Chapter Seventeen – Kian
Kian
Leaning back in my chair, I smiled as I looked at my laptop. The words were flowing, and I was nearly halfway done with the book. My phone beeped and I glanced down to see it was Cadie. Her furniture had been delivered two weeks ago, and we were both staying at the cabin, much to Sally’s dislike. She really enjoyed having us around. On the other hand, I loved the privacy of the cabin and being able to spend time with Cadie. We had spent hours just talking and getting to know one another, which is why I think she’s helped with my writer’s block.
Cadie: Aurora just came into the bakery. She invited me to a book club meeting this evening. We didn’t have any plans, did we?
I smiled. I was so happy to see Cadie opening herself up to more people. Last week, I introduced her to Aurora, who owned The Book Nook, and they hit it off instantly.
Me: No plans. That actually works for me. I’m on a roll with the book.
Cadie: That is amazing, Kian! Okay, great! I’ll text when I’m leaving to head home.
Me: Sounds good. Have fun, Cadie.
Cadie: Thank you! Happy writing.
I smiled as I pushed back from my desk and walked into the kitchen. Cadie had insisted I bring in a desk and set it up in the corner of the living room. I had been leaving and going back to the guest house to write, and it made more sense to put a desk here for me to work. Cadie and I hadn’t talked much about our relationship and where we saw things going, but with me practically living with her in the cabin, I felt we both knew. I grabbed a water and looked around the cabin. It wasn’t huge, but I kind of liked the coziness of it, and I knew Cadie did as well. She was used to living in a condo in Boston and not having much room. My condo in New York City was at least twice the size of the cabin, but I didn’t miss that place one bit.
Walking back to the desk, I sat down, read what I had written, and was about to start typing again when my phone rang. It was the last person I had expected. I thought about ignoring it for a moment but picked it up and answered.
“Mom, how are you doing?”
“Hello, Kian. I’m doing wonderful. Your father and I were thinking of heading to Moose Village this weekend.”
“Why?”
She laughed. “I don’t think we need a reason to visit our home, but it is Easter weekend. Macy told me that Mark would be home. Your father wants to make amends with him he said, and it’s been a long time since we have all been together as a family. I thought spending some family time with one another would be nice.”
“Family time?” The skepticism in my voice wasn’t lost on me .
“Yes, Kian. That thing that families do over the holidays.”
I laughed. “Mother, if you’re trying to become a family now, you’re a day late and a dollar short.”
She sighed. “Kian, I’m trying here. Besides, your father said that Trey mentioned it would be nice to see everyone.”
I rolled my eyes. I knew damn well that Uncle Trey hadn’t talked to my father at all. My mother would call him once a quarter to see how things were going with the firm in Moose Village. He had either told her about Cadie or mentioned that Jake Magoffin had been in Moose Village a few times, visiting his daughter, Hope. I was banking on him telling her about Jake. My mother couldn’t care less if I was dating anyone. Of course, the first time Cadie and I walked down Main Street holding hands, the town gossip had been in a frenzy spreading the latest. It had been the morning after our first fight and the first time we made love.
“Well, that’s great, Mom. Dad and Mark can bury the hatchet and you can meet my girlfriend, Cadie.”
There was a long moment of silence before she asked, “Girlfriend? You’re dating someone there?”
“I am. She works for Aunt Opal at the bakery.”
“She does what? Lord, Kian, could you not find a woman more up to…oh, I don’t know…your standards?”
A bark of laughter slipped free. “My standards or yours?”
“What does she do there?”
“She is Opal’s manager. She’s actually been doing more and more and allowing Opal to spend quality time outside of the bakery.”
“Really?” my mother asked. “What has she been doing with this new free time? ”
“Let’s see,” I said, purposely stalling to drive my mother crazy. “She’s joined a book club that Cadie is in as well. She plays bunco with some friends on Friday nights, and on Sundays, she is in a group that plays a really fun card game called Nertz.”
