The Slow Burn of Silence (A Snowy Creek Novel) (14 page)

“Levi, who also lied,” he said.

She didn’t reply.

“You mentioned Adam moved back here with his family; he’s married?”

“To Lily Gallagher. You remember Lily from school?”

“Yeah. Quiet, pretty girl.”

“She worked in retail for a while but is a stay-home mom now. They have two boys, eight and five: Tyler and Mikey. They seem to have an idyllic marriage.”

“What about Levi?”

“Big name in the ski business now, runs the ski hill. He’s also married, a small baby.”

“And Clint is now fire chief?”

“A fairly recent promotion. He married his pregnant girlfriend, Beppie, and joined the military right about when you went to prison. But after a peacekeeping deployment in Sierra Leone, he quit the army and came back to Snowy Creek, where he joined the fire department. They have three daughters and live on a small ranch in Pemberton now.”

She rubbed the knee of her jeans, got up, paced, then stopped to stare out the window over the lake. Jeb allowed his gaze to slowly traverse the length of her legs in her slim-fitting jeans, the tight shape of her ass. Low in his belly, desire stirred in spite of his pain, in spite of this situation. He wanted her. Desperately. A slow, smoldering fire of desire had been building insidiously in his gut from the moment he’d laid eyes on her again, outside the school. A fire that had never died, but had been fanned hotly back to life.

She glanced over her shoulder at him, gold light catching her profile. His chest hurt. His mouth was dry. He took another swig of ice water, finishing the bottle.

“Tell me about Trey,” he said.

Her shoulders stiffened visibly. “He wasn’t one of the four. He saw the same things I did, you leaving the pit with Merilee and Amy in your car.”

“Trey is a friend of the three remaining guys. They all go back. They stick together now.”

“He isn’t the only one tight with those guys.” She sounded defensive.

“What happened between the two of you, Rachel?”

“That’s got nothing to do with this.” Her words were suddenly clipped, brooking no further discussion. She either trusted Trey fully, or she still felt something for the guy.

“What about Harvey Zink?”

She inhaled deeply and turned back to face the window. “Zin
k . . .
he’s a bit of a mess, really. Owns the Shady Lady Saloon, does very good business. He was married and had a kid but is divorced now. His ex has custody and still lives in town. He goes on big drinking binges every now and then. No steady relationship but there always seems to be a string of young women.”

“Zink, who dealt drugs at school. Who had access to Rohypnol, the date rape drug.”

She spun to face him. “The empty Rohypnol blister pack, Merilee’s blood in your car, how
did
that happen?”

“I plan to find out.”

“You mean, it could have been planted?”

He said nothing.

She came, sat down beside him. The old sofa creaked. She looked at her hands, her thumb worrying her empty ring finger. Slowly, almost inexorably, he reached out, covered her hand with his. “I didn’t do it, Rach.”

She didn’t move.

“Look at me.”

She did. Her face was so close, her eyes a liquid chocolate brown, skin so smooth. Acting without thought, he cupped the side of her jaw, and her lids fluttered, lowered. His blood sank hot, fast to his groin. She leaned almost imperceptibly forward, and Jeb brought his mouth closer to hers. He could feel her breath on his lips. His heart began to slam so hard he thought it might bust out of his broken rib cage.

He brushed his lips softly over hers, tentative, a question. Her body trembled. And he pressed his mouth down hard over hers, shades of scarlet and black, swirling, whirling through his brain as her mouth opened under his, sweet, warm, inviting him in, her body sinking bonelessly against his, her hand sliding up the back of his neck, cupping it, drawing him into her.

She angled her head, a soft moan coming from her throat as her tongue slipped into his mouth, tangling, slicking with his, mounting in pace, tension, aggression. He could feel her pulse hammering in unison with his, faster, harder. He felt he might have died and was finally, after all these years, after that tiny cell, the barbed wire and fencin
g . . .
he was finally coming home. And God knew nothing was going to stop him or send him back now.

Pain roared through his torso, his ribs, but he didn’t care. Logic, the sound of the moaning wind, the chinking flagpole, the distant, thudding choppers, the crackling fire, the sleeping dog—it all slipped away, fading into just this one pure sensation of Rachel in his arms, something he’d never truly dreamed possible again.

