One Hot Summer

by Heidi McLaughlin

  My light hair had darkened, and I wore it longer than I used to, the back hitting the collar of my suit jacket. I had filled out completely thanks, first, to the summer camp, then the two years at the “private school” where I’d lived. The gym, working out, and my ongoing plans for revenge were the only way I had to cope with the isolation I endured, and I made full use of it. Now my shoulders were wide, my muscles tight and strong, and I walked with my head high, no longer hiding. All my suits were custom made to fit my shoulders, and I wore them like a cloak. Dressed in them, I was powerful and untouchable. No longer the scared, beaten boy—son of Franklin Thomas—but my own man. Lincoln Webber.

  I had rejected everything that was my father and taken on my mother’s maiden name, changing it as soon as I could once I returned to Canada.

  Today was the final piece of dismantling my father’s legacy.

  I walked along once familiar streets, looking in windows and pleased with the changes I could see. Memories surrounded me at every turn, and I gave up trying to fight them off.

  It wasn’t a surprise that she was everywhere. All my good memories were tied to her—this entire town was tied to her. Her ghost followed me with each step, whispering memories in my ear. I paused at the corner and raked a hand through my hair, wondering if this was a mistake. I should have let my lawyer handle it all, but I had wanted to do this.

  I inhaled, a sweet smell wafting through the air hitting me. Across the street was a bakery—new since I’d lived here. The door was open, the scent of fresh baking inviting. I read the sign with a smile. Biscuits and Buns. My stomach rumbled, and I headed in the direction of the tempting smell. I would grab a snack then head up to the house.

  I stepped in, the aroma intensifying. There was only one thing that smelled that good. Biscuits. I hadn’t had one in years, but the scent alone was enough to bring back the most bittersweet of memories.

  Sunny baking. Laughing as she handed me a plate of warm biscuits soaked in butter and laden with jam. Her grandmother had taught her how to make them, and they were my favorite thing to eat. I shut my eyes as the feelings the memory stirred began to overwhelm me.

  A throat clearing broke through my scattered brain.

  “Can I help you?”

  My eyes flew open, and I stared at the mirage in front of me.

  It had to be a mirage, right? I had been thinking of her so much that morning, it couldn’t possibly be.

  But there, standing behind the counter, was Sunny. Her hair was still as bright, her beautiful eyes dark, setting off the ivory color of her skin. The girl was gone, replaced by a woman so lovely, it made my chest ache.

  She frowned and spoke again in a voice I would recognize until my last breath. “Are you all right? Can I help you?”

  I stepped closer, trying to find my voice. She tilted her head, studying me, wary. Up close, I could see more changes. Her eyes, once so bright and alive, were dimmer. Sad. Her hair was swept into a thick coil at the back of her neck—Sunny always hated to wear her hair up. She was as tiny as I recalled, and there was a coolness to her manner she’d never projected before. Reserved and formal.

  Her brow furrowed as she looked at me. She began to worry her lip the way I remembered her doing. Her breathing picked up, whether in fear of the stranger in front of her, or some long-forgotten recollection of the boy I was to her surfacing—I didn’t know.

  I pulled off my glasses and met her confused stare. Her eyes widened in shock as we locked gazes. Years fell away, and the warmth of her stare that always filled me up hit me all over again. I was seventeen, staring at the girl I was in love with.

  The girl I still loved, now a woman, a virtual stranger, who could still bring me to my knees with a glance.

  “L-Linc?”

  I sighed at the way my name sounded on her lips. How the letters sounded when she said them.

  “Sunny,” I breathed out.

  Then her expression changed. Bewilderment and anger brought her shoulders up and a scowl to her face.

  “What are you doing here?” she snapped.

  I cleared my throat. “Ah, some family business.”

  She barked out a dry laugh. “Family business. Yes, I know all about your family business. What are you doing in my shop?”

  Her anger wasn’t unexpected, but I had never heard Sunny’s voice be so cold.

  “When did you move back here?” I replied.

