Wicked Wishes (An Ivy Morgan Mystery Book 10)

by Lily Harper Hart

  Table of Contents

  Prologue

  One

  Two

  Three

  Four

  Five

  Six

  Seven

  Eight

  Nine

  Ten

  Eleven

  Twelve

  Thirteen

  Fourteen

  Fifteen

  Sixteen

  Seventeen

  Eighteen

  Nineteen

  Twenty

  Mail List

  Acknowledgments

  Books by Lily Harper Hart

  Wicked Wishes

  An Ivy Morgan Mystery Book Ten

  Lily Harper Hart

  HarperHart Publications

  Copyright © 2018 by Lily Harper Hart

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the author, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  Created with Vellum

  Contents

  Prologue

  1. One

  2. Two

  3. Three

  4. Four

  5. Five

  6. Six

  7. Seven

  8. Eight

  9. Nine

  10. Ten

  11. Eleven

  12. Twelve

  13. Thirteen

  14. Fourteen

  15. Fifteen

  16. Sixteen

  17. Seventeen

  18. Eighteen

  19. Nineteen

  20. Twenty

  Mail List

  Acknowledgments

  Books by Lily Harper Hart

  Prologue

  18 months ago

  I’m alive.

  Jack Harker only knew it because the machines next to his hospital bed told him so.

  They monitored his heartbeat, which faltered at first coming out of his surgery, and his breathing. He knew he was alive because the machines insisted it. That meant it had to be true, right?

  Otherwise, he almost assumed he’d died and gone someplace else – maybe even to hell itself – after the shooting.

  The shooting. He didn’t want to think about it. He didn’t want to dwell on it. He certainly didn’t want to talk about it no matter what his commander demanded each time the man stopped in for a visit.

  No, Jack wanted to forget all of it. He wanted to close his eyes and shut out the world. That wasn’t possible, though. Every time he closed his eyes he saw … he saw a man he thought was his friend. He saw the gun in the exact moment his former partner fired it. He felt the bullet rip into his chest.

  He remembered very little after that. He didn’t remember the ambulance ride to the hospital other than a few murmured voices. He didn’t remember the first seventy-two hours in intensive care because he was on pain medication and he happily succumbed to oblivion rather than remembering. He didn’t remember any of it … and he was glad for it.

  His mother and sister had visited since then. Jack was aware of their presence but barely talked. What could he say, after all? There was nothing to say. He should’ve died in that alley. He should’ve bled out on the street and left all of this behind.

  He’d heard the doctors. It was a miracle he survived. That was their word, not his. Miracle. They said it with reverence and hushed tones. They thought there was a purpose to his survival even though he was positive it was a mistake and someone from the great beyond fell down on the job when monitoring life and death rituals.

  He wasn’t a miracle, and he certainly didn’t want to be revered.

  Jack found himself staring into nothing when a pair of high heels clicked on the ecru tile and it took everything he had to glance in the direction of his new visitor. He knew her face, although he wasn’t exactly fond of it. He recognized her fake smile and perfectly coiffed hair. He remembered putting his hands on her slim waist and climbing into bed with her at least five nights a month. That, again, was her decision. He would’ve been fine with one or two nights.

  “Hello, Jack.” The woman’s voice was low and throaty. “How are you doing today?”

  Jack looked her up and down, unimpressed with the way she made a big show of flooding her demeanor with sympathy and love. “I’m alive.” He rasped out the words. Even though he was no longer on the ventilator it hurt to talk … for more reasons than he cared to admit. “What are you doing here, Holly?”

  Holly Doherty was his sometimes girlfriend, a convenience more than anything else. She was pretty, didn’t hassle him about the nature of his job, and rarely picked a fight because she didn’t believe in arguing in public. She had good manners. She was more the type to let loose with a disappointed look than an acidic zing.

  She was essentially passive-aggressive to a fault … and since Jack didn’t care enough to fight, he was fine with the passive aggressive stuff. It meant he rarely had to deal with an emotional tsunami. That’s the way he liked it.

  “I wanted to come see you sooner, but the doctors wouldn’t let me in because I wasn’t on the approved list,” Holly started. “Apparently I’m not family.”

  Jack stared at her for a long beat. “You’re not family.”

  “No,” Holly agreed, clearly missing his point. “I’m not family. They don’t consider a girlfriend to be family. I think that’s a bit ridiculous, don’t you?”

  Jack licked his dry lips, unsure what she wanted or what he was expected to say. “What are you doing here?” It seemed like a safe question, but the way Holly’s eyes snapped to him told him otherwise.

  “I’m here to check on you.” Holly’s expression reflected annoyance. “You’re my boyfriend, Jack. You’ve been shot. You almost died. Did you really think I wouldn’t find a way to get to your side as soon as possible?”

