by Chelsea Fine
“I knew it.” He points at my smile. “You like me.” He shows off his dimple and nods. “You think I’m obnoxious but you still like me. Do you want to kiss again?” He leans in and wiggles his eyebrows.
“Oh my God. You’re ridiculous.” I drop my smile but can’t help the warmth that spreads over my cheeks and down my body. Because a tiny part of me does want to kiss him again. It’s such a foreign feeling for me, wanting to kiss a guy. Yearning to touch him. And I’m not sure if I like it. It makes me feel out of control, like I can’t trust myself.
My eyes sweep over his mouth where his lips, so soft and warm against mine last night, curl into another playful grin, and my heart skips a beat.
Maybe I can’t.
“Can we just do this already?” I say.
“What, kiss? Or have sex?” He looks around. “The floor is kind of dirty but if you insist…” He reaches for the button of his pants.
“Ugh. I’m done talking to you.” I kneel on the floor.
His smile widens. “Oh so now you want to give me a blow job? Make up your mind, woman.”
“Shut up.” I aggressively yank his wrist down so he’s forced to kneel beside me, where we’re within reaching distance of the suitcase. “I’m down here for the suitcase, you idiot.” I can’t help but glance at his jeans, remembering how large he felt in my hand last night.
“Here, I’ll get it.” He drops the teasing attitude and reaches for the suitcase. As he stretches out his arms, his biceps flex and I trail my gaze up his shoulders and over his profile.
He’s built like a model. Lean and cut, with a chiseled jaw and long eyelashes. His mouth is large and masculine but his lips look soft and he smells good. Again. Like citrus.
He slides the suitcase from the closet and positions it by our knees. It’s an old piece of luggage, with a hard outer casing and a thick plastic handle. Tipping the suitcase up at an angle, he pops open the latches. The lid sticks a little at first, but after working at the seam for a moment, he’s able to coax it open with his long fingers.
Inside are three sealed envelopes. One with Daren’s name on it, one with my name on it, and one that reads TO YOU BOTH.
Daren and I lift out the envelopes labeled with our names and take turns opening them. We find a note from my father inside each one.
Daren reads his note privately while I silently read my own.
My sweet Kayla,
As you read this, you are most likely handcuffed to Daren Ackwood. Despite what you may think or assume, Daren is a good soul. If he were anything less, I would not have asked you to lock yourself to his side. Which brings me to why you are here at all. My death.
I love you more than you will ever know, and more than I could ever explain. These last few years being apart from you have been torturous for me. There is so much I’ve wanted to explain. So much I’ve wanted to make up for. I realize my apparent absence from your life has made you skeptical of me, and probably of love as well, but please know that it is not what it seems. My love for you is and will forever be very real. The last five years without you have been pure heartache for me, and I hope you will choose to remember me as the father from the years before, not the one who’s been away from you recently.
Since I didn’t have a chance to say good-bye to you before passing, I’ve written my thoughts on these notes. But more than anything else, I want you to know that you have always been the greatest part of my life—always—and I am amazed and proud of who you are and who you will become.
I encourage you to share this note with Daren. He is one of my favorite people and I trust him beyond measure, as I hope you will, someday, as well.
I love you.
I blink at the note. Then blink again. Nothing in it makes sense. The last few years were pure heartache for him? Ha. And Daren is a good soul that he trusts beyond measure? Double ha.
There’s no way in hell I’m showing Daren this note. The last thing that guy needs is more air to fill his big head.
At the bottom right-hand corner of the paper is the word “Through” written in black marker and the number fourteen written below that. Just that one word and number. Nothing else. I turn the paper over but it’s blank on the other side. Through fourteen? Weird.
Folding up the note, I quickly tuck it into my purse and glance at Daren. He’s staring at his own letter, looking perplexed.
I nod at his note. “What does it say?”
He blinks up at me then swiftly shoves the note into his pocket. “Nothing. Let’s see what’s in this last envelope.” Reaching into the suitcase, he grabs the remaining envelope, opens it, and pulls out yet another note from within.
