Page 34 of The Pretender

Kramer stepped back to the front of the porch, right in front of Harris. “You don’t know much. Do you, son?”

“I know I will work it out with Gabby.” Harris didn’t know that at all, but he refused to admit that. Not to these two, who he barely knew. It was bad enough he had Damon riding his ass.

“This should be interesting to watch.” Ted laughed. “My money’s on her.”

Gabby managed to avoid Harris all day. She tried to avoid all of them. Every single man on the island. Their numbers seemed to be growing by the day.

She traveled around the island, and in between ducking and hiding, checking and rechecking, she’d searched for the map and the papers. Someone had taken them or moved them. Since Tabitha was the only other person who knew where they were buried, that meant it had to have been her. There really was no other reasonable explanation, and even that one wasn’t all that reasonable.

Tabitha didn’t have any reason to dig out that rock. Gabby hated to think the paranoia had gotten to her. She would have called, right? But since the why and when would never be known now, Gabby tried to push those questions out of her mind and focus on what shecoulddo.

She pulled everything apart in the guesthouse. Drawers, bookshelves, turned the mattress. Then she tried the boathouse. Tabitha didn’t go in there very often but maybe that made it the best new hiding place. A building she rarely ventured into might be the last place anyone would look.

No luck.

Now it was early evening. Past dinner and the sun had started to set as dusk moved in. She’d finished searching for the day and hung around with Ted on Craig’s boat before the two of them took off for whatever they planned to do in Baltimore tonight. She intended to walk back to the guesthouse but she saw the fire. She couldn’t make out the figure from this distance and in this light, but she’d bet the man at the fire pit was Harris.

Before she knew it, she was there, standing at the edge of the small patio. As she watched, he sat on the bench with his legs stretched out in front of him. No s’mores tonight. He held a water bottle and stared into the dancing flames.

“You just don’t learn, do you?” There was no reason to play coy, so she sat down next to him. Only a few inches separated their thighs on the bench.

He handed her the water bottle. “I liked the memory of us here.”

Her heart flipped again. The stupid traitorous thing. It needed to stop doing that when he said something kind of sweet.

She took the bottle because it gave her something to do with her hands. “Why are you out here alone?”

“It’s been a long day.” He rubbed his palms up and down on his legs. “Kramer gave me ‘the talk’ this morning.”

The plastic crinkled in her hand as the water bottle dropped and bounced on the pavers. “What?”

“He thinks you need protection from me.” Harris still hadn’t looked at her. Didn’t look at the bottle where it rolled around next to his foot either.

He continued to watch the fire, follow each cinder as it spun into the wind and up into the sky.

“I’m thinking he might not be wrong,” she said.

He leaned back against the bench and turned his face to her. “I screwed up.”

“Genius deduction.” But she didn’t feel any anger. Not there, not in that second when the light of the fire let her see the starkness in his eyes.

“Any chance you’ll give me another shot?”

“I guess that depends on whether I need to use sex to evade another conversation.” She tried to lighten the mood but she couldn’t tell if the joke worked. “Want to ask me a few questions and we’ll see if I automatically jump on you?”

His smile didn’t reach his eyes. “Cute.”

“You asked for it.”

“True.” For almost a minute he didn’t say anything. He looked like he wanted to, but stayed quiet. Then he sat up straighter. “I’m skeptical when people act on emotion. I assume they need something from me or are trying to pull me off topic. Taking people at face value, believing them, is not one of my strengths.”

“That sounds healthy.”

He reached down to retrieve the water bottle. “Blame my mother. She lied to me my entire life.”

As soon as he said the words he closed his eyes. He sat there, passing the bottle back and forth between his palms. Rolling it and ignoring the sound it made as the plastic gave under the force of his hands.

But she sensed the slip, and it was clear that was what it was. It provided a small window into the man behind the sexy smile and killer shoulders. A way for her to get in. “What does that mean?”

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