  Jack searched his memory, doing his best to put together a decent timeline in his head. Some things didn’t make sense – many things, actually – and Holly’s visit was one of them. “We broke up.” The words came out in a croak.

  “What did you say?” Holly stared at her fingernails instead of him.

  “We broke up,” Jack repeated. “Days ago. At least … I don’t know what day it is. We split before it happened, though. It was before I was shot. I … remember. I remember the fight and going our separate ways.”

  “Yes, we fought,” Holly agreed, seemingly oblivious to Jack’s discomfort. “People fight and get over it all the time. I’m sure we will, too.”

  Jack narrowed his eyes. Something about the entire situation seemed off to him. He simply couldn’t put his finger on what. “We broke up.” He was firm. “We’re not together any longer.”

  “It doesn’t have to be like that.”

  “It does. That’s what happens when you break up. You’re not together.”

  Holly heaved out a long-suffering sigh, as if she were talking to a child rather than an injured man. “I’m here to take care of you, Jack. Someone needs to take care of you, after all. The reporters who have been crawling around looking for the story think I’m the one taking care of you so … I’m going to take care of you.”

  Oh, that made sense. Jack didn’t even think about the reporters. He was in the hospital and they weren’t allowed past the front desk, so why would he think about the reporters? What happened in that alley would’ve been a big deal, though. It would’ve turned into a feeding frenzy with all the local print and television personalities trying to track down new angles on the same story.

  Of course they stumbled on Holly. She proba
bly set it up so they would have no choice. The possibility of playing the martyr on television would be too much for her to give up.

  That’s when the truth hit Jack square between the eyes. Holly wasn’t here to take care of him, or because she cared about him. She was here for what he could do for her, which was provide exposure, rather than what she could do for him.

  “Get out.” Jack was surprised to find strength in his voice.

  “Hmm.” Holly barely glanced in his direction. “I told one of the reporters I could get her an interview with you, by the way. I know you’re not quite ready yet – and I’ll pick up some dry shampoo so we can do something about your hair – but maybe in a few days … .”

  She purposely left it hanging, as if allowing Jack to make the decision himself. That only infuriated him more.

  “Get out,” he repeated.

  “Maybe we can do the lobby in the atrium or something,” Holly mused, glancing around the room. “This place is depressing and the lighting is not flattering.”

  “Get out.” Jack’s strength rushed back as outright annoyance washed over him. He wasn’t all that fond of Holly before he realized what kind of person she was. Now that he knew, now that he fully understood, he wanted her out of his life.

  “Stop being petulant, Jack,” Holly ordered. “We need to talk about schedules … and the future. I was thinking we might get married.”

  Jack snorted, disdain practically dripping from his sneering mouth. “Get out, Holly.”

  “Jack, you’re being ridiculous and I really don’t have time for it.” Holly was back to being disappointed. “I know you said you didn’t want to get married the one and only time we talked about it – I believe your words were ‘better dead than wed,’ right? – but you almost died and I figured you might have shifted your priorities.

  “We could get married right here in the hospital if you’re up for it,” she continued. “That way I could handle all the questions from the reporters. Right now your mother and sister are listed as the next of kin and they’re getting the bulk of the interview requests – which they turn down, if you can believe that? I just want to help them by taking some of the burden off their shoulders.”

  Jack knew exactly what she was doing … and why. He wasn’t stupid. The pain medication dulled a lot of his senses, but his brain still worked fine. “Get out.”

  “But … .”

  Jack was done playing around. He was done putting up with a woman like Holly Doherty. He was done with all of it … including the city.

  He was well and truly done.

  “Get out!”

  He felt better for the screaming even after her expression crumbled and she made a face that suggested she might cry. Jack knew it was fake. She never cried unless she wanted to manipulate him.

  “Get out and don’t come back,” Jack ordered, closing his eyes as he rested on the propped pillow. “I’m starting fresh. That’s what you do after a near-death experience, right? Well, I’m starting fresh and I don’t want to see you when I do it.”

  “You’re going to regret this, Jack.” Holly’s lower lip quivered. “We belong together and you know it.”

  “We don’t.”

  “We do.” Holly was persistent. “Some people belong together, and we’re examples of people who belong together.”

  “I don’t belong with you.” Jack’s eyes remained closed as he started considering his options, where he might move and how he might change his life. In his head, he was already out of this room. Holly was nothing more than an annoyance. “I definitely don’t belong with you.”

  “You could.”

  “I don’t.”

  “If you wanted … .”

  Jack cut her off with a shake of his head. “I don’t want to be with you.”

  The tears were back as Holly clutched her purse to her chest. “You don’t mean what you’re saying.”

  “I’ve never meant anything more.” Jack felt revitalized. Sure, he was still in the hospital and would be for days, but he finally had something to look forward to. He just had to figure out what. “Seriously, get out.”

