Page 2

CHAPTER 1

Dawson Ridge allowed another vehicle into the parking lot of Mitchell’s Marina. He could handle the locals. They were easy. This was just another day in South Florida. However, all it took was one overly excited city slicker waving his registration out the window, yelling yeehaw, to put Dawson in a bad mood. The town hadn’t wanted the challenge, and they’d fought it for two straight years, but they’d lost.

While Dawson understood the need to rid the Everglades of the invasive python, he couldn’t comprehend the amount of excitement bristling in the air regarding hunting and killing massive pythons while trying not to get eaten by alligators.

He shivered while large droplets of sweat dripped from his brow.

For the first time since moving to what felt like a permanent vacation , he wanted to take an actual vacation.

He didn’t care about the heat. Or the humidity. He could even deal with damn alligators swimming in his backyard, taunting him. But he couldn’t tolerate strangers coming into what he now viewed as his town. Mentally, he laughed at that thought. This wasn’t his town, and every local let him know it. He was the interloper. The guy who’d stolen someone’s job who had lived here their entire life. It didn’t matter that Dawson had more experience. That experience might not have been in law enforcement, but seventeen years in the Navy—ten of them as a SEAL—was worth something.

“Good morning, Officer.” A woman with long red hair stuck her head out the window.

A damn redhead.

“It’s going to be a scorcher today,” she said as she pushed her sunglasses to the top of her head, collecting some of that thick, lush hair and pulling it away from her face to show off her sparkling teal-green eyes.

The last thing he needed today was a distraction wrapped in the form of a sexy woman with fiery hair and freckles set against a slightly darker complexion.

“You can say that again, ma’am.” He lowered his sunglasses just a smidge off the bridge of his nose. His breath caught in the center of his chest, but he told himself it was a thick clump of humidity that got stuck there like a fur ball.

Because he knew what that felt like.

Swallowing became a lesson in futility.

He’d always been a sucker for redheads, and they’d always been more trouble than they were worth.

“It’s your lucky day because we just closed up. Anyone coming in now will have to park down the road.” He pointed to the last spot before waving to Fletcher and Keaton, who were closing off the lot. “You can bring your registration information into Mitchell’s. A woman by the name of Baily will take care of you.”

“I’m surprised she’s got this many boats available. I’m more surprised that Calusa Cove got so many people to sign up for the challenge. This is not the epicenter for python wrangling,” the sexy woman said.

“The damn things have made their way into all sorts of places.” Dawson looped his fingers into his belt. The lady had had his attention the moment she’d stuck her head out the window, but now she had his cop instincts wondering a few things—specifically, who was she, and how did she know anything about Mitchell’s or Calusa Cove? “My deputies and I have been on a few snake calls that turned out to be pythons. It’s not fun,” he said. “Did you rent a boat?”

“No. I did rent a slip, though.” The woman shook her head, leaning over the door. “Some guy named Hayes and a dockhand named Bingo directed me to the launch and said my boat would be in the slip by the time I finished my paperwork. They told me the trailer had to be left in the lot across the street.”

“Hayes Bennett is a local firefighter and is a buddy of mine. Bingo works here at the marina and he’s not a bad kid. You’re in good hands.”

“I hope so. The boat might be a rust bucket and old, but it’s new to me.” She nodded. “I better go?—”

“As I live and breathe,” Fletcher said as he marched across the pavement. “Audra? Is that really you?”

Dawson rolled the name around in his brain. Fletcher had told many stories over the years about his hometown and the crazy people who resided in Calusa Cove.

Everyone was a character. Dawson used to understand why Fletcher and his late buddy, Ken, had wanted to get out—and stay out. That was until Dawson had moved to Calusa Cove. After that happened, he couldn’t wrap his brain around why anyone would ever want to leave. All Dawson had ever wanted was to be part of something. Part of a family. Part of a town. Part of something bigger than himself. However, returning to his hometown in Western, New York when he’d left the Navy hadn’t been an option. There was nothing left for him there except sadness and painful memories.

