Letting Go (An Echo Bay Romance Book 2) Read online

  "She doesn't want a digital footprint."

  "Exactly. That's why I believe there's a threat."

  The ache in my gut twists. Anything could have happened in the eight years she's been out of touch wither family. "No one really knows what she's been doing."

  "She's not forthcoming either. Maybe with Devon…a little. She told Devon and Claire she joined a commune out west. Just a heads up though, I haven't shared much of this with Claire and I don't want her worrying. Not after what she's been through this summer."

  You mean not after what you've both been through, is what I wanted to say, but I didn't. Finn lost his wife and child to a sociopath three years ago and then the same guy came after Claire. I'm still not sure they have both entirely recovered. This might explain why he seems so hyper-vigilant about Chloe.

  "I can’t have any more trouble brought here," he says and levels his gaze at me. "That's why I'd like you here, skip the studio apartment in Portland and take your room upstairs. When you're done with this conference in four days, I want you here full-time."

  The annoying ache in the pit of my stomach tells me Finn is spot on. If Chloe is afraid, there's a reason to be afraid.

  As I start to open the door, Finn lobs more comments my way: "Another thing. She's doing something out on Rock Island. No matter what, she's out there two hours, sometimes three, every day."

  I nod, taking note and then my original concern takes root again. "And about the other thing?"

  "What thing? Oh. You and Chloe? Yeah. I repeat. Grown-ass man."

  Chapter Three

  Chloe

  Late morning-early afternoon is my time. The kitchen is closed from ten to four, so I can prep, make our mother's signature triple berry pie, torch the crème Brule and do simple things like feed sourdough starter and send in orders. Three times a week, I stroll down Carter's Point Road to buy fresh fish, crab, and lobster. Twice a week, I order meat from Weaver's, the general store on the street side of the wharf. I refuse to cook pork, but the Inn offers chicken and beef.

  I vary my trips.

  It's Monday, my sort-of day off but I feel like I'm already running late. Usually by now I've either driven into Saxton's Bay or Rockland or walked to the piers to check out the morning catch. I glance at the clock: ten forty-five. I'm officially off the clock at noon until Wednesday morning. I splash water on my face, step to the rear entrance by the floor tub to grab a towel, and pat dry.

  Just as I come back around the corner, there's Bryce, peering in the industrial fridge.

  "Jesus," he says adding, "I didn't know you were still here," completely deadpan but placing a hand to his chest. Though he doesn’t flinch, I must have surprised him.

  "Didn't mean to startle," I say slightly amused I could surprise him at all. The guy is like a human rock. It seems nothing could or would move him.

  "I've been meaning to talk to you since—" he pauses. "Since that time we danced at your sister's party."

  My ears immediately start to burn. Tucking away a strand of hair, I blurt, "I had a good time."

  This puts him off his game, and there's this awkward pause and then he starts again: "I just wanna say…"

  He looks conflicted, like he doesn’t know if he should finish the sentence.

  "What? Did you not like something I made?"

  Grabbing the door handle, I peer into the fridge. "Did something go bad?"

  He takes a step back and tries again. "No, no, no. I just want to say…"

  I close the door and stare at him.

  "I think you're amazing."

  For some reason, this instantly pisses me off. "I want to be clear, I am anything but amazing," I say, and I can feel my mouth pull into a thin, angry little line. I feel instantly sorry because, again, he looks so surprised—this time, though for a different reason. He's trying to be all complimentary, and I'm ruining it.

  "Hey, I'm sorry," he says. "I didn't mean to set you off or anything."

  Even his apology does nothing but make me angrier. "I don't need you to apologize and I certainly don't expect you to understand, but I am anything but a good person."

  With a glint in his eye, his next line drops from the smile on his lips. "I didn't say you were a good person. I said I thought you were amazing."

  Something about the way he said I wasn't a good person makes me soften for a moment and we connect. Somehow, he knows how horrible I've been to my family and how unforgivable my actions have been, but then I realize he couldn't know any of that. He and Claire don't talk and though I know Claire's probably told Finn, I'm sure he hasn't shared any of this with Bryce. Men, I've discovered, often don't talk about deep, intimate feelings. They tend to talk about the ball game, what beer they drank, and high school conquests. There's no way Bryce has any idea of what I've done.

