by Katy Ames
They didn’t talk much for the rest of the flight. Grace and Mark tried to assure her that Tristan wouldn’t think that. That he knew his father, and the manipulative shit he pulled. They tried to assure her that Tristan knew her even better, that he knew she’d never do anything to hurt him. Not intentionally.
But, intention or not, Tessa had hurt him. She knew that with heart-shattering certainty. And it was a thought she couldn’t escape, no matter how fast the plane flew or how quickly the car drove them to the Fitzgeralds’ inn.
Tessa knew Orchard Inn well. It was where she’d met Grace. One summer, between semesters in culinary school, Tessa had earned a spot in the Inn’s kitchen. The B&B was well known in the area. Grace’s mother’s family had run it for generations and it was one of those classic New England spots where everyone returned, year after year. The beauty of the estate and the welcoming atmosphere were part of the reason. The food was another. Tessa had been over the moon when she’d landed a seasonal position, and an opportunity to master apple-cider doughnuts and Mrs. Fitzgerald’s famous buttermilk biscuits. She and Grace had become friends and the Orchard Inn had been her home for one wonderful summer.
And of all the ways she’d dreamed of returning, this wasn’t it.
Grace’s parents were waiting for them when they arrived. Diane and Robert Fitzgerald were the classic early-to-bed, early-to-rise hard workers that one expected to find at a successful, long-running family hotel. But they also weren’t the kind of people to let a little routine get in the way of welcoming their daughter home or meeting her boyfriend—and boss—for the first time. Even late at night, even in their pajamas.
Tessa watched with a weak smile as Diane pulled Grace into a huge hug and Robert pumped Mark’s hand with a tight grip. The two men sized each other up as Grace muttered something to her father. He gave a gruff laugh before slinging his arm around Grace’s shoulder and dropping a kiss on her head.
Tessa was envious of the warm welcome. The only member of her family who was ever that happy to see her was Gran. And Tristan. Tessa dismissed the thought. He wasn’t family. And, at that second, she wasn’t sure he considered her anything more than a liar.
“Tessa. So good to see you again.” Diane squeezed her quickly before giving her a once-over, the kind only mothers had perfected. “I realize my daughter can be a challenge; she’s always been so stubborn, insisting on doing things her own way. But I didn’t realize working for her was so draining. You look done-in, dear.”
Tessa managed a small laugh. “No, no, Mrs. Fitzgerald. I love working at the resort. It’s been wonderful. I’m just, um…tired from the trip.”
Grace whispered into her mom’s ear and the woman frowned slightly before looping her arm through Tessa’s.
“Good thing we have some of the most comfortable beds in western Massachusetts at our disposal. Come, let’s get you settled in. Everyone can get a good night’s sleep and we’ll catch up in the morning. I’ll even see if Marigold can whip up some of her famous blueberry scones.”
“With lemon curd?” Grace said, giving her mom a hopeful look. “I dream about them. Oh, God, they’re so good.”
“With lemon curd,” her mom repeated, obviously delighted to have her daughter back. “I’ll see what we can do. Now, come.” She ushered everyone into the inn, pointing the trio up the ancient curved oak stairs. “Tessa, you have a spot under the front gable. Grace, you get your old room.”
“And Mark?” Grace asked.
Her dad coughed before her mom answered, “I seriously considered making him sleep in the old housekeeper’s room. The one under the back stairs. But your father pointed out that he probably wouldn’t fit. He’s much taller than Mrs. Jenkins. So he can sleep in your room.” Diane’s mouth was drawn in a stern line, but her eyes twinkled. Tessa almost smiled when she heard Mark sigh in relief.
“Thank you, Mrs. Fitzgerald. I can’t say this with certainty, since I haven’t had the pleasure of meeting Mrs. Jenkins, but unless she was an unnaturally tall woman, I doubt I’d find her room under the staircase very comfortable.”
Diane looked him up and down before saying, “She was five foot two. And didn’t believe in taking up space with a bed she didn’t need. Very sensible woman.”
