Chapter 5
Chapter Five
Dean
“Why the hell would you want to do that?”
It’s not an answer. She asked to book another tour, and I’ve thrown a question back at her, which even I know is stalling, but it buys me a second, and I need the second.
“You spent half the tour the color of pea soup.” I turn back to face her, arms crossed, a scowl on my face I couldn’t soften even if I wanted to. “One good wave and you’d have splatter-painted my deck.”
She doesn’t back down. Of course she doesn’t. She’s planted in the middle of my office with wind-whipped hair, looking about as steady as a woman can look after the day she’s had, and she just tips her chin. “I’ll take a Dramamine. Book me the next one.”
The smart thing is to say no. Flat, final.
Ask anyone in this marina why you don’t want to be on my boat, Hollywood.
The office door bangs open before I can decide whether to say it out loud.
Mimi.
She fills the doorway, all leather jacket and big hair and rings on every finger, a tote over one shoulder with a baguette sticking out of it like a weapon. “You know how hard you are to get hold of? I called the office phone four times. Four, Dean.”
“The office phone doesn’t ring.”
“I know it doesn’t. That’s the problem.” She points a finger at me, rings catching the light.
“You turned it off on purpose so nobody can find you, and I’m done with it.
Dinner. Tonight. Henry’s making that stew you pretend not to like, and if you tell me you’re busy I’ll walk down to that dock and sink your boat myself. ”
“I’m busy.”
“No, you’re not.” She’s been cutting me off for eighteen years, and she doesn’t slow down now. “I’ve already told Wren to set your place. Shea’s on dessert. Colter’s bringing Hazel. Bodhi’s coming straight from the office. Even Zade said he might show up, and you know what a miracle that is.”
Zade. The kid who used to look at me like I hung the moon, back when I still had a uniform and a reason to wear it.
I’m the one who told him the Coast Guard would save him, that if he didn’t put the rage somewhere after Lana died he’d end up in a cell instead of a boat. He believed me. He followed me in.
Then I walked out, and he stayed, and he’s never looked at me the same since.
Zade turning up to a family dinner isn’t a miracle. It’s damn near an extinction-level event.
“Knox won’t be there,” I mutter. A weak excuse, and we both know it.
“Knox is fighting fires in Montana, or he’d be at the table too.” She narrows her eyes at me. “This isn’t a negotiation, Dean. It’s a summons. You’ve been summoned.”
I open my mouth to argue it anyway, and that’s my mistake, because arguing means engaging, and engaging means she’s still standing in my office instead of halfway back to her car. Mimi never leaves while there’s ground left to take.
Then her radar swings to Scarlett.
“Who’s this?” It isn’t a question. It’s an opening salvo.
“Scarlett Crawford. I’m—”
“Malcolm’s reporter.” Mimi finishes it for her.
“The treasure-hunt girl. Instagram famous. Had herself a meltdown on national TV.” She sizes Scarlett up with a look that makes grown men apologize for things they didn’t do.
“I loved your work on the wildfire recovery in Northern California a few years back and hated your work on the commodification of true crime.” She points an accusatory finger.
“Don’t you come for my true-crime podcasts, missy.
” Then she waves it away. “But that’s another conversation. ”
Scarlett doesn’t bat an eye. “That conversation would be more fun with drinks.”
Mimi slaps the desk. “Damn straight it would.” She glances at me, eyes sparkling, and I have time to think one word—fuck—right before she adds, “You should come to dinner, too.”
Keep her away from the family, Bodhi said, and Mimi’s three feet from folding her into it.
“Absolutely not,” I say, at the same moment Scarlett tries, “I really appreciate the offer, but I have research to—”
“Research can wait.” Mimi waves a hand. “The archives aren’t going anywhere. Malcolm’s sat on those documents for decades. They’ll keep another day.”
“I don’t want to impose on your family—”
“It’s not imposing when you’re invited.”
“—and I’m sure the last thing anyone wants is a stranger at the table while—”
“You’re not a stranger anymore.” Mimi cuts her off flat, no opening left. “I just decided. Process complete. Welcome to the Haven family.” She thrusts out a hand. “I’m Miriam Haven by the way, but everyone calls me Mimi.”
“Oh.” Scarlett blinks, and as Mimi pumps her hand in an enthusiastic shake, she appears to be at a complete loss for what to do next. “Uh… thank you?”
I catch her eye and let my face say the thing I can’t: I’m sorry. There is genuinely nothing I can do here.
Her mouth ticks up at the corner. “I’m starting to think declining isn’t actually on the table.”
“It’s not,” Mimi confirms and finally releases her hand. “Declining’s theoretical. Showing up is mandatory. Big white house, red barn, can’t miss it. Anybody can point you if you get turned around. Half the island’s eaten at Henry’s table.”
She turns to me one last time, her eyes full of worry and love and the flat refusal to let me disappear into my own grief the way Henry nearly disappeared into his after Lana died.
“Six o’clock, and you bring this girl with you,” she says, then warns, “Don’t make me come get you, Dean Sprout.”
Then she’s gone—boots on the boards, jacket creaking, curls bouncing—back out the door the same way she came.
Hurricane Mimi.