  As if reading my mind, he suddenly says, "I know more about you than you think I do."

  Now, I'm the one who's startled. "What do you mean?"

  "You and I need to talk," he says.

  I glance at my watch. It's a thin, silver accordion band, set with two tiny microscopic diamonds on either side. It used to be our mother's. I took it as well when I ran off. I stole it. See? Not a nice thing to do.

  "I have exactly twenty minutes if you want to walk with me down Carters Point. I have to buy some fish."

  As he grabs his windbreaker by the back door, I watched the muscles move underneath the thin sweater. God this guy's built. Why was I inviting him along? Talking is never good—especially when one person wants to do it and the other doesn’t and I haven’t felt much like talking in years.

  Outside, the air is crisp and sunny-dry for late summer. Salty, Claire's rescue horse, nickers softly as we walk along the path by the corral. For a moment, I can hear Claire's laughter from inside the vet clinic. She's probably getting ready for surgery now, holding off on breakfast until later in the day. That was one of the small things she confided in me after I came back to the family just weeks ago. I had brought over some cinnamon buns, warm and yeasty as a gift. She turned them down and told me she didn't usually eat breakfast first thing in the morning. Not before surgery.

  So maybe that's why she didn't take the croissant. But she could have taken one for later.

  "What's got your forehead all frowned up," says Bryce waving an index finger at my hairline.

  Glancing at him I try to rearrange my face.

  "You're thinking about something not fun," he continues.

  "I'm just trying to figure out how much haddock to get."

  Bryce leans over and whispers in my ear conspiratorially: "Not buying it."

  His warm breath against my ear makes me shiver, as hair rises on my arm. I have to put certain thoughts aside. There's no way I could ever invite him into my life.

  The walkway down to the wharf was grit-brilliant with white crushed shells. I just hoped Owen Curtis wasn't around. Growing up, he was a high school kid a year older and a grade above me. I realized a long time ago he had harbored an unhealthy obsession with what he thought was "our" relationship. It was more like a fiasco. Devon warned me he had taken over his father's fishery and had hurt his back last week. This meant he might be working behind the counter and not out at sea. But the truth is, I can't avoid him forever.

  "You've said hardly two sentences. What are you hiding?" says Bryce.

  "I'm not hiding anything."

  "I'm calling you on that one," he says, pulling open the wooden screen door.

  Shrugging, I brush by him to enter and offer a smile. "I'm just private."

  "Oh, no. You're mysterious."

  My heart melts just a little. I shake my head as we step inside the fishery.

  "I am definitely not mysterious." I turn my attention to why I am here: fish and shellfish.

  To my relief, a teenager stands at attention behind the counter. With a touch of greasy hair, a very large and active Adam's apple, he's strapped into a slightly stained but clean apron.

  "Can I help you?" he
says, his voice cracking.

  Bryce tries to say something to me but I wave him to be quiet for a math-moment. I have to think about fourteen guests staying the week with stuffed haddock as our signature entrée. My mouth suddenly waters and I realize I haven’t had anything to eat this morning either. But the sudden flash of sun-dried tomatoes, goat cheese, chives, and capers melting in the center of wedges of Haddock is too seductive.

  I make a decision. "Twenty pounds of haddock. And ten pounds of mussels. Are they local or PEI? And some oysters. Five pounds."

  "Local. Pemaquid and Belon he says.

  "Half and half. That's enough for now." I dig around in my back pocket for the kitchen's charge card. The boy wraps up the haddock first and is working on selecting clutches of mussels when the door behind him opens and slams shut. It's Owen Curtis.

  He's chatting with the kid and doesn't see me right away, thank God. I pull my hood up, just hoping he won't recognize me, but as he reaches over and sets the mussels up on the countertop, our eyes lock.

  "Oh my God," he says. "Is that you? Is that you, Chloe?"

  "Yes," I say, trying to authenticate a smile.

