8. The Predator #2
I keep both hands on the wheel, steady only because I make them steady. The ghost of Stanley's fingers still burns against my cheek. But underneath it, Reed's nod stays with me. The six engines idling in the shade. The perimeter nobody asked for.
He knows. He is here. He is going to try to take the land.
By the time I turn onto the Beckett access road I have made myself a promise: I will not let him.
I throw the car into park near the front porch, kill the engine, and climb out.
The cottage smells like sizzling bacon, butter, and fresh coffee. Warm. Grounding. The kind of smell that means someone was here while you were gone, keeping things running, keeping the lights on. I've restored a hundred houses. I know what loved ones look like. This is one of them.
"Nora?"
Gran Iris is standing by the stove in the kitchen, a wooden spatula in her hand. She turns around, a relieved smile breaking across her face.
"There you are, sweetheart. I checked your bedroom and the dock, and I did not see you. I was starting to worry you'd gone down to the salvage yard to fight that boy again."
I stop in the archway of the kitchen.
I try to speak. I open my mouth to say I'm fine, Gran, but my throat is completely sealed shut. The adrenaline is draining from my bloodstream, leaving nothing but crushing exhaustion and fear.
Gran's smile falters. She lowers the spatula. Her blue eyes sweep over my rigid posture, the white-knuckle grip I have on my purse, and the pale, bloodless color of my face.
She turns the knob on the stove, killing the gas flame with a sharp click.
"Nora?" Gran steps away from the counter, wiping her hands on her apron. "What is wrong? You look like you have seen a ghost."
I still cannot speak. To my absolute horror, hot, thick tears flood my eyes, spilling over my lashes and tracking down my cheeks. My shoulders cave inward.
"Oh, my sweet girl," Gran breathes.
She closes the distance between us in two strides. She pulls me into her chest, wrapping her arms tightly around my shaking shoulders. I drop my purse onto the floor. I bury my face in her neck, sobbing uncontrollably.
We stand there in the archway for several minutes. Gran just holds me, rocking me slightly, murmuring quiet words until the violent shaking in my chest subsides into ragged, wet hiccups.
She pulls back slightly, her hands gripping my upper arms. "Tell me," she demands gently. "What happened?"
I swallow hard, wiping my face with the back of my trembling hand. "Stanley," I whisper. "Stanley is back."
Gran goes completely still.
"What did you just say?"
The voice does not come from Gran Iris.
I whip my head around.
My father is sitting in his wheelchair just beyond the edge of the kitchen wall, half-hidden in the shadows of the hallway. I hadn't seen him. I didn't know he was awake.
His good hand is gripping the wheel of his chair so tightly his knuckles are white. His face is flushed a dark, dangerous red, the slackness on the left side of his mouth making his expression look twisted and terrifying.
"Daddy," I gasp, stepping out of Gran's arms.
"What did you just say, Nora?" my father asks again, his voice shaking with a fierce, unchecked fury I rarely hear from him. "Did you say the Hargrove boy is back?"
"Robert, calm down," Gran Iris says sharply, moving toward him. "Your blood pressure…"
"Do not tell me to calm down, Mama!" my father roars, the sound wet and gravelly, tearing from his damaged throat. He looks at me, his good eye wide and burning with absolute rage. "Explain what is going on, Nora. Right now."
I step into the kitchen, rubbing my arms as if I am freezing.
"I ran into him in Houston, Daddy. A few weeks ago at a networking mixer. I tried to ignore him. But then I came to Moonrise. And the calls started."
"Calls?" Gran asks, her face turning pale.
"From a Houston number. He called repeatedly. I never picked up. Then I saw a silver rental car parked at the end of the driveway yesterday. That was him surveilling the property. And last night, he texted me. He asked me to meet him."
"And you went?" my father demands, his chest heaving. "You went to meet that piece of shit alone?"
"I had to!" I cry, my voice breaking. "He said he wanted to talk about the property. They are buying up the river corridor for a resort. I didn't want to go, Daddy, but I couldn't let him get his hands on the land. I couldn't let him near Clara."
