Page 2 of Canvas of Lies (Spruce Hill #3)

Chapter One

Kat

“ E arth to Willoughby, come in, Katherine Willoughby.”

I jerked to attention, blinking stupidly at my assistant, Erin, who’d voiced a question I hadn’t heard and now arched a perfectly shaped brow at me.

“Sorry, what did you say?”

Erin rolled her pretty green eyes toward the ceiling as though searching for strength to deal with her daydreaming boss and said, “That history professor you went out with last week. Are you going to see him again? He was cute, in a geeky sort of way.”

“The professor’s name is Alan, and I don’t know if I’ll see him again,” I said, rubbing my temples with both hands. “How do you know he’s cute? ”

“I might’ve stalked his social media for you. He seems like the type to have studied the female orgasm extensively. I can tell these things, you know. It’s a gift.”

“Right, how could I forget about your amazing gift?”

Erin’s off-color commentary didn’t faze me at this point, though I wasn’t in agreement about Alan’s study habits—I wasn’t even convinced he knew what a female orgasm was. Our non-relationship hadn’t yet progressed to that point, but there didn’t seem to be much chemistry between us.

“Look, I’m just about done here, if you want to head out to ship those packages. Thanks for your help today.”

“Anything for you, boss,” Erin chirped. “And text that poor guy back! You need some fun in your life, Kat. It’d be good for you to go out, have a drink, maybe get laid once in a while. Let him dazzle you with his nerdy charm. You might be pleasantly surprised, you know.”

I snorted and waved her away. As Erin left the office, silence descended, cloaking me in peaceful solitude. I leaned back in my chair and closed my eyes, ignoring the internal organs of the Teddy Ruxpin that lay spread across my desk.

Breathing new life into old things was my drug of choice.

I couldn’t recall a time when I didn’t take things apart just to put them back together again.

Inspecting their inner workings, surrounded by gears and gadgets, I could drift into my own little world, like entering a daydream, while I returned an object to its former glory.

If only my life outside of work were so easy to fix .

Business was booming at Kat's Keepers, the vintage toy resale shop I’d started when I was still in college.

With Erin to assist in managing inventory and scouting for items, we made enough to maintain a small warehouse at the edge of Spruce Hill, New York, where rent was cheap.

The only other business nearby was a car garage called Saucy Wrench, owned and operated by a handful of female mechanics.

I’d only been there a couple times for oil changes, but I felt like we were kindred spirits inhabiting this side of town.

The property wasn’t smack dab in the middle of Main Street where all the shops were located, but casual foot traffic wasn’t really my market. We fixed up antiques and collectibles, things that most people didn’t see the value of aside from a hit of nostalgia.

Running my little business was about as far from my father’s glamorous lifestyle as I could get.

I still recalled with perfect clarity the look of utter disdain on his face the time I’d asked him to stop at a yard sale when I was six years old.

Though I doubted there’d been anything worthwhile to find—or that my childhood self would have recognized it back then—the spread of old toys and dolls across that wide driveway had looked like heaven to my young imagination.

So many things I could’ve fixed, even if only to give them a destination that wasn’t the trash.

I couldn’t deny that I now found a great deal of satisfaction in making a good living in a way that disgusted my father. It was a win-win situation all around. And now that I had Erin to help out, everything was easier.

After I reassembled Teddy, I placed him back on the shelf and finished loading up a box of unsold toys to drop off for donation the next day.

Some of my resale items went for a decent amount of money, but anything that didn’t sell, no matter how long I’d spent fixing it up, I donated to a local charity called Path of Hope that helped refugee families establish homes in the area.

I’d started volunteering with the organization in college and stayed involved through every stage of building Kat’s Keepers from the ground up.

No matter how long it’d been since we moved into the warehouse, there was something eerie about being on my own after Erin left.

The two of us were practically complete opposites, but we worked well together.

I hadn’t realized how lonely I was before she joined me, and I often didn’t notice just how lively she made things until she was gone.

Still, in the silence, Erin’s advice haunted me. Have fun, get laid.

I scoffed. The business had simply taken up most of my free time as I got it off the ground, that was all. I had plenty of fun, but I didn’t want to waste time on a meaningless fling that was more likely to hurt a sweet guy like Alan than to give me any kind of fulfillment before I ended things.

“I have plenty of fun,” I mumbled aloud .

When the obnoxious cuckoo clock on the wall chimed the hour, I drew on the butter-soft leather jacket I’d picked up at a thrift store the previous month, shut down my computer, and made my way to the back door of the warehouse.

In the dark winter months, Erin and I took care to leave together—it wasn’t a bad area of town, if Spruce Hill even had such a thing, but the deserted parking lot behind the warehouse could be unsettling in the dark and I felt responsible for Erin’s safety.

We even took a self-defense class together one summer, and while we’d spent more time laughing than trying to take one another down, I always figured the two of us could tag-team an assailant in the event we needed to actually defend ourselves.

In September, though, the sun didn’t set until after seven, so I had no qualms about sending her home when I lingered until the clock struck five.

I hummed a jingle from some old gum commercial while I locked up and activated the alarm system.

As I rifled through my purse, looking for my trusty lip gloss, an engine growled and I spun toward the sound.

A white van was parked at the side of the building, blocking the driveway into the parking lot—the kind of van with no windows in the back.

The kind I always imagined a kidnapper would drive.

For a second, I froze, then a familiar grin flashed at me through the passenger’s side window before the door opened and a blast from my childhood hit me like a cannonball to the stomach .

“No freaking way,” I breathed. “What the hell are you doing here, Nico?”

Memories galloped through my head, both good and bad. Sweet moments shared with my first and best friend melted into the hurt of him turning away, keeping his distance from me, leaving me alone again , and bitterness crept in.