Grace snorted and dragged Mark towards the back of the inn. “’Night, Mom, Dad, Tessa.” She gave them a little wave. “See you in the morning.” She stopped just before they turned a corner, catching Tessa’s attention. “Don’t worry. We’ll find him. We’ll help you talk to him if you think that will make a difference. Get some sleep. Everything will look less shitty in the morning.”
Tessa nodded, feeling nowhere near as certain as her friend sounded.
Three hours later, Tessa was still awake. She’d torn the quilt off the bed. The sheets were a mess by her feet. And, no matter how hard she punched it, the pillow bunched beneath her neck.
If Mark was right, Tristan was somewhere nearby. Alone. Again. Tessa couldn’t imagine what he was going through. What he was thinking. Worse, what he was thinking about her. And the longer she lay in bed, staring at the ceiling, counting down the minutes till dawn, the more Tessa knew she shouldn’t wait. Couldn’t wait.
Grace answered after the third knock, her hair a messy halo, her lips a little more pink than the last time Tessa had seen her.
“Sorry. But I’m not waiting. I’m going to the cabin. Can you get the address from Mark?”
“You sure? You want us to come with you?”
“No, no. You stay. I need to do this. Please,” she begged her friend. “The address. I can’t just sit here. I’m losing my mind.”
“Yes, yes, okay.” Grace disappeared behind the door and returned a moment later with a slip of paper. “Mark says there isn’t really an address. This is the name of the closest intersection, and the landmarks before the cabin. He says if you go past the red barn you’ve gone too far.”
“I’ll find it. Don’t worry.” Tessa squeezed Grace’s arm.
“You remember where my folks keep the keys to the truck?”
Tessa nodded.
“Drive safe. Those back roads can be rough, especially in the dark.”
“I’ll be careful. Promise. Thank you.”
“Good luck. Call if you need anything.”
“Yup, sure.” Tessa was already on her way down the back stairs, her sneakers silent against the thick runner. The key to the Fitzgeralds’ pick-up truck was on the back hook, exactly where it had always been.
The soft green glow from the GPS on Tessa’s phone lit up the passenger seat as she maneuvered the truck around a dip in the road. She was thankful she’d become familiar with the area the summer she’d lived there. Some things had changed, but the narrow, gravelly back roads were pretty much the way she remembered them.
She’d been driving about thirty minutes when she hit the intersection that Mark had written down. Tessa turned, on the lookout for the big white farmhouse. After that, there should be a field, then a mile or so of woods, before a driveway cut off to the right. “Last time I checked, a field and and trees didn’t count as landmarks,” she muttered. The farmhouse came into sight five minutes later, the field immediately after that. There wasn’t much of a moon, but what little light there was in the sky vanished as soon as Tessa hit the tree line.
The world shrank to the small section of gravel lane lit by the headlights, the line wavy as Tessa hit pothole after pothole. Her teeth were knocking about her head and she’d started to lose focus on the road when she caught what must have been the driveway. She didn’t stop in time. Tessa had to slam on the brakes and throw the truck into reverse, sending the gravel flying into the nearby trees. Between that and the sound of the muffler, Tessa was pretty sure her arrival wouldn’t be a surprise.
Mark hadn’t said how far off the road the cabin was. She’d been on the dirt path ten minutes, maybe more, and Tessa was getting nervous. Or more nervous than she already was. A line of trees loomed ahead and she punched the bra
kes. The road stopped. No cabin in sight.
“Fuck!” Tessa left the truck running, lights on, as she slipped down, thankful she’d put on jeans. Running around the woods in the middle of the night in shorts or a dress would have made an already sketchy idea so much worse. Tessa squinted, trying to catch sight of a structure through the thick foliage. A breeze caught the branches above her, a slow whistle building as it swept through the leaves.
Tessa shivered. The deep darkness of the woods was damp and made her skin prickle. “You’re just nervous. Calm down. Deep breaths, Tessa, deep breaths,” she chanted.
“Not sure what good that will do.”
Tessa screamed, whirling around at the unexpected voice. A form emerged from the thick shadows beyond the truck. Tall, but not tall enough. Wide, but not as wide as he should be. It couldn’t be anyone else, but it wasn’t who it should’ve been. It definitely wasn’t Tristan.
