But I could tell from Leslie Fairchild’s body language that she wasn’t quite comfortable with my mother. Leslie stood just a little too far away from my mom, her head tipped to the left while my mother stood on her right. My parents weren’t kidding; the Fairchilds were tough to crack.
Which meant it was all up to me. All riding on my relationship with Logan.
I didn’t see Logan, so I headed for Selena and David, talking near the bar that had been set up to the right of the string quartet playing softly at the edge of the lawn.
“Hey!” I said, giving Selena a hug. “You look fantastic!”
She looked stunning in a simple black dress that skimmed her body and ended demurely below the knee. Her hair was pulled back in a loose, high bun, ever-present curls escaping around her face.
She blushed. “You too. But you always look amazing.”
We talked for a minute about the crowd and the decorations. Everything had come together perfectly, white lights twinkling in the garlands, linen napkins sitting atop pristine tablecloths on the tables that dotted the lawn. It somehow managed to be welcoming while being in perfect taste, just like the Fairchilds.
Olivia and Raj joined us, and I used the added conversation as a distraction to scan the crowd for anything interesting. Everyone was drinking and mingling, their voices a hum over the classical music coming from the quartet. I turned my attention to the security contingent, wondering if their location might give up some clue about the gold, but they didn’t seem to be concentrating on any specific area of the property.
“Hey, beautiful.” The words were spoken softly in my ear, and I turned to find Logan standing behind me, his eyes filled with that special light he seemed to save just for me.
“Hey, yourself,” I said, standing on tiptoe to give him a kiss on the cheek. “You look so handsome.”
And he did. Unlike the other guys, he wasn’t wearing suit pants or chinos. Instead he wore dark, tailored jeans and a black sport coat over a V-neck T-shirt. The effect was one of effortless class, and I marveled that while he never looked like he was trying too hard, he always managed to look better than any other guy in any room.
He grinned. “I have to stay on my toes next to my gorgeous girlfriend.”
I shook my head, laughing even as my cheeks got warm. “Stop sweet-talking me.”
“It’s not sweet-talking if it’s true,” he laughed.
“Okay, you two,” Raj said. “Break it up.”
We all laughed and went our separate ways. David took Selena to meet his parents, while Raj and Olivia headed across the lawn to join Rachel. I looked around, wondering what had become of Parker. I didn’t see him, and I had to force the knot of concern out of my stomach. Parker had been okay since our conversation that foggy morning after he’d vandalized Logan’s car. Besides, he’d promised to keep his cool through the rest of the Fairchild con.
Logan slid an arm around my waist, pulling me a little bit closer. He leaned down, whispering in my ear. “You up for an escape?”
Forty-One
We stuck to the tree line as we followed the gravel pathway leading to the back of the property. We didn’t want any of the others to see us and mistake our getaway for a chance to ditch the adults en masse.
The sun was setting over the ocean, and the wind that blew in off the water wasn’t balmy anymore. The temperature had plummeted at least five degrees since we left the lawn. The hired party help had been turning on lights and patio heaters when we left. Looking around the path, everything rendered in shades of twilight gray, I suddenly wished for light and warmth.
“You cold?” Logan asked, his hand over mine. He pulled off his jacket without waiting for an answer and draped it over my shoulders.
“Thanks.”
The carriage house came into view in the distance, a throwback to another time. Unlike the rest of the Fairchild house, the outbuilding wasn’t well maintained. The white paint was peeling, the old wood siding splintering from years of damp, cold, and heat. Still, it was beautiful, and I took a second to admire it as Logan pulled me into its shadowy interior. Knowing we’d already ruled it out as a possible hiding place for the gold, and without Rachel breathing down my neck, I could truly appreciate its abandoned desolation.
“Did they really used to keep carriages in here?” I asked, turning in a circle, watching the play of shadow on what little light remained.
He nodded. “You can tell from the way the doors slide back and forth, like barn doors.”
“It’s amazing.” I looked at him and smiled. “Really beautiful.”
He laughed.
“What’s so funny?”
He shook his head with a smile. “I don’t know any other girl on the peninsula who would think so. It’s all custom tile and skylights.”
“Don’t get me wrong,” I said. “I love a lot of the houses up here. But the newer ones can be a little . . . sterile.”
He walked slowly toward me, his eyes never leaving mine. Taking my hand, he led me across the room to an old workbench against one of the walls. He leaned on it, pulling me gently against him. I laid my head on his chest, listening to the gentle beat of his heart.
He stroked my hair, leaning in to kiss the top of my head. My breath caught in my throat, and a rush of hot wind sped through my body as his hands traveled to my neck, down to my collarbone, spreading to my shoulders, bare under the slender straps of my dress. My head fell back as his lips touched the sensitive skin near my ear.
“Grace . . . ,” he murmured, his breath hot against my skin.
My breath caught in my throat as his lips moved down my neck. He tenderly kissed the corners of my mouth before touching his lips to mine. Then there was no room for gentleness, no room for anything but the passion building between us, as undeniable as the waves crashing on the beach in the distance.
