know her the old-fashioned way—by talking to her.”
He didn’t tell her that Ian had suggested the same thing.
“Yeah, I don’t think it’s as easy as that,” he said with a wry smile.
He told her about “running into” Anna at the diner. He didn’t admit that he’d been following her, for obvious reasons. Or that Mrs. Campbell had slipped the fact that Anna would be alone and unchaperoned into casual conversation.
“She shot you down, huh?” Faith hummed, trying not to smile. When he nodded, she said, “Leave it to me.”
“What are you going to do?”
Her response was a crafty smile.
All it took was a phone call to Mrs. Campbell the next day. Faith laid one or two subtle hints that Matt wanted to know more about Anna—not the why of it, of course—and Elsa took it from there. She’d already been riding the Matt-and-Anna train, and she was thrilled to have an ally in Faith.