Jeb slid his hand into her shirt and found her breast. Tears of exquisite pleasure burned behind his lids as he felt the firm, soft swell, the tightly aroused nipple. Liquid fire arrowed into his groin, and he grew so hard he felt he might explode. His penis, his body, the cut on his head, his ribs, ached with each pound of his heart.

This was more than arousal, than sex. This was everything. This was love, reawakening, rekindling, starting a fire so fierce and poignant in his heart and belly, Jeb knew he would stop at nothing now. This was being alive. And nothing could match being held in the warm, enveloping arms, feeling the care and affection and desire of another human being after nine long years of being so isolated and cold and alone.

He felt her hand moving gently down his waist, sliding between his thighs. She cupped his groin. And Jeb was sunk.

CHAPTER 11

He is hard and lean in my arms, a warrior broken but not diminished. His muscles are tight with pain, yet he doesn’t seem to care as he slides his hand down my back and cups my buttocks. His other hand threads through my hair, fisting, pulling hard enough to make my eyes water as he kisses me deeper.

My hand is between his legs. The sensation of his erection bulging stiff under my palm is dizzying. Heat floods to my groin. My nipples tingle in response. I’m being sucked down into a place where there is only sensation. I grapple for reality, for logic, for air, a part of me knowing this is wrong. We’re not ready. It could all still go so terribly bad. Yet it’s something I’ve ached for on some level since our relationship turned from friendship into something more, and since the night of our fight. I wanted him that night and he turned me down, and the whole world went to hell.

I feel his tears, wet against my face. I taste the salt of them sliding between our lips. His emotion, his need for me, cracks my heart open wide. He’s consuming me all over again—past, present, future, spiraling into one dangerous vortex of dark, simmering, sexual power. I’m breathless, sinking, drowning, into this dark man. This renegade I think I’ve always loved.

And suddenly I’m desperate for all of him. Naked against my bare skin. I want to wrap my bare thighs around him, feel him hard inside me. I can’t breathe. I fumble with his zippe
r . . .
a ringing sounds in my ears. No, a tune. Ringtone. I slow the kiss, heart slamming as I try to surface. It’s my phone, ringing in my pocket. Reality slams back with a punch.

I pull back, breathing hard. His eyes are inky pools, his features etched with desire; something untamed has been released in him.

“
I . . .
I need to get this.” I spin away from him, scrabbling in my pocket for my cell as though it’s a lifeline. I shouldn’t have done this. I don’t even want to think about what it means now.

I answer. “Hello.” My voice comes out thick, husky.

There’s a beat of silence.

“Where in the hell are you?”

Trey.
Electricity sparks through my body. My gaze shoots to Jeb. He’s watching me with a feral intensity that unnerves me.

“Just a second,” I say into the phone. I turn to Jeb, “I’m going to take this outside.”

He says nothing.

I step out into the icy wind coming off the lake. I move out of the puddle of light coming from the boathouse window and stand in the shadows of a tree where Jeb can’t see me. “What do you want?” I wrap my arm over my stomach against the cold. My jacket is inside the boathouse.

“You didn’t answer the callout.”

“I wasn’t able to attend.”

“I saw you out there, you
know
I saw you. What in hell is going on? Is he with you?” His voice is clipped. I hear another wailing siren in the distance. The western sky glows dull orange. Caution whispers through me.

“What do you mean?”

“I mean Cullen, goddammit. He was
there
, at the old Wolf River lodge. They’ve impounded his bike. He set fire to the place; the entire mountain is burning now. He’s back for revenge, he’s trying to burn the whole resort down, that’s what they’re saying.”

My heart kicks. “Who is saying?”

“The cops. Adam has a forensics ident crew and arson team out there right now, combing the place.”

“They think
he’s
responsible for arson?”

“They found gas cans and matches.”

My mouth turns dry. I’m seized by a sense of history repeating. If they take Jeb in for questioning again, it could be like last time. He might never come out.

“Did you bring him out, Rachel? Is he with you now?”

“Listen to me,” I say quietly, debating just how much to tell Trey. “Jeb went home to his land. He was asleep when three masked men arrived. He saw them setting fire to his place. He was attacked, beaten badly, left for dead. The
only
reason those men didn’t kill him was because they fled when the old propane tank exploded.”

There were several beats of silence.

“So he is with you.”

“Why did you call, Trey? To find out if he’s here? Because that’s none of your damn business.”