As we lean in to read it, our shoulders brush. His body heat wraps around me in the small hallway, tucking me into his citrus scent and I’m momentarily distracted.
No.
I shake myself.
I will not like him—or his awesome-smelling soap, or shampoo, or whatever that heavenly orange scent is coming from.
Getting a grip, I focus on the words scrawled out in my father’s handwriting.
Daren and Kayla,
You’ve agreed to be handcuffed together! I can’t tell you how pleased I am by this. I realize handcuffs are uncomfortable and quite distasteful, but I wanted you to take this inheritance seriously. More importantly, I wanted you to work as a team. Because life is a series of working with others to achieve mutual goals. And that is lesson number one. The money I’ve left you is elsewhere. Use the enclosed key to open #23 at the train station.
Daren shakes the envelope, and an oddly shaped golden key falls into his palm. It’s large and heavy, with a square top and thick teeth. I’ve never seen anything like it.
He holds it up with a small smile. “Well now we know where the money is.”
“I guess we do.” I inhale deeply, my spirits lifting to crazy levels of giddiness as I stare at the key. This is really happening. My life is really going to change.
“You okay?” Daren cocks his head.
“Yeah.” A slow smile stretches across my face. “I’m good. Just excited, that’s all.”
“Then what are we waiting for? Let’s go find us an inheritance!” He tucks the key in his pocket and moves to stand.
I follow suit but as I try to pull myself up, my heels wobble and I lose my balance and fall back. My chained wrist pulls Daren down with me but where he kind of slides to the floor on his knees, I end up landing square on my butt with my legs sprawled beneath me and my skirt hiked up to the palest skin of my thighs.
Daren looks at me with a suppressed laugh and throws my words from earlier back at me. “Real smooth.”
“Hey,” I snap. “It’s really hard to get off the floor when you’re handcuffed and wearing heels and a skirt.”
He stands. “Oh I have no doubt. That’s why I opted for my casual shoes today.” He mocks, “They don’t do much for my calves but they’re quite comfortable, and they go with everything.”
“I hate you.”
“No, you don’t.” His eyes skim my naked thighs and his smile shifts from amusement to appreciation.
I yank the tight material of my skirt down as far as possible and he clears his throat and moves his eyes back to mine.
“Here.” He has his genuine smile back on. “Give me your hand.” He reaches for my left hand as he threads his fingers through my cuffed right one. Then he starts to pull me up.
It’s a practical gesture but it feels intimate. His fingers, laced between mine, are big and warm as they fold over the back of my hand and lift me up.
I manage to stand without flashing him or toppling over. “Thanks.”
Once we’re on our feet, we quickly untangle our hands. As his fingers slide out of mine and his skin rubs against my skin, something low in my belly twitches. My eyes drift up the sinewy muscles of his forearm and bicep, across the thick muscles of his chest, and down his lean stomach to his hips where he’s brushing dust off his jeans. For a brief second, I wonder
what those hips would look like without jeans on. Then I mentally slap myself.
This is Daren Ackwood, for God’s sake. Mr. Sleeps-With-The-Whole-Town. I will not get sucked into his funnel of good looks and sexy hips.
I glance him over again and frown. Goddamn Daren and his bandit kissing, getting my body all worked up and bringing on unsolicited belly twitches. I really need to get away from his fingers and hips, STAT.
“Let’s hurry up and finish this.” I start tugging him back toward the front door.
“Yes, ma’am. But first?” He stops walking and the handcuffs snap me back. “I’m going to find my baseball cards.”
“What?”
“You heard me.” He moves in front of me and marches down the hallway, whipping me behind him.
“No way,” I say as I’m reluctantly towed behind him by our steel restraints. “We don’t have time for you to play card detective.”
He doesn’t look back. “Sure we do.”
“What is with you and these baseball cards?” I say. “You’d think you were twelve by the way you’re so emotionally attached to these things.”
