Ismay spotted the Jeep in the drive before Jack did and grabbed his arm.
“What is it?” Jack said, lifting his head.
“Bastian’s here.”
“Oh, shit.” He peered through the trees that partially concealed Honey’s house and scowled. They’d slipped down to the Windsors’ private beach and spent the past forty minutes enjoying the mild spring evening while they talked about so many things—their upbringing, their parents’ life view, letting go of Ashleigh, getting a condo or apartment together in Los Angeles, Ismay’s engagement to Remy and their subsequent breakup. And Bo. Mostly Bo. Ismay hadn’t responded to his last text from over a day ago, and he hadn’t tried to reach her again. She assumed he knew she’d learned the truth. The practical part of her—the part that was most like her father, she supposed—warned her to let him go. To leave things as they were. There were plenty of other men in the world who hadn’t experienced what he’d experienced and with whom she’d never face such difficult questions.
But she couldn’t stop thinking of him and didn’t want to walk away, despite what she’d learned. She’d never felt so strongly about anyone else. She at least owed it to him to decide if she believed his version of events, didn’t she?
“Let’s go back to the beach,” Jack said, stopping. “I don’t want to deal with Bastian.”
“He’s probably come to get the keys to the truck,” she said, trying to guess the purpose of this unwanted visit. “I say we give them to him and be done with him. We don’t need the truck—we can always walk or Uber. And then he’ll have no reason to bother us.”
With a shrug, Jack started walking toward the house again. “Yeah, might as well get it over with.”
Prepared for a hostile encounter, Ismay squared her shoulders as they approached the vehicle, but there was no one sitting inside. Because she and Jack hadn’t planned on being gone more than a few minutes, they hadn’t bothered to lock the house, and she got the distinct impression Bastian had let himself in. She could see why he might feel free to do that with the bungalow. His family owned that. But Honey’s house? It came as a shock that he’d go so far.
“What an assuming bastard,” Jack muttered just before he opened the door. But it wasn’t only Bastian who was in the living room. Remy was with him.
Ismay felt her jaw drop. “Remy! What are you doing here? What about your exam?”
“I decided I can take it during residency when we’re both in LA. We don’t have to be apart, not with so much going on here.” He’d stood when he saw her and was coming forward as if he expected her to fall into his arms.
She put up a hand to let him know that wasn’t going to happen, and he stopped about three feet away. “Nothing’s going on here. Not anymore.”
His thick dark eyebrows slammed together. “You’re not answering my calls and texts...”
“And you know why...”
“I think you’re making a big mistake,” he said.
“Breaking up with you?”
“Yes! You’re trading a physician who could give you a great life, everything you could ask for, for an ex-con who probably doesn’t have two nickels to his name. He has no family to speak of, either—just a history of violence. Do you really want to tie your future to his? He can’t take care of you like I can!”
What Bo had been through was terrible, and he probably had some deep scars that would inform his worldview. But maybe his past had taught him a few good things, too—made him humble and kind and more aware of what really mattered in life. Maybe, unlike Remy, he wouldn’t take so much for granted. At least he seemed capable of true feeling. With Remy, she’d never connected on a deep level, not like she had with Bo, especially when they were making love. Bo had made her feel that those moments were precious beyond measure.
Bottom line, Bo made her feel valued, and she wasn’t sure any feeling could be better than that. “I don’t need anyone to take care of me, Remy. I’m an attorney. I’ll be fine. And you’re not so innocent yourself.”
Remy stiffened. “What are you talking about?”
“Your affair with Sam, your so-called study partner, for one. The underwear in that duffel bag in the wall of your closet for another. And the cheap jewelry. Where did all that come from?”
His eyes began to glitter—with anger, she supposed. He wasn’t used to anyone calling him out on anything, especially her. She typically did what she could to avoid a fight, because he was always willing to go further than she was. “I still can’t believe you didn’t ask me about it,” he said. “That you took it to Bo instead?”