  “How do you know I ever left?” she shot back.

  I leaned on the counter, incredulous. “I looked for you. You had disappeared.”

  Her eyes widened, but before she could retort, a young girl came through the door at the back.

  “The last batch is done, boss. You want me to start on some cookies?”

  Sunny stepped back. It was then I realized how close we had leaned toward the other. I rose to my full height, moving away from the counter.

  “Yes, Shannon. Let’s do the ginger ones today.”

  Shannon eyed me curiously, then smiled at Sunny, before disappearing through the door. “On it, boss.”

  We stared at each other.

  “As much as I’d love to go down memory lane with you,” Sunny informed me, her voice cold, “I have a business to run. Do you want anything, or did you just come in here to bring more upheaval into my life?”

  I blinked. “I smelled biscuits.”

  She barked out another laugh. Even that sound was foreign. I recalled her sweet, low laughter. Her lighthearted giggle. This was neither of those.

  She reached below the counter, and grabbed two biscuits, shoving them in a bag. “There.”

  “I was going to—”

  She cut me off. “No. You’re going to take the biscuits and get the hell out of my shop and my life, Linc.”

  “Sunny, I just want to talk. I need to—”

  Again, she cut me off. “I said no. You had plenty of time to talk while I pined away for you. I no longer care what you need.”

  “But I—”

  “Get out, or I’ll have you arrested for trespassing.”

  I stared at the angry, cold woman in front of me. This wasn’t Sunny. Not the Sunny I remembered. Then again, I wasn’t the same boy.

  “All right, I’ll go. But I’m coming back. I’ll see you soon.”

  Her eyes narrowed. “I’ve heard that before. I guess we already know that won’t be happening.”

  Then she turned on her heel and walked away.

  She was on my mind all day, no longer a ghost, but a living, breathing woman. Beautiful. Sad. Angry.

  Here. Right here in Mission Cove. I had looked for her years ago, unable to locate her, finally deciding to let her go and move on. Concentrate on my plan and make sure my father no longer had the power to hurt people. I knocked over the pieces in his intricate game of chess, taking his queen and leaving him with no moves left.

  The day I received the call that he’d had a massive heart attack in his office and died had produced only one emotion: relief. I didn’t go to see him. There was no funeral. A simple statement in the paper and I had his ashes shipped to me.

  I found great satisfaction in driving them to the local dump and tossing them in a pile of rotting garbage.

  His soul was rotten, and that was where he belonged.

  I shook my head clearing my morbid thoughts. I glanced at the two boxes of possessions I was taking with me. Small mementos I had found in searching the house all day. Things my father would have overlooked since they were sentimental, and he would have had no idea they could mean something to me. One box was of items that belonged to my mother that was in the basement, the cardboard covered in dust and forgotten. The other a few photos and various things I’d picked up as I walked around.

  “Are you sure that is all?” my lawyer, Ned Jenkins, asked. “Some of the things in the house are incredibly valuable, Lincoln.”

  “I’m sure. Send all the books to the library. They can sell the first editions and use the rest. Open the place up. Biggest ga
rage sale in the history of Mission’s Cove. All the money goes to the town.”

  “The place will be swamped.”

  I lifted a shoulder. “I’ve hired the right people. It’ll be handled. Once it’s done, the house comes down.”

  “And what will you do with the land?”

  “I’m still thinking on it. But the symbol of this place, the power my father had over this town, needs to go.”

  “I understand. All the papers are drawn up, the contracts signed. Anything else you need?”

  “No.”

  “I’ll be in touch.”

  He left, the sound of his car fading away, leaving me alone in the house I hated as a child, loathed as a teen, and now planned on destroying as an adult.

  I sat at my father’s desk, looking around the room. His seat of power—now crumbled to dust.

  The same as his body.

  Appropriate.

  I opened the drawers, all empty now, the personal effects long removed. As I gripped the drawer front, I felt the edge of something with my finger, and I opened the drawer again, curious.