Tessa jumped back, directly into the beam of the headlights. They were so bright, Tessa blinked, her eyesight blurring for a second. The other person was fast, hauling her forward before she could run to the other side of the truck.
“Stop squirming!” the man ordered. “This will all go so much faster if you stop squirming.”
“Who the fuck—” Tessa stopped short, her eyes finally adjusting to the light. For a second, she’d thought it must be Dexter. It didn’t make any sense. There was no way he could know where she was. Or, if not him, her father?
But it was neither. Tessa didn’t recognize the face, but the set of his features, the slope of his jaw, the waft of expensive cologne and how his skin looked buffed and moisturized the way only a wealthy, narcissistic man’s would…. Tessa couldn’t understand how he was there, or why, but she shuddered when she realized exactly who he was.
“Walk.” He jerked her towards a small gap in the trees. “No point making introductions out here.”
Tessa tripped on a tree root and the man tightened his grip on her arm. He didn’t say anything else, just pulled her closer and propelled her down an overgrown strip of grass that, several heart-pounding seconds later, widened in front of a low, square cabin.
“This is what you were looking for, yes?” he asked, but Tessa knew from his voice he didn’t expect an answer.
In front of them was the cabin’s small, rickety porch. Only one step was unbroken. The man pushed her up, following close behind, his other hand wrapped around the back of her neck.
“Knock,” he directed. “Let’s see how happy my son is to see you.”
Tessa did as she was told. She wasn’t going to run. She had nowhere to go. The only place she wanted to be—and the only person she wanted to see—was on the other side of that door.
But nothing happened. The man’s fingers tightened against her neck and Tessa knocked again. Finally, she heard the floorboards creak and the knob jostle before the door swung wide.
“Tessa?” Tristan’s eyes went from sleepy to surprised to enraged as he absorbed the scene on the porch. He barely looked at her before pulling her against his chest and growling at the man, “What the fuck are you doing here?”
The intruder smoothed a well-manicured hand down the front of his shirt, completely ignoring Tristan’s question. “I would’ve been happy to pay a visit at a more conventional time if you hadn’t picked such an inconvenient place to stay.”
“Leave.” Tristan held Tessa even harder, one hand cupping the back of her head, tucking her face just below the hollow of his shoulder.
“No.”
“It wasn’t a request.”
“Son.” Tessa felt the word shake Tristan. She curled her hands into his sides. “I would have thought you’d have learned by now. You’re not the one calling the shots.”
“That’s about to change, old man.”
“Haha.” Maxwell Hurst’s laugh was frigid. Just like his eyes. “Well, whatever happens, at least I’ll be able to say this visit was worth a chuckle.”
“Fuck you,” Tristan hissed.
“You have yet to succeed,” his father retorted, slipping into the cabin, not bothering to close the door behind him.
“You okay?” Tristan tipped Tessa’s face up, his thumbs sweeping across her cheeks. His fiercely protective expression made Tessa’s knees wobble. She sagged into him and he shot his father a murderous glare.
“No, he didn’t hurt me. I’m fine. Just surprised.”
“You can stop with the melodrama. I’d never harm a woman.” Max paused, weighing the truth of his statement. “At least, not personally.”
“Not for lack of trying,” Tristan bit out. He closed the cabin door and moved them back across the small room, putting as much distance between them and his father as possible.
“Well, let’s hope this visit goes well then, hmm? So I don’t decide it’s time to rectify that situation. You do know how I hate to fail.”
Tristan growled something undistinguishable, his hands fisting against Tessa’s back.
His father didn’t pay any attention. He was in a chair, looking around the cabin, wearing an expression of boredom mixed with disdain. “I suppose it’s too much to hope you have a single-malt stashed somewhere in here?”
“No drinks. No chit-chat. Tell me what the fuck you’re doing here. Now.”
“Tristan,” his father heaved out on a sigh. “So crass. So angry. So not the way we raised you.”
Tristan jerked, his head whipping in Max’s direction. “I suggest, Max, that we not get into a discussion about how I was raised. Unless you want to leave here looking significantly less put-together than you do right now. Speaking of, who goes for a walk in the middle of the woods at three in the morning wearing a suit?”