When he speaks again, his voice is cold, hard. “The cop manning the roadblock saw you out there tonight. Zink saw you. I saw you. They’re going to come knocking on your door in the morning. They’re going to look at you as an accessory to arson. Don’t be a fool about this.”

Shock slakes through me. I think about the way I picked up that gas can, the possibility I’ve left prints. Fear is suddenly raw in me. I’ve seen what the cops and courts did to Jeb all those years ago. And if what Jeb claims really is true, I can’t trust they won’t try to do the same to me—to both of us. In order to hide the dark, terrible secret buried in this town. Whoever did rape Amy and kill Merilee might have much more at stake now—kids, wives, important positions in the community. The collateral damage of exposure would be far-reaching.

“Did you hear me, Trey? Jeb was
attacked
by three men.
They
started the fire. Who were those men? That’s
the question you should be asking.”

“He got to you.”

I swear softly.

“Rachel.” His voice changes. “
I . . .
I’m worried about you.”

Wind whips hair across my face. Waves splash and the old dock creaks against the push of the lake.

“Are you, really? Or are you worried about protecting someone else? Are you worried Jeb’s going to find out who really raped Amy and killed Merilee?”

“Don’t do this. Don’t put yourself on the wrong side of the fence here. That man is a smooth-talking, sociopathic, self-serving liar. You never did get that, did you? You still feel something for him. You’re playing with fire, Rachel. You’re going to get burned.”

Fury whips through me. I kill the call, clutching the phone tight in my fist. And I stand there, trying to get my bearings, shivering in the cold. A fresh wave of icy fear washes through me as a thought strikes me. Trey is the only one who knows the secret of Quinn’s paternity. And he’s making me the enemy. My ex-fiancé and I might just land on the opposite sides of a battle line being drawn right through the heart of Snowy Creek. Will Trey use the information against me now, against us?

I hold my blowing hair off my face and curse. I—we—have no choice but to trust that whatever Trey feels about Jeb, he won’t hurt an innocent kid, no matter what comes now.

That man is a smooth-talking, sociopathic, self-serving liar. You never did get that, did yo
u . . .

I think about everything Jeb has said. I think about the past. I think about what Trey is saying. Doubt shimmers inside me. What do I do? My grandfather Jaako’s words of Finnish wisdom flash suddenly through my mind, as if he’s out here in the wind somewhere, over the lake, giving me the answer.

There are two ways to be fooled,
kultaseni
, my little gold. One is to believe what isn’t true; the other is to refuse to believe what is true.

He was quoting Søren Kierkegaard when he said that, a Danish philosopher, theologian, poet, and social critic from the 1800s. An existentialist, like Jaako was. I still have his old leather-bound books on my library shelves.

People see what they want to see, or what they are told to see, and once that picture starts to fill your mind, logic starts bending things to fit. My job is to tell the truth, kultaseni. That is my belief with this newspaper of min
e . . .
that’s why I started it.

Heat, emotion, a mess of feelings swamps through me. I’ve been entrusted with this legacy, my grandfather’s vision, my father’s business—the newspaper. My sister has also entrusted me with her child. My sister who believed in Jeb, who was fighting to clear him, for his child’s sake. My sister who died before she could finish her fight.

I look up at the sky. I feel them all. Here. My family. Looking down, watching me now. I rub my arms. I need to find the truth. I need to do what my grandfather and father would have done. I need to stand by my sister.
There are two ways to be fooled, kultasen
i . . .

I will not be fooled.

I pocket my phone and return to the warm glow of the boathouse. I open the door, holding it firmly as the wind tries to snatch it from my hand. As I draw it closed behind me, I see Jeb wincing as he struggles into his leather jacket.

“Where are you going?”

Those liquid obsidian eyes meet mine. His long hair is matted in places with blood, his skin a dusky soft brown. Heat spreads low through my belly again. He’s the most beautiful, striking man I’ve ever known. But I will not be fooled. Not by my own libido. I’m going to get the truth. I might not like the truth, but it’s the only way to set this all straight.

“I’m going to find a motel,” he says.

“Motel—what are you talking about?”

“I don’t want you part of this. I can’t put you in danger.”

“I
am
part of it.”

He makes for the door.

