Chapter Forty #2
Well, they had, in an odd way—not on surveillance or on anything that had so much importance, but passing in closely orbiting circles of friends and people they considered family.
Their quiet teamwork meshed well, and Chelsea thought about their work expertise.
She didn’t know his details but could guess it amounted to blowing things up.
Hers was the opposite—hiding in sight, discovering the impossible.
Their connection had a yin-yang balance rooted in savagery and sleuthing.
When they finished the final section, covering the Nymans’ backyard, she knew their work was solid. They had eyes everywhere.
They finished in the back corner in front of a black wrought-iron bench that had an expansive view of the property.
Liam lowered himself onto the bench as a chilly breeze swept up her hair.
Chelsea wrapped her chill-bumped arms around herself, rubbing her jacket’s sleeves for warmth, and joined him.
The cold metal bled through her pants, and she snuggled under his arm.
Liam tossed his arm around her shoulder and rubbed her arm. “Chilly?”
“A little.”
But neither made any effort to stand up.
She didn’t know where his thoughts were. Despite the brisk fall breeze, the backyard offered calm peacefulness. Never in a million years could Chelsea imagine how they could sit like that in the Nyman’s backyard. But never in a million years could she forget how he made her feel.
“Good work,” Liam broke the silence.
Their thighs touched, and she tilted her chin to watch his face. “Good company.” Then she asked, “Are you okay?”
A small, almost surprised grin formed. “You know what I like most about you?”
“Hm?”
“We can talk about what happened. That we don’t have to ignore the past like it’s an elephant in the room, and that we can fight about it—”
The hand holding? “I wasn’t trying to fight earlier.”
He laughed. “I like that it’s okay to figure this out.”
No matter if the rest of the world would agree, he was right. No one was better suited to find solace and move forward with. “So.” She paused. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah.” He scanned the backyard. “Despite a target on the Nymans and that feeling you had at the bagel shop? I’m okay.”
“How about outside of an operational assessment?” She tapped his chest. “In here.”
His lips parted, but his gaze averted and held over her shoulder. Chelsea twisted, unsure what to expect.
Liam was trained on a childhood relic that swayed in a pine tree. “What is that?”
She snickered. “That arts-and-crafts beauty?”
“Yeah,” he chuckled too. “I always wondered what the hell it was supposed to be. I never asked—” He cut his attention back to her and shrugged. “I never asked…”
Her heart hurt at all the questions he might never have asked. But there was a lesson to be learned in their messy connection. Don’t hold back. Embrace the present. “It’s a wind chime.”
“What?” His forehead creased as he took another look. “Really?”
“Or maybe a wind-chime-turned-bird-house.”
He laughed then squinted. “I can see that—I think.”
She tossed her head back and laughed also. “I have no idea why Linda treasures those little projects.”
“Because the woman treasures you.”
A shallow sigh caught in her throat. Liam’s words made her nostalgic for the past and grateful for the Nymans.
“Was it a preschool project or something,” he asked.
Chelsea snorted. “We were definitely in our twenties.”
“Damn—I mean.” He rolled his lips together. “How did… that happen?”
She side-eyed him. “It involved a bottle of wine.”
“I can see that.”
“We came home one night as a surprise visit from school. Linda and Frank were asleep, but Linda had left out a bag of school supplies.”
“And that thing was the result?” he quipped.
She elbowed him. “Linda woke us up the next morning. We’d passed out in a sea of school supplies. Wood glue. Paint. Construction paper. You name it, we’d used it. She didn’t have anything she’d needed for the day.”
Liam tsked.
“But instead of reading us the riot act, she hung it up—” Chelsea couldn’t keep from laughing. “And Linda said, ‘I’ve been waiting for you to bring me something home from college to hang up.’ She picked it up like it was a Van Gogh but hung it in the tree.”
Liam bent down to kiss her. Chelsea froze, so lost in the past that the right now had slipped away.
She didn’t pull back, and he hovered, a breath away, while he searched for an answer. She didn’t know the question. Every time she thought she did, it changed.
