Chasing Love

by Melissa West

  So maybe AJ&P wasn’t a good topic either. Lila wracked her brain for what to say, when Annie blurted, “He decided he didn’t want to be serious, you see. We’re in our sixties, knocking on death’s door, but by God, be sure to keep your options open!”

  “Ohhh,” Lila said, treading carefully. So far, she had lived at Annie’s for a week, and she and Marty had been on and off again twice. Which was one of the reasons she had added Annie to her to-do list. But if she said something bad about Marty and they made up, Annie could be angry that Lila spoke out against him. Which all meant Lila was in a lose-lose situation here. If she said nothing, Annie would think she was taking Marty’s side. If she said something, then she could be resented later.

  Taking her time at the Keurig, she placed her K-Cup into its spot, then her coffee cup, then hit the right size and waited, careful to keep her back to Annie.

  “Well? Are you going to tell me what you think or aren’t you? I didn’t come over here to watch you make coffee.”

  Jesus take the wheel.

  Lila closed her eyes and turned around slowly, careful to watch each word she said for fear of being misinterpreted and becoming, in turn, homeless. “I don’t know. I’m not exactly a poster child for dating or men, Ms. Annie. But I’d say you need to take care of you. If he doesn’t want to be with you, as amazing as you are, then he doesn’t deserve you. Maybe you should move on. But then again, Marty seems like a nice man, so perhaps you should talk to him. See if y’all can’t work it out.”

  The TV was on in the family room, the news talking about the latest election. Good God, how long had this woman been in her apartment? Lila tried to push aside how badly that creeped her out. Ms. Annie wasn’t a stalker. She was just nosy . . . and maybe a tad crazy.

  Stalling, Lila went to work adding sugar and cream to her coffee, then took a sip, wishing Annie would let her get a solid cup in before throwing this stuff at her. Finally, she smiled at Annie. She thought maybe everything was fine, when Annie cleaned up her paper, plucked a muffin from the plate, and took a bite, then around a mouthful said, “You’re right.” Lila released a relieved breath. Thank God, she—“You aren’t good at giving dating advice.” Then Annie walked out, and Lila burst out laughing. Wow, just . . . wow. Her sanity may not survive her living there!

  Taking her own muffin, she went over to the couch and sat down, took a bite, then moaned loudly. Damn, this is sinful. Annie might be crazy, but she sure could cook. She downed the last of her coffee and stood to grab more, when a story on the news grabbed her attention. The words MISSING PERSON IN CHARLOTTE flashed on the screen, each letter hitting Lila like a punch to the chest. Suddenly, all the air was sucked from her lungs, the words stealing the comfort she’d felt before and replacing it with fear.

  It couldn’t be. No, because that would mean . . .

  Lila slid the remote off the coffee table and fumbled with it until she found the volume, then hit the arrow several times until she could hear the news story clearly.

  “The family of local student Elena Campbell is asking your assistance in finding their daughter.” A photo of a dark-haired girl with large blue eyes and a bright smile on her face appeared on the screen. She was young, pretty, the sort of girl who had her whole life before her. “Twenty-two-year-old Elena disappeared on Friday, April 14, at approximately ten a.m. while on her morning jog. Elena is a nursing student at UNC-Charlotte, set to graduate this May. If you have any information regarding this disappearance, please contact the number at the bottom of the screen or your local police station.”

  The news anchor switched to another story, but Lila wasn’t listening. Another girl had gone missing in Charlotte. This was the first report of anything like this since . . .

  No. I’m not going there. I won’t think about that now.

  Lila slumped down on the couch as goose bumps worked through her. He’d gotten off. Our legal system let a madman loose, and now he could be at it again. What if he didn’t release Elena? What if the police couldn’t get to her first? What if... ?

  She drew a rattled breath to try to calm down, but it was no use. Her pulse was racing, her heart hammering in her chest, her thoughts on a million things she’d promised herself she would no longer think about.

  Unable to just sit there, Lila grabbed her cell and hit her lawyer’s number, but then she realized the office wasn’t open yet. Frustrated, she ended the call and tossed her cell phone on the couch, anger and fear working through her in even turns.