“I was pretty freaked out. I still am.”
“I had nothing to do with that,” he said. “Until you mentioned it, I had no idea it even existed!”
“It’s gone missing, so I figured it had to be Bastian’s, especially because a pair of my underwear suddenly went missing, too. Only he could’ve taken that stuff. But now that I think about it, maybe he took my underwear to upset me or scare me. Lord knows he likes to get under people’s skin. It’s possible he was even imitating you. But I don’t think he’d leave that bag in your room. Why would he leave it outside his control? And it was with your notebook. So what’d you do—tell him to get it for you?”
“I didn’t tell him anything.” He whipped around to face his brother. “Did you put that stuff there?”
Uncertainty flashed across Bastian’s face. He looked cornered, frantic. But he quickly masked those emotions. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” he insisted.
“You have to know.” Jack joined the conversation even though he’d been making an effort to stay out of it. “You’re the only one who could’ve taken it—and Ismay’s underwear.”
“It wasn’t me,” he said. “I didn’t take either one!”
Remy’s eyes narrowed. “Bastian, if you’re up to your old tricks—”
“Stop it!” Bastian broke in. “Shut up, or you’ll be sorry!”
Ismay didn’t know what that meant. Was she wrong? Did those things belong to Bastian or Remy? “One of you is very sick,” she said. “You should seek help.”
“It’s not me,” Remy said emphatically. “According to my mother, you’re willing to believe Bo didn’t murder his father, even though he was convicted of it and served time, and yet you won’t believe I didn’t stick a duffel bag of underwear in my closet?”
Ismay rubbed her forehead. She couldn’t say who had done what. But she knew one thing. Bo was the man she wanted. “Forget it,” she said. “This isn’t even about that.”
“Then what’s it about?” he asked. “Why have you broken off our engagement?”
The memories of everything they’d shared over the past three years flashed through her mind as she looked at him. A certain nostalgia came with it. They’d had good times and bad. But when she thought of going back to Remy—she knew that wasn’t the path she wanted to take. “Because I’m in love with someone else,” she replied.
He looked like she’d slapped him. “You’ve only been here a short time!”
She got the keys to the truck from the kitchen counter and gave them to him. “I know,” she said. “I can’t explain it. But I can’t deny it, either.”
“You’re making a big mistake. Huge!” he snapped and might have pushed her on his way out if Jack hadn’t yanked her to one side. “This isn’t over,” he added.
Bastian looked surprisingly rattled as he followed his brother outside. “This isn’t going to end well,” he muttered.
“All you have to do is leave us alone, and it’ll end fine,” Jack called after them. But they didn’t respond. They didn’t bother to shut the door, either, so Ismay could hear both engines when they flared to life and reached the front stoop in time to see Remy squeal the tires of the Jeep as he backed out of the drive and went flying down the road.
When his phone dinged, Bo glanced down to see Ismay’s name pop up with a message. But he didn’t dare read it. He couldn’t take having her turn on him, making him feel the way Matilda had made him feel fourteen years ago, as if he had no chance of being heard, let alone believed.
When Ismay didn’t respond to him the day he was fired, he almost blocked her—not because he didn’t want to hear from her but because he was afraid he’d never hear from her again. If he blocked her, he’d never have to know. He thought it might be easier that way.
But he couldn’t bring himself to go through with it, couldn’t quite extinguish the hope that he might’ve established enough credibility with her that she’d give him a chance to explain.
She didn’t know him very well, however, so he was asking for a lot, probably more than he had a right to expect. Most people believed the worst when they heard someone had been convicted of murder. If he hadn’t been through what he’d been through, maybe he’d be like everyone else. He had assumed a fake name and lied about his past. He was guilty of that, which didn’t exactly build his credibility.
Still, he hadn’t murdered anyone and would always want the people he cared about most to believe him.