  A key was fitted into the wood and I pulled it out, studying it. It was nondescript and dull, and I had no idea what it was for. I stared at it, nonplussed. Why would my father have a key hidden in this drawer?

  I pushed back the chair, studying the desk. On impulse, I pulled out the drawer and studied it, then glanced at the desk. The drawer was shorter than the desk by at least nine inches. Using my phone for light, I peered into the dark recess, shocked when metal glinted back at me. A hidden lockbox. My father had a hidden lockbox.

  Reaching inside, I grasped the metal box and slid it out.

  It sat on top of the desk, innocent-looking, yet somehow, I knew the contents held inside would prove to be anything but.

  With a shaking hand, I inserted the key and opened the lid. I stared down at the items inside.

  I picked up a book, flipping open the cover. It was a journal belonging to my mother. There were envelopes addressed to me in her writing. Letters and documents. I was mystified as to why these were all locked away.

  My breath caught as I saw the two piles of envelopes that lay at the bottom.

  Rage built, anger crashing over me as I recognized my own writing.

  “That fucking bastard,” I hissed.

  A movement in the doorway caused me to look up. Sunny stood, observing me, her arms crossed, anger holding her head high, her shoulders tight.

  My own emotions were so heightened, I drew on her anger. Welcomed it with my own.

  Found myself hardening at the sight of the beauty her anger brought out in her. She was a fucking vision in her outrage. I dropped the items I was holding and crossed the room.

  “Come to brave the monster in his den, Sunny?” I asked. “Get me in private so you can tell me what you think of me? What you think I did to you all those years ago?”

  “I know what you did to me, Lincoln,” she replied, her eyes flashing.

  Her use of my full name made me angrier. “No, you think you do, but you don’t.”

  “How dare you show up today, just walk back into my life as if the last ten years didn’t happen?”

  I stalked closer, so we were inches apart. I wanted to push her past the breaking point. I wanted to break through the rigid shell she had around her and find Sunny. To make her see Linc.

  “I go anywhere I please, sweetheart. You might not realize it, but I own the building your shop is in.” I pointed toward the window. “I own every goddamn place in the town, just like my father did.”

  “Is that a threat, Lincoln? Is that what happened to you? You became your father?”

  “Maybe I did,” I lied. “Maybe whatever thoughts you have of me now are right. Maybe I am a bastard just like he was.”

  “The boy I loved wasn’t a bastard.”

  “But he fucked you and left, isn’t that how you see it?”

  Her slap echoed in the room, my head snapping back from the force. We stared at each other, locked in a wordless war. I smiled grimly.

  “How appropriate you hit me here, in this room. This is where he always beat me. Right here.” I crossed the room to the center of the rug. “He’d start here—usually with a punch in the ribs or kidneys if my back was turned. Once he had me down, he’d add a few more punches or use his feet. Those fucking hurt, you know? Usually it was because I had been with you or couldn’t account for every penny I’d spent. Again, usually because I made sure I left money in your house to help your family. Or my arrogance in thinking I deserved to make a decision for myself. Or sometimes just because he fucking liked it. It made him feel better, and God forbid Franklin Thomas ever not feel good.” By the end I was shouting. I strode back to her, all my anger boiling over. “So do it, Sunny. Hit me. Hit me until you feel better. One of us might as well.”

  Our eyes met—enraged, crazed blue clashing with bewildered, shocked brown. Silence hung between us, the only sound my panting breaths and Sunny’s muffled sobs, her hand covering her mouth as tears leaked down her cheeks.

  Wait.

  Why was she crying?

  “Sunny?”

  “I-I… Oh God, Linc.”

  The next thing I knew her arms were around my neck and her lips on mine. Shock rendered me still for a moment, then every sense in my body came alive. I dragged her tight to my chest, kissing her like a starving man who had just been offered the feast of a lifetime.

  It was nothing like the kisses we had shared in the past. It was redemption and grief. Longing and need. Passion and hate. Love and hurt. Forgiveness and healing.

