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Six hours earlier, Heath finished up his paperwork and turned over the booth at Blakely’s front entrance to the night guard. First day on the job hadn’t gone too badly, and he’d appreciated the overtime, even though he didn’t like leaving Chloe home alone. Connor, a huge brute of a man, nodded as Heath said goodbye. It had been a slow evening, with only two visitors checking in at the booth, both of them new assistant professors. Heath’s walking rounds had revealed nothing except two couples studying on the lawn in front of the library and an overturned trash bin by the path that overlooked the water.
Wonder if things pick up during the school year? He imagined they probably did. Campus parties would take up a fair amount of his time, according to his boss. Still, pulling a few drunk kids off each other paled in comparison to the way he’d spent his nights the last seventeen years. He stared at the stars and wondered if he’d ever again feel like he mattered. Really mattered. Like what he did saved a life or protected an ally.
He climbed into his truck and checked his phone. Returning to the Hideaway had quickly become the best part of his day. The minute he turned onto Main Street and smelled the salt on the wind, his tension melted away. Knowing that Franny, Chloe, and Bud waited for him gave him a peace the rest of his life lacked. He toed the gas and kicked up his speed a few notches. He’d felt bad at leaving Chloe alone until almost nine, but she’d sent him multiple texts with smiley faces, and one picture of her sitting in his living room with Bud beside her, so Heath supposed she was doing okay.
When he pulled up to the Hideaway less than twenty minutes later, he saw just how okay she was.
People everywhere. Cars and trucks parked on the lawn, one with its tires buried in the flowers Chloe and Franny had just planted. Kids dancing barefoot in the driveway. A bunch of them playing some kind of drinking game on tables set up near the house. Music blasted from a car stereo. Every light inside the Hideaway burned. As Heath slid from the cab of his truck, his vision went red. His windpipe closed, and for a minute he couldn’t breathe. Then Bud nosed his leg and whimpered. Heath looked down to see that someone had tied a bow around his neck, and the dog scratched at it with one paw.
“Chloe!” he roared. He marched across the lawn. Now that he was out of his truck, he could smell marijuana. Empty beer bottles rolled across the sidewalk. Conversation around him trickled to a halt. Only the group playing beer pong on the side lawn kept cheering and drinking until Heath slammed one hand on the table and sent plastic cups flying.
“Where is she?” he asked through clenched teeth. His hands went to fists as he saw one banister on the front porch knocked from its mooring. I just fixed that damn thing. “Where’s Chloe?”
“I think she’s inside,” whispered a girl with too much lipstick and a wine cooler in one hand.
Heath marched halfway up the steps and then stopped. “Get the hell out of here. Every one of you.” Probably half of them had had too much to drink or smoke and shouldn’t be driving, but he didn’t care.
They stared at him with stupid cow eyes and silent lips.
“Get. Out.” His voice shook. Thank God Franny’s not here. “I’m calling the cops,” he said and pulled out his phone. “You want to be arrested for underage drinking, trespassing, and vandalism? Stick around.”
Someone to his left spat on the ground. “Asshole.”
Heath leapt over the banister and grabbed the kid by his shirtfront. “What did you say?”
The kid stared at him, eyes wide. Couldn’t have been older than sixteen. For a moment he was in the Great White again, staring down a punk as he slowly cut off his air supply. Get a grip, Garrick. Heath shoved the kid away. “Get out of here,” he said again. Finally they began to leave in twos and threes. Heath stood on the lawn and watched them go. He muttered a half-prayer that no one would get killed on the way home.
Then he turned and walked inside.
“Oh, no. Oh, shit.”
The front parlor was a mess. Cans and bottles lay everywhere, beside empty bags of chips and a half-eaten jar of salsa. Some had spilled onto the carpet and left a dull red stain. The cushions of both loveseats lay at the bottom of the stairs, as if someone had decided to use them as either an impromptu bed or a makeshift sled.
“Chloe!”
No answer. Heath turned off all the lights in the parlor except one. He checked the kitchen, expecting to find more damage, but all he saw was a pot of coffee and an empty carton of milk sitting on the counter.
How could she? Heath shook his head. After all the time Chloe had spent over the last ten days, helping Franny clean up after other people, how could she treat the Hideaway like this? He swallowed back bile. Maybe she was more like her mother than he’d wanted to see. Clearly, she had no regard for anyone but herself.
That’s Beth to a tee, he thought as he climbed the stairs. Thinks of what she wants first, and what everyone else wants second. He checked every room on the second floor. Nothing. He glanced at the ceiling. He knew where she was. He knew her favorite room in the bed and breakfast, and he also knew he wouldn’t find her alone up there.
