Knot Me In Paradise (Whispering Grove #6)

Chapter 1

ADELAIDE

It’s funny how when you’re trying to get away from your own life, you don’t realize how appealing someone else’s might seem.

I’m currently sharing a coffee with my brother in what might be the warmest café I’ve ever been inside in my life.

And I’m holding a mug of something sweet called a Snow Bear Latte.

I only got into town a week ago, and after missing my brother like crazy, it’s been nice living with him and his pack and feeling like part of a family again.

Now, I’m watching Chris, the same guy who once superglued his hand to a skateboard and called me crying from a ditch, staring at his Omega, Hannah, like she personally invented the concept of morning light.

It’s the most disgusting thing I’ve ever seen.

And I’m absolutely losing it over how much I love it.

Then there’s my hometown of Whispering Grove, which feels utterly unreal.

The main street alone is a picture-perfect scene of shop windows adorned with Christmas decorations, delicate little white lights strung between lampposts, hand-painted signs in the windows of the bookshop and the flower place, and they’re playing festive tunes from outdoor speakers.

That’s dedication. It’s snowing outside, big, lazy flakes that drift rather than fall, settling on the windowsill in an undisturbed line. I might be in a fantasy right now.

Honestly, it’s a lot. I lived in Los Angeles for the last few years, and it doesn’t get that cold there.

Hannah’s been talking almost continuously since we sat down at the café, which I mean as the highest possible compliment. She’s constantly smiling, those brown eyes sparkling, and she’s just gorgeous.

“Okay, so I need you to tell me I handled it correctly,” Hannah says, fork hovering over her avocado toast, “because Chris thinks I was aggressive.”

“I said assertive,” Chris adds.

“Nope, that’s not what I heard.” She grins, then turns to me.

“One of his bounty targets showed up at my corporate dinner last weekend. Forty guests. Senator’s wife at table three.

And this one”—she points the fork at Chris—“walks in mid-service in his work clothes and escorts the man out through the main dining room.”

I look at my brother. “Chris.”

“The job had a window,” he admits. “But it worked out, as no one left the event and they were safer with the guy removed.”

“If you say that one more time, I’m telling Adelaide about the penguin documentary.”

Chris goes quiet.

I stare at him as he picks up his coffee, not making eye contact with either of us.

“Which documentary?” I say, smiling.

“We’re not doing this,” he states.

I glance at Hannah. She mouths, Penguins, and holds up two fingers for how many times he cried. I press my lips together hard and stare at the table.

“I can see both of you.” Chris makes a grunted sigh.

That’s when I burst out laughing because I can’t help myself, Hannah joining me.

He stares at me for a moment, the way he’s been doing since I arrived, like he’s trying to work something out.

“You should stay permanently here in town with us,” he finally blurts out.

It’s not the first time he’s floated the idea, but today there’s more weight behind it.

“A buddy of mine has connections in town, and there’s a creative agency here that’s smaller than what you’re used to, but the work is solid.

It would be great to have you around more often. ”

“I don’t know.”

“I’m just saying there’s space. And we’ve been doing this thing for too long.”

“What thing?” I ask, except he gives me that look and I know exactly what thing.

Where we love each other very much from a comfortable distance, calling on birthdays, sending voice memos at weird hours, meaning to visit and then not visiting.

The thing where we’ve been doing that for so long now that neither of us quite knows how to close the gap without it feeling like a big deal, which means it stays a gap.

“I know,” I admit.

“So then stay,” he says plainly, like it’s the most logical conclusion in the world.

I’m thinking about how to say something about what’s actually happening to me and why I came to Whispering Grove. How I intended to ask for his help with a situation, when I lift my gaze.

It’s a reflex. I’ve been doing it constantly since I left LA, glancing at doorways, checking windows, remembering who’s where in whatever room I’m in.

I didn’t use to be like this. I wasn’t this person a month ago.

But the version of me that existed before that night in the hallway outside Daniel’s office, when he was still both my boss at the advertising agency and my boyfriend, seems like someone I knew a long time ago, and this is who I am now, apparently.

Someone who can’t get through a café breakfast without scanning the street.

And right now, there’s a man standing to the left of the flower steore entrance across the road.

