Page 65 of Dark Roads
She smiled. “Perfect.”
His house was a surprise, with white clapboard, a front porch with a set of sky-blue Adirondack chairs. The lawn was mowed, the garden beds in front of the house weeded and tidy. The vegetable garden was organized in neat lines, some plants tied to stakes. She imagined him kneeling with his hands in the soil, pulling out fresh carrots or potatoes. She’d thought him a boy, but he was more settled and grown up than most men she knew back in the city.
Each corner of the house had a security camera, and one above the door. She turned her head, spotted another one on the workshop. Dirt bikes were expensive, and he probably had tools too, but she wondered if the security had more to do with Vaughn than with possible thefts.
She followed him inside, padded across oak floors sanded down to a soft finish. His furniture was simple, a cedar-slab coffee table, a worn leather couch, and a 1950s-style kitchen table with aluminum legs and a sparkled orange Formica top. He saw her smile and shrugged.
“It was my grandma’s.”
So were his avocado-green cups and plates, she learned as they ate outside on the porch. The evening light bathed their bare feet with gold where they were kicked up together on the railing. Once in a while the side of his foot drifted against hers. She never moved away.
After they cleaned up, working together in a comfortable silence, he took her to his garage and pulled out a kid’s dirt bike that he’d fixed for a neighbor. She laughed when he said he was going to teach her how to ride, but she stopped when he held out the helmet.
“What? You don’t think you can do it?”
She snatched the helmet from his hands. “How do you start this thing?”
She lay on her side, head in the crook of his arm, her back against his chest. The steady thump of his heart reverberated through her. The night before it had been dark when they stumbled to his room, her hand in his, neither of them talking, and then only murmurs under the blankets, the whisper of his husky voice.
He shifted behind her and yawned. They would have to speaksoon, acknowledge what had happened, and what it meant, but she didn’t know. Was she really going to stick around in this town? Was she going back to school? Could she be the kind of girl who changed her life for a guy? She was here to find closure, not a boyfriend, but judging by the way Jonny’s hand was drifting down her arm, settling softly on her hip, the night meant something to him.
His bedroom had been another surprise. No posters of dirt bikes or naked girls. No empty beer bottles on the nightstand. Instead there was a map of the world with colored pins—places she assumed he wanted to visit—and travel posters. He also had a few tastefully framed photos. One was of him fishing in the river, his head thrown back in a laugh. She was almost sure Hailey had taken the photo but didn’t want to ask. There was a photo of the two of them, their faces tight together and turned upward. A selfie. They looked tanned and happy, with the hint of bare shoulders and water in the background. The lake.
“I’ll get us some coffees.” He rolled off his side of the bed. She heard him moving around behind her, opening drawers, closing them softly.
He walked across the room in long strides. She peeked at him over her arm, which was tucked partway under the pillow. The sheets were lemon-scented and crisp-white. She wondered if he washed them in preparation for having a girl over for the weekend. Maybe one had already stayed the night this week. She pushed away the thought.
Now he was pulling on his jeans, tugging them up his long, muscled legs. She glanced away. The drawer on his side table was half open. She moved closer to the side of the bed to close it—and paused when she noticed a black cell phone. His iPhone, with the blue case, was sitting on top of the table. She looked up at him.
“You have two phones?”
He followed her gaze. “It’s dead. Me and Hailey had prepaid phones so she could call when things were bad with Vaughn.” He stepped closer to the drawer and picked up the phone, staring at it. “I forgot it was in there. I’ll charge it up and give it to one of my brothers.”
“Hailey had to sneak around that much?”
“Vaughn is an asshole. That’s why I told you to stay away from him.”
“Did he hurt her?”
“He got rough a few times.”
She held his gaze. Maybe he was lying. Maybe he was a drug dealer and needed a burner phone, but he was obviously upset. His mouth was tense and his eyes glassy.
“I’m sorry.”
He nodded and blinked a few times. “You take sugar and cream, right?”
“Yeah.” After Jonny left the room, Beth rolled into a sitting position with the sheet around her body, running her hands through her hair to untangle it. She glanced at the door, then looked up at the selfie on the wall, focusing in on Hailey’s bright green eyes, her pretty smile. She couldn’t imagine what it must be like for Jonny to know that Hailey’s body was still out there somewhere. Alone. If Beth didn’t know where Amber was, she’d lose her mind.
“I wish I could find you for him,” she whispered into the empty room.
CHAPTER 25
Jonny seemed fine for the rest of the morning, while they drank their coffees in bed, while they showered together, while he made bacon and eggs, but that was the crux of it all. Heseemedfine. Beth had done enough pretending in her own life to know when someone was faking.
Their footsteps crunched on the gravel as he walked her out to her car. She thought they would kiss, but he pulled her in for a quick hug that ended with a vague, “Text you later?”
For a moment she wondered if he was being distant because he still thought she didn’t know what she wanted, but when she looked in his eyes all she saw was sadness.
