“Yes. I was just wondering if you heard anything further.”
“A forensics team will be handling the site. They’re supposed to notify me when it’s cleared so I can see if there’s anything I can salvage from the rubble. I don’t know anything else, like if the skull was still there, or more bones. I guess they’ll let me know.”
“Okay. Good.”
She stopped on the edge of the road to take a look both ways, then tried not to notice the way Jake’s palm lightly brushed her back as if watching out for her as they crossed the two-lane highway. It was an automatic gesture, chivalrous but meaningless. She liked it, though. Liked the feeling of his arm around her.
“I guess you saw all that about the paranormal stuff.” She was making conversation, hoping the ball of nerves in her throat would go away. What was she, sixteen years old and afraid of being alone with a boy?
Not that Jake was anybody’s idea of a boy. He was a man, tough as nails, but quietly kind despite first impressions. Her pulse raced with stupid nerves. This was no date and yet she felt like it was.
“Do you know what positive ions are?”
He shrugged. “Some kind of electrically charged particles.”
“What did you think about all that?”
They’d reached his car parked in front of the rental house across the road. He had his hand on the door, set to open it for her.
“I think they need something to talk about when they carry news twenty-four hours a day.” He shrugged. “Of course, anything’s possible.”
He’d surprised her. “You believe what that woman was saying from the Paranormal Activity Institute?”
“I didn’t say that.” He opened the door for her. Keely slid into the passenger seat of the economy-size lease car. “I just stopped thinking I knew it all a while back. Whenever you start thinking you know everything, that’s when life hits you on the ass.”
He shut the door and walked around the car to the driver’s side and got in.
“Which way?” he asked when he’d keyed the engine.
She gave him directions as he pulled onto the highway. She watched his rock-hard profile, wondering about his comment.
“You get hit on the ass by life much?” she couldn’t resist asking. He’d told her about his partner. That had to hurt, and maybe that was why he’d been sent away on R&R.
“Doesn’t everybody?” His voice was even, giving nothing away.
“Not really. My friend Lise. She’s married to her high-school sweetheart. Tom. Her life’s pretty perfect, I’d say. She doesn’t get hit on the ass much.”
“It’s good that you aren’t jealous.”
“I am not!” Dammit. “Well, okay, maybe a little bit.”
Jake’s mouth quirked and it was hard to be defensive. He wasn’t judging her.
She turned her gaze from his profile to the narrow country road she’d directed him to turn onto off the highway. “I like my life. Mostly. Hers just seems a little simpler.”
“Nobody’s life is simple to them.”
“I know.” She looked back at Jake. “You like your life, Jake?”
“When I get one, I’ll let you know,” he said.
She felt a flush of embarrassment at how much she’d opened up to him. Obviously, it wasn’t a two-way street.
“I thought we were friends.” Jeez, she sounded pissy now and she hated that.
He shot her a look. “We are friends, Keely.”
“Then tell me who you are. I don’t mean your name, but who you are. Who is Jake Malloy?” She realized they were almost at their destination. “Turn there.” She pointed to a fork in the road. “Then the first drive is my parents’ house.”
Jake made the turn then pulled down the drive and stopped behind a black SUV.
“Who is Jake Malloy? What do you want to know, Keely?” He gazed at her and she knew he was trying to decide how much to tell her. “I grew up in Charleston. My dad died in a crash ten years ago out in Pocahontas County, right after I graduated from WVU. My mom had cancer and passed a while back, too. They were divorced. She was married and divorced five times by the time I was out of high school.”
“I’m sorry.”
“That stuff, like most things you apologize for, isn’t your fault.”
“I know that. I’m just sorry you had to go through it.”
“It’s all right. I’m tough.”
He gave her a cocky smile, as if he didn’t have a care in the world. He was covering up, though. She could see the pain underneath. She knew all about covering up.
“What else do you want to know? I watch the History Channel and I like math. I count things.”
“Count things?” Now he’d thrown her.