  She thought about everything the news story had said. Maybe this was a different situation. Maybe Elena simply needed a break from her life, and her parents were freaking out because she hadn’t called them in a day. Maybe this wasn’t a repeat attack. But even as she tried to convince herself that everything was okay, she couldn’t get her heartbeat to slow down or force her hands to stop shaking.

  Because it might be a misunderstanding, but there could also be a girl out there, petrified and tied up, while she waited for help . . . that would never come.

  * * *

  “Tracy, can you grab me some more towels?” Lila called as she stared down at the disaster before her and cringed. “And maybe a mop?”

  The one good thing about going to work was that it kept her mind off the news story she had heard earlier. The bad thing? She was now cleaning up a Great Dane’s vomit.

  It had been a week since Lila started, and though she wasn’t allowed to actually treat any of the animals, she was allowed to clean up their messes. Case in point, the current horror before her. The Great Dane was white with black spots and patches, affectionately named Oreo, and he was a beautiful dog. A beautiful giant dog. And he was about three times larger than his owner, Ms. Lockley, a petite older lady who couldn’t weigh a hundred pounds. So when Oreo received his first booster shot, he tore through the exam room, knocking over everything in his wake.

  Screams erupted throughout the animal hospital, followed by barking by every single dog in the place, including Oreo, though it was less of a bark and more of a howl. It took Baxter and Lila twenty minutes to grab the dog and calm him down, but it was too late by that point. Oreo the Tornado had struck, and the exam room and everything in it was torn and broken and generally destroyed even before Oreo decided to vomit all over the floor—likely as sickened by the whole encounter as the rest of them.

  Immediately, Baxter took Ms. Lockley and helped her and Oreo to another room to finish the exam, and then shot Lila a look over his round glasses, for which really the word spectacles was a better fit, and said, “You can clean this up, while I finish with Oreo in the next room.” And then without even waiting to ask if she was okay with that, he closed the door and she was alone to stare at the mess.

  Now, Lila was a worker. She would never shy away from work, never push something off on someone else that she could do, but she hadn’t suffered through eight years of education—okay nine, because her first year of undergrad she hadn’t been sure what she wanted to do and changed her major three times—to scrub floors. And Baxter’s unwillingness to let her do anything that hinted at real medicine was starting to grate on her nerves.

  She had just pushed out of the exam room door to grab even more towels because the five Tracy had given her hadn’t made a dent in this mess when she narrowly missed slamming into Charlie.

  “Hey, Speed Racer,” he said, gripping her elbow to help balance her. “Where you going in such a hurry? Off to save the world, one animal at a time?”

  And just like that, Lila’s lip quivered and she fought back the surge of tears that refused to go away. Dang emotions. Dang tears. “No, because apparently I’m not a real vet. I’m a janitor.” She pushed open the exam room door and motioned to the massive mess, and Charlie started to laugh before catching her glare and clearing his throat instead.

  “Baxter get in a fight with himself again?”

  Her mouth quirked up. That was the thing about Charlie—he could always make her smile, even in the most horrific of
situations. Like Lucas getting deployed. Or Oreo the Tornado wreaking havoc on exam room 3.

  “Now, let’s see what kind of mess you got in there.”

  Charlie pushed into the exam room like he owned the place. And just like everyone else who knew the man, Lila could do little else but follow after him. His hands went to his narrow hips, and Lila caught for the first time how he was dressed—cargo shorts and a fitted Black Crows T-shirt that looked like he’d had it since he was a teenager. On his feet were a different pair of flip-flops, and she couldn’t help grinning down at them when he glanced over at her.

  “What?” he asked, eyeing his feet.

  “How many pairs of those do you have? I’ve seen you three times now and every time you’ve had on a different color of those same flip-flops.” She cocked an eyebrow at him.

  “So?”

  “So, aren’t guys supposed to own only one pair of each kind of shoe, and even those are about a hundred years old, holes in them, and falling apart?”

