Page 70 of In the Pursuit of Haven
Jessie did it. “Um, nope, he was the first owner of Bakers Island.”
I screamed in celebration and hopped up and down, unable to stop touching him I was so thrilled. His lips turned up. “I should’ve been working with you all along,” he muttered.
“You bet you should’ve!” I twisted around to him to let him have it. “Jessie Crabb—if you ever keep anything from me ever again, I’ll have your head. Don’t think I won’t! You need me… and—and I need you! Do you hear me? We’re going to take down Hunter and he won’t see what’s coming!”
He’d sobered at that and nodded.
I broke from him and ran to get the sticky notes with shaking hands.
I wrote John Turner’s name on Bakers Island. We still hadn’t found his Relic yet, but I was amazed at how easy this was coming with the internet and Haven’s notes.
“Okay, we’ve got to just keep doing this tonight, Jessie.” I clutched at his shoulder. We only had so long to get ahead of Hunter before he was out of jail. “We can see who we have in Haven’s notes and then look them up online to see if they have any connection to the islands or—or even just look up the history of the islands and see if we can’t find them in Haven’s notes, but…” He was staring at me. “What are you looking at?” I asked.
“You’re hot when you talk like that, you know that?”
Well, his flattery wasn’t about to dampen my giddiness. “Oh yeah?”
He reached for me and pulled me into his lap. “Yeah, really hot.”
I threw my hands around his neck to keep from falling. He found my legs and completely swept me off my feet while he studied me—the same way he always used to. My words got tangled in my throat somewhere. I was afraid to go back to how we used to be so quickly because he held my heart in his hands—he could smash it so easily.
“I miss this,” he said.
Me too, but how much of his sudden affection came from his excitement at finally getting the drop on Hunter or because he really cared about me?
Haven’s notebook had fallen between us and I reached down to push it into his stomach. “You look through this one and I’ll start looking up the islands online.”
His lips quirked. “Homework, huh?”
“Yeah…” I was starting to sound like I couldn’t get a breath in. He wasn’t any better. His gaze veered to my hair and he reached for one of the dark strands and slid a twig out. “You’re filthy,” he said.
He pressed his lips against my cheek. My fingers tightened over the notebook as he breathed me in. Was this really happening? He wasn’t pulling away. “Okay,” he whispered into my hair.
“Okay?” I asked dumbly.
“Okay.” His eyes twinkled and he released me. “We really stink.”
I sat up. Knowing my face was on fire with emotion, I retreated back to the edge of the couch, not sure where my brain had gone.
He’d completely knocked me off my game.
Reaching for my hand, he squeezed it. “If we’re going to spend the night together, honey, we’d better clean ourselves up.” His eyes traveled all over me, leaving me in no doubt that he was flirting with me. “Ladies first.”
I clutched Haven’s notebooks to my chest and stood quickly, not sure what to think as I headed upstairs to the shower. A glance behind me showed that he was watching me the same way he had when we first met—that lost, captivated way when we exchanged vows at the church or when he handed me into his boat on a magical, starry night.
This was the most attention he’d paid to me in forever. How real was it? Gathering my sweats and a t-shirt to change into, I shuffled into Haven’s tiny shower. The intensity behind Jessie’s mesmerizing gaze still tingled through my senses.
In a lot of ways, this unexpected fascination he had with me was flattering, and in others, well… it filled me with confusion because I couldn’t figure out if this meant Jessie wanted to start again or if he was just overcome with the thrill of the treasure hunt.
Part of me wanted to enjoy the brief truce between us while I could and I supposed… that isn’t a good sign, is it?
Chapter Nineteen
Iwas obsessed!
Aunt Haven’s sweetheart had teased her about being more into this treasure hunt than he was, and after a night of slapping sticky notes onto a map to show off all our clues, I understood her completely.
I was so pumped up about putting Hunter in his place that I wasn’t even tired… well, I was more like driving-all-night-to-an-awesome-concert tired, but I was definitely okay with that, especially since this “drive” Jessie and I shared made me feel more at one with my husband than ever.