“To get stuff off my mind. I count things. Steps, passing cars, people, anything. I count at night. I used to count backward, but now I count forward because you run out of numbers the other way.”
She remembered their conversation about trouble sleeping.
“Why are you in Haven on R & R?”
Silence stretched taut. There was no more cocky smile on his face. “They say I’m not dealing with my partner’s death very well. I think I’m doing fine.”
He didn’t seem that fine to her. “You have trouble sleeping.”
“So do lots of people.”
That was true. She did, for example. But she didn’t think it was quite the same. Or maybe it was…. “Do you feel guilty about his death?” She remembered that he’d said he’d saved the kid. He’d been too late to save his partner. “Do you think you did something wrong?”
“Nothing ever goes down perfect,” he said. “I should have known that. The backup didn’t get there in time. Brian’s cover got blown. I wasn’t there in time. I couldn’t save him.” His voice was hoarse suddenly.
“Maybe if you’d been there in time, you would have died, too,” she pointed out gently. “Then you wouldn’t have been able to save the child. You saved a child. That’s a good thing. Brian would have wanted you to save the child first.”
“He told me to get the girl. He told me to get her first.”
“Then forgive yourself. I’m sure Brian does.”
He was silent, his chiseled face in stark profile now. She could almost feel his pain, stretching across the short space between them in the shadows of the car. Seeing the way he blamed himself made her take another look at her own thought patterns.
“I felt responsible for Ray’s death,” she said quietly. “Still do sometimes. We had a fight right before he drove off that day. I felt like it was my fault that he did something that stupid, but it wasn’t my fault. He did a lot of stupid things and none of them were my fault.”
Jake looked back at her. “You’re one of the nicest people I’ve ever met. Nothing you could have ever done justified how he treated you.”
“I’m not all that nice.”
He reached out, touched her face, skimmed his fingers along her jaw. “Yeah, you are. You’re damn nice.”
She saw all the pain and need she was feeling reflected back at her in his eyes. She understood him, too.
Quiet stretched between them.
“Why did you come here with me tonight?” she asked.
“Nothing else to do in this one-horse town, is there?” He added more seriously, “I’m worried about you. I’m worried that you’re in danger.”
He was worried about her. That was unbearably sweet. And dammit, she was wanting him again.
Her so-called friend.
Her stomach clenched. What was wrong with her? Why couldn’t she keep this to a friendship? She didn’t want a man in her life, especially one who clearly had no lasting interest in the community she adored. And she had plenty of problems, including a possible murder.
And yet…
Yeah, she was in danger, but not the kind Jake meant.
Chapter 10
The front door of the house opened.
“I think we’ve been made,” he said. “Ready?”
She looked oddly reluctant to go inside, and he wasn’t all that eager himself.
“I think I should tell you something,” Keely said. She put her hand on his arm, stopped him before he could get out of the car. “The people who love me are hell-bent on setting me up. That’s what the wart thing was about.”
“Wart thing?” He vaguely recalled her friend making mention of something along those lines.
“Lise was bugging me. Wanted to know all about you. I told her you were old and fat and had a wart.”
He had to laugh. “Thanks.”
“Sorry.” She blushed.
“It’s too late for me to grow one,” he said, working to keep things light. “Or get fat and old.”
“That’s okay.” She laughed now, too, and he could see the tension break in her eyes. “I’m just letting you know so that you’ll be prepared. They won’t be content with your being my friend. We’ll just have to be firm about it, and you might have to be a little patient with their pushiness. They’re good people.”
He hoped she was right. A large, rugged-looking man was heading down the steps from the front of the house. Jake and Keely met him halfway and Jake reached out to shake the hand offered to him. The older man’s grip was firm, his gaze level. He wore crisp slacks and a golf shirt, casual yet clean-cut.
“Dad, this is Jake Malloy.”
“Howard Bennett,” he introduced himself. “I want to thank you for being there with our Keely last night when the quake hit. She told us you were a big help to her. Good to meet you.”