"I will kill him," my father snarls, trying to push himself up from the wheelchair.
His weak left leg buckles instantly, and he falls back into the seat with a heavy, defeated groan.
The rage drains out of his face.
What replaces it is worse.
He looks at me with an expression I have seen only once before — the night I finally told him about Houston. We were sitting at this same kitchen table. His coffee had gone cold. He never touched it. He just looked at me with that face.
I should have protected you.
He has never said it aloud. He has never needed to.
"Daddy, please." I drop to my knees in front of his wheelchair, grabbing his right hand and holding it against my chest. "Please, you have to calm down. You cannot do this to your heart."
"He hurt my grandchild," Gran Iris says, her voice a deadly, quiet hiss behind me. Her hands are curled into tight fists at her sides. "If Robert doesn't shoot him, I will."
Gran Iris never curses.
That frightens me more than the threat.
"Nobody is shooting anyone," I beg, tears streaming down my face again. "I told him to leave. I told him we aren't selling."
My father looks down at me, his chest heaving. The rage in his eye slowly morphs into a stark, terrifying realization.
"Nora," he wheezes, his grip tightening on my fingers until it hurts. "He thinks we own the land. He thinks I hold the deed."
"I know," I whisper. "I didn't tell him."
"What happens when they pull the actual county records? What happens when Stanley finds out that the Becketts don't own the dirt? What happens when he finds out that Margaret's son owns it?"
A cold, heavy silence falls over the kitchen.
"If he approaches Jackson Rowe," my father says, his voice dropping into a horrified whisper, "and he offers him millions of dollars… the son will sell. And Stanley will bulldoze Clara's grave."
The absolute worst-case scenario hangs in the air between us.
I thought Jackson Rowe was my biggest problem. But if Stanley bypasses me and goes straight to the salvage yard with a blank check from Houston oil money, Jax will hand over the deed, and Stanley will own the very dirt Clara sleeps in.
I swallow the lump of terror in my throat. I squeeze my father's hand, forcing a fierce, unbreakable resolve into my voice.
"I won't let that happen," I vow, looking him dead in the eye. "I will convince Jax. I will make him understand. I will secure the deed from him, regardless of what it takes, Daddy. Stanley will never touch her. I swear it on my life."
Deep down in the hollow cage of my ribs, I have absolutely no idea how I am going to do that.
The sharp, shrill ring of the front doorbell echoes through the cottage.
All three of us freeze.
My father's head snaps toward the hallway. Gran Iris goes completely still. My heart stops beating.
Did he follow me?
"Stay here," Gran Iris orders.
She turns on her heel and marches down the short hallway toward the front door. I slowly stand from my knees, my hands hovering over my father's shoulder. We wait in agonizing silence. I hear the deadbolt click. I hear the hinges creak as the heavy wooden door pulls open.
"Can I help you?" Gran Iris asks. Her tone is sharp and unyielding.
"Is she here?"
The voice that answers is not the smooth, polished baritone of Stanley Hargrove.
It is a deep, rough, gravelly growl that sounds like crushed stone and thunder. It vibrates through the floorboards, hitting me right in the center of my chest.
I step out from behind the kitchen wall, peering down the hallway.
Jackson Rowe is standing on our front porch.
He fills the entire doorway, his massive shoulders blocking out the morning sun.
Dark T-shirt. Jeans stained with grease.
Boots coated in gray dust. His face is a dark, furious mask of heavy stubble and tight muscle.
He looks larger than life out there — a wall of barely contained rage standing between my front door and the rest of the world.
He looks past Gran Iris. His pale, icy blue eyes lock onto me standing in the kitchen archway.
"I need to speak to her," Jax says to Gran, though he doesn't break eye contact with me. His jaw is ticking with a rigid, controlled energy.
He looks like a man who made his decision before he ever knocked.
For the first time all day, I stop feeling alone.
My heart pounds against my ribs.
Gran Iris turns her head, looking back at me with a questioning, protective glare.
I take a shallow, trembling breath.
I slowly nod my head.