However, Dawson had taken to Calusa Cove like bees to honey. He loved almost everything about this town—the quirky people, the funky places, the smallness of it—and especially, the quietness. He loved that. When he’d first decided to come here, he’d thought he might miss the snowy winters or even the change of seasons, but he hadn’t. He enjoyed the palm trees and the perpetual warmth.

Still, there were two things Dawson didn’t like about his new home.

Gators and mosquitoes the size of gators.

And maybe one more thing. The lack of available single women. But Dawson had had his heart ripped out once, and he’d rather be in a place like Calusa Cove than some town where a woman could steal his soul—especially a redhead.

So why was his pulse purring like a damn kitten?

“Yeah, it’s me,” the pretty redhead said. “I guess I should’ve known that even after all these years, I wouldn’t be able to fly under the radar.”

“Not with that hair.” Fletcher laughed, waving his finger over the top of his head. “Besides, you had to register. Everyone knows you’re coming,” Fletcher said. “It’s been what—sixteen years since you left?”

Audra… Ken…

Dawson didn’t know the entire story, but he knew enough.

“Something like that,” Audra said. “Look, I’d love to sit here and shoot the breeze, but I’ve got to get going.”

“I can’t believe you came here—of all places—to do the Python Challenge.” Fletcher leaned against the vehicle.

“It was time to come back.” She turned, leaning across the seat. “And for more than one reason.”

Dawson pushed his glasses to the top of his head and glanced around the lot. He counted fifty cars. That was five more than last year. According to Parks and Recreation records, this was the second year the challenge was open to this area. Different areas in the Everglades would get well over two hundred participants, but the reality was that less than a thousand would hunt during the ten-day challenge.

The number of pythons that would be removed would barely put a dent in the problem, but it still helped.

“I would hope the number one reason is to capture and kill the pythons,” Fletcher said, “considering how your dad felt about keeping the Everglades intact. I bet he would’ve been out there every day trying to remove as many as he could.”

“If this challenge had been going when he was alive, he’d have run it. But it’s not like he wasn’t wrangling snakes before he died.” She lifted a large camera. “Killing pythons is one of the reasons I’m here, but I’m also here to take some pictures of the wildlife and the hunt for a collection I’m putting together and an article I’m writing on the situation.”

“You should sit down with our friend Keaton Cole,” Dawson said. “He’s Fish and Wildlife, and he’s got an opinion about the pythons and this challenge.”

“Dawson’s right about that.” Fletcher nodded. “We’re all passionate about the removal of the snakes. We’re just not all thrilled about this.”

“You can say that again,” Dawson said under his breath. This area didn’t get too many novice participants, but others did, and every year, someone got hurt. “I don’t mind the professionals, but take those guys over there…” He jerked his chin toward two men leaning against a fancy foreign sports car wearing golf shirts, slacks, and god-awful shoes that some company sold for a small fortune to men like that, claiming they were “boat shoes.” It was an utter disgrace—worse than those Army-grade backpacks sold online that came from China. Dawson had a bad feeling about those two and had texted Hayes and Remy to make sure they did a thorough check of their boat.

But something else about those two got under Dawson’s skin. They stood out like a sore thumb, and that made him twitchy.

“Technically, I’m not a professional snake hunter, although I’ve done this before in a different area and grew up catching rattlers and water moccasins.” Audra cocked her pretty little brow. “Do you have a problem with me?”

Dawson cleared his throat. “I guess I walked right into that one,” he said softly. “I didn’t mean to insult you, ma’am.”

“You didn’t, but keep calling me ma’am, and we’ll have a problem.” She laughed. “If I can wrangle an alligator, I believe I can deal with a python.”

Fletcher bent over, placed both hands on his knees, and full-out laughed.