“It’s good to meet you, too, but I didn’t really do anything,” Jake responded.
“Just being there was important to her,” Howard argued. “And important to us.”
“We’re so glad to have you here. Roxie, Keely’s mother.” The woman who came up behind Howard Bennett was petite, much slighter than Keely’s tall build. “I’m just thrilled that you’re having dinner with us.”
Both of her parents were regarding him with obvious interest. They both seemed young and physically fit for their age. Roxie Bennett was attractive, her slender face carefully made up, looked younger than her years.
“Thank you, Mrs. Bennett.”
“No, now you just call me Roxie.”
Howard slapped an affable arm around Jake’s back and guided him into the house. It smelled like fried chicken and fresh baked bread inside and his mouth watered just a little. It’d been a long time since he’d had home cooking. A long time since he’d been part of any kind of family gathering.
He looked back for Keely. Her mother seemed to be fussing over her, but he couldn’t hear what they were saying as they entered the house to the sound of a baby’s wail.
A woman walked into the airy foyer of the home, a chubby baby dressed in a sailor suit draped over one shoulder.
“Hi there,” she said over the child’s crying. She jiggled the boy on her shoulder and he quieted to a sobbing hiccup. “Paul, come meet Keely’s friend,” she called over her shoulder. “I’m Sherry, Keely’s brother’s wife.”
She positively beamed at Jake.
A man appeared behind her, another sailor-suited baby in his arms. “I’m Paul.” He shook Jake’s hand while cradling the baby in his other arm. He was tall and bore a striking resemblance to his father.
More people than he could imagine fitting into the house started filling the foyer, all with curious looks at him while calling birthday greetings to Keely. She’d been just about swamped in hugs. He learned that Keely had two brothers, as well as a sister. There were several cousins and friends, with children and spouses.
“Danny, hey, thanks for coming,” Keely was saying as she stepped around him, brushing against him in the press of family and friends. She gave the man who was as big as a linebacker a warm hug, then said, “Where’s Mary?”
“Out back with the kids,” Danny said.
“Mary’s a good friend of mine,” Keely explained. “This is her husband, Danny. He teaches at the high school and coaches football.”
“Now let’s not crowd in here when we’ve got a whole house,” Roxie Bennett said, shooing everyone back into the living room. The furnishings were comfortable, informal cottage-style with lots of florals and checks. Jake went with the flow as they spilled out onto a spacious back deck where he saw at least one person he recognized—Lise Tanner.
“You came! I’m so glad,” Lise welcomed him. “Meet my husband, Tom.”
Premature sparks of silver at his temples, wire-rimmed eyeglasses and a slender frame gave Tom Tanner an academic air. He reached his hand out to grip Jake’s, then turned to Keely. “Happy birthday. Some birthday, eh?”
Keely’s friend Mary, he discovered, was the woman in the flowing purple-patterned summer dress with beads draped around her neck and a couple of kids hanging onto her ankles.
He thought about his own family and old friends, split up about a hundred different ways. He had some stepsiblings from his mother’s later marriages. He wasn’t close to any of them and hadn’t been in touch with old school friends in years. Haven was the kind of place where people grew up and stayed together. It was all foreign to him.
“Sit down, sit down. Now. Tell us about yourself,” Roxie invited as she sat down on a padded redwood chair across from Jake, who found himself shooed to a seat next to Keely. There was a stack of beautifully wrapped birthday gifts on the umbrella-topped outdoor dining table. This crowd wasn’t going to fit around it but he could see that there were plenty of seats, some nice redwood and other extra plastic chairs that had probably been brought out for the occasion. Flowers overflowed from pots and wind chimes hung from poles on the ends of the deck.
Keely had one of the bouncing baby boys on her lap. One of her cousin’s daughters was running laps around a bird feeder in the smoothly cut sloping lawn that stretched to a line of trees. The sun had dipped below the trees and shadows crossed the lawn. A chorus of cicadas beat the crisp, clear air.