  I lifted her off her feet, wrapping her in my arms. She was no longer a tiny, waiflike girl. She was a lovely woman with curves that fit in my hands as if they were made for me and me alone.

  Because they were.

  However much pain we had to go through, whatever secrets and scars we had to rip open to get back to finding us, I was determined it would happen. I wasn’t losing her again.

  “I’m sorry,” she pleaded, cupping my face after our mouths separated. “Linc, I’m so sorry.”

  “Shh, Sunny. It’s fine. I deserved that slap.”

  “I’ve never hit anyone,” she hiccupped. “I can’t believe I did that.”

  “Hey,” I murmured, waiting until she met my gaze, her eyes sad and red-rimmed. “It’s fine, baby. Considering how much you work with your hands, you’re not very strong. It didn’t even hurt.”

  Her lips quirked at my words, but she laid her hand on my cheek in a tender gesture. I leaned into her caress, the memories of her touch making me feel more alive than I had in years.

  “Where did you go?” she whispered. “Why did you leave me?”

  I set her down on her feet and took her hand, leading her to the small sofa in the corner. “My father.” I sighed as I let the memory of that night come back. “I was on such a high after our night together, I went for a walk after taking you to your cabin. I sat on the dock for a while, just thinking. Of you. Of us. What I wanted to do when we got home. Our future.”

  “I couldn’t sleep either.”

  I smiled, lifting her hand to my mouth and kissing it. Her skin was still soft, although she had small calluses on her fingertips and palm from her constant work. I stroked them, feeling her life on her skin.

  “When I went back to my room, my father was there, waiting. He had seen us that day in town, Sunny. He was furious. More than I had ever seen him. He told me to pack up and that we were leaving. I argued and told him off, but he pulled three documents from his pocket and gave them to me.”

  “What were they?”

  “One was an eviction notice and condemnation of your grandmother’s house. The second was the directive to fire your mother from her job. The third…” I swallowed. “The third was a letter to child services saying your mother was abusive and unfit and Lori and Kim needed to be removed from a condemned house and placed in foster care.”

  Her eyes grew round.

&
nbsp; “He had them all in his pockets, Sunny. The bank, the hotel, even social services. They were all false accusations, but they would have happened. He told me if I came with him, the directives would be destroyed. If not, your life—your entire family’s lives—would be shattered. He told me he would also shut the shelter and make sure your reputation became so tarnished, you would have to leave town anyway.” I sighed heavily. “I had no choice. I had to protect you. I thought I would somehow figure something out. I agreed right away.”

  “You disappeared.”

  I barked out a laugh. “Yes, I did. He sent me to a school, a prison more like it, in Europe. I had no phone, no access to the outside world, no friends, and no way to get out. He isolated me.”

  I got up to walk, because I couldn’t sit down. “He left me there for two years. He thought it would break me, but I fought back. I listened and learned. I worked out and built up my body so he couldn’t hurt me again.”

  “You never contacted me.”

  “I left you a note.”

  She frowned. “It said you were sorry and to forget you. Your smashed cell phone and a piece of your cuff were all I had.”

  He dug into his pocket, holding up the rest of the cuff I had given him. Well-worn and cracked, the clasp missing, all that was left the tattered pieces of leather. “My father caught me writing the letter. I planned to put it under my pillow and take the phone so I could call you. The note said I was sorry, but to be patient and I would get to you somehow. I said I loved you and not to forget me or what we had shared. I wasn’t expecting the uppercut he hit me with, and I was out cold when he dragged me to the car. He obviously tore it up to suit his own agenda and smashed the phone.” He huffed. “When I came to, I was still in the car en route to the airport. I was gone before the camp opened the next morning.”

  “Oh, Linc,” she whispered.

  “I tried to get in touch with you. I wrote you every day for three months. I finally figured out the letters weren’t reaching you, and I bribed another kid who had freer access than me to take my letter to town and send it. He had his return info on it, and it came back, saying Unknown-Moved.”