Chapter Two Summer
Chapter Two
Summer
Sheriff Daniel Turner is Port Harbor’s favorite resident and their elected protector. He’s basically a king in this town, and if my calculations are correct, that makes me a princess. The last time I checked, princesses aren’t usually chained to tables.
“Is this cuff from Jenkins really necessary?”
My dad snorts from across the table in the interrogation room. “With you? You’re damn straight it is.”
“You know I can get out of this easily, right?”
“I have no doubt, Summer Anne, but you’re not going to because you love your father and you care about his job, so you won’t be causing yet another scene today. Right?”
“Right,” I agree through gritted teeth.
We’ve gone through the same song and dance before.
When I was growing up, my father was always worried about election season and collecting votes, which meant I needed to be on my best behavior.
Which I guess also means I maybe shouldn’t have stolen the mayor’s microphone an hour ago and used it as an opportunity to start a rant about the patriarchy and how archaic it is that we’re auctioning women off like cattle.
To be fair, I was right, and if their cheers were any indication, many people in the crowd gathered in Pine Square for the Mid-Summer Fling agreed with me.
Sure, we were raising money for repairs on the community center that was destroyed by a tree falling on it during a bad storm, but my point remained the same.
My father sighs loudly. “So, the Mid-Summer Fling, huh?”
“It’s a crock of shit!” I explode. “Can you believe we’re still participating in that thing? It’s ridiculous! And so embarrassing. This town is so much better than parading women around for the sole purpose of selling them for dates. As if we need men. It’s—”
He lifts his hand, putting an end to my tirade. “I agree with you, Summer. You know that.”
I smile. I do know that. My father raised me as a single parent from the time I was eight, and for as long as I can remember, he instilled in me that women are strong and that we can do anything men can do, damn whatever anyone else says.
I’m sure he didn’t expect those words of wisdom to be the reason I’m sitting handcuffed to a table today.
“While I’m very proud of you for standing up for what you believe in, I do think there were better times you could have chosen to relay your feelings to the entire town.”
A flicker of guilt shoots through me. He’s right. I shouldn’t be riling everyone up, least of all him, given what happened last month and brought me back home in the first place.
I didn’t think anything could be worse than losing one parent, but the idea of losing both might just be it. Getting the phone call that he was having a “heart incident” at 2:00 a.m. wasn’t on my bingo card, and I booked a ticket back to Washington as fast as I could.
He swears he’s fine, and I believe him to an extent, but it’s not enough to send me back to Chicago anytime soon. Not like I have anything to go back to anyway. I burned too many bridges, and I have nobody to blame but myself.
Staying in Port Harbor just makes sense right now.
“It wasn’t the entire town,” I say, trying to cross my arms and failing because I’m still handcuffed. I lift my wrist, the metal clanking against the table. “Can we please take these off?”
He nods, rising from his chair and pulling the keys from his pocket. He undoes the lock, tossing the cuffs onto the table as I rub at my wrists.
“Fucking Jenkins,” Dad mutters, talking about his deputy who likes wearing his badge just a little too much some days.
I have no doubt he’ll be getting an earful from the sheriff later.
“Thank you.” I fold my hands together on the table. “So, what’s my punishment other than embarrassment from being cuffed in front of the entire town?”
“It wasn’t the entire town,” he echoes, grinning when I roll my eyes. “I’m sorry Deputy Jenkins did that to you.”
“Not as sorry as he’s going to be if I catch him around town again. I’ll make him a cheesecake. He still gets the shits from dairy, right?”
“Summer . . .” my father warns, but I see the amusement in his eyes.
“Fine. I’ll just politely jaywalk away from him.”
“Do not jaywalk!”
“Why do you ruin all my fun, Father?”
He shakes his head, sinking lower in his chair like he’s exhausted by me. “I swear, you remind me more and more of your mother every day.”
I grin. “I take that as a compliment.”
My mother passed away from breast cancer when I was young enough to remember only a few things about her, and one of those things was her tenacity. Rebecca Turner never let anyone off the hook, not even my father, and I always admired her headstrong nature.
Apparently I picked up the same trait.
“Good. It’s intended as one.” He clears his throat, and it’s because he still misses her, even though it’s been eighteen years since she’s been gone.
He’s dated a bit over the years, but nothing long term, and while I wish he had someone so he wasn’t so lonely, I understand it.