  Charlie lifted a fallen shelf and rested it back against the wall, his bicep flexing in the effort, and Lila found her eyes trained there, her ability to swallow coming into question.

  “Now, I don’t know what kind of dude you’ve been hanging around, but us classy folk”—he pointed at himself—“prefer the finer things.”

  Lila giggled, each second around Charlie easing the knot in her stomach. It was so easy to be around him, like breathing, everything about it comfortable. “Like a twenty-year-old T-shirt? And Hava-ianas flip-flops?”

  “Hey, a man likes what he likes, woman. And I like these flip-flops. Jade got me hooked on them back at my days in the Keys, and I can’t find another pair that works quite as well as these.”

  “Jade?”

  “Huh?” He was by the back wall now, trying to organize the medical equipment that had been strewn across the floor and looking at each thing like he wasn’t entirely convinced it should be used on a living thing.

  “You said ‘Jade.’”

  His hand paused midway to a bag of spilled dog treats. “No, I didn’t.”

  “You did. You said ‘Jade.’ Who’s Jade?” she asked. And was it her imagination or had the air changed in the room and Charlie gone super rigid?

  “No one. Look, want me to send someone to help clean this up? I kind of needed to talk to Baxter. Vet thing.”

  Lila’s heart dropped. “Right. Of course.” A vet thing—so obviously he’d need Baxter, not her. She fumbled with her own T-shirt, a Crestler’s Key Animal Hospital one, apparently the dress code for Mondays and Fridays and any other day when Baxter decided he wanted the staff to match. Of course, he didn’t wear the shirt.

  Charlie closed his eyes and shook his head. “Damn, I’m sorry. My mouth got away with me there, and I don’t like to . . . Never mind. Listen, I hate to leave you hanging here, but I promised Zac and Brady I’d meet them at the shop, and Zac’s never late, so . . .”

  “It’s okay. I can give Baxter a message for you. What is it?”

  He ran his hands over his face and peered back at Lila, clearly feeling guilty. “I really am sorry. In fact . . .” He snapped his fingers. “Forget Baxter; you can do it.”

  “You’re not making sense. What exactly is it that I can do?”

  “We need a part-time vet at the farm. Just someone to pop by and make sure all the animals are looking okay, doing their thing. Zac wanted me to ask Baxter if he was up to it, but why don’t you do it instead?”

  Lila waved her hands through the air. “Oh, no.”

  “Why?”

  “Um, because Baxter won’t let me do anything other than clean up animal feces. He sure as heck won’t let me tend to your animals.”

  Charlie smirked. “See, you’re forgetting a very important detail here.”

  “Which is . . . ?”

  “Baxter doesn’t own Littleton Farms.”

  Lila smiled. “No, he doesn’t. I hear a trio of reckless men do.”

  “You’d be right, and the center of that trio is none other than this hot thing in front of you right now. So, it’s done.” He pointed at her. “Congrats you got the job. Come by the farm when you get off, and I’ll introduce you to the rest of the staff.”

  “But Charlie . . .”

  “Shh, woman. I said it’s done. Now—shit.” He stared at his watch and then Lila. “Gotta run or Zac’s gonna be on my case. See you around six, Tiny Girl.”

  “Lila.”

  He winked. “That’s what I said.”

  And then he left and Lila turned back to the mess before her, but instead of the defeat she’d felt moments before, there was a tiny bit of hope, and for once, she loved the word tiny.

  Chapter Six

  What the hell had just happened?

  Charlie shut his truck door and pressed his forehead to the wheel, trying to make sense of things. Why had he said Jade’s name? Why of all slips of the tongue did he have to go there? It was like his walls went down around Lila, and he stopped trying so hard every second of the day. He hadn’t realized before that moment how hard he worked to be normal, how he pushed away the bitterness that clawed at his insides and forced a smile instead. Even around his own family. It was exhausting.

  But with Lila, everything was easy, and in turn everything in him became centered.