  "It's so good to see you," he goes on, a little too loud. Everything about him is too loud: his voice, red cheeks, bright blond hair, and bright purple shirt. The only thing subdued are his pants, faded, stained, and dull blue jeans. Freckles stand out on his arms.

  "Man, I'd like to catch up with you," Owen starts right in.

  Bryce stiffens next to me and there is something about that slight arrest in posture, his almost imperceptible intake of breath—I feel instantly protected. I don't think I've ever felt this before. Maybe with my father, years ago when I was little, and some stranger would reprimand me in public. My father would step up and say, not your kid buddy, back off.

  "Well, I've been back for just a little bit. A month or so," I say. "I'm working at The Inn." I smile at Bryce because he, too, sort of works at the Inn. I want it clear to Owen that I will not be having drinks with him.

  This seems to be the morning for unwanted mindreading.

  "I'd love to have drinks with you, girly girl. Man," he says, shaking his head, "It's been too f-- long." After his aborted curse, he turns to the pale kid and says, "Tim, go and meet the Proxy Queen and help them."

  Out the little square glass window, a lobster boat chugs along, idling toward the peer, loaded with traps.

  Owen turns around. "So what are you doing at The Inn?"

  I glance at the price flashing on the electronic register. "I'm the chef," I say. Usually, I tell people I just cook, but lately, Finn has been grooming me to say I am the chef. He finally convinced me the public needed The Inn to have a "chef," not a "cook." But it still feels weird. I'm not a trained chef and my previous kitchen experience was not of choice but under duress. Let's put it this way: I didn't enjoy cooking at the previous place and I was cooking for about a hundred people. Every day. Every meal. Just me.

  "Are you making your mom's pies and stuff?"

  "Yes," I say hoping he just drops it. I don't want Bryce to know anything about Owen Curtis and our history. But the mind-reading goes on and my ears begin to burn more.

  "Do you remember prom that spring?" Owen kind-of gives a nod, with his mouth open, as if ready to wink at Bryce and me simultaneously but for two different reasons. For Bryce, it's to warn him off. For me, it's to unite us.

  I shiver.

  Owen grins broadly. "We ate that entire pie afterward, remember?"

  "Can I just get the oysters?" I say. "Another five pounds."

  "I remember it. The pie."

  Please stop.

  "So when are we gonna grab that drink?"

  Fuck me.

  Owen hoists the last of the meshy bags of oysters and at that moment Bryce clamps one massive hand over the guy's wrist and says, very quietly, "I think she made it clear she doesn't want to have drinks with you."

  Again, there's that little thrill of feeling protected, but I'm also very embarrassed. "Bryce, it's fine. It's okay."

  Bryce lets go of Owen's wrist. Without removing his gaze from Owen's startled face, he says to me, "It's okay now. I think it's perfectly clear this guy's not going to ask you out again."

  Owen's face turns an even brighter red. "I didn't mean anything by it," he says, flustered and defensive.

  "That's great." Bryce's voice is even. "Keep it that way."

  Outside, I peel off my Orono college sweatshirt and tie it around my waist for the walk back, and adjust the large, plastic, rectangular tote I carry for the load of fish.

  "Gimme that," says Bryce and in one fluid motion, he lifts it from my shoulder. He already has the mussels and clams in his other hand. I'm left with the lowly bag of gleaming white oysters

  His hand brushes the top of my bare shoulder where the tank top makes a large "O" around my arm. I shiver.

  "You okay?" he says suddenly concerned.

  I open my mouth to say something, but nothing comes out. How do I explain to him I don't know how to trust the small thrill of hearing concern in his voice? Of believing he cares? I left college right before graduation with a man with blond hair and depthless blue eyes, who told me he had a plan for me. And I believed him. I left my family for him. He didn't have a plan for me—he didn't care for me. All he did was provide a framework for a life I didn't believe in and it took me nearly a decade to leave.

  Now, walking back, I feel I can't even trust myself, let alone trust Bryce. Suddenly exhausted by how complicated it all is, I just shrug. "I'm fine. I just got a little chilled in there."