He let her text go unread for the rest of the day. Matilda was cooking up a storm and storing meals in the freezer, so Chester could heat them up after she was gone. And Bo was repairing all the dry rot around the dilapidated house and painting. They’d both been busy, but they had dinner with Chester every night, and after Chester went to bed, they’d sit out on the deck and talk until late. Despite having his past discovered by the Windsors, which meant Ismay had learned about it, too, the past three days had been a time of healing as he and his sister put things right between them. But they didn’t have too much longer to be together, especially with time alone. Her husband was bringing her two boys—five and three—to Louisiana over the weekend to meet him. Then Matilda was going home with her family.
Bo figured he’d stay on Grand Isle until Chester’s arm healed. Then, after his belongings arrived from Mariners, he’d try to find another job in another place that held more promise. Fortunately, he’d saved most of the money he’d earned working for the Windsors. Since his housing and vehicle had been covered, and he lived a simple life, he hadn’t spent much, only what he’d needed for food and basic necessities.
“You were quiet at dinner tonight,” Matilda pointed out after Chester said good-night and shuffled down the hall, and they once again settled into the chairs on the deck.
Bo had been consumed by the text he’d received from Ismay—was constantly thinking about it while putting off actually looking at it. He was afraid she’d sent a reproach of some kind. She had a right to be angry. He’d slept with her without telling her who he really was, but he didn’t want to ruin his memory of that night by spoiling it with accusations and anger or the news that she was going back to Remy.
“Just tired,” he said. He hadn’t told her that he’d assumed a new name or been fired. He didn’t see the point of going into all that. Although she knew his time on Mariners was over, he’d just told her he was tired of doing maintenance work for rich people and was going to move on in search of something else after he left Louisiana. She’d been trying to talk him into moving to Tampa, where she lived, ever since. But he could never go back to Florida. Florida held too many memories.
Almost an hour later, Matilda’s phone dinged with a text, and she lifted it to show him. “I can’t wait for you to meet the boys,” she said.
Bo smiled at a picture her husband had sent of her children hamming it up in their pajamas. He’d never dreamed Matilda would be eager to have him around her kids. It was proof that she finally believed he was innocent—and that felt even better than he could’ve imagined. “You think you’ll have any more children?” he asked.
“Maybe one. I’d like a little girl.” She set her phone aside and took another sip of her beer. “What about you? Would you like children one day?”
Bo had finished his beer thirty minutes ago. “If I can get anyone to marry me,” he joked.
She didn’t laugh with him. She studied him for several seconds, then said, “You’ll find someone. And whoever you settle down with will be lucky to have you.”
“There isn’t much to recommend me.”
She looked pained when she said, “I’m sorry for my part in that. The more I’ve come to know you these last few days, the more I realize how wrong I was to believe what I did.”
“Let’s not relive it,” he said. “It happened, it’s over. We have to salvage what we can from the wreckage and move on.”
“I know. It’s just...” She groaned. “You lost twelve years of your life because of me.”
“We don’t know that. I had the motive and the opportunity, and my fingerprints were on the murder weapon. I probably would’ve been convicted either way.” What she’d said to the jury certainly hadn’t done him any favors, but he’d been far more hurt by the fact that she’d refused to believe him about what really happened that night.
“Thank you.” She reached out to take his hand. “Thank you for understanding and forgiving me in spite of everything,” she said and gave his hand a squeeze before getting up to go to bed.
Bo stayed on the deck alone, listening to the cicadas as he held his phone in his hand, both longing to read Ismay’s text and dreading it. Finally, when the hall light snapped off and he knew Matilda wouldn’t come out again, he drew a bolstering breath and navigated to the message that’d held his heart and mind hostage all day.
I’m sorry it’s taken me a while to process everything that’s happened. I wanted to be sure of how I feel before I said anything. Now I hope I’m ready because I can’t wait any longer. I miss you too much. And I want to tell you that I have no idea what happened the night your father died, but deep inside, I know you’re a good man—and that’s all that matters to me. I hope what we had, though new and untried, was worth enough to you that you’ll come back.
