Page 2 of Break Away
“What?”
She pointed to his Suburban. “Big blackmonster. That thing looks like a hearse.”
“Ah, no. No body.”
He glanced at her Prius and figured she wasjudging. He couldn’t help feeling a little defensive. Withoutdoubt, the Suburban was a gas hog.
He stretched his back, glancing up thedriveway where the cabin stood, shingled siding, metal roof, andwith a bed that was waiting for him. Oh, so close.
He should’ve left the SUV in the driveway andwalked around the dog and saved himself some grief. When he’dstopped for gas and called to give his brother an arrival time,Brad had asked him to check on the woman living in the cottage.Levi wasn’t sure if he’d told him why he needed to check on her,but he might as well get the chore out of the way.
He wiped his hand on his shorts and stuck itout. “I’m—”
“I know who you are.” She left his handhanging. She turned and the midday sun lit her face. The side ofher forehead had a healing scrape surrounded by mottled green of afading bruise.
“Okay.” He didn’t like the look of thatbruise or the deep purple one on her elbow.
She ran an assessing gaze over him. “LeviGallagher of the locally prominent Gallagher family. Brother ofHangman’s Loss police chief Bradley Gallagher, and related throughblood and marriage to a couple dozen people scattered around thisarea.”
Locally prominent? Bullshit. But the rest wastrue.
“You were also first baseman and team captainfor Loss High’s varsity baseball team the year they made it to thestate championships. You got a full ride to University of thePacific to play baseball.” She ticked off his accomplishments onher fingers while he ran through his mental people files. Nothingpinged.
“You go to Loss High?”
She nodded, and Levi sighed.
“You going to tell me your name?”
“Big brother didn’t pass along that littledetail when he asked you to check on me?”
“He told me, but I don’t remember. Why is mybrother having me check on you?” When she didn’t respond, he barelystopped an eye roll. “Cut me a break here.”
For the first time, the woman seemed toreally see him. He must have looked like any more verbal sparringwould be the end of him. “Zoey Hardesty. I was two years behind youin high school.”
He narrowed his eyes as the ping soundedinside his head. “Your hair was blue and you had a ring throughyour eyebrow.”
“Yeah, that was me.” She did a flutteringthing with her hands that came across as self-deprecating. “I’m notmuch for fitting in.”
“You weren’t the only kid who dyed their haira weird color or pierced body parts.”
“Those of us who did were rare enough tostand out.”
Levi considered her. “You were also a brain.You may have been two years behind me, but you were still in my APBio class. You’d have been what, a freshman taking AP Bio?”
She shrugged. “We also had the same trigclass. Listen, tell your brother I’m fine and not to worry.” Sheturned back to her cottage, and Levi would’ve had to’ve been deadnot to notice her rounded ass as she walked away. Or the limp.
***
Sharp knocking sounded at the door. Levidebated dragging himself out of bed to tell whoever was there to goaway. Instead he pulled a pillow over his head to muffle the sound.The knocking stopped and he drifted back to sleep. The next time hesurfaced was to find sunlight streaming through the window and thebedroom stuffy. Since the window faced west, the late afternoon sunwas doing its job, and he bet he’d slept through most of the day.He got up to pull down the blind, figured he wasn’t going to beable to get back to sleep, and wandered into the kitchen.
The cabin wasn’t much. Just the basics, butgood enough for him, and more importantly, it meant he hadn’t hadto move into his mother’s place. Rentals were scarce during thesummer vacation season, which would be picking up in a few weeks.He frowned at the vase of fresh flowers sitting on the littledining table. Next to the flowers sat a bowl containing severalbananas and a couple of apples. They hadn’t been there when he’dcome in.
Opening the fridge, he spent a minute to takein the bounty. Milk, OJ, eggs, cheese: all good. But the best was aglass dish of something that looked intriguingly like home-cookedlasagna. He grabbed the OJ, shook the carton, then opened it todrink straight from the container. He went searching for his phone,found it in the bedroom, and brought it with him back to thekitchen.
He tapped a number from his favorites list,and with the phone tucked against his shoulder, pulled the lasagnafrom the fridge.
“That my baby?”