“What the hell is so funny, Fletch?” Audra narrowed her stare. “That gator might have only been four feet long, but I got him, and you were there. You lost fifty bucks that day.”

“I’m sorry. I’m not laughing at the idea of you wrestling a snake—or a gator. Really, I’m not. I’m sure the fiery redhead I remember back in high school can do it all again. What I’m having a good chuckle over is you coming out of that swamp after wrestling that gator and the shirt Ken bought you?—”

“Oh, buzz off,” Audra mumbled. “You got to see breasts that day, even if they were itty-bitty. You should be grateful. Now get your ass the hell off my car so I can hand in my paperwork, get my boat in order, and get me some snakes.”

Fletcher lifted his hands and backed away.

“Nice meeting you, Officer.” She lowered her glasses over those mesmerizing eyes that Dawson would not allow himself to be captivated by.

“Feel free to call me Dawson,” he said.

She punched the gas and maneuvered her vehicle toward the last free spot in the parking lot. She slipped from the driver’s side, wearing a pair of jean shorts that hung loosely from her hips, and her shirt didn’t come down to meet the top of her shorts, showing off a taut midriff.

Damn. Dawson swallowed. Hard.

Flipping redheads got him every time.

And she was wearing flip-flops.

“She hasn’t changed one bit, but it’s going to be hard for Baily to see her,” Fletcher said.

“Is that Ken’s Audra?”

“One in the same.”

Dawson lowered his glasses and strolled across the dirt pavement with his buddy. He snagged a water bottle from the cooler and climbed up on the picnic bench, where he could watch the marina and the parking lot. Not much happened in Calusa Cove, making his job as chief of police a relatively easy one. He loved his job. He had three deputies under him, and they were good people. Even Remy Pillar, who had been next in line to be named chief, had Dawson not shown up.

“Why were you staring at her boobs?” Dawson asked as he watched her hips sway back and forth while she marched herself from her car toward the entrance of Mitchell’s Marina. She had a narrow waist, wide hips, and a round ass. “I’m sure Ken did not appreciate that.”

When he’d dared to look at her breasts while chatting by her car, they were not that itty-bitty—as she’d put it. Small? Sure. They might even get lost—oh, for fuck’s sake. Why the hell was Dawson even thinking about them?

She was a redhead, and he didn’t do redheads.

Not to mention, if she was the Audra he believed her to be, she was even more off-limits.

“Do I need to be worried about you, considering you can’t take your eyes off her?” Fletcher chuckled before taking a long swig of water. He sat on the table, leaned back, and stared at the sky.

“Nope. Not interested,” Dawson said with about as much conviction as a kid in a candy store, dancing on his tippytoes, brimming with excitement. “But you haven’t answered my question, and you know how much that pisses me off.”

“For the record, I wasn’t staring at any part of Audra when she wrestled that gator. That would’ve gotten me in too much trouble with my girlfriend at the time.” Fletcher turned his head and cocked a brow. “Audra was Baily’s best friend, and Ken was mine. I would’ve gotten the shit kicked out of me twice.”

“There are lots of rumors about what happened to her old man. What do you know about that?” Instead of asking questions about the woman, he opted to discuss the mystery.

“Just the rumors.”

“Are there more than the three?”

“Not that I know of.” Fletcher sat tall, resting his forearms on his knees, and fiddled with the water bottle. He’d always been a contemplative man. When it came to serious matters, he took his time before he spoke. He liked to choose his words wisely, especially when dealing with matters that affected others.

Dawson had always appreciated that about Fletcher. It’s one of the many reasons he’d been willing to follow him out of the Navy and to South Florida after Ken had died. But more so because where else was Dawson going to go? He had no home. No blood family. No friends outside of Fletcher, Keaton, and Hayes. They were his brothers. After his nana had died shortly after he joined the Navy, these men had taken him and made him the person he was today.

He owed them his life.

He owed Ken, too. His death was part of the reason they had come to Calusa Cove.

