Chapter Forty-Seven
“Had to find the flare gun, didn’t you?” Veeta asked, shaking their head as they put up their hands.
“It was a reflex, you would have done the same,” Kate whispered, lifting her hands extra high. “And at least someone found us. Even if they’re also arresting us.”
The three of them learned very quickly that the Coast Guard didn’t have a sense of humor about stolen tender boats, rigged engines, or accidentally fired flare guns.
Someone had luckily reported a boat speeding across the bay and the Coast Guard had decided to investigate when they didn’t respond to a radio hailing.
They’d assumed the stolen tender boat was part of a drug trafficking operation.
But between Kate’s panicked ramblings, Veeta’s cryptic confirmations of the wilder details, and Juliette’s returning motion sickness, they deemed the rescued boaters not a threat and removed the handcuffs to replace them with thermal blankets.
They even gave Juliette some industrial-strength anti-nausea medication that put her into soft focus.
She barely cared as Kate and Veeta insisted the Coast Guard radio the mainland and contact Detective Marks to start the hunt for Clayton.
She barely remembered who Clayton was at this point.
“You know what almost dying has taught me?” Juliette said musingly, watching the stars float by overhead as the boat continued its stately pace back to land.
“To really start living?” Veeta offered.
“No,” Juliette scoffed. “That’s stupid, this isn’t a Hallmark movie. It taught me that I was right all along, and everybody else should have listened to me sooner.”
“And to maybe let us help out sometimes, as a favor to us?” Veeta added dryly.
“And to apologize to Charlie,” Kate added, never one to give up on a topic.
Juliette let out a heavy sigh. Her breath puffed out around her in pink, fluffy clouds.
What was actually in those Coast Guard meds, and could she take a few for the road?
“I don’t think Charlie would listen if I tried.
Or he would, and that would be worse. He’d forgive me and give me another chance, and I’d find a way to fuck that up, too.
He’s just so … good. Like if you told me he was secretly a serial killer burying girls in his backyard and keeping locks of their hair to sniff as a memento, I would be like ‘That’s why he was always so nice.
So no one would suspect him when the bodies start piling up. ’”
“We’re getting a little off topic here,” Kate said. “You were saying all the things you liked about Charlie?”
Juliette let her eyes drift closed. “He looks stupid good in a suit. If I had my way, I’d make a bonfire of all those shapeless, boxy lab coats he wears. I might make a bonfire of all his clothes, actually. Make him walk around naked. My gift to the world.”
“And Charlie the person?” Kate prompted.
“Did you know he lied about the presidential biographies?” Juliette asked, shaking her head.
“I didn’t think he had such levels of deception in him.
And he was so good at playing nice cop. He made bread out of his roommate’s socks!
I never even got to eat his bread. I called him a dud.
To his face. I ripped his heart out, like the vampire I am.
Who cares if he was nice to his ex? I don’t want him to be mean.
I don’t want him to think he should be mean.
I love that he’s nice, and I called him a dud.
I don’t deserve homemade sourdough. He deserves good.
Better than good. The best. Better than Sporty Ex, for damn sure.
Better than me. Somebody as good as he is. ”
“What if I don’t want somebody good?” came Charlie’s voice from her memory.
“You should,” she told Memory Charlie. “You should want someone who deserves you.”
“Why do you think you don’t deserve me?” Memory Charlie asked.
“Because I’ll only hurt you, it’s all I know how to do. You trusted me, and I stomped on your heart like a real fucking Juniper. Like my parents. They were right about me all along. I can’t escape who I am. No matter what I might want.”
“And what is it you want?” asked Memory Charlie, his voice soft and intense.
Juliette huffed a soft laugh. “You. All the time.”
“Ma’am, you really need to get off the boat now,” came another un-Charlie voice.
Juliette blinked her eyes open. They were at the docks, Kate and Veeta already deboarded. Kate’s boyfriend, Jake, had her in a protective grip, with Kennedy and her husband, Spencer, right behind them. And then there was Charlie Hawkins—not a memory, but very flesh and blood. Looking right at her.