Scarlett’s watching me with an expression I can’t quite place. Something between amusement and bewilderment and curiosity. “Did she just call you… Dean Sprout?”
“Don’t.” I hold up a hand. “Don’t ask.”
She’s biting her lip, and I can see the laugh building behind her eyes like a wave about to break. “Is it a family nickname?”
“It’s a family curse.” I rub the back of my neck where the tension has taken up permanent residence.
“She’s called me that since I was twelve.
I was tall and skinny and—” I stop myself.
I’m not explaining my childhood to a reporter who’s about to sit at my brother’s dinner table. “Just don’t repeat it.”
“I make no promises.”
The laugh she’s been holding back finally breaks free. It’s not the camera-ready laugh I expected—the bright, performative one from the dock this morning. This one’s quieter, warmer. It crinkles the corners of her eyes and I don’t like it. I don’t like how it sounds. I don’t like that I noticed.
“You’re enjoying this.”
“Immensely.” She tucks a strand of wind-blown hair behind her ear, still smiling. It’s a good look on her. I wish it weren’t.
I must be scowling again because her smile freezes, then slowly fades.
“I don’t have to come to dinner,” she says. “Make some excuse for me.”
I should agree. Yes, I’ll make an excuse so you can go back to the Tidewater Resort, write your fluff piece, and leave my family the hell out of it.
That’s supposed to be the plan. That’s the arm’s length I promised Bodhi in his office a few hours ago.
“You don’t give Mimi excuses,” I hear myself say instead. “She’ll turn up at the Tidewater and drag you out by the ear. Save yourself the drama.”
Scarlett’s shoulders relax, tension draining out of her.
Huh. Interesting.
Does she not want to go back to the resort?
“So that’s a yes to dinner,” she says. “For both of us.”
“It’s a yes because neither of us has a choice—” A low grumble rises from my dog, and I cut myself off. “Jesus, now you’ve done it.”
“Done what?”
“You said the D word in front of Doug.”
Doug hauls himself up off the life jackets and shakes himself, jowls swinging, then fixes me with the first fully conscious look he’s managed all day.
Her expression tells me she’s searching back through what she’d said. “Wait, you mean dinner?”
“No—”
Too late.
Doug’s ears perk forward, and his whole body goes rigid. His jowls quiver. His stubby tail starts wagging so hard his entire back half swings with it.
“Dinner,” Scarlett repeats, testing the word, and Doug lets out a sound that’s half bark, half war cry.
He launches.
Not at her. At me. He hits my legs with the full force of a bulldog who has just been promised food and will now die before he lets that promise go unfulfilled.
His paws scramble against my jeans, claws catching on the denim, and he’s barking—the loud, insistent bark that says feed me or I’ll eat your shoes.
“Jesus Christ, Doug—”
“Abort, abort, abort!” Captain shrieks from his perch, flapping his wings for emphasis.
“Not helping!” I snarl at the bird.
Scarlett takes a step back, eyes wide, and I can’t tell if she’s alarmed or amused. Probably both. “Is he—is he okay?”
“He’s fine. He’s just—” Doug’s jowls are vibrating against my shin now, drool pooling on my boot, and I give up. “He’s a menace. That’s what he is.”
I reach down and scoop Doug up under one arm. He’s heavy—all dense muscle under those wrinkles—and he immediately stops barking and goes boneless, tongue lolling, eyes rolling back in bliss at being held.
“Dinner,” Scarlett says again, softer this time, watching Doug’s reaction with fascination. “That’s his trigger word?”
“That’s his only word.” I adjust my grip on him. “Say it, and he turns into a four-legged alarm system. Doesn’t matter if you’re promising him dinner or talking about what you had for dinner last Tuesday. The word activates him.”
She crouches down so she’s at Doug’s eye level, and something in her face softens. “Hey, buddy. You’re a good boy, aren’t you?”
Doug’s tail wags so hard his entire body wiggles. He lets out a low, happy groan and tries to lick her face, which would be disgusting if it weren’t so goddamn earnest.
“Careful,” I warn. “He drools on everything.”
“I don’t mind.” She scratches behind Doug’s ears, and the dog melts further into my arms, making a sound that’s embarrassingly close to a moan of pure pleasure. “He’s cute.”
And, yeah, her reaction surprises me. She seems exactly like the kind of woman who would mind drool.
“He’s a disaster. And he’ll be like this for the rest of the day now. Once the word’s been said, he’s activated. There’s no turning it off.”
“Fuck me sideways,” Captain says, and Scarlett laughs.
“You have the world’s weirdest pets, Dean Sprout.” There’s a sparkle of mischief in her eyes and a challenge in her grin when she says the nickname. She’s pressing my buttons on purpose, and I should shut it down. Keep her at arm’s length.
Instead, I hear myself say, “Keep it up and I’ll leave you on Gull Shit Rock.”
“Is that a real place?”
“You’ll find out if you say it again.”
She laughs again, delighted, not remotely deterred, and I already know she’s going to use the name at that dinner table in front of my entire family, and that every one of them is going to love her for it.
Doug drools contentedly down my arm. Captain mutters something obscene at the window.
This is going to be a very long night.