Dawson let out a deep breath. “No one gets into the details with me. It's just that most people believe she killed her dad. I’ve been told it could’ve been some weird witch ritual. That she’s some mystical Owl Witch or some bull. Lots of strange talk, that’s for sure. But what I want to know is if you’ll tell me more, or do I have to start pulling your teeth, one by one?” Dawson said.

“You’ve got the basic idea.” Fletcher nodded. “Occasionally, people wonder if it could’ve been someone other than Audra, and there is that one random person who might consider it an accident.”

“Did you know she was coming back to town? You and Keaton had a list of participants, right?”

“I’ve known about her return for a while. I kept it quiet and asked Baily not to tell anyone because I didn’t want the town buzzing and coming at her before she even set foot in this parking lot.”

“I think you should’ve told me.” Dawson didn’t get pissed at Fletcher often, nor did Fletcher keep things from Dawson or the rest of the team. So, Dawson was willing to reserve judgment until he had the facts.

“I thought about it, but if I had, I know you, and you would’ve gone down the rabbit hole,” Fletcher said. “Baily also told me that Audra was a late registrant. She almost didn’t make the deadline, but because of her press credentials, she would’ve been able to skirt that anyway.”

“How do you think this town will react to her being here?”

“The rumors are already coming out of the woodwork, and it will be all this town will be able to talk about for the next ten days now that Audra is back.” Fletcher jerked his chin toward Silas Monroe and his crew. “It won’t be good.”

Silas was a pain in the ass. He thought he knew everything and didn’t take too kindly to strangers coming in and running his town.

That meant he didn’t like Dawson, Hayes, or Keaton.

And he merely tolerated Fletcher, but only because he’d been born in Calusa Cove. Silas and others—like Baily—didn’t appreciate Fletcher's return.

“And over there. Paul Massey, Dewey, they’re all talking about it, too.” Fletcher sighed. “I’m honestly shocked she came back.”

“Should I be worried about her?”

Fletcher chuckled. “The girl I knew could hold her own.”

“So, everyone in this town thinks she murdered her dad, dumped his body in the Everglades, and got away with it? That’s messed up.”

“She was one month shy of turning seventeen when it happened. Her dad was all she had,” Fletcher said. “Ken and I were getting ready to ship off to boot camp. Ken loved Audra. Perhaps a little more than she did him, but she was always a bit of a tough read. It screwed with Ken’s head for a while. He didn’t know what to believe when it came to Audra. This town came after her hard. I remember late-night phone calls with Baily, which were a hot mess.”

“If she had no one and was a minor, what happened? Because she was never charged.” Dawson rubbed his temple. Being a small-town cop meant the puzzle pieces he had to put together weren’t all that complicated. Stolen bikes. A few car thefts. The occasional boat theft. Breaking and entering. But since he knew the players and, in general, who the bad guys were, he could usually piece together what happened pretty quickly.

Drugs were big in Florida. If they were involved, he called in the local DEA agent. However, the only drug cases he’d had to deal with concerned a few dumbass kids smoking weed they usually stole from their parents’ medical stash.

In the ten months he’d lived in Calusa Cove, not a single murder had occurred.

That was something.

“Oddly enough, Silas Monroe stepped in and helped her. In Florida, a seventeen-year-old doesn’t need to be emancipated. While she was sixteen when her father went missing, she turned seventeen a month later, so he took her in and offered to help her with any legal fees if that were going to be necessary.”

“Why is that odd?” Dawson wanted to know more. He told himself that his badge dictated and drove this inquisition—not the sexy redhead he couldn’t get out of his mind.

Nope, she had nothing to do with it because he didn’t do redheads anymore.

Fletcher shrugged. “Silas and Victor were never friends. I'm not sure anyone really knows why, but their animosity started when they were kids. Some say it was over Audra’s mother. Others say it was just normal male chest-pounding in a small town that couldn’t handle two young men with big egos.” Fletcher laughed. “And what you just witnessed was a tame version of the young girl I remember. She certainly had a way with words.”