His lips plundered mine, his fingers sliding into the hair at the back of my head, his free hand moving over my body as he explored my mouth with his tongue. He was consuming me, and I offered myself up to him without hesitation. Without reservation.
We were back on our beach. Back in space.
When we finally pulled away, we were both short of breath. His eyes were glassy, dark with desire, and he pulled me close in a ferocious embrace, burying his face in my hair.
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Grace.”
I put my hands on either side of his head, forcing him to look at me. “Why are you sorry?”
“I’m moving too fast. I don’t want you to think I’m playing you. I just . . . I’ve never felt like this about anybody.”
“Hey,” I said, touching my lips softly to his. “You’re not the only one.”
“I’m not?”
I shook my head, warning bells clanging in my head. Not because of what I was about to say. Because I meant it.
“I feel it, too. I just don’t know what to do about it.” My voice broke, and I realized with horror that tears were stinging my eyes.
“Hey, hey, hey . . . ,” he said. “We don’t have to do anything about it. We’ll just take it slow. We have all the time in the world.”
I wrapped my arms around his torso, holding him close, trying to memorize the feel of his body against mine, the smell of his cologne, the hard plane of his chest under my cheek. Resisting the urge to tell him he was wrong. We didn’t have even close to all the time in the world.
And that’s when I noticed it. The windows behind Logan were new. Unlike the splintered siding with its chipped paint, the window frames looked freshly coated with polyurethane, the glass clean and clear.
It didn’t make sense. The gold couldn’t be in the carriage house. The exterior walls were visible on all four sides. There were no adjoining buildings to hide a panic room, no shelves or paneling that could be home to a safe big enough to hold the gold.
I turned in Logan’s arms, leaning my head back against his chest, trying to make it seem like a natural way to calm the fire between us as I looked around
the carriage house with fresh eyes. He wrapped his arms around my waist and pulled me close.
The walls of the carriage house were just like I remembered; nothing could be hiding there. I scanned the floor, my eyes coming to rest on the rubber mat. It looked to be commercial grade, the kind that might be in a restaurant kitchen. But it was slightly off-center, and there was something else, something glinting on one of the sides.
I looked harder, willing my eyes to focus in the half light of what was now full-on dusk. It took a few seconds, but then I got it. Hinges. The mat was askew, and underneath it, on one of the edges that wasn’t lined up quite right, metallic hinges shone just enough against the drab concrete floor to be noticeable now that I was really looking.
There was some kind of door underneath the mat.
We’d been wrong all along. Warren Fairchild hadn’t hidden his gold in a safe or a panic room.
He’d hidden it in a bunker.
Forty-Two
I had a hard time focusing on the rest of the party. Rachel was friendly but aloof, making it impossible to tell how much she knew, how hard she was going to push to get at the truth.
People laughed and talked, marveled at the freshness of the salmon and lobster, the quality of the champagne. Money was raised for the PHCT; compliments were given to the Fairchilds for another successful fund-raiser.
But it all went by in a blur. When I wasn’t thinking about the possible discovery of the gold, I was thinking about Logan, transported back to the moments when we’d been alone in the carriage house, the feel of his mouth on my skin, his hands on my body.
Parker caught my eye toward the end of the night as he slipped from the house, and I knew from the expression on his face that I wasn’t the only one with a discovery to share.
It was after midnight when we got home. Still, we trudged up the stairs to the War Room. Details might be lost overnight, given over to the haze of sleep. We needed to debrief while everything was still fresh.
The door was barely closed when Parker and I spoke in unison.
“There’s nothing in the garage,” Parker said.
“I think the gold is in the carriage house,” I said at the same time.
My dad held up a hand. “Whoa.” He looked at me. “Did you say what I think you said, Grace?”
I nodded.
“I thought we established that the gold couldn’t be in the carriage house,” my mom said.
“That’s because we were looking for a panic room or a safe, something that could be hidden in the walls.”
“And?” my dad prompted.
“It’s not in the walls,” I said. “It’s underground. At least, I think it is.”
“Under the carriage house?” my mom asked.
“I think so.”
“But none of the houses up here have basements,” my dad said with a perplexed expression.
“Maybe it’s not a basement,” I suggested. “Maybe it’s a bunker.”
My mom lifted one delicate brow. “A bunker?”
Parker nodded. “It makes sense. Warren’s super paranoid, right?” He continued without waiting for an answer. “If he were stockpiling supplies for a catastrophe, he’d want something disaster-proof.”
“Tell us what you saw,” my dad instructed.
I explained the setup in the carriage house, the new windows, the hinges in the floor.
My dad turned to Parker. “And you’re sure there’s nothing in the garage?”
“I’m sure. I had almost half an hour to check it out. There’s nothing there.”
My dad took a deep breath. “Okay, then. Let’s assume Grace is right and the gold is in the carriage house. We need to confirm it. Along with this.” He pushed a piece of paper across the table.
I looked at the six numbers written on it. “Is that the pass code to the Fairchilds’ alarm system?”
“I think so. The tonality matches the keys to our system, but there’s only one way to find out for sure.” We were all quiet, waiting for the other shoe to drop. “Someone’s going to have to test it.”