But he didn’t push her, not like earlier on the sidewalk with his Romeo act. That was silly, and calling her out had been spot on. This was self-conscious and breathless. She couldn’t relax when she forgot about them.
Her heart slammed in her chest, shouting for her to stop thinking and kiss that man. What was wrong with her? They’d talked until they had logical answers. Nothing was wrong with her and Liam! It was Chelsea who couldn’t get it together.
She leaned back from his lips. “You know what I like most about you?”
“What?”
Her eyes closed. “The grace you give me.” He was a haven each time her tangled emotions had a hang-up. Healing, grieving, and falling in love were not linear. Liam had explained that, now she had to live like she believed him.
A gust of wind rolled, and he brushed her hair back. “That’s one hell of a compliment.”
“One that you deserve.” She gently kissed him and let their lips part and their tongues tangle in that effortless way that made her feel as if they were floating on clouds.
His forehead rolled to hers, their lips hovered close, then Liam stood from the wrought-iron bench and held out his hand.
She believed in them—and Chelsea took his hand. Their fingers locked, and they slowly walked in the direction of her wino-wind chime.
“My family was nothing like theirs,” he said.
“Same.” Linda ran laps around her actual mother when it came to support and love.
Liam guided her behind the stately pine trees that lined the fence. “My dad should’ve left my mom.”
“Families are hard,” she finally said as the silence widened.
The long-sweeping pine branches above and the pine needles on the ground muffled their steps and conversation. She didn’t know anything about his family but recalled Linda mentioning how no one blood related had come to Julia’s funeral. Her heart ached.
“I became the man of the family early on.” He scoffed quietly. “What was I? Six? Maybe seven?” They continued to wander, but he didn’t elaborate.
“What happened?”
Liam inhaled and let it out slowly. “When…”
She waited for him to find the words. Their walk became a winding trail in and out of the trees at a glacial speed.
“Before my mom died,” he said, “adults saddled me with the man of the family title when the only concern I should’ve had was making the first-string peewee team.”
The idea of him as a little footballer who’d lost his mom and couldn’t escape the pressures of adulthood made her throat tighten. She wrapped her free hand around his arm and held it to her chest. “You don’t have to tell me any more.”
“My dad was a piece of shit.”
“He left you?”
Liam cackled. “I wish.”
Chelsea held on to him as if he needed the support, but truthfully, she wasn’t sure she could let go until he explained what happened. Even then, she might not be able to let go.
“If you were to look up how my mom died, the record would say she was the victim of random, senseless violence.”
She thought that over and asked, “What should it say?”
“It’d say—” His voice cracked. “That we weren’t supposed to be home.”
She wanted him to stop. “You don’t have to say anything else.”
Pain pinched his features. “I was sick. A cold or a fever—”
Chelsea was terrified to hear more.
“My dad had fallen into a bad spot with some loan sharks.” He cleared his throat. “They shot up our house.”
Nausea hit her like a tidal wave. Little Liam… “Oh God.”
“They were sending him a message.” He toed the pine needles until a layer of dark dirt surfaced. “And he heard them, loud and clear. But my mom was collateral damage.”
Tears streamed down Chelsea’s cheeks. She wrapped her arms around him and prayed to ease his suffering. “I’m so sorry.”
He unwound himself, and his pained expression had dulled to emotionless. “Happened a long time ago.”
“That doesn’t matter.”
“True enough,” he finally admitted.
His mother and Julia. No wonder he’d embraced their reality quickly. If someone meant something, Liam understood to hold on that second. No one knew how life would change.
He pulled her close and laid his lips on top of her head. It wasn’t so much a kiss as him holding her in place.
In the last few weeks, she’d learned more from him than she had anyone—even her partner, Mac—in her life.
But it wasn’t until then that she realized Liam had taught her the most important of life lessons.
Each person was a second away from a different life.
Shying away from the seconds was the same as shooting away the future.
Chelsea pushed onto her toes and pressed her lips to his cheek. An urge to share how much he meant was nearly crushing.
His impassive walls faltered. “What was that for?”
“Because I don’t know how to pay you back for all that you give to me.”