“I’ve got a crazy question here because you’ve piqued my curiosity. Do you know what Silas believes about what happened to Victor?”

“All I know is that, when it happened, he swore he didn’t believe she could’ve hurt her father. That no matter his feelings toward Victor, Audra wasn’t a killer. But his opinion changed the second she turned seventeen, and the cops couldn’t keep her from leaving town. In his eyes, that made her look suspect, mostly because she just up and left. She didn’t tell anyone she was leaving. Not even Baily. To my knowledge, no one has heard from Audra in years.”

“Baily hasn’t spoken to her?”

“Not that I know of,” Fletcher said. “But Baily barely speaks to me, so I honestly don’t know.”

“One more question.” Dawson wiggled his finger. “Do you know if either of my predecessors had a possible motive for her killing her dad?”

“That’s a weird question.” Fletcher jerked his head. “But yeah. She and her dad had a massive fight the day before. She said something that could’ve been seen as threatening,” Fletcher said.

“Were you there? Did you witness that? Were you living here when he went missing? Or had you and Ken already left for boot camp?”

“Wow, that cop brain of yours is in full gear,” Fletcher said. “Or are you trying to figure out if you want to entangle yourself with the redhead?” Fletcher lifted his hand. “Because if it’s the latter, I might have something to say about that and not because I know you and redheads, but because I know that redhead.”

Dawson chugged the last of his water before jumping off the picnic table and tossing the empty bottle in the recycle bin. If it were anyone other than Fletcher, he’d be insulted. But Dawson knew his buddy was only looking out for his best interests. Fletcher had seen him through some of his darkest hours. Fletcher was the glue that held their little group together. “I’ll admit she caught my attention, but the story holds it. Now, please answer my original question, and then tell me why you’re calling me off. Not that I’m going to pursue.”

“All right.” Fletcher laughed. “Yes. I was still living at home when Victor disappeared, and yeah, I witnessed that fight. It happened a month before Ken and I shipped off. It was a difficult time for Ken. Like I said, he was in love with Audra and was conflicted about leaving her, but he was excited about joining the Navy. At first, Audra wrote letters every day, letting him know what was going on, but a month or so in, the letters stopped. Baily informed us that she had taken off and hadn’t left a forwarding address. Ken hired a private investigator. He found her once living in Virginia and paid her a visit. She told him she never wanted to see him or talk to him again. That she wanted nothing to do with anyone from Calusa Cove. Ken came back from seeing her a completely different man.” Fletcher ran a hand over his face. “Ken once told me he wondered if Audra might know more about her father’s death than she was letting on.”

“Seriously? And he never came forward?” Of all the men Dawson had worked with, Ken had been the hardest to get to know. Dawson told himself it was because, by the time they met, Ken was a married man.

“He had nothing to go on except concern,” Fletcher said. “Audra was very close to her dad, and Ken loved her enough to put up with Victor’s weirdness. But that fight affected Ken. He thought Audra was out of line, and he let her know it. So, when he returned from seeing her and decided to put that part of his life behind him, I thought that was harsh. If I even brought up her name, he told me to stop. He said he was done. It was over, and he’d moved on. I had to respect that. Besides, I was dealing with my shit with Baily because we’d started to drift apart.”

“I met you both two years after we all joined the Navy. Ken had already met his wife. Audra was mentioned a few times, but you warned me not to ask questions.” Dawson knew there were things about his good friend Ken that he didn’t know. He was okay with that. They had been through so much together. Near-death experiences. Deaths of loved ones. Deaths of brothers. SEAL training—a different kind of hell.

And then that fateful mission that had changed their lives forever.

“Ken hated coming home to Calusa Cove,” Dawson said. “You had to drag him.”

Fletcher nodded. “It’s also one of the many reasons that Baily thinks I’m an asshole. For some reason, she likes to blame me for her brother’s hatred of this town when that one was on Ken and whatever went down between him and Audra.”