He loved my mother more than anything, and love like that only happens once.
He’s not looking to try to replace her, and I respect that. “Now, about your punishment.”
I groan, tossing my head back and blowing air against my brown bangs that could use a trim. “Which old lady do I need to help across the street this time?”
“First of all, helping others is not a punishment.”
“Of course not, Boy Scout,” I mutter.
He cuts me a glare that has me sitting up a little straighter. “Secondly, it won’t be anything like that. You’re getting a job.”
“But I’m on sabbatical. I’m here for—”
He raises one brow, and it’s enough to shut me up. “I know why you’re here, and I appreciate you coming to stay with me, but your problems began when you quit your job out of nowhere. Given what happened today, it’s clear you’re bored and need something to keep you out of trouble.”
He’s wrong. I’m not bored. And I didn’t quit my job out of nowhere. I quit it because I could feel the joy slipping away day by day and I didn’t want to end up hating the thing that once brought so much light into my life.
But I’m not exactly in a position to argue, so I don’t. “I understand. I’ll start looking around town, maybe stop by the library to see if they need help. I—”
“There’s no need.”
I tip my head to the side, confused. “No need? But I thought you said I had to get a job.”
“You do. I already found you one.”
My jaw slackens. “Wait, what? I don’t even get to pick my job?”
“No.”
He stands, opening the door to the small room with the two-way mirror. He motions for . . . well, I’m not sure what, but whatever it is, I’m assuming it’s coming into the room, because he steps aside.
Suddenly someone is there, taking up every inch of the doorway, towering over my father, who isn’t a small man at six foot one.
A simple gray button-up stretches over the newcomer’s chest, and a pair of slacks that seem to have been tailored specifically for him hug his thick thighs. He’s scowling yet somehow looks like he’s ready to teach me math or something.
But that’s not what draws my attention.
No, it’s the slight limp in his step as he makes his way into the room.
I avert my eyes, trying not to notice, and the man doesn’t miss it. I swear I see annoyance flash in his gaze.
“Mr. Rawlings,” my father says, closing the door behind him as he steps into the room, which suddenly feels smaller. “I appreciate you coming in today. I’m sure you have better things to be doing on your Saturday.”
“No problem, Sheriff Turner,” Mr. Rawlings says, his voice deeper than I thought it would be. “Not like I had a choice, did I?”
Dad laughs. “With the very real possibility of a court taking your license away, no, I suppose not.”
Interesting. This guy is a delinquent too.
Dad gestures toward me. “This is my daughter, Summer.”
The man doesn’t say anything. He just stares at me with hard, green eyes that remind me of a Granny Smith apple.
“She’s your newest employee.”
A single dark eyebrow is raised. “She is?”
“Yep. I’ve decided that, as your punishment for speeding down Harborview Boulevard yet again, you’ll select my daughter’s name from that stack of résumés I’m sure is sitting on your desk since putting that help wanted sign in the window.”
Mr. Rawlings’s jaw tics as he continues to stare at me, and I refuse to look away, even though I want to crawl under the table in response to the blatant nepotism my father is blackmailing this guy into.
“With all due respect, sir, she hasn’t filled out an application.”
“Oh, I assure you, that can be fixed quite easily, especially if you’d like to not take public transportation to and from your next session, Mr. Rawlings.”
I can tell the man wants to sigh, but he represses it.
“I’m sure once Summer here fills out an application, I can make sure it’s sitting at the top and that she’s the one we call with the job offer.”
“You can’t be serious,” I interject, annoyed they’re talking about me like I’m not even here.
My father looks at me with amused eyes. “Oh, honey, I am very serious.”
“You can’t call me honey and be serious in the same sentence. That’s not how it works, Sheriff.”
He glares at me from the other side of the table, and I try my best not to smirk at his reaction. He hates it when I call him Sheriff.
Then suddenly he doesn’t look so entertained after all.
He looks furious as he leans over the table, and I have to tip my head back to look up at him.
“Listen to me, Summer Anne, if you think you’re going to run away from your problems and live in my house while terrorizing my town without any consequences for your actions, you’re dead wrong.
You’re twenty-six years old. It’s time to grow up. ”
His words are low, but not so quiet that I don’t hear them loudly.
He’s glad I’m here. I know he is. But he also knows I’m not just here for him. I’m here because I’m hiding from everything that happened in Chicago.