Chapter 21 #2
“So you switched rides,” she said. “I can’t say I’m not disappointed. It was fun earlier, dinner and the ride, before all the chaos. I guess what I’m saying is that, in your official county vehicle, it feels more like business.”
“Is that a good thing or a bad thing?”
Hard to say. “Probably the best thing.”
Great. As if the rest of their venture together was personal.
She’d given her thoughts away. To his credit, Braden said nothing more, but he was brooding.
On the dark, lonely road, he navigated down the sharp drop to the marina, then kept driving in the opposite direction of the Pirates’ Bash preparation and to a deserted part of the shore where vehicles could park.
She’d seen a couple of vehicles earlier, but tonight she and Braden were alone.
“You want to get out?” he asked.
In the Pacific Northwest, the clouds and rain moved in and then onward before another band of clouds. At this moment, the rain had moved on, and she caught a glimpse of the night sky. “Yes.”
She pulled her jacket tighter. She didn’t have to pretend with him.
They’d both admitted that they liked each other, but she was already having regrets.
Was he having those same regrets? She wished she could take it all back.
Neither of them had time for a like relationship with chaos and murder around them.
And standing out here alone with him under the stars felt like they now moved away from professional and back into dangerous territory.
“So what’s happened? What’s going on?” she asked.
“So much.” He shrugged out of his jacket and laid it across the hood of the vehicle. “Madeline is on the run. She took off.”
“So she’s out there and dangerous?”
“We’ll catch her. Her face is everywhere. But there’s something else.” The way his chin dipped and his eyes locked on her, she knew she should brace herself.
“The guy who attacked you on the beach is dead.”
What? “I don’t want to be relieved that someone is dead, but I wasn’t expecting that. You’re on the case, then?”
“I am working the case right here and now. You deserve to know the man who attacked you is dead.”
And still, he had more to say. She could tell by the angle of his chin. She didn’t know him well, but she knew at least that much about him. And right now, that look gave her chills. “I can tell there’s more. I’m listening.”
“I can’t know for certain, but you arrive in Hidden Bay, and you’re attacked. Diggins, who has a connection to you, is attacked, and Monroe. It feels like you’re at the center of what’s going on. Or rather, your research is.”
“I kind of figured that.” She couldn’t hold Braden’s stare. Rubbing her arms, she took in the stars and another set of clouds crawling toward them from out over the Pacific. “Why are you telling me this? What do you want from me?”
“I want your permission to stick close to you.”
Okay. She definitely hadn’t expected that. “So you can solve the mystery behind a ghost ship?”
“You bring up a good point. Solving that mystery could help resolve this, but in the meantime, I want you to be safe. I already told you it’s my priority.”
“And your sheriff would agree to you being my protection.” This felt off to her.
“Braden . . . Detective Sanders . . . not saying that I don’t welcome the protection, and if that’s what it takes for me to finish Dad’s book, I’m all for it.
But why are you really doing this?” There’s much more to you than you’ve shared, and I might need to dig deeper.
“Thatcher insisted on it. I have his full support.”
Then it hit her. Maybe it had been staring her in the face and she’d been slow to see it. She stood tall and lifted her chin. “I get it now. You’re not so much concerned about me as an individual. It’s because of who I’m related to. It’s because of my mother. You’ve learned that much about me.”
Braden lifted his hands in surrender. “I’m surprised you don’t already have security detail. But let’s be clear.” Then he closed the distance.
Cressida might have stepped back and fallen over a log, but he caught her and pulled her a little too close.
“I would be here protecting you with or without Thatcher’s directive.
I’m saying, regardless of your connections, I would be here, Cressida, for you .
. . You.” Then he leaned closer, and his next words she barely heard over the waves. “Do you understand?”
Cressida couldn’t move. She couldn’t speak. He was close enough he might kiss her. Against all common sense, she closed her eyes and lifted her chin. Kiss me already.
Pounding footsteps drew near, and he stepped away, reached for his gun. A jogger ran by them a little too close.
“Sorry!” he shouted.
And the moment was broken. What had just happened? What was going on between them?
Braden took two steps back. “Watch that log behind you.”
She couldn’t see his eyes in the shadows, but she could feel the intensity coming off him. What would it have felt like to have been kissed by him?
Come on, Cressida, you’re not some middle schooler with a hard crush.
“About Mrs. Monroe,” he said. “A deputy took her statement, but I talked to her later.” He hesitated, then, “She shot the man—your attacker—in self-defense.”
“Oh . . .” The thought of that poor elderly woman shooting and killing someone rocked through her.
Her knees buckled a little. She hadn’t met Evelyn Monroe, but the news still stunned her. She swiped at a couple of errant tears. “Is she okay?”
“She’s upset. And she said some things that surprised me. I’m still thinking about them, but I got you an interview with her too, Cressida.”
“But . . . I can’t imagine she’d want to talk to me after this. How did you manage that? Why even focus on it?”
“She believes it’s imperative she speaks with you soon. She held back from telling me, but I strongly suspect it’s related.”
“Okay. You’re kind of scaring me.”
“If it was up to me, I’d say pack up and go home. Get away from this.”
“But you think I’m going to keep digging no matter the danger.” She’d never let go of a story in her life. What was happening here went much deeper than research to finish Dad’s book. This was a story, but she wasn’t entirely sure what it was about.
“While I believe you certainly have the tenacity to continue no matter what, I think packing up and going home isn’t going to make you safe. It isn’t going to save you.”
What did he know that he wasn’t telling her? His words chilled her to the bone, because she agreed. She wanted to leave for her safety, but go where? What then? Her father—if he was murdered because of what he’d learned—had been killed in DC, which was on the opposite coast. “And you are?”
“I intend to keep you safe, yes. I thought I made that clear.”
I can’t believe I’m in so much danger this guy and his sheriff want to guard me. Not quite protective-custody danger, but maybe he knew she would never stand for that, and to find out the truth about what was going on, she needed to continue her research.
But that truth could get her killed too, if it had in fact gotten her father killed.
She felt his eyes still on her, as if he was waiting on a response from her. Oh, she had a response, all right. Her heart was pounding. It should be pounding because she was in this much trouble, this much danger, but instead, she knew it pounded for an entirely different reason . . .
The man with the steel-blue eyes who stood like a fortress between her and danger—as if she belonged to him.