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“Is Jack still in?”
“He is, and that’s going to make what he’s going through both better and worse.”
“What do you mean?”
“Word of Ashleigh leaving him will spread fast. Almost everyone he sees on Sunday will know what happened by the time he shows up for his church meetings. But many in the congregation will try to reach out to support him, too.”
“Double-edged sword,” he said. His biceps bulged as he sat back and folded his arms. “That’s rough.”
“What about you?” she asked as she got up to toss her can in the wastebasket.
“What about me?”
“Why don’t you tell me a little more about your family?”
“You don’t want to hear about my family,” he replied.
She scowled at him. “Everybody’s got drama.”
He leaned forward again and gestured at the board. “Maybe after we play another game. You can start.”
When she just stared at him and didn’t make a move, he met her gaze. “What?”
“You just might be the most guarded man I’ve ever known,” she said with a dramatic sigh.
His eyebrows gathered over his topaz-colored eyes. “What are you talking about? I’m an open book.”
She could tell he knew better, which made it funny, and she’d had just enough to drink that once she started laughing, she couldn’t seem to stop. He didn’t laugh with her, but his lips curved into an affectionate, indulgent smile, which made her wonder why she hadn’t thought he was the most handsome man she’d ever met the first moment she laid eyes on him.
“What is it?” he asked when she suddenly sobered.
“Nothing.” She focused on the game. But the truth was she felt guilty for the first time since she’d met him. Last night, she’d thought it was ridiculous that Remy would demand they not stay together. Because of the storm, it had simply made sense that she give him shelter.
Letting him stay again tonight also made sense; it was storming just as badly and because of the tree that’d fallen on his roof, his house was flooding. And yet...something was different—something that made her slightly short of breath whenever she looked at him.
8
They played chess and then cards until it was late. Last night, they’d stayed in the living room on separate couches with the lantern on the coffee table to offer a soft reassuring light. Doing that had seemed more natural than going to separate bedrooms in such a large house, given the storm raging outside and the fact that the generator supported just the bathrooms and central living areas—the refrigerator/freezer, internet service, air-conditioning/heating, hot water, and TV. It made sense not to change their arrangement, and yet, tonight felt far more intimate to Ismay than the night before.
“Are you sure it’s okay to leave the lantern on again?” she asked.
“Should be fine,” Bo replied. “Weather report says the storm will be over tomorrow, and the generator should last a couple more days, even if I can’t get more gas for it, which really shouldn’t be a problem.”
She scooted down under the blanket that covered her. He’d told her a little about his days fishing near the small village where he’d gone to live after losing his mother, and his uncle Chester, who seemed like a version of Paul Hogan’s character inCrocodile Dundee—someone who’d spent his life living off the land. What Bo had shared made her curious enough to want to visit the village and see it for herself but she couldn’t show too much interest. When she did, he shut down. Clearly, there was pain associated with the place that made him reluctant to say too much.
Despite his reticence, or maybe because of it, she was tempted to tell him what she’d found in Remy’s bedroom. She thought he might be able to give her some advice on how to interpret the contents of that duffel bag. He knew Remy and the other members of the Windsor family, and he seemed like a wise, quiet observer, who took in far more than he ever shared. She wanted someone to tell her she had nothing to worry about, because as hard as she’d tried to put that stuff out of her mind, she only succeeded for short intervals. As soon as she wasn’t preoccupied with something else, the vision of that young girl staring back at her from the torn photograph rose in her mind.
“Do you ever watch true crime?” she asked.
“You mean like documentaries?”
“Yeah.”
After a few beats of silence, he said, “Sometimes. Why?”
“I was just wondering if there’s much crime here on the island.”
“Not really—at least not when it comes to violent crime. I’m guessing there’s plenty of theft. I had to chase off some drunk college boys who were trying to break in here once, but I doubt they would’ve done much more than help themselves to whatever alcohol they could find.”