Nico closed the door of the van and leaned back against it, crossing one foot over the opposite ankle like he had all the time in the world to stand there staring at me.

Fuck, he looked good. He’d grown into those long limbs and his hair was as unruly as ever, falling nearly into the dark eyes that surveyed me from head to toe in a warm, leisurely way that threw my pulse into overdrive.

I scowled at him. “Nice van. Did you go into kidnapping after college? Become a pirate, after all?”

God, that smile. It’d been ten years since I last saw him and it still had the same power to hurl me right back to the height of my adolescent crush.

“No, Kitten,” he said quietly, “but we need to talk.”

Anger bubbled up into my throat. Back in high school, I would’ve given my right arm for Nico to talk to me. His unexpected appearance tonight filled me with a riotous mixture of fury and hope.

It made me want to scream.

“We need to, do we? At twilight, behind my business, while your creeper van is blocking the driveway? Who’s driving, anyway? ”

He pushed away from the van in question, grinning as he strolled over to me. “That’s Gumby. He’s a friend. Would you believe me if I told you that was all coincidence?”

“No.”

At my sharp response, Nico laughed. “I’m not here to kidnap you, just to talk.”

Why that annoyed me so much, I didn’t know, but it was enough that I poked an angry finger into his chest. He barely flinched, while I was left wondering when the hell he’d developed muscles hard enough to jam my finger on.

“What do we have to talk about that couldn’t have been said in a phone call, Nico? My number can’t be that hard to find.”

“Kitten,” he murmured, the old nickname so soft and so sweet that my temper built in direct opposition to his intent.

He wrapped his long fingers around mine, holding my hand to his ridiculous pecs.

“Please. I promise it’ll only take a few minutes and if you still want me to leave after that, I’ll go. ”

My temper often got the best of me—I was too impulsive, too quick to react. I knew that about myself and had worked hard to control those urges, but staring at my childhood crush, at the man he’d become, I lost it.

Nico’s eyes flared when I jammed our joined hands into his chest, using them to push him back an inch or two before his fingers tightened.

“You waltz back into my life after ten years, chauffeured in a creepy van, for a conversation that will only take a few minutes? What the hell are you up to, Nicolas Beaumont? ”

He cocked his head and shifted toward me, using his grip on my hand to keep me close against his chest. So close I could barely catch my breath as his warm, soothing scent—tones of vanilla and bergamot—surrounded me.

“I need your help, Kat.”

Too many years. I spent too many years wishing things were different between us, waiting for him to come back to me, wondering where my friend and protector had gone.

With a sound of frustrated rage, I shoved against his shoulder, hoping to free myself from his grasp.

Unfortunately, the curb was just behind him when he stumbled backward.

Not even Nico’s usual grace could stop him from tripping over it.

As we went down, his body curved protectively around mine, but our momentum swung us both into the wooden pallets stacked beside the dumpster.

The sound of splintering wood accompanied a flash of sharp pain as my shoulder and the side of my head collided with the wall of the building.

Dimly, I heard Nico calling my name. I blinked at him, wondering why my arm stung so badly, but when my eyes finally focused on his face, Nico’s visible relief distracted me from the pain.

“Jesus, Kat,” he muttered, brushing a loose strand of hair from my face. “Are you okay? Did you hit your head?”

“I’m fine.” The words were harsh, but his gentle concern grated on me .

I forced my gaze away from him to see my purse had spilled and my phone shattered into pieces on the asphalt beside us, shards of glass glittering in the setting sunlight.

Nico’s friend—the chauffeur or accomplice, whatever he was—opened his door and froze halfway out of the van, like he couldn’t decide if he should interfere.

“You broke my phone,” I grumbled.

“I’ll replace it. Are you hurt?” He looked closely into my eyes like he’d be able to spot an injury through force of will alone.

“No, but I am pissed about my damn phone. I need that for work.”

Nico reached over and lifted it, frowning down at the remnants of the screen and inner mechanics spilling out where the entire back had broken loose. “I think it’s a lost cause. I’ll get you a new one as soon as I can.”

I sighed. “Fine, but it better be an upgrade.”

“I think we should get your head looked at, Kitten, just to be safe.” He rose to his knees beside me and brushed a finger along my temple. “Gumby can drop us at the clinic.”

“Not a chance,” I shot back.

“Nothing is ever easy with you, is it?”

My scowl only intensified. “Guess not.”

He grinned and tossed the phone into the dumpster beside us before I could protest that I might be able to fix it—or at least get the SIM card out of it.

I wasn’t as good with modern electronics as with vintage mechanics, but I could’ve given it a try.

Feeling a little too woozy to articulate all that, I simply glared until he spoke again.

“Look, I’m here to ask you to come out to my cabin with me, okay? I’ll explain everything there and we’ll get you sorted out. If you want to go home after that, I’ll bring you back right away.”

With him crouching over me, brow furrowed and mouth tight with worry, I couldn’t remember why I’d tried to make him go away in the first place.

This felt like every teenage fantasy come true, aside from the ominous van and the broken phone—like Nico was a white knight riding to my rescue instead of the reason I was on the cold, hard ground in the first place.

I stared up at him as the strength of our childhood bond flared in my chest. The boy who’d meant the world to me was now a man asking for my help.

Maybe an adventure was just what we needed to rekindle that friendship.

“Okay,” I said with another sigh, but as Nico took my arm to help me to my feet, a wave of dizziness almost sent me tumbling back to the asphalt. Before I realized what was happening, he swept me into his arms and carried me toward the van.

Maybe he wasn’t so bad at playing white knight, after all.