  Up until he thought about how his body kept reacting to her and that summer-and-wildflowers scent of hers. Or what Lucas would say if he knew Charlie’s real thoughts about Lila. And suddenly there was nothing easy about it. But Lucas had been crystal clear—don’t touch his sister—and Charlie respected his friend too much to do anything other than honor his wishes.

  His phone vibrated against the cup holder, and he spied Zac’s name before accepting the call. “Almost there.”

  “We’ve been waiting for—”

  “I know. Problem at Baxter’s.”

  “Does that problem go by the name Lila?” Brady called, and Charlie cursed Zac for forever using speaker.

  “Can’t you ever just hold the damn phone? Is it really that heavy for you? What lazy-ass uses speaker all the damn time?”

  The sound of shuffling filled the void, and then Zac’s voice. “This lazy-ass. Now hurry up.” And then the phone went dead.

  Bastard.

  Well, he’d done it now. Charlie would take his sweet-ass time, stalling at every stop sign and traffic light. Even if there were only two stop signs and one traffic light, and that one was forever flashing.

  The streets were clear for early afternoon, the sky so blue he’d bet half the town was outside tending to their yards while their kids rode their bikes or threw a ball around. Another month and sprinklers would be running, squeals calling as those same kids ran through the water. It was typical spring in Crestler’s Key. Only suddenly all the things Charlie liked to do—camping, hiking, fishing—no longer seemed so fun. They seemed . . . lonely.

  Which made him think he should invite someone to go with him, but every time he thought about asking someone, the only name that came to mind was Lila’s. The very person he’d been instructed to stay away from. But then hadn’t Lucas asked Charlie to protect her, to look out for her? Didn’t that mean he needed to spend time with her, check in on her?

  Yes, yes it did.

  An idea came to him as he parked around back of Southern Dive and threw his keys in the air, catching them easily, excitement building in his chest. Because suddenly Lila wasn’t the forbidden fruit that he craved but wasn’t allowed to sample. Oh no, he was supposed to be around her. And even if they remained purely platonic, it made him feel a contentment inside that he hadn’t felt in a long, long time.

  He just had to keep it platonic. Which he could do. Hopefully.

  “Dude,” Brady called as soon as Charlie stepped foot inside the shop. “I thought we agreed that you would show us your designs before you posted them on Instagram to your admirers.”

  Shit. Not this again.

  Charlie continued on around the counte
r and dropped his keys in the small clay bowl Carrie-Anne, Zac’s daughter from his previous marriage, had made him in art class last year. “Spontaneous thing.”

  “Nothing you do is spontaneous,” Brady said. “You just like them better than you like us.”

  Zac laughed. “Pretty sure he likes anyone better than he likes you.”

  Charlie nodded to his brother. “Nice one.”

  “I try,” Zac said. “So, on last month’s numbers, I think—”

  “How many followers do you have now, anyway?” Brady asked, not giving up yet.

  Charlie hadn’t figured out if his brother’s relentless attention to his designs was brotherly support or what, but he was getting tired of answering questions.

  Brady huffed, impatient. “Waiting here.”

  Again he tried to shake off the conversation. The Instagram thing was another Jade creation in his life, and one that he would have been happy to close down if it weren’t for all his followers and how supportive they had all been when he’d decided to open Southern Dive. Five followers wouldn’t have been a big deal, even a hundred, but his list had become ridiculous even by Instagram standards.

  Originally, Jade would post pictures of him doing his thing. Diving. In a wet suit. Anything and everything to capture him shirtless, and because he was a twenty-something dipshit, he let her. It had surprised him at first how quickly his follower count grew, and he feared once the pictures of him doing nothing but standing there with his shirt off were gone, the followers would die off. But then he started posting cool shit. Pictures from especially dangerous dives. Or ghost ships deep down in the ocean, long since forgotten. Fishing trips and large kings. Shark fishing from the shore.

  Eventually, his “let me show my pecs” Instagram account morphed into “let me show you my latest adventure,” and boy did his follower count soar. It took him a while to realize that they wanted a story. They wanted to come to his page and not just see a cool pic, but read about it, experience it. So he offered as much detail as he could manage.