Please don’t let them be having sex. If he saw Brett on top of his daughter, Heath would kill him, plain and simple. Yeah, he’d done the same thing with Beth when he was in high school. They’d gone to more than one party and ended up naked in an empty bedroom. But there was no way a pretty boy with half a brain was going to knock up his daughter, not as long as Heath had breath in his body. He didn’t care how hypocritical that thought made him. He stomped as loud as he could on his way up to the third floor, hoping to give them enough warning to get their clothes back on. He sucked in breath after breath, trying to calm himself and failing.
“Chloe!” he said at the top landing. The Lighthouse Suite was all the way at the end. He eyed it and scowled. If I find them in there together...
Thankfully, the door opened before he got there, and a fully clothed Chloe peeked out at him, eyes wide. “Dad?”
The word stabbed him. “Get out here right now.”
She pressed her lips together and edged into the hallway. She wore a white sundress and a silver bracelet and nothing on her feet.
“Where’s Brett? Is he in there?”
The door opened wider, and the boyfriend stepped out. “Hey, man.”
“Shut up.”
Brett reached for Chloe’s hand, but she shook it off. “I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I didn’t think it would turn into anything so big.”
“You didn’t think, period.” His jaw tightened so hard it sent white-hot pain through his skull. “This isn’t your home. It’s not even my home. What would make you think you could have a party here?”
“I just wanted my friends to see how nice it was.”
“So you waited until Franny was gone and I was at work.”
“Mr. Garrick, if –”
“I told you to shut up. In fact, why don’t you get the hell out of my sight?”
Brett blinked, gulped, and tugged at his stupid plaid shirt. “Ah, I –”
“Now.”
“Yes, sir.” He slid past Heath and scampered down the stairs. Heath waited until he heard the front door open and close.
“I’m really sorry,” Chloe said again.
“That’s not good enough.” He didn’t know what would be, because hell if he knew how to raise or discipline a child. “You’re going to clean up everything.”
She nodded.
“And then I’m taking you back to your mother’s.”
“Tonight?”
“Yes. Now get downstairs and start cleaning.” He didn’t want to look at her any longer than he had to. Betrayal sent an ache straight through him. What on earth would he tell Franny? One of the only things she asked was that he look after the Hideaway.
Chloe began to cry, and Heath turned away. Downstairs, he helped her find rags, cleaner, and a bucket. Together they mopped up the parlor, the front porch, the steps, and the walkway. Someone had vomited in the bushes, and he made her hose down that mess as well.
“Can we please talk about this?” she asked as they carried bags of trash to the dumpster.
“There’s nothing to talk about. You broke my trust. You can’t stay here.”
“Let me at least talk to Franny when she gets back. I didn’t mean for anything to get ruined.” She was crying again. “I don’t want to go back to Mom’s. Please.”
He closed his eyes and walked to the edge of the lawn, so he couldn’t hear her sobs. Nothing lasts forever. You should’ve known this was just temporary.
“Let’s go,” he said when he turned around again. “Pack your things.”
“It’s twelve-thirty in the morning.”
“And it’ll be after one when we get there. So let’s go.”
She dragged her feet. She yelled. She cried. She begged. She told him he was ruining her life. He closed his ears to all of it. You let people in, you let down your guard, this is what happens. He threw her bags into the bed of the truck and drove to Bluffet Edge as fast as he could.
Beth walked down the driveway in a robe and slippers. Her hair stood up around her face, and he could make out a few wrinkles in the moonlight. Her hips had widened considerably, and the skin around her neck drooped. She looked older than her thirty-five years, and Heath guessed this late-night phone call hadn’t helped any.
“You made it almost two weeks,” she said in a sad, tired voice. “Congratulations.”
“Sorry,” he said gruffly. He kept his eyes on the steering wheel as Chloe climbed out of the truck.
“Don’t be. I know what she’s like. Why do you think she was grounded most of the summer?”
Heath watched Chloe stomp into the house, spine stiff and hair swinging against her back.
Beth rested her hip against the door of the truck. “I’d say it’s nice to see you again, but the circumstances are kind of shitty.”
A light flicked on in an upstairs bedroom, and Heath could hear a male voice yelling. Chloe yelled back. The boyfriend. The ass. For the first time in almost two hours, Heath’s resolve faltered. Maybe he’d overreacted. Maybe he should have listened to her pleas and let her stay until Franny returned.
His fingers tightened around the steering wheel. Didn’t matter now. When you set a course of action, you followed through with it. Weakness and indecision didn’t make a man. Sticking to one’s guns did. But at one o’clock in the morning, sitting in the gravel driveway of a rundown house belonging to his tired-looking ex-girlfriend, Heath didn’t feel like much of a man. And he didn’t feel like much of a father.
“She’ll be fine,” Beth said as she turned away. “Thanks for driving her home. I’ll deal with her tomorrow.” She flipped up one hand in goodbye.
Heath backed down the driveway and turned up the radio as loud as it would go. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d felt so low.