Chapter 34
Emery
Bright lights illuminate the rink, making it easy to spot Isla.
She glides down the length of the ice, her long hair flowing from beneath her hat as she and Thomas practice their puck passing.
Carson and Brooks are corralled on the far side with Jon, swaddled in helmets and gear to avoid injury that’s otherwise guaranteed.
But it’s the sight of Logan coasting beside Macy as she toddles along, struggling to stay on her feet without the training walker, that makes my heart swell.
He sees me approaching and his intense expression breaks with a secretive smirk before he refocuses on his little niece.
“Does anyone work around here?” I sidle up next to Holt. The wave of blistering cold temperatures has passed for now, leaving us with balmy highs of minus four degrees Celsius. Big, fluffy snowflakes float down from a darkening sky, making the entire scene magical.
“Not on this ranch, they don’t.” But he’s smiling as a Colt burns in his fingertips, the pungent sweet scent of tobacco clinging to the air.
He only allows himself one a day and he seems to always enjoy it out here.
“The market’s open an extra hour for the last-minute rush.
Annie’s been coming home smelling like butter and icing sugar every day for the last two weeks. ”
“She loves it.”
“Don’t I know it. I’m glad she’s agreed to close up shop after the twenty-fourth until the New Year. God knows we could all use the break. Especially with Jon’s brother flyin’ in on Sunday and everyone else coming for Christmas Day. It’s gonna be an absolute zoo.”
“Are you sure you guys can handle two more animals in that zoo?”
“Ah.” He waves off my concern. “You’re family. You should know that by now.”
Macy loses her balance and sprawls face cage–down on the ice.
“Oh, here we go.” Holt winces. “Let’s see if she screams like she does with Jon.”
But she simply lies there.
Logan stands over her. “Let’s get up like we practiced.”
Instead, Macy rolls over and flaps her arms and legs as if making a snow angel, her childish, high-pitched giggles carrying in the peaceful night.
Logan chuckles. “Come on, you goof.”
“I’ll tell ya, he’s a hell of a lot happier now than he was when he first got home,” Holt muses through a drag, watching his son.
“It’s going to take time.”
“Maybe. But you and I both know it isn’t time that’s making him come out of his shell.”
I feel Holt’s sideways glance on me, but I keep my attention on the rink ahead, even as my cheeks flush.
“Have you found what you’re looking for in Jay’s stuff yet?”
I falter. “Who says we’re looking for anything?” I didn’t think Logan would mention it to him.
I get a flat look in return. “The thermometer does. Cleaning out old boxes is something you do in the spring, when the cold doesn’t bite your skin.
But you two have been at it every night you can spare, which makes me think you’re lookin’ for something and it has to do with what Jay might have been up to with Ian. ”
It’s not the only thing we’ve been doing, and Holt clearly suspects as much, but he has the good grace to not spell that part out. “If we find something that should concern you, you’ll be the first to know,” I promise. It is his property after all.
But so far, there’s been nothing helpful among the boxes.
Old football helmets and sports trophies, G.I.
Joe figurines and WWF wrestling dolls, band T-shirts and yearbooks, loose four-by-six photos of Jay’s grade eight school camping trip, and scraps of movie stubs and receipts that are so faded, they don’t show anything anymore. Annie really did save everything.
Holt’s gaze drifts back to Logan, now carrying Macy as he does laps around the rink, gliding smoothly as if no time has passed since he last wore skates. “You know, I’ve been thinking about Clive a lot lately.”
Mention of my dad swells a knot in my throat. He and Holt were best of friends for years, until that fateful night. They remained friends after, but it was a relationship fraught with tension, regret, and judgment. “Why is that?”
Holt’s mouth works over his words. “Because, for the first time in a long time, I think we’re all gonna be okay.
And Clive would’ve liked to have seen that.
” He pats the top of the rink’s boards. “Better drive out to the market to see how the ladies are doin’.
” He steps away but then falters. “You two be careful, you hear?”
I nod.
With that, he’s gone, ambling down the cleared path through the snow.
Duke ambles by my side when I arrive at the garage that night.
Logan is shuffling around boxes inside. He looks up briefly, his eyes touching me for a split second.
“Hey. This one’s got a pile of old papers.
No idea what’s inside, but we can go through it upstairs where it’s warm.
I’ve had enough of being outside today.” He doesn’t wait for my answer, swiftly carrying the box up the stairs.
“Hello to you too,” I murmur, following him to the warmth of his apartment. Duke trails me, heading for his customary spot by the flaming woodstove. That dog has spent almost as much time here as I have.
“How was work?” Logan drops the box on the kitchen counter.
I shake off my boots and shuck my coat. “Pretty quiet, until we got this call to the Bale House because a girl with a nut allergy forgot her—”
Logan’s mouth collides with mine, cutting off my words with an almost frantic kiss. “Tell me after,” he pulls away to whisper, kicking the door shut before his strong hands seize my waist. “It’s been three days. I can’t wait another second.”
“I forgot Jay got his welding certificate.” I study the college paperwork from my horizontal position on the couch.
Logan’s focus is divided between the pages in his grip and a rare Friday night Leafs game on TV.
Music plays over the Bluetooth speaker that I taught him to use after insisting we needed to listen to something recorded after the mid-2000s.
“That was the only way he was allowed to live here after high school. He didn’t want to help around the ranch, so my dad told him to either do something useful with his life or get the fuck out. ”
I toss the page into the burn pile on the floor beside the couch. “I think this box is a bust.” It’s full of report cards and Player of the Game certificates, the kind of stuff a kid hands off to their mother to keep or toss.
“I think you’re right.” Logan drops his pages after mine and sinks back.