“Nerds?”
“No, Nertz.” I spelled it out for her. “N. E. R. T. Z. It’s a really fun game. Cadie, Sally, and I joined in last Sunday.”
She sniffed. “I see. Well, it sounds like you’re settling back into life there in Moose Village.”
“I am. It’s been great being back home and writing.”
Clearing her throat, she asked, “Do you have a date of when you will be returning back to the office after you’ve finished this little writing experiment of yours?”
My mouth fell open. “Writing experiment? Mom, I don’t know how much clearer I could have made it. I’m not coming back. I don’t want to be a lawyer anymore. I want to write this book, see how it goes, and possibly write more.”
“You think you can make a career out of this, Kian?” she asked with a laugh. “Please. This is a silly fantasy you had that you never got to fulfill. Once you see it will take you nowhere, you’ll return to your senses.”
I had to force myself not to hang up on her. “We’ll have to see which of us is right. But, I can tell you that no matter what, my days of being a lawyer are over.”
“All that time in law school, for what? A few good years? This is crazy, Kian.”
“Mom, if you’re going to come back this weekend and preach to me about what you think I should do with my life, then you might as well stay in New York. For the first time in a very long time, I am happy. The happiest I think I’ve ever been. ”
She sniffed once again. “If this is what you want, then I guess there isn’t anything else I can say.”
“You still coming home for the weekend?”
“Yes, Kian. We are.”
“Great. I’ve got to run, Mom. Tell Dad I said hello, and I’ll see you in a few days.”
I hung up the phone and sighed. “Well, this should be fun.”
Hitting my sister’s number, I drew in a deep breath and exhaled.
“Hey, little bro. What’s up?”
“Did you know Mom and Dad were coming home to Moose Village this weekend?”
She sighed. “I did not.”
“She claims Dad talked to Uncle Trey, and he misses everyone. Dad, not Trey. Plus, you mentioning Mark would be home, Dad supposedly wants to make amends with all of that.”
Macy giggled. “I was going to call you today to tell you Mark is flying in tomorrow. He’s spending a day in Boston then heading to Moose Village. I told him I would get with Sally and maybe we could plan an Easter dinner. Now that Mom and Dad are coming in, I’m sure she’ll want to take over the plans.”
“My advice, call Sally and get her working on the dinner now. Mom won’t step on Sally’s toes if she knows she has already started planning.”
“Good point,” Macy stated. “Will Cadie be there?”
“Yes, why wouldn’t she?”
“I was just wondering, Kian. No need to bite my head off. I told you, if you and Opal trust her, then so do I.”
“Good, because we both do.”
“I should hope. She’s Opal’s second in command and you’re sleeping with her.”
“Macy,” I warned.
“I’m just saying…I find it odd you’re living with her.”
My hand pushed through my hair. “How do you even know that?”
“Betty Lou.”
“What?”
“She called to let me know that you moved into the cabin with, and I quote, ‘The new mysterious woman in town.’.”
“When did you and Betty Lou become phone buddies?”
“We’re not. She was worried and wanted to call me.”
I stood and started to pace. “Fucking hell. Can people just not mind their own fucking business. It’s not like I met Cadie last week. This is the one thing I didn’t miss about Moose Village. Let me just set you—and Betty Lou—straight. I know Cadie. I know her past and heart, her intentions, and yes, I know her body very well.”
“Gross, Kian! I did not need that visual.”
“Then stay the fuck out of my business, Macy. I don’t meddle in yours, so don’t meddle in mine.”
Unlike my mom, I could hang up on my sister. Hitting the End button, I tossed my phone onto the table and headed to the bedroom. I needed to change and go run for a bit to clear my head.
After changing, I grabbed my phone and headphones and headed to the door. I opened it and let out a girlish scream. My long-lost baby brother stood before me, a huge smile on his face.
“Jesus, Mark, you scared the living fuck out of me. ”
“Great seeing you too, Kian.”