  Holly’s sadness was replaced with haughtiness in the blink of an eye. “When you change your mind, you know where to find me. I expect flowers with my apology. Oh, and some jewelry couldn’t hurt. Let me pick out my engagement ring, though. I want control of that because you’ll just screw it up.”

  “Don’t hold your breath,” Jack muttered, his mind already racing through a myriad of possibilities. “Close the door on your way out.”

  “That’s it?”

  “That’s it.” Jack didn’t bother looking at her. She was already part of his past. “Have a nice life.”

  He meant it. He didn’t wish her ill, but she wasn’t high on his priority list. That was as much his fault as it was hers because they were never a good match and he didn’t care enough to confront that simple truth. They had a careless way about them during their relationship. It was time to look to a future, though, and Jack knew his future wasn’t with her.

  “I hope you get everything you want in life,” Jack called out as she strode toward the door. “That was never going to be me, though.”

  Holly narrowed her green eyes. “You’re going to regret this.”

  Jack didn’t believe that for a second. “Good luck. Close the door on your way out.”

  And just like that Jack felt better about the future even as the past threatened to haunt him until the day he died. He would get past this. For one brief moment, and he had no idea why, he believed that and gave into hope.

  Now, how would he do it? There was little more than Jack loved beside a plan. He was moving forward and starting anew, and he was doing it right now.

  One

  “I can’t believe it’s almost done.”

  Ivy Morgan’s blue eyes sparkled as she looked over the massive basement renovation project that had essentially taken up the bulk of her life for the past two months.

  “I know.” Jack Harker sat on the folding chair in the middle of the room and looked at the freshly erected drywall. “We really need to decide what we’re going to do about the floor here, honey. I don’t personally mind the cement slab, but I think it will irritate you fairly quickly because you’re a bit of a perfectionist.”

  “I think you’re assigning me an attitude I don’t have,” Ivy shot back running her hands over the drywall as she did an adorable hip wiggle that made Jack’s heart soar. “I don’t get irritated. I’m easygoing and lovely to live with.”

  Jack grinned so wide it nearly split his face. “You’re lovely to live with. I agree with that.” He attempted to snag her around the waist as she moved across the room, but she was expecting it and easily sidestepped him. “Dang it,” he muttered under his breath when she sidled up to the basement door.

  “They did a good job with this door.” Ivy remained in awe of the basement transformation – it was no longer a dank hole she avoided unless she needed to store something – and stared out the window. “I can’t wait to decorate it.”

  Jack clucked his tongue as he watched her. “You have to decide on a floor before we can paint and we need to paint before you can decorate so … .”

  “I like the door.” Ivy tested the handle. “I always had nightmares about being trapped down here when I was a kid. I mean … there was no way out before in case of a fire. Max had his room down here and it was totally unsafe.”

  Jack eyed Ivy with a mixture of impatience and skepticism. “Now you’re just talking to hear yourself talk. I know you’re pretending not to hear my comments about the floor, by the way. It’s not going to work, though. You’re not that good of an actress. We have to make a decision.”

  Ivy let loose with a heavy sigh as she turned to face Jack. Her brown hair looked normal in the muted light but every so often the sun snuck in through the door window and glinted off the pink streaks, giving her an ethereal glow. It was then she looked almost otherworldly and Jack had to suck in
a breath and remind himself she belonged to him.

  “Fine.” Ivy scuffed her feet against the cement floor as she crossed to Jack. “We need to discuss the floor.”

  “We do.” This time when Jack grabbed Ivy around the waist she didn’t manage to evade him. He tugged her onto his lap and dropped the catalog he had been searching through into her hands. “You know when I said you were lovely to live with?”

  Ivy nodded and squirmed when he rubbed his lips over her neck.

  “I meant it,” Jack whispered. “You’re far from being easygoing, though. In fact, you’re a lot of freaking work. You’re so much work I should get overtime pay.”

  Ivy’s smile dipped as she glared at him. “I am easygoing.”

  “You’re the exact opposite of easygoing. I’m fine with that, though.” Jack pressed a kiss to her forehead and grinned when she tried to escape. “No way.” He tightened his grip on her. “There’s no way I’m allowing you to get away.”

  There was a double meaning to his words that caused Ivy’s lips to curve even though she was determined to at least pretend she was angry with him. They’d been fighting since they met – he didn’t want her to cede the fiery personality he fell in love with, after all – and making up was half the fun.

  “Knock it off.” Jack poked Ivy’s side. “We have to talk about the floor in here. You’ve been putting it off for weeks and we’re officially out of time. You have to make a decision.”

  Ivy didn’t doubt that and yet making a decision seemed like an impossible task. “I’m torn.”

  “Between?”

  “Berber carpeting or one of those nice wood floor laminates.”