“What brings you to Haven?” Roxie prompted when Jake didn’t reply right away.
Keely’s gaze slid from the giggling baby to Jake. She looked gorgeous with a baby, he thought unexpectedly. She also looked extremely curious, waiting for his response.
“Country living,” he came up with. “Peace and quiet.” It was true enough, though not his idea.
That brought a laugh from Keely’s father. “And we greet you with an earthquake and a media frenzy. What kind of work do you do?”
“I’m not working right now.”
“I could help you find some work if you like,” Tom put in. “I work for the town.”
Well, Jake had managed to give the impression that he was out of work and slightly better than a bum. He figured that would help Keely out with the matchmaking problem.
“Tom helps everybody,” Lise put in. “You should see him at Christmas. We hardly even see him because he’s out buying food and presents for the families of everybody who comes through the local shelter.”
“Girls, would you help me in the kitchen?” Roxie asked, and Keely’s sister, sisters-in-law and friends exited, one of them with her arm swung happily around Keely’s shoulders.
The people who love me…Yep, she had a lot of people who loved her, that was clear. He wondered if they were all really as nice as they seemed. Or maybe that was just his suspicious, bitter-cop side coming out.
He found himself hoping they were all as nice as they seemed. The scene before him was like some fantasy family gathering. He didn’t fit in, didn’t belong.
Keely’s mother was no doubt dragging Keely off to point out how unsuitable he was as husband material, bringing along the rest of the women for added support. And he was unsuitable, just not for the reasons Keely’s family knew about. Her friend Mary was the last to go, grabbing up the lap-running three-year-old from the lawn on her way. Another little girl, maybe six, ran behind her. Sherry had left the twin babies with her husband, who looked somewhat pained as he attempted to juggle the two of t
hem.
“You all live around here?” Jake asked Tom and Danny, who were both seated near him.
Danny took another beer out of a big cooler on the deck and offered one to Jake. “We’ve got a place out on Black Hollow Road,” Danny said. “It’d take a forklift for me to get Mary out of Haven. When we have kids, she wants to raise them here, where she grew up.”
“We’re out on Lick Fork,” Tom said. “Just built a new house last year.”
The town manager was doing pretty good, Jake guessed as he opened his beer. Keely’s parents were doing all right, too, judging by the nice home he’d passed through on his way to the deck. It was well-furnished, comfortable, very modern and full of light. Nothing like Keely’s farmhouse, he thought as the men’s conversation turned to the disaster.
“It’s too bad about what happened to the old family farmhouse,” Jake said.
“Hopefully we can salvage something out of it,” Howard said. “It’s a huge loss, in terms of family treasures, but—”
“Maybe Keely can move on now,” Tom said. “We tried to talk her out of living out there when Ray died. I never thought she was safe there by herself. And now, with what she says she found—”
“I went out there today to get something out of my car,” Jake said casually. “My car got hit by a tree in the storm, right before the shock hit. Someone’d been tampering with the site before the police got there. The dirt was freshly turned out behind the house and someone rammed a white pickup truck out of the barn, blew the doors down, nearly ran me over.”
He’d taken careful note of the vehicles in the driveway and parked in the yard when he’d driven up. None of them had been white pickups. Of course, there he went, being paranoid and suspicious again.
“Now that worries me,” Howard said. “I don’t want Keely out there at all.”
“I agree,” another of her brothers—David? Jake couldn’t remember his name—added.
“I’m just wondering who knew about what she found,” Jake said.
“Unfortunately, probably a lot of people,” Tom said. “I heard about it this afternoon from my secretary, who’d had lunch with one of the dispatchers. Of course, she knew it was my sister-in-law in this case, but people talk. They shouldn’t, but they do, and finding a skull in your rose bed is certainly good gossip around here. We don’t get a lot of murders in Haven. But for all we know, might not be human bones. Could just be animal bones.”
Secrets Rising Page 9