“We’ve been docked for like twenty minutes,” Veeta said, grinning. “They were talking about carrying you off in a stretcher.”
“Charlie,” Juliette said, trying to stand and very quickly realizing her legs were no longer under her control. It took the Coast Guard officer and Charlie working in tandem to get her onto the docks. Charlie cradled her against him, so strong and sure.
“When Jake called and said Kate was in trouble, I knew you were involved,” he said, smiling. He brushed her cheek with his thumb, his expression turning serious. “Are you all right?”
“I vomited all over the tender boat,” Juliette said.
“So much vomit,” Kate whispered in horror. “Everywhere.”
Charlie blinked. “Not exactly the answer I was expecting.”
“The Coast Guard gave me drugs,” Juliette said. “Really good ones. And Clayton tried to kill us Miami Vice–style. Speeding boat crash.”
“We should get you to a hospital,” Charlie said. “I think you might be in shock.”
“No!” Juliette protested, holding tight to his shirt.
“No, I’m okay. I mean, I could take another hit of those anti-nausea meds, because everything looks like cotton candy right now.
But I need to say this. I really like you, Charlie.
Not just because you look like cotton candy, too.
I like your hands, and your face. But I like your insides, too. ”
“Who sounds like a serial killer now?” Veeta asked.
“You shush,” Juliette said. “I’m so sorry I called you a dud.
I’m sorry I ever thought you were a dud.
That was a younger, dumber Juliette. You’re not a dud.
You’re incredible. You’re nice, and thoughtful, and you care so much about other people.
I don’t know how to care about anyone at all, but you just care about everyone all the time like it’s your job.
And I don’t want you to ever change that, even if it means your terrible ex occasionally takes advantage of your niceness. ”
Charlie sighed. “You were right that I shouldn’t have helped her, and I told her so after you left.
I told her that we were broken up, and she was dating Rajiv now, and if she wanted the opinion of a cardiothoracic surgeon, she should call him instead.
I told her she wasn’t my problem to deal with anymore. ”
“Oh my god, I wish I’d been there for that,” Kate whispered.
“Kate, please!” Juliette said.
“Sorry, sorry, do your makeup speech.”
“The only reason I was ever … dull with you,” Charlie continued, “is because I really, really liked you. You’re beautiful, and whip-smart, and incredibly intimidating—”
“So intimidating,” everyone else at the dock intoned simultaneously.
“But you’re also incredibly dedicated, and fiercely loyal, and you love the people you care about even if you pretend not to care at all,” Charlie said, smiling gently.
“The first time I met you, I liked you so much it surprised me. Because in all my years of dating Katarina, I’d never felt that way about her.
And it made me question my relationship, and what I wanted, and whether or not I was a good person.
And I kind of freaked out, and I clammed up because I didn’t know how to talk to you without flirting. ”
Juliette gasped. “Is that why you accused me of always trying to flirt with you?”
“I was worried if you did, I might not be able to stop myself from flirting back,” he said sheepishly.
“Oh, you were right, I was one hundred percent flirting,” Juliette said.
“I was just offended that you seemed so immune to my charms, that’s why I called you a dud.
Charlie, I’m gonna fuck this thing up. Guaranteed.
I don’t really understand healthy relationships or proper emotional communication, but I want to try.
I want to be better, because I want you.
I want to be whoever I need to be so I can be with you. ”
“I don’t need you to be anyone else,” Charlie said, using that voice she loved so well, the one that brooked no argument.
“I want Juliette Winters, do you understand? The woman who insisted she’d be great at tennis despite never holding a racket and doing a hatchet job with a nine iron.
The woman who came to my defense in the sexiest, most inappropriate way possible.
I want the woman who made me feel like I was worth fighting for for the first time in my life. ”
“Charlie, I would literally murder someone for you,” Juliette said, dead serious.
“I’m going to pretend I didn’t hear that,” came Detective Marks’s dry tone from the far side of the docks.
“You were clever enough to lure my uniforms away from their posts, but you didn’t spot the cameras we set up on the dock and the boat?
