7. Chapter 7
Thirty-eight days.
It had been thirty-eight days since his dad died.
Twenty-eight days since the will reading when Jase learned he would be taking a trip with Graham and Graham’s then-girlfriend, Lindsey—a woman Jase hadn’t wanted to know then but couldn’t get out of his head now.
Twenty days since they left Ohio, following the first letter and map through Kentucky to Alabama.
Ten days since the trip ended in Santa Cruz, since everything ended outside the storage unit in a cloud of dust and bloody knuckles.
Ten days since Jase blew his last chance with the one woman who haunted him across the miles.
A bad dream he couldn’t shake, because the dream wasn’t bad at all. It was good.
So fucking good, actually, it made him sick thinking about how he couldn’t stop thinking about it.
Then, the nausea might’ve been the whiskey. His gullet was rotten from this morning’s coffee and aspirin, last night’s Jack.
Twenty days ago he’d locked up his bike in the garage at his apartment in Dayton.
In the past few weeks, he’d gotten used to the Harley Road King, a gift from a man named Saul they’d met on the road.
Today the throaty rumble of his ancient Electra Glide felt clunky by comparison.
He never thought he’d prefer the feel of another bike between his legs over the Electra Glide, his dad’s old motorcycle.
He never thought he’d leave the Road King in Nebraska either.
It’s Lindsey. This is serious.
Passing the swampy reeds and sapling trees in the ditch, the old stone house from Jase’s childhood came into view.
Beyond the swamp threatening to take over the driveway, and the weeds allowed to grow freely around the pond, the rest of the estate was manicured, as if the gardeners were still giving the place its weekly trim.
Who was in charge of paying the crew now?
Whitlock hadn’t mentioned maintenance or what was to become of the house at the will reading.
The will also hadn’t mentioned the shop, Jase realized, as the two-story garage on the east side of the property came into view.
Jay’s Garage, fully stocked with spare parts and a couple decades’ worth of tools, had been locked up for months. Jase couldn’t remember the last time the neon sign above the two oversize garage bay doors was turned on. The yellow glow used to be how he knew his old man was home.
There were three cars in the driveway: Graham’s beige Volvo, a silver Jeep he didn’t recognize, and the wooden wagon they’d taken on his father’s trip. What was Graham still doing with the Squire? Jase figured his brother would’ve hocked the teal beast weeks ago.
Jase stilled the bike and pulled his helmet off, setting it under his arm.
The air was cool in the shade of the house, and he could just hear frogs croaking in the pond over the ringing in his ears.
Idyllic, as always, except for the smell of something rotten, as if an animal died nearby and had decomposed in the sun. He looked around for the carcass and—
Oh. Shit.
It was him. He was rotten. When was the last time he showered? California?
You’re cute, but I’m not desperate, Paula had said. Even the butch bartender in flannel and flashing reindeer antlers, a horror from last night he wished the whiskey had scrubbed from his brain, hadn’t wanted to get too close.
This wasn’t how he wanted to return to his father’s house—filthy, stinking, and soggy from last night’s alcohol.
Jase climbed the steps anyway and tried the door. It was locked. He pulled the ring from his pocket and found the seldom-used key for the front door.
It didn’t fit.
He rubbed his eyes and squinted through the fading daylight at the gold key in his hand, trying it again.
“Graham?” he shouted, pounding on the door when the lock didn’t budge.
“Just a minute,” he heard someone call from inside. Someone not his brother. A beat later the lock clicked and the tall wooden door opened.
And Jase… Jase stared like a dumbass at the vision in the doorway. He hadn’t seen her in ten days. In ten long, long nights he couldn’t remember.
He’d never actually seen her like this, with her long brown hair pulled up in a ponytail, wearing cut-off shorts instead of one of her sundresses, feet bare on the hardwood.
Beautiful wasn’t enough but it was all his whiskey-logged brain could come up with.
And she was. So fucking beautiful it hurt his bloodshot eyes to look.
“Lindsey?” he managed to say.
She was gaping at him, Bambi in a tank top caught in his headlights. The laundry basket she was carrying fell to the floor.
“Jase?”
I should’ve told you about the money. I’m sorry. I’m such an asshole.
“My key didn’t work,” he said dumbly.
“Uh, yeah.” She bent to recover the basket, propping it on one hip. “I changed the locks. I didn’t think you’d be here already.”
“Graham said— Are you okay? He said something happened.”
“Something did.” She slowly backed away from the door to let him inside.
Jase ruffled his hair, a darker shade of brown than usual on account of the grease, and followed her.
Lindsey set the basket at the foot of the staircase, and spun on her peach-painted toes to face him.
For a beat they collided in the hall, unplanned and unwanted.
Nothing like their meeting in the hotel hallway in Austin when he’d kissed her for the second time.
She smelled like the trip. Her soft, summery perfume reminded Jase of the flowers in California, and the watermelon lip gloss made his dick hard remembering the taste.
If he’d known she was going to be there, he would’ve showered at his apartment when he picked up the Electra Glide. Put on some pit stick. Something.
“How did you get here so fast?” she asked, taking a step back from his funk, breaking his fucking heart. “Graham said you were in Nebraska.”
“I flew,” he said. Like you told me I should’ve done to get back in time for my dad’s funeral, or don’t you remember? “Left the bike at the airport.”
“Oh,” she said. She remembered. It was part of her scathing review of his life choices. “Jase, have you talked to Whitlock? It’s important.”
“No, he hasn’t.” Graham appeared in the front hall from the kitchen and appraised Jase up and down. “What kind of rathole did you climb out of?”
“Nice to see you too, asshole. I see your face is healing up.”
“Hardly a scratch to begin with,” Graham said, sipping what was probably bourbon from one of their dad’s fancy tumblers.
“Sure.”
With his eyes locked on Jase as if he thought he’d disappear again, Graham called down the hallway, “Queue it up, hon. Jase is here.”
“Working on it,” Helen hollered back.
“Queue what up?” Jase asked.
“You’ll see,” Graham said.
Jase searched Lindsey for something more.
She shrugged and followed his brother to the den.
Helen didn’t look up from the remote she was pointing at the flat-screen TV beside the fireplace.
What were any of them doing there? After the last map, Graham and Helen were supposed to fly off into the sunset and get married or some shit.
And Lindsey never wanted anything to do with any of the Youngs ever again.
Yet here she was, doing laundry in his father’s house, with Graham, who she hated, and Helen, who she hated even more.
And Jase, who she hated more than the other two combined.
“Did you say you changed the locks?” Jase asked her.
The question seemed to throw her. Lindsey opened her mouth and looked at Graham—at Graham, for Christ’s sake—for help.
“And what are you even doing here?” Jase asked his brother.
“We’ve been calling for days, Whitlock and I,” Graham said. “Seventeen times, Jase. Seventeen times and you couldn’t pick up the phone.”
“Shh, it’s ready,” Helen said. She intercepted her moody boyfriend—no, not boyfriend. Fiancé—and they sat on the leather sofa across from the TV.
From behind his desk in the study, his well-read paperbacks framing him, Jason Young Sr. stared out from the screen and smiled.