He’s really big, with a heavy jaw, close-set eyes, and a physical density that takes up space even when someone’s standing still.

His coat is dark, his hands are in his pockets, and the snow is coming down around him, yet he’s paying absolutely no attention to it because he isn’t watching the street.

He isn’t watching the shop windows or the people passing or any of the things others watch when they’re just existing on a pavement.

He’s completely still and stands out in this small town.

I’ve seen it once before. In the corridor outside Daniel’s office, on a night I had no business being there except that I wanted to surprise him and thought it was a good idea.

I had the key. I could hear voices through the ajar door, and I paused in the corridor with my hand raised to knock, but something made me stop, some animal instinct firing before my brain had processed why, and I just stood there in the shadows and listened.

The voice I didn’t recognize was low and unhurried. That was the frightening part, how unhurried it was.

“You need to handle him,” the deep voice commanded. “Or this comes back on you, Daniel. And you won’t like what I do when it does.”

“I’ll deal with that fucker, Thomas Cassidy,” Daniel stated.

I didn’t see the stranger’s full face, only his side profile through the thin crack of the ajar door when he shifted slightly.

Dark hair. Strong jaw. Leather jacket stretched over broad shoulders.

He stood with one hand in his pocket, a scar down the side of his neck.

I stayed frozen in the shadows, staring through that narrow gap, and knew with absolute certainty that I needed to get out of that corridor before he ever realized I was there.

I pressed the elevator button and walked inside the second the doors slid open.

Just before they closed, I glanced up and saw Daniel step out of his office and look straight down the corridor.

Maybe he was only checking the noise. Maybe he didn’t see me at all.

But the doors slid shut with his head turning in my direction, and the look on his face sat cold and heavy in my stomach the entire ride down.

Rushing out onto the street, I stood in the night for a full minute before I could breathe normally.

Two days later, I saw the name Thomas Cassidy on the morning news.

Found deceased and dumped in a local river.

I sat on the edge of my bed in my apartment with my coffee going cold.

I read the news three times and thought about Daniel saying that name, quietly and carefully, in that conversation.

I thought about “You need to handle him.” I thought about what handling it clearly meant to the man with that voice and that stillness.

Daniel had already called me twice since then. I hadn’t answered. I hadn’t gone into work either. I was still staring at the article when my phone lit up again, this time with a text from Daniel.

I know you were outside my office that night.

My whole body went cold. A second message came through before I could even think.

We need to talk, Adelaide. Don’t do anything stupid. Don’t go anywhere. I can explain everything.

Like he’d explained it to Thomas Cassidy?

And then I started making plans to leave, starting with blocking his number on my phone so he couldn’t get hold of me anymore.

I don’t know if the man across the street is the same stranger from Daniel’s office. It was dark, and I barely had more than a side view with shadows. I go completely quiet and glance back at the café table, trembling.

Hannah is cutting a slice of hummingbird cake she ordered into thirds. Chris is saying something about the Saturday market and road closures.

I smile, pick up my coffee, and take a sip. It’s still warm, sweet, and I taste absolutely none of it.

Under the table, my knees are bouncing, and I unlock my phone and type with my thumb, glancing down every now and then. Call me right now. Make it sound like an emergency.

I sent it to Clio, my bestie, who lives in Oahu, Hawaii.

I nod at something about road closures, then accept my piece of cake. I take a bite and tell Hannah it’s incredible, which it genuinely is, and I mean that from some distant part of me that still has access to normal responses.

Outside, the strange man is gone. My heart is beating faster.

My phone rings.

I stare at the screen with a small frown. “Sorry, one second, it’s Clio.” I answer.

Clio says in a fast whisper, “What’s happening? Are you okay? What do I say?”

“Wait, slow down. What happened?” I say. “Are you serious?” And then: “No, no, don’t worry. I’ll sort it out. I’ll be there, okay? Give me a day or two.” Then I hang up and stare at Chris with an expression I’ve carefully arranged into something that reads as reluctant rather than desperate.

“Clio’s in a bit of a state. She had a horrible breakup,” I explain. “I think I’m going to need to cut this short. She really needs someone there.”

The table goes silent.