Chapter 16
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Stunned, I stared at Tate for a moment. “Weapons? As in plural?” I asked.
He nodded. “I won’t say more than that. Not until you meet with my grandmother.”
Charlie looked shell-shocked, his gaze distant. “I didn’t do this,” he said softly, as though the weight of defending himself grew too heavy.
“I know,” I said vehemently. And then I remembered. “What about that police officer who came to see you?” I turned to Tate. “Don’t you have those reports? Surely more questions would’ve been asked if someone had been here only hours earlier and didn’t notice anything odd?”
His eyebrows lifted in realization. “That’s what you were going on about at the ranger station. I thought you were hallucinating.”
“What?” I asked, confused.
“You talked about Charles Randolph like you knew him. You said a police officer came to visit him, but that’s not real.
I checked. There’s no record of anyone coming out to the lookout that day.
You looked like death warmed over, though, so I thought it was all nonsense.
Uh, sorry,” he added in Charlie’s direction, cringing.
“It wasn’t nonsense,” I cut in, angry again. “Someone came to see him.”
Charlie focused on Tate. “It’s true. A police officer came out to ask if I’d seen anything unusual.”
Tate eyed him suspiciously. “Do you remember their name? What did you tell them?”
Charlie shook his head. “I don’t remember his name.
He was young. Twenties, maybe? Said he was the sorry deputy saddled with hiking all the way out here to talk to the lookouts.
” He shrugged. “He wasn’t here very long.
I gave him my observation logs, and that’s really it.
He said he’d pass them on to the ranger station for me unless there was something necessary for the investigation. ”
“You gave him your logs?” Tate asked, tone sharp.
“Wait,” I interrupted, holding up a hand. “There’s no record of this at all? How is that possible?”
Tate made a non-committal noise. “It’s been almost forty years. Some information gets lost in the shuffle.”
If smoke could come out my ears, it would’ve.
“Fuck that,” I snarled. “Lost in the shuffle? A cop was here hours before he disappeared and didn’t notice a goddamn murder weapon?
And that was somehow overlooked when they decided to wrap this up and put a pretty bow on it?
Sure, blame it all on the missing guy, who isn’t around anymore to defend himself! ”
I stood and paced, gesticulating with my hands.
“Get the fuck out of here with that. His family suffered for years because of that lazy excuse of an investigation. More people are going missing, now! And let’s all be transparent for once—they’re dead.
I saw what he did to that bobcat. What if it wasn’t a cop that came to see Charlie, huh?
What if it was the killer? Did no one look into this at all? ”
Tate looked cowed. Rocky perked up from his nap, whining softly.
“We’re trying to do the right thing, this time,” he said softly.
“I’m trying to do the right thing. I don’t know for sure who was responsible for the murders in eighty-six, and I don’t know who’s responsible for the ones in the last few months.
Maybe it’s the same person, maybe it’s a copycat. We don’t know yet, but we are trying.”
He looked at Charlie. There was less hostility in his gaze, now. “If…” he took a deep breath. “If you’re not the one to blame, your memories will help. Even if you didn’t see the killer’s face, there could be details you don’t realize are important.”
Charlie nodded. I sat back down next to him and took his hand again.
“I’ll do it,” he whispered.
I squeezed our linked fingers harder than I should’ve.
“Alright,” Tate said. “Thank you. If I can arrange it, would you be able to come to my grandmother’s house? Are you able to leave the lookout?”
Shit. I hadn’t even considered that.
“For short periods, I’ve been able to manage it. It’s much easier with Reece. If I’m with him, I think I can go. Or we can try, at least.”
He nodded. “When’s your next supply run?”
“In a couple of days,” I answered. The band around my chest tightened even more. I wasn’t ready for it to be that soon. What if it went wrong? What if Charlie disappeared forever? I needed more time. We needed more time. There was still so much I wanted to do with him, to say—
We can’t lose him, the Thing wailed. We can’t, we can’t, we can’t—
It’s not my decision.
It bared its teeth at me and slinked off.
“I’ll see if I can swing it,” Tate said. “Work’s hell right now, obviously, but I’ll talk with my grandmother and ask her about seeing you.”
“Is that okay with you?” I asked Charlie, hating every single word of this conversation.
He nodded and squeezed my hand back. “Sure. Yeah. Great.”
Rocky’s loud bark cut through the cabin. He leaped up, front paws on the windowsill, and continued to huff and growl even after Tate’s command to hush.
“What are you hollering at?” he asked as we all stood to see for ourselves.