Laughing, I pulled him into a hug and held him a bit longer than normal. When we stepped back from one another, he smiled. Then started for inside the cabin. He slapped the side of my arm and walked in.
“Sorry about showing up unannounced, big brother. I was about to knock when you opened the door.”
I watched as he walked in, dropped his bag, and headed straight to the refrigerator. “Got anything to eat? I’m starving.”
Staring at him, I blinked a few times. He was acting like I had just seen him last week instead of a few years ago. “Um,” I said, “why don’t you make yourself at home.”
He glanced over his shoulder. “Your casa is mi casa, right?”
“This isn’t my casa. I mean, yes, I own the cabin, but Cadie rents it out.”
That caused him to pause. “Cadie?”
“My girlfriend.”
Confused, he shut the door and folded his arms over his chest. “Wait. Your girlfriend lives here, but you’re what…just here?”
“She lives here, yes, and I’m staying with her. I was staying at the guest house, but when she moved in here…”
I shook my head. “Why are you here? I just got off the phone with Macy, and she said you were flying into Boston then coming here.”
Mark turned and opened the refrigerator once again. “Like I would tell Macy my plans. Sometimes she is as bad as our mother.”
I couldn’t argue with him on that one .
“Well, I’m glad to see you, Mark, but is there a reason you don’t want to tell her why you’re home early?”
“Because it’s Macy. She’ll want me to go to her house, spend time with her kids, and fish with her husband. All that shit.”
“She doesn’t ask me to do any of that.”
“She knows she can’t force you to do anything. And you haven’t gone to see Millie and Jack yet? What kind of an uncle are you?”
“I have gone to see them, thank you very much. And William wasn’t there. Macy said he was out of town for work.”
“When was this?”
I shrugged. “I’ve gone a couple of times now. Each time, William wasn’t there. What is your beef with him anyway?”
Mark popped a deviled egg into his mouth. “I don’t trust the guy.”
Laughing, I asked, “And why not?”
“There is something about him that sits wrong with me.”
“And you’re suddenly an expert on things like that when you haven’t hardly even been around him to get to know him?”
Something moved across my brother’s face. “Mark…is there something you’re not telling me?”
It was his turn to laugh. “Oh, there is plenty I haven’t told you, Kian.”
I raised a brow. “What is that supposed to mean?”
My brother leaned against the counter. “It goes to show how self-absorbed you are, Kian.”
I was pretty sure my mouth fell to the floor. “I’m sorry?”
“Have you ever once seen me post pictures of the places I’m working? Ever talk about my latest project, mention friends or a girlfriend? Seen anything on social media? ”
Letting out a gruff laugh. “You know damn well I’m not on social media, but now that you mention it, you haven’t sent any pictures, but I figured you’d send that kind of stuff to Mom or Macy.”
“Does anyone in this family talk to one another?”
“You’re one to speak. When was the last time you texted me?”
When he didn’t reply, I asked again, “What is going on, Mark?”
“So… I live in Washington, DC, and I’m not a structural engineer.”
Had I heard him correctly? “What?”
“In college, I was approached by a guy who worked for the government. They were impressed by my score on the ASVAB and the fact that I spoke Spanish and German.”
“You speak German?” I asked.
My brother looked at me and slowly shook his head, proving his point. “Yes.”
“Wow, I didn’t know that.”
“Well, you weren’t around when I was growing up. I was bored living in that house all alone with no one but Sally. I started studying languages. I can speak Italian also, but not as fluently. Anyway, they were interested in me. I figured I wouldn’t go the lawyer route, so I figured I might as well see what they had to say.”
When he stopped talking, I asked, “And?”
He rubbed at the back of his neck. “I work for the CIA, Kian. Even though I’m based out of Washington, DC, my job takes me all over the world. We came up with the structural engineer job so it would give me a good excuse as to why I traveled all the time.”
I took a few steps back. How was that even possible? How could my younger brother work for the government and I not know?