“Baily thinks we’re all assholes,” Dawson said. “Now, outside of the fact Audra is a redhead, and I don’t do redheads, why else should I stay away?”

“Because I know you.” Fletcher stood, stretching. “And she’ll put a hole in your heart bigger than Liz did.”

Dawson cringed at the name. Just hearing it was like listening to fingernails on a chalkboard. But Dawson had moved past Liz. She was in his rearview. Sure, she’d ripped his heart from his chest with her bare hands, but he’d managed to repair the damage. He wasn’t so broken that he’d given up on the concept of love.

Just redheads.

Only, he really liked women with red hair and green eyes.

It sucked having a type.

“So, what you’re saying is you don’t like Audra,” Dawson said. “Does that mean we’re supposed to dislike Baily?” Dawson pointed toward the marina shop. “Because isn’t she the one who broke?—”

“That’s the worst analogy ever, and I like Audra just fine.” Fletcher folded his arms across his chest and widened his stance, daring Dawson to say otherwise. “Just not for you.”

Normally, he would let it go. Baily wasn’t a topic any of the guys dug too deep into. They all knew why they’d come to Calusa Cove.

To honor Ken. To help save Mitchell’s Marina.

But there was more to it, even if Fletcher wasn’t willing to admit it. “I don’t do redheads, and I don’t think this is about me anymore.”

“I’m done with this discussion.” Fletcher tossed his empty bottle in the recycle bin. “I’ve got to head over to my post. I’ll see you at the end of the day.” He turned and marched toward the parking lot without saying another word.

Dawson shouldn’t have poked the bear. Fletcher had been carrying a torch for Baily his entire life. He’d loved her as a teenager. They’d tried to have a relationship for his first four years in the Navy.

It had failed.

They’d tried again a year later.

It became impossible after her father passed, and she took over the marina, refusing to leave Calusa Cove. But the two of them had managed to remain friendly.

Until Ken had died.

That had changed everything.

Fletcher understood, but that hadn’t fixed his broken heart, and he’d never been the same.

Dawson stood there for a long moment, staring at the front door of the marina, contemplating if he should try to catch a glimpse of the sexy redhead or head to the office.

He opted for the latter, reminding himself he didn’t do redheads.

His cell buzzed. He pulled it from his back pocket. “Hey, Remy, what’s going on?”

“We’ve got a problem, Chief,” his second-in-command said. “Remember the two guys with the boat shoes that rubbed you the wrong way?”

“Yeah, what about them?” Those damn shoes.

“Well, Hayes and I finished the inspection of boats, and guess what we found?”

“Do I really want to know?” Dawson rubbed the back of his neck. Of all the towns that had been opened up in the last two years for the challenge, this location was the smallest one. Most people here were passionate about removing the pythons from the Everglades. They didn’t care about the prize money. They wanted the damn things gone from the ecosystem. But he’d been warned that one or two would try to slip in and do things the easy way instead of the right way.

“Dynamite.” Remy laughed. “They actually have a license for the shit, but obviously that doesn’t cover the removal of pythons.”

“Nope, but what does the license say?” Why he asked the question, he didn’t know because it didn’t matter. Obtaining an explosives license with false information was a first-degree misdemeanor that came with a possible thousand-dollar fine and a year in jail. Using it made it a third-degree felony with a ten-thousand-dollar fine and potential prison time of up to five years or longer, depending on the intent.

This was not what he wanted to deal with right now. He’d rather hop on one of the airboats and check out the hunt.

Not the redhead.

At least, that’s what he told himself.

“They have a federal license as a distributor, so they can be in possession of it, but there is no reason for it to be on their boat.”

“You’ve got that right,” Dawson muttered. “Where are you?”

“Dock three, slip eight.”

“I’ll be right there.” Dawson tucked his phone in his back pocket. Time to go earn his paycheck.