“Someone who’s focused on a goal, son.” Max crossed one leg over the other, a well-heeled foot swinging. “Something I’m well aware you know nothing about.”
“You know nothing about me.” Tristan took two huge steps forward, keeping Tessa safely behind him. “We’re strangers, Dad.” Tristan made the word sound so foul. “So don’t come here and fuck with me or my girlfriend and pretend this hasn’t turned out exactly the way you wanted.”
“Girlfriend? Really?” Max’s lips twisted as he looked between Tristan and Tessa. Then his face blanked and he shrugged. “It’s amazing. How easy you make it.”
“Easy?”
“Yes. Hurst men don’t have girlfriends. We have wives. Mistresses. Lovers. Women we fuck. Any and all of the above. Often at the same time. But girlfriends?” Max laughed. “Just one of the many ways you prove, over and over, you aren’t a Hurst. Son.”
Tessa felt sick. The cruel dismissal in Max’s voice was more than she could take. It was deliberate. Meant to inflict cut after cut until the intended victim was a mess of blood and scars. Like his son. Who just stood there, braced for impact.
“You need to leave.” Tessa stepped around Tristan, clamping a hand on his arm when he tried to pull her back. She infused her voice with all of the command she was used to wielding in her kitchen. “You aren’t welcome here. You have no reason to be here. Go.”
Max cocked his head, like she was a problem he couldn’t solve. Or a creature he’d never seen before. Then he smiled. Wide. “Dexter said she was feisty. Explains why he likes her so much.”
Tristan flew across the room and hauled his father out of the chair. “You stay away from her. Dexter stays away from her. No one. Goes. Near. Tessa.” He emphasized every word with a shake. “Do you understand?”
“You can’t stop, can you?” Max’s teeth chattered between jerks. “See how far you’ve fallen? How low? All because of her.” He nodded in Tessa’s direction and Tristan tightened his grip on his father’s collar. “Oh, don’t be so hard on yourself. In this one instance, I’ll admit I’m partially to blame.”
Tristan got closer, yanking Max until the older man was balanced on his toes. Max Hurst wasn’t small, not by any stretch. But Tristan was younger, stronger, and had at least six inches over his father. If the fight
turned physical, Max didn’t stand a chance.
“Stop taunting and spit it out. Before I knock you out.”
“I tried to teach you. Like my father taught me, like his father taught him. I tried, Tristan. So you’d learn that this”—he jerked an arm between Tessa and his son—“is the fastest way to ruin. Makes you weak. So, yes, it’s partially my fault. For not teaching you well enough. Because it obviously didn’t sink in.”
Tristan’s hands slipped to his father’s neck. Tessa came forward but stopped when Tristan shook his head. “No, Tess. Don’t come any closer. I don’t want you any closer.”
“Why are you trying to protect her, Tristan? What purpose does it possibly serve?”
“Purpose?” Tristan roared. “There is no purpose, Max. No reason, no motive. Just the simple fact that I will. Always. Without thought, without hesitation. With my body and every fucking breath in it. Because I don’t know any other way to live. I will always protect the people I love. And if that means I’m not a Hurst man, that I failed your fucking lesson? Good. I’m glad. ’Cause there’s only one thing that could be worse than being like you.” Tristan’s hands flexed around his dad’s throat. “And that’s Tessa getting hurt by you. By either of us.”
Tristan and Max stared at each other. Rage ripped across Tristan’s entire body and Max was still. The look on his face sent a shudder through Tessa. Could it be possible? It almost looked like the malice in Tristan’s words had hurt. Like Max had intentionally prodded a bear but was surprised when it attacked.
The glimpse past Max’s shield was short-lived. Seconds later, that flat, lifeless laugh rang out. Followed by, “You haven’t changed. A bit bigger, a bit louder. But you’re still that scared little shit who barged into my office that night. That same stupid boy who protected his whore of a mother.”
Everything happened so fast. Tristan’s roar barreled through the small room. Tessa barely saw him move before she heard the sickening crunch of bone against bone. Blood flowed down Max’s face the same time his curses filled the air. Tristan wouldn’t let him go, his arms flying, when a body flew in front of Tessa and attacked him from behind.