I admire his sculpted bare chest. “Aren’t you cold?” I redressed in my sweatshirt and joggers, but all Logan reached for were his track pants, and they sit deliciously low on his hips.
“No.” He collects my bare feet in his hands and begins kneading away at small aches I didn’t know I had. “Where’s Isla tonight?”
“At a party. Her friend Cody came to get her.”
Logan’s eyebrow arches. “Boyfriend Cody?”
I smile. “No, friend. Though I don’t think he’d mind being more.”
“Does she know that?”
“Not a clue.” I’ve seen the way he looks at her when he thinks no one’s watching; I’ve noticed how he’d come to all her games when she was playing in Cold River. She assumed it was because he had a thing for Holly who was also there, but I knew that wasn’t it.
“So, I guess you can’t stay here tonight then?” There’s no missing the disappointment in his tone.
“I should be home when she gets there.” I reach into the box, collecting another stack to flip through, finding orthodontist paperwork. “Oh, right! Jay had braces!”
“Yeah, his teeth were fucked. He had that extra row.” Logan filters through another stack, a page at a time with one hand while his other continues rubbing my foot.
“Holt’s figured it out.”
His hands stall. “Figured what out?”
“What we’re doing with Jay’s stuff.”
“Oh.” He continues his scanning and tossing.
“And I think this too.” I punctuate my meaning by sliding my foot back and forth gently over his groin, feeling him harden under my touch. “But definitely about Jay. You sure you don’t want to clue him in?”
“No. The thought of Jay burying God knows what on our land that Dad can’t find will drive him nuts.”
“You know, you can’t protect everyone from everything all the time.”
“Maybe not, but I can try.”
I finish sifting through the pile and root through the box for more, pulling out a yellowed copy of a Toronto Star newspaper.
Logan frowns at it. “What’s that about?”
“I don’t know.” I check the date and a shiver skitters down my back. “This is from a week before Jay died—”
Duke barks and wags his tail, his focus on the door.
Where Isla stands.
“Honey!” I toss the paper aside and sit up, slipping my feet out of Logan’s grip.
“I knocked,” she says tentatively.
“We didn’t hear it.” And in Logan’s frantic rush to get me into his bed earlier, he didn’t lock the door. “What are you doing back from the party so soon?”
“I wasn’t feeling it. Cody drove me home.” Her mood seems dour, her expression downcast.
Logan stands and saunters over to collect his shirt from the floor where it fell when he was stripping. “You want something to drink?”
“No, thanks.” Isla’s eyes skim over his torso as he redresses before averting, darting around his apartment, over to the rumpled bed.
They widen a beat.
I stifle my curse, remembering the box of condoms that sits on the nightstand. My balled-up socks nearby probably don’t help much either, if she’s noticed them too. “We’re watching the game and going through some old stuff. Why don’t you come and sit?” I beckon her over.
She kicks off her boots and ambles in, dropping beside me, allowing me to wrap an arm around her shoulders.
Logan watches quietly from the kitchen where he chugs a glass of water, giving us space.
“Tough night?” I push strands off her forehead before I lay a kiss there.
Her head bobs, her eyes welling with tears. “I really miss her.”
I pull her into a hug. “I know you do, baby.” And I desperately wish I could fix it all or at least carry this pain for her for a while.
“Here. In case you change your mind.” Logan drops onto the couch, setting a can of Coke on the coffee table where the old newspaper lays, discarded.
Duke veers to the left, his nose caught on a scent.
“Come on. None of that.” I whistle to deter him as Isla and I walk home.
Isla seems in a better mood, especially after winning a round of cards against Logan.
“I’m sorry you didn’t have a good time tonight. But it’ll get better, I promise.”
Isla nods, and after a lingering pause, she finally asks, “So, are you and Logan, like, together?”
I knew this conversation was coming. If she didn’t bring it up, I’d have to, eventually. “It’s complicated.”
“Mom …” She casts a sideways glance. “I saw the condoms.”
“Yes, I figured that much out.” I struggle to navigate the truth of it.
“As far as anyone knows, Logan and I are neighbors and friends. And I mean anyone, Isla. Your friends, my detachment officers, my boss, Breanne.” I need to see her soon to get my highlights freshened up.
That will require a masterclass in deception.
“Do Holt and Annie know?”
“They suspect it, but they’re not talking about it, and neither are we.”
Isla considers this. “What would happen if people found out?”
“Nothing good. I can basically kiss my career goodbye.”
“Why? ’Cause you’re not allowed to date someone with a record?”
“It’s not a rule, not exactly. Like I said, it’s complicated.”
“But why?” Her cute face pinches up with frustration. “Logan’s not out there, breaking the law. He’s not doing anything wrong.”
I smile, remembering a time when Logan was nothing more than the “old criminal” next door, crazy for coming back to Cold River.
“Whatever Logan and I are, we’re only that in his place. Outside of there, out in the open, we are neighbors and friends, and I’m the Cold River detachment commander.”
Duke reaches the porch first, trotting up the steps.
“And Dad?”
“He cannot find out, okay?” He’s already angry and hurt that Isla is skipping Christmas Day at his place. “I hate asking you to lie to him, but—”
“I won’t tell him.” Isla shakes her head to emphasize her declaration. “He hates Logan, doesn’t he?”
“Pretty much, yeah.” I unlock the front door.
“I like Logan. I feel safe around him.”
“You are safe around him.” He would literally kill for her or me, which is a scary notion because he’s proven he’s capable.
Isla sheds her coat and kicks off her boots. “I guess I know why you’ve been in such a good mood when you come back from next door lately.”
I squeeze my eyes shut. “Oh my God. Stop—”
“My mom’s finally getting laid.”