Chapter 4
BOLTING
Nolan
I’M SITTING IN MY RENTAL car, the blank page of my scrapbook illuminated by the dashboard lights. The darkness beyond the windows settles like a shroud. But cutting through it, peeking between the leaves of thick foliage, is the light from Harper’s cottage.
I tap my pen on the page, a tick of time as I stare at her house, lost in thought. And then I title the page.
Harper, June 26th.
I know I’ll remember the big things, like the exhumations or the locations she mentioned for Arthur’s other victims. It’s the nuances I’m afraid of losing in the sea of chaos we’re in.
Little observations that might tell me more about how to break through her fortified walls.
If I map out these details, I can see the bigger picture.
And something about it is soothing to me.
Like I’m honoring her in these pages that were once meant for her destruction.
Karaoke night at Buoy and Beacon.
Nightfog.
The gym.
BM and McM—something still with her?
I keep my descriptions brief—just enough information that it will jog my memory.
I make note of anything that I feel compelled to follow up on, like her mention of karaoke night with Jake Hornell and whether or not she might still have evidence related to McMillan and whoever this Bryce Mahoney guy is.
And I add observations about her from today.
Vein on forehead, one note says. Not chewing lip, trying to avoid me noticing her stress.
I think back to the notes I found in Sam’s room when I broke in, the ones written next to printed photographs of Harper.
One of which is now in the Sleuthseekers Discord chat.
My notes aren’t that dissimilar from his, I guess.
Neither is my goal: to piece together her many layers and connect the Harper I know to the ghosts of her past. And as I close the book and slide it into my backpack, I think about whether it’s invasive to catalog these details and haunt her steps.
But I meant what I said. I can’t help her if I’m trapped in the dark.
With a deep sigh, I exit my SUV and head toward the cottage.
When I reach the door, I hesitate before sliding the spare key into the lock or grabbing the handle.
It feels like too much pressure on her, to just assume I can come and go like it’s my house.
For now, anyway. So instead, I fold my hand into a fist and gently rap three times on the door.
A few moments later, Harper opens the door with a puzzled expression.
“Hey,” I say.
“Why didn’t you just use your key?”
Maybe I’m overthinking things, judging by the deepening confusion spread across her face. She’s a practical person, after all. “I didn’t want to intrude.”
Harper’s eyes narrow. “But you live here.”
“Temporarily.”
Christ. I don’t know if I’ve just made things better or worse. Her vexation takes on a lethal edge. “Right. Well, for now, you can just come in, Nolan.” Harper opens the door wider and steps back. “Do you want a beer? I’m just about to make some dinner.”
“Sure,” I say, stopping just long enough to press a kiss to her cheekbone as I pass. Relief dances behind my bones when she leans into my touch. “I’ll give you a hand.”
I take off my boots and trail after her, but she stops abruptly partway through the living room, wheeling to face me. Her mouth opens, then closes, then opens again, as though words are stuck in her throat.
“Something wrong?” I ask.
The question barely passes my lips when she says, “Did you move the black knight on my chessboard?”
I look over at the board, where the white pawn that was two spaces ahead yesterday has been placed back in line, the game reset.
Dismay weighs down my shoulders. It must mean more to her than I realized.
She probably has a particular way of positioning the pieces, and when I picked up that knight yesterday, I set it back the wrong way.
Maybe just a few millimeters too far to one side, or turned a little on the wrong angle.
If this board is some way for her to feel a measure of control over a world that seems so chaotic, or if it’s somehow tied to her traumatic past, I could have disrupted her sanctuary with the slightest change.
“Yeah,” I say, “I did. I’m sorry, I didn’t realize it had significance.”
Though I was worried she might be angry, surprisingly, she seems relieved. “I thought I was going crazy,” she replies, expelling a long breath. “It’s okay. It’s just . . . a thing. For me.”
Her smile is faint, her features less pinched by stress as she nods toward the kitchen.
I hate to burst her newly found bubble of comfort so soon, but there are still so many obstacles between us that we need to break through.
I only wait until she’s cracked two beers and assigned me to chopping vegetables before I say, “I feel like we have a lot to talk about.”
“Yeah,” she says, not looking up from the fish she starts deboning.
“Like, did you meet Maxine Yates at the volunteer center? Lukas nearly imploded at the distillery. I’ve never seen him so rattled.
He’s had a crush on her since second grade.
