Troubles in Paradise (Paradise #3)(45)

“I’m going to pack my things,” Irene says. “Which shouldn’t take long, but I’d appreciate it if you weren’t here when I left.”

“Oh, that’s rich,” Huck says. “You’re ordering me out of my own house. After I took you in and gave you a home and gave you a job and…” He wants to say Gave you my love—but no, he won’t let her have the satisfaction. She wants to leave? Fine, she can leave. She wants to throw away the relationship? Great. Maybe she’s right, maybe they are on different sides of this goddamned situation, maybe the stupidest thing he ever did was let her on his boat that first day.

But even as Huck is thinking this, he knows it’s not true. They are on the same side because they’re alive. They’re the survivors. “I’ll leave,” Huck says. “But just remember what you told me yesterday, Irene.”

She cocks an eyebrow. Her expression now is more sassy than angry; she looks like a rebellious teenager.

“You said you would find a way to forgive them.”

Irene retreats to the bedroom and slams the door behind her.

When Huck gets out to his truck, he lights a cigarette and flies down Jacob’s Ladder faster than he should. He checks the spot where the black Jeep with the tinted windows was waiting that morning, but it’s not there. Too bad, because he’s in the mood for a confrontation. He wonders if the woman is a reporter. Or someone sent by the FBI to watch them. Or…someone sent by Croft to watch them. Maybe it’s good that Irene is leaving. He doesn’t need strangers lurking around him and his granddaughter.

When Huck reaches the bottom of the hill, he has to decide where he’s going. He could pick up some barbecue from Candi’s but he won’t be able to eat a thing and Maia would be just as happy with peanut butter and jelly.

Her own charter boat. Ha!

He should have passed the journals on to Vasco. People think they want the truth but they can’t handle the truth! Huck supposes it’s possible that Irene would have reacted like this if he’d given the journals to the FBI without telling her about them. He was damned either way.

He toys with the idea of going to a bar for a beer and a shot, something to calm him down, but that’s not the answer tonight. He could only too easily end up like Mick, chained to a bar stool at CBL making a spectacle of himself.

Huck drives through town, past Mongoose Junction, and up the wide, sweeping hill to the sunset-view spot over Cruz Bay. He pulls over and parks. There are a dozen or so people, several couples and one family, waiting for the sun to drop into the ocean. They have their cameras out—of course. These days, a picture of a thing is more important than the thing itself. But Huck is old enough to remember otherwise. He’s old enough to watch the sun go down and the fiery pink brush-stroking the clouds and do nothing but think.

At first he’s melancholy. The sun is setting on the last day he will ever spend with the Angler Cupcake, Irene Steele.

But then he thinks, No, that won’t do.

He’s a pretty smart guy, resourceful. He’s going to find a way to get her back.





Ayers


The phone rings at midnight but Ayers doesn’t wake up until she feels Winnie’s cold nose pushing against the back of her hand. The dog has proven to be eerily in touch with the human world. Your phone is ringing! Yes, Ayers hears the muffled tone; she digs it out from under the rumpled covers of her bed.

The screen tells her it’s Mick.

Ayers huffs and hits Decline. She was so tired after her shift at La Tapa that she face-planted on her bed still in her uniform, still in her clogs, and when Winnie jumped onto the bed with her, she didn’t protest. The phone goes dark for a second, then lights up again, and again Winnie nudges Ayers.

“Argh,” Ayers says, but she answers. “What? What, Mick, what?”

Mick is crying.

“What’s wrong?” Ayers asks, then remembers that she no longer cares what’s wrong.

“Can I come over?” he asks.

“No,” Ayers says.

“Please?”

Ayers summons her resolve. It would be only too easy to relent. Okay, fine, you can come, but you’re not staying long. Mick would step inside, bringing their nine-year history with him. It’s not that Mick is even that attractive, but he’s attractive to her. He has that something. Ayers loves his hands, and the tattoo of Gordon’s paw print under his left rib, and the way he squints when he looks at her like he’s looking at the sun. They have good memories, years of them—snorkeling and hiking and partying on the water and on land. How many times had Mick anchored a boat off Water Island so they could swim ashore and get bushwackers from Dinghy’s? How many times had they played the brass-ring game at the Soggy Dollar or rolled the dice at Cruz Bay Landing? How many times did they stand in line together at the post office or at the bank to deposit their paychecks, pinkie fingers entwined? How many brunches up at the Banana Deck, how many hikes to Ram Head, how many times had Mick dropped Ayers off at Driftwood Dave’s on their way home from the beach so she could run in for two rum punches to go while he drove around the block? How many times had Mick saved Ayers the corner seat at the Beach Bar while he was working so she could have a front-row view of the band? He used to sneak up behind her and kiss her shoulder, take a surreptitious sip of her drink.