“Someone?” Parker asked.
“I think it makes the most sense for Grace to do it. She—”
But he didn’t get any further before Parker interrupted. “No way. What if it’s wrong?”
“Then she’ll run like hell.” My dad’s eyes were steely.
“No fucking way,” Parker said. “I’ll go.”
“Grace knows the house better than you do. And she can double-check the bunker while she’s there, too.”
“The alarm keypad is right by the front door. It’s not going to take a rocket scientist to find it and test it out,” Parker said.
“We can both go,” I said. “One of us can test the alarm and the other one can double-check the bunker.”
“That works,” my dad said.
“The Fairchilds will be out of town Friday night for a family wedding,” my mom said. “We can do it then.”
Her use of the word we got under my skin. There was no we in this job. At least not this part of it. Parker and I would have all the exposure. We were the ones who’d have to cover for them if we were caught. But that was the con. It’s not like it was anything new.
Parker sighed in resignation. “Fine.” He glanced at me. “But we stay together. That way if it’s wrong, we can beat it out of there at the same time.”
I nodded, feeling a little sick. I don’t know if it was the idea of breaking into Logan’s house or the looming end of our stay in Playa Hermosa, but I suddenly wanted to freeze time. To stay in the here and now, where Logan still cared about me and I hadn’t yet committed an unforgivable betrayal. Where everything that had been done could still be undone.
Forty-Three
We were in the kitchen the next morning, eating a late pancake breakfast made by my dad, when the doorbell rang. We froze, looking at each other. It was Sunday morning. We weren’t expecting anyone.
My mom got up and headed down the hall, hurrying back to us a moment later. “It’s Harrison Mercer.” And then, as if any of us needed the reminder, “Rachel Mercer’s father.”
“Well, open the door,” my dad said.
She nodded and left the kitchen. Parker met my eyes over the business section spread out in front of him. A few seconds later I heard the front door open.
“Harrison! How nice to see you!” My mom’s voice, slightly muffled, carried through the house. “What brings you here on this lovely morning?”
I strained to listen, catching only the murmur of their voices and a few scattered words before footsteps sounded on the tile floor.
“Look what the cat dragged in!” my mother joked, entering the room with Harrison Mercer.
My dad stood, a smile washing over his face. “Harrison! How are you? Would you like a cup of coffee?”
But I already knew this wasn’t a social call. I could tell from Harrison Mercer’s pained expression, the worry lines in his normally smooth brow.
“No, thank you,” he said.
“Cormac,” my mom said, “Harrison has something he’d like to speak to us about.” She turned to Rachel’s dad. “Shall we go to the living room?”
Harrison nodded. “That’s fine.”
It was obvious from the way the three of them left the room that Parker and I weren’t invited. I sat there, my heart thudding painfully in my chest, adrenaline flooding my body as I contemplated all the things Rachel Mercer’s dad could want to talk to my parents about.
I shrugged when Parker raised his eyebrows in silent question.
Turning my head toward the hall, I listened to the voices in the living room, hoping for some kind of heads-up. But everything was a little muffled, and I could only make out snippets of conversation.
“. . . sorry to have to do this,” Harrison said.
And then my dad. “Don’t be . . . What’s . . . your mind?”
After that it was a series of whispers, an occasional word finding its way through the halls of the house.
Fifteen minutes passed before my mother appeared in the doorway, her face tight with something that could have been fear or anger. I didn’t know which would be worse.
“Come with us,” she said, leveling her eyes at me. “Both of you.”
I followed Parker out of the kitchen and into the living room. My dad sat in one of the upholstered chairs while Harrison looked on from the sofa. Parker and I sat at the other end of the couch.
My mom reached into her pocket. When she held out her hand, she was holding my Chandler High School ID and a folded piece of paper. She opened it, and I was shocked to see the assembled remnants of the Fairchild property map glued carefully onto it. It wasn’t perfect, but it was close enough. Despite my feelings about Rachel, I felt a burst of admiration. I couldn’t imagine the kind of persistence it must have taken for her to piece it together.
“You’re fortunate to have Rachel as one of your new friends,” my mom said, casting a smile at Harrison. “It seems she’s a good one.”
I searched her face, trying to get a feel for which direction we were headed. “What . . . what do you mean?”
Harrison spoke up. “My daughter can have a bit of an overactive imagination. Somehow she got it in her head that you”—he laughed a little—“that you had something to hide.”
My mom set the ID card and map down on the coffee table. “Your father and I explained to Harrison that we haven’t been the best parents lately, what with the move to Arizona followed by the quick turnaround in San Francisco.” She sighed. “It’s not easy chasing your dad’s next big deal.”
Harrison glanced sheepishly at me. “I’m sorry. I wasn’t aware you were adopted.”
“It’s no problem at all,” my dad said. “Now that the paperwork has gone through, Grace is officially a Fontaine.”
My mind was calculating, cataloging the story my parents had told: that my Chandler ID card listed me as Grace Rollins because I was adopted. That we’d lived only briefly in Arizona before a quick stop in San Francisco. Then, Playa Hermosa.
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