He looks over his shoulder and grins. “I have attachment issues, remember?”
I roll my eyes.
“Seriously, though. They were a Christmas present I got when I was thirteen. All valuable collector’s cards.” He takes us back into the living room where he opens the cabinet in the corner and starts going through the shelves. “I barely had a chance to enjoy them before your dad jacked them.”
I nod. “Uh-huh. And why, exactly, did he ‘jack’ them?” I make air quotes and Daren frowns at my fingers.
“He jacked them,” he says, “because he thought I was too spoiled to appreciate them.”
I snort. “You probably were.”
“I was.” He nods. “At the time.”
I raise a brow. “You admit you were spoiled?”
“Oh yeah. I was totally spoiled.” He shrugs. “Growing up, my parents bought me anything I wanted whenever I wanted, as long as it kept me out of their way. I had all the money and freedom in the world. And I took it all for granted.”
He looks back at the shelf. “I thought having money was the most important thing in life. Money got me video games, popularity, friends… girls. But as I got older, my home life started to crumble, and I realized that there was a huge difference between the kind of rich that my father was and the kind of rich that, uh… that your father was.” He glances at me. “Your dad had an appreciation and humility—for life, for money, for people—that my father never had. And when I was young I was just like my father. Selfish. Ungrateful… So yeah.” He looks back at the shelf and resumes his search. “I was a spoiled brat and your dad knew it.”
I watch him for a moment, wondering what he meant by his home life starting to crumble. I know about his mom running off with the reverend, Brad Keeton, and how his dad started drinking after that, but the way he said as I got older makes me think there’s something more to the story.
I muse, “Sounds like you deserved a lesson in appreciation.”
He tosses me a crooked smile. “I may have been a spoiled brat but that’s still no excuse for a grown man to steal a kid’s baseball cards. And frankly, I think Turner’s lesson on gratitude would have been better spent on you.”
I blanch. “Excuse me?” His insult stings, but the casual tone with which he said it hurts more. “I’m not spoiled. I—I’m the opposite of spoiled.”
“Sure you are.” He moves from the cabinet to the entertainment center, dragging me along as he looks inside, under, and behind every nook and cranny. “Didn’t your father set up a trust fund for you?”
“What? No.” I blink. “No. Why would you think that?”
He lifts a shoulder. “That’s what I heard.”
I scowl. “From who?”
“It’s a small town. From everyone.”
“Well I don’t know what people told you, but I do not have, nor have I ever had, a trust fund. That’s ridiculous.”
He eyes me skeptically before moving to the sofa. “Maybe I’m wrong then.”
Everywhere he goes, I have to go but all I want to do is storm off. Damn these handcuffs!
“Yes. You are wrong. You know nothing about me,” I say as he crouches down to look under the couch. “And I seriously doubt my father hid your baseball cards under the couch.” I look down at him with an exasperated breath.
He frowns at the nothingness beneath the sofa. “Where would he have put them?”
I pinch my lips together. “He probably has a secret vault where he stashes all the toys he takes from little kids and the candy he steals from babies.”
“Laugh all you want,” he says, “but if he stole something from you when you were thirteen, you’d be just as mad as me—” He sits up and his words catch in his throat when he comes face-to-face with my skirt.
With him still crouched on the floor, and me standing beside him, my bare lower thighs are right at his eye level. An exhale leaves his mouth and his hot breath grazes the inside of my legs, floating up my skirt and between the bare skin of my thighs. I suddenly forget about his insult and my anger as my head clouds with desire.
He looks up at me from under those long dark eyelashes of his and my entire body flushes. My throat goes dry. My nipples harden. I want to swallow but my brain doesn’t seem to be working as I stare down at his large pupils boring into me.
He rocks back on his heels and my leashed wrist swings back with his, our arms moving in sync. I watch his Adam’s apple bob with a thick swallow as his eyelids grow heavy and his gaze returns to my legs. I grasp for something to do or say, anything to distract me from the fact that there is a hot beautiful mouth breathing against my thighs. And not just any mouth. Daren’s mouth.
