Page 38 of Colton's Secret Weapon
A mirror to Whaler’s disappearance—no viable leads—which Mitchell knew would be eating at his brother. Cases with no solid clues made investigators uneasy. Two of them happening around the same time—especially in their relatively quiet remote town—raised cause for alarm.
Mitchell kept an eye on the marina and watched the road as well while he completed his business with Stuart as expediently as possible, and then he headed straight for the small office not far from the docks.
Lunch in a neighboring town sounded like a good idea to him. Get Dove away from Shelby and all the heartache, intimidation and fear she’d been suffering over the weekend. Yet they’d stillbe within easy range in the event that Whaler was found alive. In a restaurant, conversation would more easily stay focused on the business he had to discuss with her, even with someone as intent on living through her inner voices as Dove was. So yeah, his reasoning was partly to ward off his own discomfort.
More than that, though, Brad Fletcher, or anyone he hired to keep digging at Dove, would not be looking for her in a dockside restaurant twenty miles down the road.
Calling ahead to the place—one of his regular eateries for business lunches with clients—Mitchell made the reservation. And walked into the office to see…
A card table set with a red-and-white checkered tablecloth, two big bowls from his kitchen, cutlery, napkins and glasses—and Dove on the floor behind it all.
She stood as he came in, saying nothing, and moved to the refrigerator Whaler kept stocked with beer.
No alcoholwas his first thought. He’d made a list of guidelines to prevent him from repeating the morning’s debacle with his body in the kitchen. Feeling attraction, as he had in the studio the other day was one thing: normal reaction. That morning in the kitchen…he’d made a wrong move and had caused himself to cross a line.
“I’m assuming there’s been no word from Kansas?” she asked the same question she’d greeted him with every time he’d entered the small structure that morning.
Shaking his head, more at the table than anything, he said, “No.” He wanted to tell her he was sorry but was too focused on the food she was pulling from the refrigerator.
Freshly roasted salmon. Greens. Dressing.
Not beer.
With tension filling him, Mitchell sent a quick text to cancel the lunch reservation he’d just made and went into the smallbathroom to wash up. The sink, floors, stool and towels were all clean.
There’d been no cleaning service on the St. James Boat books.
Nor did Whaler seem to deal in cash. All transactions that he’d reviewed, both private and personal, had been completed by card. Even his bar tab.
Which had been astronomical.
Dove.He wasn’t going to ask, but he knew the cleaning most likely had been done by her. The bucket of cleaning supplies on the corner bottom shelf—right next to extra toilet paper rolls—looked a lot like the one she’d pulled supplies out of to hand to him Sunday morning in her studio.
It had become pretty clear to Mitchell that Dove had been taking care of her father in all the ways she knew how—and could get away with.
She’d only come to him when she’d done all she could herself.
Some of the things she’d said to him over the past few days lined up in a row, replaying in his mind.
“How do you know I even like lasagna?”
“My spirits told me.”The tone of voice she’d used—she’d been playing with him. Letting him know that she knew that he’d branded her as a bit out there, along with much of the rest of the town. Just as they’d done her mother.
And then…“No, Mitchell, I’m not calling you a liar. I’m just paying attention to your posture, your tone of voice. You’re uncomfortable, which tells me that you know more than you’re saying.”He could clearly picture the smile that had teased the corners of her mouth on that one. As though she’d known he’d been uncomfortable—because he’d been taken in by the rumors that she and her mother thought they could read minds.
There were others.
In less than four days’ time, he’d come to know her better than people he’d been acquainted with for years.
He could almost feel how difficult that had to have been for her. To have to beg for help from someone she hardly knew but was acquainted with enough to understand that he’d judged her without having actually spent time in her presence.
She’d walked into his office, head held high, knowing that he thought her flighty.
The realization held him hostage there in that tiny space, as his mind tried to unravel the implications. Leaving him with the certainty that no matter what happened between them, he couldn’t turn his back on her and live with himself.
“Mitchell, you okay in there?”
He jerked as her voice came to him through the thin walls and he was mentally transported back to that morning in his kitchen.