“Does Mom and Dad know?”
“Of course not. No one does; well, you do now.”
I shook the confusion from my head. “And why are you telling me?”
Mark looked around. “Are we alone?”
“Yes,” I said with a humorless laugh.
He exhaled and said, “A couple of days ago, a friend of mine in the FBI contacted me about a case he has been working on in Boston. There is a large, pretty powerful mafia family there. The Bellucci’s.”
My heart dropped and I was pretty sure the color drained from my face.
“They had the daughter’s house bugged since it was easier to access. They picked up a conversation between her and her brother, Michael. I guess he’s been searching for a woman he dated. Her name was Katy Reynolds. He said Katy up and left town without word about where she was going. Apparently, he stopped at her condo, and her roommate said she came home and found her gone with her cell phone left behind. No note, nothing. On top of what they learned from the bug, after digging deeper, we know that her bakery was sold pretty much right after she vanished, and all her money was taken from her account…and not by her, by someone in the CIA.”
The lawyer. Randy. I knew he was more than just a lawyer.
“Michael told his sister that Katy might have witnessed something, so she disappeared. The sister asked what she might have seen, but Michael didn’t say. He only said he needed to find her on orders from their father, but he really didn’t want to find her. Clearly, he thinks this ex-girlfriend saw something the family didn’t want her to see. That led the FBI to do some digging of their own.”
My legs felt like they were going to give out. “Why…why are you telling me all of this?”
Mark raised a brow. “If they could track this girl to Moose Village, then so can this family, Kian, if he can pay the right person off in the FBI or CIA. I know the girl you’re dating; the one who works for Aunt Opal, is Katy Reynolds, now known as Cadie Waterford.”
I rubbed my temples. “How did they find her?”
“All it took was one traffic camera that got a good picture of her face. It wasn’t hard to match it to the Katy Reynolds who vanished. She wasn’t listed as missing; her family tells the same story. Katy needed a fresh start, and they haven’t heard from her or know where she is. The feds think she somehow got a message to them through a guy who works for the CIA agent who helped her escape. Anyway, they traced the car plates, and it didn’t take much work for them to realize she was here in Moose Village and how she got the fake identity. They just don’t know why her lawyer, slash CIA guy, didn’t have her go to the police. He was the one who arranged for her new identity and took care of the sale of her bakery and moved her funds. My buddy knows I’m from here, so he called to see if I could help with the case. Get close to Cadie, find out what she knows, and see if we can bring her in to testify against the family if she even saw anything. But, if she went through all the trouble to leave Boston, sell her bakery, and get a new identity, I’m pretty confident she saw something. When Macy mentioned the mysterious woman who had shown up out of nowhere, I quickly pieced it together. I needed to do some surveillance and make sure this girl was the girl the FBI and the Bellucci family were looking for, so I told Macy I was going to Boston for a few days. I saw Cadie on her way into the bakery this morning and confirmed it was the same person. I knew you were dating her, so…here I am.”
“Did you tell your friend at the FBI?”
Mark shook his head. “Not when I realized you were dating her, and she was indeed working for Opal. Did you know about her past, Kian?”
I sat down on the sofa and scrubbed my hands down my face. I leaned forward, my arms resting on my knees. “Yeah, I knew. She told me, but only recently, and Opal doesn’t know. She knows she’s running from something, but has no idea how serious it is.”
When he didn’t say anything, I looked up and saw the anger on his face. “So you knew this woman witnessed something and that the mafia…the fucking mafia was looking for her, and you didn’t do anything? You just let her keep working at Opal’s bakery, putting her and everyone in this town in danger?”
I stood and pointed to my brother. “You don’t know a damn thing. Fuck, you don’t even know if she saw anything! Cadie wasn’t even sure the Bellucci family would be looking for her.”