We got your whole confrontation on tape, including Clayton threatening you with the gun and rigging the tender boat.
I put the call into all the local airfields.
We caught Clayton Westminster trying to bribe his way onto a single-propeller plane at a private airfield.
He’s in custody now. He would have been in custody sooner, if you’d just let us do our damn jobs. ”
“If I’d let you do your damn job, you would have closed the Warren Ellingham case as natural causes and put Troy Pham in jail for Brad’s murder,” Juliette shot back.
“We were getting there,” Detective Marks griped. “We figured out the resin used in the restaurant was the wrong type to match the kind under Brad’s fingernails. It was—”
“A high-end type used in painting restoration, like the kind Clayton was doing for Warren’s art collection, yeah, we know,” Juliette said.
“I just want to hear you say it. ‘Thank you, Juliette Winters, for solving my case for me. Here are the keys to the city, an honorary badge, and a phone call the next time we have an unsolvable case.’”
Detective Marks shook his head as he turned away from them, starting back down the docks.
“I left Chicago PD because the cases were getting too nuts. I figured Seattle would be a quieter beat, more time for hiking. If I ever got into hiking. But this has truly been the craziest case I’ve ever been on.
They’re not gonna believe this one at the next briefing. ”
“‘Thank you, Juliette! For being the best detective I’ve ever known!’” Juliette called after him. “I genuinely think he would have been happier if he’d been able to arrest me for something.”
“There’s always tomorrow,” Detective Marks said. “Now I mean it when I say GO HOME.”
“Nice guy,” Veeta said as he departed. “Also, good advice. Do you think Simon will give us the day off tomorrow?”
Juliette sighed. “And every day after that, probably.”
“What do you mean?” Kate asked.
Juliette looked to Kennedy and Spencer. “They did almost explode on a boat with me, I think they deserve to know.”
“Simon Says has been spiraling for a while now,” Kennedy said mournfully. “We’ve done all we can to try and right the ship—sorry, is it a bad time for ship metaphors?”
“It’s never a good time for ship metaphors,” Juliette said darkly.
“We cut staff, delayed contracts, tried to bring in outside funding,” Spencer said, frowning. “Kennedy even invested her own inheritance in the company. But after the Loretta series ended, there were no titles to keep our operating expenses afloat.”
“Not that anyone is blaming you, Kate,” Kennedy said quickly.
“I did, a little,” Juliette muttered. When Kate gave her a look of distress, though, she relented. “Not really. Not in my heart.”
“You had every right to end the series, Kate,” Spencer said, surprising them all with his maturity on the matter, considering he was a key reason she had decided to close out the series. “And you couldn’t have kept the publisher going anyway, not with the way things were declining.”
“I thought making the deal for Warren’s memoir would boost our sales enough to save Simon Says,” Juliette said.
“But I finally found it, and it’s absolute trash.
The worst kind of bloated, self-important business-guy speak.
If he were still alive, maybe we could work some magic with him.
But Warren’s manuscript is completely useless, and without it, I have nothing to save the publisher from closing.
I should have told you guys what I was doing, and why, but I …
I wanted to be the one to save us. I needed to be the one who saved us.
And now, instead, I’ve totally sunk us.”
“You can’t save Simon Says,” Kate said, looking thoughtfully into the distance where Detective Marks had made his exit.
“But maybe we can. This is the story of the century, even more over-the-top and sensational than Kennedy’s almost-murder last year.
We can turn this sinking ship around—sorry for continuing the ship metaphor.
We’re going to need the murder boards, a full array of the good markers, Post-its, and a minimum of three charcuterie boards. Ooh, and chips and dip!”
“What is happening here?” Juliette asked, looking to Jake and Charlie.
“She’s got an idea,” Jake said, taking a deep breath. “Which means I need to hide the coffee.”
“I will need so many cups,” Kate said, looking gleeful. “My heart will be like a little hummingbird escaping a predator.”
“Fine, but I need two showers, fourteen hours of sleep, and a mani-pedi first,” Juliette said. “And definitely some industrial-strength mouthwash. Bleach flavored.”