I’ve got nothing.
Nothing but white-hot arousal and naughty, naughty thoughts.
Jolting me out of my stupor, Daren clears his throat and leans away. I’m finally able to swallow as I watch him slowly stand, and time crawls along in the silence.
He swallows as well. “Will you please just help me find my baseball cards?”
Baseball cards… baseball cards… Oh, right. That’s what we were talking about.
“Why don’t we just forget about your search and go to the train station and get the money instead?” I suggest, my voice somewhat raspy. “Then you can buy all the baseball cards in the world.”
He stands and brushes off his hands. “No way. Those cards aren’t replaceable. They… they’re important to me. Please?” His eyes turn pleading. “Will you please help me look?”
I don’t know why he’s so obsessed with something he’s managed to live without for ten years, but I don’t have the heart to continue arguing with him. And honestly, if he keeps pouting with those puppy dog eyes of his there’s no telling what I’ll do to please him.
“Fine,” I say, totally caving.
God. What is it with this guy?
“Awesome.” He smiles. “The baseball cards are in a green box about this big”—he holds his hands out in a shape of a square—“with a red ribbon around the lid.”
I nod and we begin our search. Though it’s not a very efficient search, since we’re, you know, in handcuffs and can’t split up to cover more ground. And our movements are awkward as hell as we move from room to room, each of us trying to go in different directions. We’re not smooth at all, especially once we reach the kitchen.
As we walk past the cabinets, the handcuffs snag on a drawer and cause Daren to lose his balance. He knocks into me, I knock into the table, the table knocks into the wall, and then a picture falls off the wall as I topple toward the floor. Daren quickly grabs my waist and pulls me upright but the framed photo crashes to the tile and shards of glass skid everywhere.
Not. Smooth. At all.
“Wow,” I say slowly. “That was like something out of a cartoon.” I jingle our handcuffs. “We’re not very coordinated with these things, are we
?”
“Not in the slightest,” he says with a quiet chuckle. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine.” I realize he’s still holding me and the tips of his fingers suddenly feel hot on my hips.
I casually slip out of his grasp and try not to make eye contact with him. Instead I look at the kitchen floor. Shattered glass splinters out from the busted picture frame, leaving a photograph bent and buried beneath the rubble. I carefully retrieve the fallen picture from the glass.
It’s a photo of me with my parents at one of our family picnics. My mom is dressed in all white with an orange scarf in her hair and pink lipstick, and I’m in a polka-dot dress with a pair of Mary Janes, holding up a white rose.
White roses were a common item my dad would ask us to find on our mother-daughter scavenger hunts because they grow wild all over Copper Springs. Mom would always pick them so I wouldn’t prick my finger on the thorns. Then we’d bring them back to my dad and he would cut off every thorn before handing them back to me to keep. I inwardly smile. I loved those scavenger hunts. They always started the same way: with the first clue written on a small piece of paper tucked into an envelope, just like the ones in the blue suitcase…
My heart skips a beat.
No. No way.
My father wouldn’t stage a scavenger hunt to collect the inheritance money… would he?
No. That would be preposterous.
Shaking my head with a sigh of relief, I gaze down at the photograph and run a finger over my parents’ happy faces. I’ve seen this picture a thousand times, but now that the happy people in the photograph are gone, it means so much more to me. I glance at the wall where a square of paint, slightly darker than the rest of the wall, shows where the frame used to be. I’m surprised my dad kept this picture hanging up all these years.
When my mom left, she broke my dad’s heart. He was careful never to bad-mouth her when I’d come stay with him during the summer, but I wasn’t blind. I could see the hurt on his face whenever he’d mention her.
My mom was no angel. She was smart and friendly, but she was terribly selfish. She said my dad was too good for her and that’s why she left him. That he treated her like a queen and it put too much pressure on her. While that was probably all true, I think the real reason my mom left is because she didn’t want to be tied down to a nice guy in a small town. She wanted drama in a big city.