  "Some history? With Firehead?"

  "Sort of," I say. "Nothing serious, high school stuff. Believe me, he was just a lot more into me than I was into him."

  It's not the time to tell Bryce how Owen tracked me home from school, followed me in his car to the beach, where I drank with part of the football team, blacked out, and how I felt when I woke up.

  Dirty. Broken. Sadly typical, I thought at the time. Still think so today. Raped by how many boys? At least one. If I told Bryce this he'd go back and crush Owen like a piece of tissue paper and it's not worth it. I am still not sure Owen had anything to do with it. Another girl said he actually stood up for me. That he was the one who took me home. But I don’t remember. It was a long time ago when we were just kids. Maybe I "led them on," and maybe I didn't. I don't even know anymore. I was new to my own body and my own sexuality.

  All I know for sure is that a semester from graduating from college that a British boy with curly blond hair and blue eyes understood I was broken in places I didn’t know I had. Then there was the car accident and I had to face the pain of my parents dying, of having them suddenly gone from my life when I was away at college. The idea of returning home, to have to quit school and take care of my three sisters and my brother, felt overwhelming. To see the pain in their eyes and know that no matter what, our family was always going to be broken, was more than I could bear. There was nothing I could do about any of it. This man—this man with the blue eyes and London accent, who took me away, who promised me salvation, told me that I would learn to speak to God and there would be a plan for me, and all would be well.

  The trouble was, I believed him.

  Chapter Four

  Bryce

  When the guy in the fish market started chatting her up, I thought my head was gonna explode. Chloe is too nice. She clearly wanted nothing to do with him, resisting him not just with averted eyes but with her body language: she was completely shut down. I knew instantly there was some kind of weird history, plus it was just something about the way he would not stop.

  Jesus, women have to put up with a shit load of crap.

  Claire pulled me aside after that dance at her party and told me just a little bit about Chloe, enough to know that Chloe wouldn't expect me to fight her battles for her. She was strong said Claire, and I had to respect Chloe's need for privacy. Something in the way Chloe sort of sagged wearily against the co
unter when that asshole came on to her, told me something different though.

  But honestly? I could have snapped that guy's neck like a twig.

  Walking back to The Inn like a couple makes me feel suddenly slaphappy, though carrying two bags of fish doesn't seem terribly romantic. A breeze lifts the dark hair from her shoulder for a moment and I see the straight line of her clavicle.

  "Tell me something about you," she says.

  "What do you mean?" I struggle to tear my eyes away and gaze ahead. I fail.

  "You're always asking me about me. Tit for tat. What about you?"

  "You're the mystery."

  She arches an eyebrow, a dark, delicate arc above deep blue eyes. "All I know about you is you're what? Ex-Seal?

  Instantly there's the annoying churn in the pit of my stomach. "Yeah. Stress on the ex," I say. "I just work for Finn and Nic now. Let's leave it at that."

  "Don't get weird. I get it. The Seals. Isn't that like just some giant big bromance? I don’t mean to take away from your service and I thank you. But I mean don't you guys just all stick together?"

  "Sometimes," I say breathing in what follows: "sometimes not."

  Suddenly Finn shouts from the front porch, the door banging behind him "Nic wants to conference."

  It seems as though these days I'm constantly shuffling between Boston and mid-coast Maine. When Finn's first wife and unborn child were murdered, it nearly killed him and he walked away from the business for nearly three years. Then he found Claire, and they seem very focused on building a life together. Colton Security was named for him, as the founder, and I don’t know what went on between him and Nic, but from what I've been able to piece together, Finn wanted nothing for his half of the business when he walked away from it.

  Now he's back at Colton Security, in a real way, and took on two new clients in the last month. His forte is profiling and security design, and he can kind of do that from anywhere, once he's done an in-depth site visit. Nic's also a profiler, Jackson and I work as bodyguards, and then there's a whole list of analysts and cybercrime investigators down in Boston. We also landed security contracts at some of the smaller airports in Massachusetts. Business is expanding and I'm feeling pulled in many directions.