He’s also got zero game. I tried to be his wingman, but he failed as soon as he flew solo. ”
I suppress a smile, not wanting her to catch the slightest hint of it in case she thinks this diversion will work. “I was more thinking about starting with Bryce Mahoney, but we should definitely come back to that.”
A blush creeps up her neck as Harper clears her throat. “That guy. Yeah.”
“Let me guess. He’s made a pass through Cookie Monster, and he’s now composting beneath your award-winning flowers?”
“Yep. Mostly.”
“What do you mean, ‘mostly’?”
Harper lifts a shoulder, still not meeting my eyes. For a moment, I think she’s not going to answer, or she’ll try to switch gears on me the way she likes to do when the pressure is on. Especially when she says, “Do you remember when we met at the Bean?”
Of course I fucking remember. From the moment I walked into A Shipwrecked Bean, I was magnetically drawn to her.
Even though her back was to me, she was all I could see.
That glossy, dark hair. Those long legs, the muscles strong and defined.
Even those fucking boots. Since when were work boots sexy?
I remember trying to think of something witty or funny to say, and what I landed on was “Anything you recommend?”
And the second she turned around, the first seeds of obsession blossomed. An obsession that’s blown through every plan I’ve spent the last four years carefully crafting. One I never want to end.
I clear my throat. “Yeah, I think I remember that,” I say. “You seemed a bit . . . flustered. Maybe you liked what you saw when you turned around.”
That earns me a slice from her silver eyes, an attempted cover for the fierce blush that rises in her cheeks. “Or maybe it was because I wasn’t holding a meatball sub—”
“I figured that out pretty quick.”
“—but Bryce Mahoney’s busted-up tibia with a titanium plate. Let’s just say that Cookie Monster wasn’t fond of that particular treat.”
I stare at her blankly, processing the details. A tinfoil-wrapped human bone. That she was carrying around in her bag. And took out of said bag in the middle of a packed café to rummage for change. And then claimed was a sandwich.
“What?” she says, following my trail of unvoiced thoughts. “No one questions you unless you look suspicious.”
“Your ballmeat explanation seemed a little suspicious.”
“And you still didn’t question it. So . . . ” She shrugs and turns to face me, pressing into my space, her eyes dropping to my lips in a way that has my cock instantly hardening. “I think that sounds like a you problem.”
I know what she’s doing, stoking the fire of need that always burns for her.
Distracting me from the seriousness of everything that threatens to unravel us.
And still I chuckle, leaning into her heat.
“And where would that bone be now? Sounds to me like you didn’t want to put it in your flower bed next to a garden gnome. ”
“Garden gnomes are too pedestrian for Arthur Lancaster’s taste.” Harper steps back, refocusing on the fish, which she transfers to a ceramic dish. “It’s in my bag.”
“Your bag. You mean the one that’s over there, by the front door?”
Her gaze tracks to the pegs on the wall where the bag I saw her with that day hangs next to her Arc’teryx rain jacket. She tilts her head, then turns her back to me to wash her hands. “Yep.”
“That was what . . . three weeks ago?”
“I got a little distracted.” Harper shoots me a sardonic smile over her shoulder. “Some asshole named Nolan Rhodes came to town to kill me and left a decapitated head in my bird feeder. I was too busy kicking his ass at basically everything.”
I wait until her attention is back on the sink before I sneak up to band an arm across her middle and lift her from the floor. Her surprised squeak transforms into a flurry of laughter as I dig my fingers into her side and tickle her.
“Jesus, what do you take me for? Of course it’s not still in the bag. It’s in the freezer behind the pork chops,” she manages between gasps and giggles. “I’m not amateur-level like some people who are tricked by elderly murderers and wind up handcuffed by wannabe frat boy internet detectives.”
“I’m a methodical killer, I’ll have you know,” I say against her neck as she cackles. “You’re in danger.”
Before I even have time to process what’s happening, she reaches back to grab my earlobe. A shock of pain follows her fierce tug. As I drop her to the floor, she snatches my knife off the counter and whirls on me, pressing the sharpened steel to my throat.
Her satisfied smirk is fucking intoxicating.
“I’m sorry, I didn’t quite catch that,” she snarks, cocking her head to one side. “You said I’m in what?”
“Danger,” I say when a lengthy pause stretches between us.
“Oh, right. Danger. Are you sure—”