Randy sat on the railing outside, chattering back at Rocky as if scolding him for all the racket.
Finally, she’d found someone besides me to be angry at.
“Oh, it’s time for her hot dogs!” Charlie said.
He pulled one from the package on the counter and stepped outside, ripping it into pieces. His dimples appeared when she ignored Rocky in favor of washing her tiny paws in the water bowl he kept out for her, before reaching for the first piece of hot dog he left on the railing.
“You two seem… close,” Tate said, keeping his voice low.
I cleared my throat and turned back to him, realizing I’d been caught staring. “Yes.”
He raised an eyebrow. “How do you know you can trust him?”
“You didn’t see how broken and angry he was when I told him he’d been blamed for murdering six people in cold blood.”
Tate sighed. “I hope you’re right, for your sake. And be careful. Not just because of that, but… He’s a ghost, Reece. That will never end well—for either of you.”
My mouth set in a hard line. “We’ll see.”
He sighed, shaking his head. “You’re a stubborn ass.”
“And you’re just an ass.”
He laughed, hearty and deep. Something shifted between us, like the walls of pretend cordiality finally fell. For the first time, I thought that maybe, someday, we could be friends.
Charlie came back inside, his gaze darting from me to Tate before he slipped Rocky the last bit of hot dog with an ear scratch. Wordlessly, he went to fill the water kettle.
“Alright, buddy, time to go,” Tate said to Rocky, strapping the hands-free leash across his shoulders. “I’ll give you a call to sort things out. Pick up this time, please,” he added with a raised eyebrow.
I waved him off one last time before he disappeared into the trees, then turned to Charlie. “Making tea?” I asked.
He nodded without turning around to face me. “It helps. To ground me, like you said.”
I walked up behind him and wrapped my arms around his shoulders, squeezing as hard as I could. It only took a few seconds before he softened, set the kettle down, and turned around to mirror my tight embrace.
“You’re tense. I know you’re worried about—” he began, but I interrupted.
“Can we not, for a little bit? Please?” I whispered. “I just want to hold you right now.”
He sighed deeply. “Yes.”
We were quiet for a few minutes, breathing each other in. “Tate likes you,” Charlie said after a while. “Or liked you, maybe, before he saw you holding hands with a ghost,” he mumbled into my chest.
I hummed. “To be fair, I think the part where he thinks you might be a murderer is the bigger hill to climb.”
He huffed out a short laugh and squeezed tighter. “You skipped the first part of what I said.”
“I did, because it doesn’t matter. It didn’t before you, and it certainly doesn’t now.”
“He’s alive.”
“So are billions of other people. I don’t want them, either.”
“He’s handsome.”
“You’re more handsome.”
“Josh was more handsome,” he replied testily.
I’d told Charlie about how I was diagnosed, and everything that’d happened that day and shortly after. He’d asked to see a picture of Josh, and scowled at my phone when I showed him an old one of us.
I kissed Charlie’s cheek and pulled back to look him in the eye. “One of the first thoughts I had about you was how shockingly beautiful you are. I was deeply upset the scary ghost pushing me over the railing was so hot.”
He rolled his eyes. “I did not push you. I saved you, you—”
I kissed him, slow and deep. I loved the way his body reacted to my touch—muscles loosening and leaning in for more.
“Yes, you did,” I whispered when I pulled away. “In more ways than that, Charlie. And I don’t want anyone else.”
Ever.
“Reece.” His fingers danced up my spine, clinging to my shoulders.
“Let me help,” I said, voice low and gruff between nips along his jaw line.
“With what?” he breathed.
“Grounding you. Keeping you here, with me. I bet I can do a pretty good job. At least as good as the tea.”
He smiled, guiding me to suck at his exposed collarbone. “What did you have in mind?”
“Well, I could use my hands,” I palmed him through his joggers. “Or maybe my mouth.”
He sucked in a sharp inhale.
“Or whatever else you’d like.”
“Anything else?” he asked, voice cracking halfway through.
I took his mouth again, relishing in the warmth I found. So real. So mine. Please be mine.
“Something you have in mind?” I asked, nipping his full bottom lip once more before pulling away to gauge his answer.
He fidgeted with the elastic waistband of my pants, bringing our hips flush. “You know I’ve never been with a man before you. I have with women, though. Do you ever…” he hesitated.
“Do I bottom?” I asked.
He blinked and then nodded.
“I have before. It’s not my preference, but if it’s something you want to try, we can.”
That skiff of pink dusted his cheekbones. “And if I wanted to try?”
“Do you?”
“Would that be okay with you?”