Page 20 of The Lovely and the Lost

“For you,” Ness corrected.

“Not for me.”

There wassomethingin the old man’s tone when he said those words. I needed Jude here to translate.

“Did you tell Mac—”

“No.” Bales clipped the word. “And you won’t, either, Ness Ashby.”

Tell him what?I wondered. My weight shifted from one foot to the other, and the floor creaked beneath me.Did they hear that?The sound of a chair scraping against the kitchen tile made a breath catch in my throat.

I went to retreat, but Ness’s voice held me back. “Thirty-plus years, Bales Bennett, and you’re still telling me what to do.”

“Thirty-plus years,” Bales replied, his voice rough and hoarse and oddly quiet, “and you still don’t listen.”

I felt suddenly like this wasn’t something I should be eavesdropping on.

This—whateverthiswas—was private.

I backed away—from the door, from listening—but as I edged toward the exit, a final piece of their conversation made its way to my ears.

“Cady won’t thank you for bringing Mac into this, Bales.”

“Since Ash, Cady doesn’t thank me for much.”

Ispent the night outside, sleeping propped up against the base of a tree, Saskia and Silver curled by my sides for warmth. I woke the next morning to the sound of a low, warm chuckle. At first, I thought I’d been spotted, but then I tracked the laughter to its source.

A dozen yards away, Gabriel Cortez knelt on the ground, his body disappearing under an onslaught of wiggling, yipping little balls of fluff. The pups’ mother—a golden retriever—watched, amused, as they mobbed Gabriel. A crooked smile on his face, he set down several bowls of food. The entire litter descended like a horde of locusts, except for the biggest puppy, who appeared quite satisfied rolling back and forth at Gabriel’s feet, and the smallest, who couldn’t seem to find a way around his siblings to the food. As I watched, Gabriel lifted the runt toward one of the bowls.

Beside me, Saskia stood and shook the morning dew off her fur, pelting me straight in the face.

That’s what you get,her expression seemed to say,for admiring puppies.

I stood, and though I moved with near silence, Gabriel looked up. “I’m going to go out on a limb and assume you don’t want me asking why you look like you slept on a tree.”

I stared directly at him. “I slept on a tree.”

“Never would have guessed.”

Jude had once spent an entire day trying to teach me what asmirklooked like. It had ultimately been unsuccessful because Jude was as bad at smirking as I was at recognizing that particular expression.

But I was nearly certain that Gabriel was smirking now.

“Why do you keep talking to me?” The question came out lower in pitch and more intense than I’d intended.

“Because I don’t know how to keep my mouth shut.” Gabriel delivered that statement in a tone that matched his facial expression almost exactly.

Beside me, Silver huffed. She stood, pressing the front half of her body down toward the ground in a stretch. Within seconds, she’d made a loop around my feet. She sniffed me, then glanced at Saskia, as if expecting the younger dog to report.

“Don’t take this the wrong way,” Gabriel said, lowering his voice. “But I’m pretty sure they’re talking about you.”

I almost smiled, but Gabriel chose that moment to shift his weight—slightly, almost imperceptibly—and the reminder that he was astrangerandunpredictableand athreatthrummed through me.

I didn’t put my guard down around threats.

He wants something. That’s what people do. They want, and they take. They—

A door slammed behind me, muting the thought, but not the increase in adrenaline that had come with it.