I block him. “Wait. You have no transport, you have no—”

“I can get a cab, rent a room. I have funds untouched since I was incarcerated. My mother never spent a thing she earned from the river company. My land still has value. Every penny I ever earned, I’ve saved.” His gaze pins mine. “I was saving so I’d be in a good place to marry you.”

My stomach bottoms out. I press my palm against my abdomen.

“And I have my bike—”

“The police have impounded it.”

He stills. A darkness fills his face.

“They want you for arson,” I say.

“What?”

“They say you did it; set fire to the west side. They found the gas cans, matches.”

“Who was that on the phone?”

“It doesn’t matter who—”

“Who?” he barks.

A flicker of fear sparks through me. I take a step back, glare at him. Memories snake round my brain. I think of what he did to his father.

Jeb sees my response and something changes in his eyes immediately as he tempers his flare of passion. But the moment niggles, an uneasy little reminder. A tiny whisper of doubt.

You’re playing with fire, Rache
l . . .
you’re going to get burne
d . . .

“It was Trey, wasn’t it?” he says more calmly. “What did he say?”

I swallow. “He says the police have an arson and forensic identification team out there, and they’re looking at you for burning the place up.”

His eyes narrow and a muscle pulses along his jaw.

“You can’t let them take you in, Jeb, not even for questioning. You need to stay here.”

He comes up to me, stands close, places his hands on my shoulders. His voice is gruff. “What else did Trey say?”

“That they’re going to look at me as an accessory. That they saw me out there tonight.” I curse. “I touched that gas can. My fingerprints are on it.”

“See?
This
is why I need to go.”

“No, this is why you have to stay. Here, in this boathouse. They can’t touch you on my property, not without sufficient evidence and a solid warrant. They have no right.” I pause. “You were preempted, Jeb. You can no longer do this alone. You need my help. You need
me
.”

“Why are you doing this?”

“To give you a chance. So you can tell your story to the media before they take you in. So you can start rattling those cages and shaking something free. So that those three men who attacked you can’t hide behind masks of anonymity. Someone, something, will slip. Someone will notice, or remember some detail. And I’m going to make damn sure it’s
all
over the media, starting with Internet, social media, television.” My voice is shaking. I try and modulate it. “So, you need to stay here, in the boathouse, at least until the interview is over tomorrow evening.”

A wry smile twists his sculpted lips. “I love you, you know that?”

Cold drops like a stone through my stomach. Moth wings of panic flutter in my chest. Suddenly I need distance, fast.

“And while you’re here,” I say coolly, ignoring his comment, “you’ll stay away from Quinn. That’s understood, right? As long as no one connects you with her, no one has any reason to bother her.”

He holds my gaze for a long moment. The wings of panic beat harder. But he doesn’t push it. Instead, he says, “I thought you were going away with her. For the Thanksgiving break.”

“First the interview tomorrow. I’ll see what happens after that. Meanwhile I’ve got Brandy, Quinn’s sitter, booked full-time for the break. The original plan was for Brandy to take Quinn with her to bike camp every day. Brandy is one of the camp guides. We’ll proceed as planned tomorrow. And you’ll stay inside this boathouse until the interview—I don’t want Brandy or Quinn seeing you. You can use my father’s SUV to get to the Shady Lady. I’ll bring you the keys.” I hesitate. “Jeb, will you promise me one thing?”

He watches me, a wariness entering his eyes.

“Don’t lie to me. Not even by omission. Promise you’ll be totally open with me about everything, even if you think I’ll find it hard to swallow.” It’s a gauntlet of sorts that I’m casting down at his feet. I want desperately to be able to trust him. Fully. I want him to
show
me he’s telling me the whole truth.

But he remains silent. There is something in his eyes, something I can’t put a finger on that leaves me uneasy. Tension shimmers between us. Dark, viscous. Sexual. Dangerous in its power to consume.

“I won’t lie to you, Rachel,” he says quietly. “I never have.” He steps forward, takes my arm, draws me close, and he whispers over my mouth, his breath like warm feathers, “Trust me, please.” His lips meet mine, but I jerk away, heart slamming. I turn and make quickly for the door.

“Get some sleep,” I say crisply, my hand on the knob. I’m unable to meet his eyes again. “I’ll bring breakfast, supplies for the fridge in the morning.”

I exit and run up the lawn to my house without looking back. Dawn is not far behind those peaks. I fear we don’t have much time.