“Well, they’re looking for her, and I’m telling you, Kian, they’re not going to be that far behind the FBI. She’s too fucking close to Boston. This is a tourist town; what if someone comes here and sees her? Do you have any idea how popular her bakery in Boston was? ”
The sound of someone gasping caused us both to turn and look at the door. Cadie stood there with a look of pure horror on her face.
“Cadie,” I said as I walked toward her. Her eyes darted from me to Mark. “This is Mark, my brother.”
Her look of fear turned to confusion. “What?”
Mark took a few cautious steps toward Cadie. “Hi, Cadie, I’m Mark Carter.”
He pulled out a CIA badge and showed her. Cadie’s head whipped around to look at me. “Your brother works for the CIA?”
“I just found out,” I said as I held up my hands. “I swear to you, Cadie, I had no idea.”
Cadie pushed past us and ran to the bedroom.
“Stay here,” I told Mark as I went after her. I found her pulling the suitcase out of the closet.
“What are you doing?”
She didn’t even bother to stop and look at me. “I’m leaving. I need to get out of here.”
“No, you’re not leaving.”
Pulling out the drawer, she grabbed a handful of clothes and threw them into the suitcase.
“For fuck’s sake, Cadie, will you just stop for a second, please.”
She opened another drawer and did the same thing. I walked over and grabbed her, turning her so she would look at me. “Stop. Stop this right now.”
Her eyes looked crazed. “You don’t understand, Kian. If the CIA knows I’m here, they also do.”
“The CIA didn’t find you, the FBI did.”
She let out a humorless laugh. “Because that makes it better. ”
“Cadie, stop for two seconds and just breathe.”
“I can’t!” she screamed. “If they find me, they’ll kill me. And they may kill you or Opal or Katherine. No, I can’t risk it.”
“Do you trust me?”
She looked up at me, and when I saw the tears in her eyes I nearly fell to the floor. She nodded.
“Say it.”
“I trust you, but–”
Pressing my finger to her mouth, I shook my head. “But nothing. I just found you, Cadie, and I’ll be damned if I’m going to let you walk out of my life. We’re going to do this together.”
She chewed on her lower lip. “Your brother is in the CIA?”
I closed my eyes and sighed before looking back at her. “Today has been a day of surprises. My mother and father are also coming for Easter this weekend.”
Her eyes widened. “What?”
“One problem at a time.”
I saw the corners of her mouth twitch with a hidden smile. “I think my problem is a lot bigger than your parents coming to visit.”
“You’ve never met them.”
That time she did laugh.
“Are you calmed down?”
She nodded, but tears appeared again. “I would never forgive myself if anything ever happened to you or Opal, Sally, Katherine. Aurora. I’ve met so many amazing people in this town. The last thing I want to do is bring trouble.”
“You won’t.”
“How did the FBI find out about me? ”
I took her hand in mine. “I think you should let Mark tell you that.”
She looked at her suitcase once again.
“Cadie, please trust me.”
Her eyes met mine, and she nodded. “Okay.”
We walked back into the living room only to find Mark eating from a tub of Ben & Jerry’s ice cream.
Cadie and I walked over and sat down on the sofa. “Help yourself to the ice cream, Mark.”
“I’m starving, Kian. I haven’t eaten breakfast or lunch.”
Standing, Cadie asked, “Would you like for me to make you something to eat?”
Mark looked at me. I shrugged. “You can tell her what you told me while she makes something to eat.”
Then I realized she hadn’t gone to the book club meeting. “I thought you had book club.”
Cadie was pulling different things from the refrigerator. “It’s not until later. I was coming home to change. I guess I better let Aurora know I won’t make it.”
“No, you should go,” Mark said. When we both looked at him, he explained. “The last thing you want is to change your routine or act like something is wrong.”
Cadie sighed. “But something is wrong. I have a crazy family hunting me down.”
Mark held up his hand. “Let me tell you what I know, and then we’ll talk afterward. Is that fair enough?”
Nodding her head, Cadie replied, “Fair enough.”