He’d prepared himself for so much worse he almost couldn’t absorb the meaning of those words. He read her message three times before the pressure on his heart and gut eased—so much that he suddenly felt light as a feather—and he turned his face up to the moon and smiled. He’d gotten twelve years in prison he didn’t deserve. Now he was getting the chance to continue a relationship with the most beautiful woman he’d ever met—beautiful in every sense—which was probably something he didn’t deserve, either.
Life could be inexplicable, totally unfair and cruel and yet exquisite and fleeting and gorgeous at the same time. Ismay had far less reason to believe in him than the family and friends who’d turned their backs on him when he was on trial. But against all odds, she was still there, and she had her hand outstretched.
But could he take it? What did he have to offer someone like her?
“Any word from Bo?”
After having breakfast in town, Ismay and Jack were slowly walking around the island to the public beach closest to Honey’s house. They could’ve taken an Uber, but the exercise was good for them, and the long lazy days ahead removed any sense of urgency. “Not yet,” she replied.
“But you wrote him last night?”
“I did. After you went to bed.” She took out her phone and showed her brother the message.
He smiled as he read it. “That’s nice. It must’ve felt good to receive that. I’m shocked he hasn’t written you back.”
“I took a while to decide how I feel. He deserves the same courtesy.”
He stopped to remove a small rock from his flip-flop. “Are you afraid he won’t come back?” he asked as he straightened.
“Terrified,” she admitted. “Especially because Remy’s been texting me like crazy, telling me I’m making a big mistake—never mind his cheating,” she added with a roll of her eyes.
Jack started walking again. “He’s not taking no for an answer?”
“Not so far. He insists things will be different back in LA. He also told me Bastian packed up Bo’s things and will be shipping them to Louisiana.”
Jack frowned. “That suggests Bo isn’t coming back.”
She stared at the ground as they walked. “Yeah. There’ll be nothing left for him here.”
“Except you,” he pointed out hopefully. “At least if he comes back, you’ll know why.”
“I guess,” she allowed.
He adjusted his sunglasses. “What will you do if he doesn’t?”
“There’s not much I can do,” she replied. “I’ll try to stay in touch for a while, but he has to want me badly enough to make the effort and be willing to take the risk. And I’m not convinced he does.”
He gave her a lopsided smile. “He’d be a fool to miss out on someone like you.”
“After what he’s been through, maybe all he wants is to lick his wounds. He might not be ready for a relationship.” As much as it hurt to admit that, it was a stark reality she had to face. Maybe it was easiest to remain closed off, so he couldn’t make a mistake or get hurt again.
“All you can do is let go and hope he comes back,” Jack said, but then he grabbed her arm and jerked her to a stop. “Ismay...”
She looked up to see Remy and Bastian coming around the bend in the Jeep, probably going into town. “Just ignore them. Act like you don’t even see them,” she muttered, and he fell in step beside her as she started walking again. But she was glad he didn’t look away like she did, because a second later, the Jeep swerved toward them going full speed, and he had to throw her to the side so she wouldn’t be hit.
She landed so hard that she skinned her hands and knees, but at least they hadn’t been seriously hurt. Jack landed on the ground next her and his hands and knees were also skinned.
“What the heck?” he cried, jumping to his feet. But Remy and Bastian were already well beyond them, heading down the road toward town as if nothing had happened.
“Remy just tried to hit us!” Jack cried, as if he couldn’t quite believe what’d occurred.
Ismay got up and dusted the tiny rocks out of the flesh of her hands and knees as she tried to process the fact that the man she’d been planning to marry could’ve killed her with that kind of impulsive, reckless behavior.
“Remy and Bastian are dangerous, Is,” Jack said. “I’m not sure we can remain on the island. Remy seems like the kind of man who thinks if I can’t have her, no one can.”
“We can’t leave,” she said. “What about Honey? We told her we’d look after her house and her cat.”
“We’ll have to tell her it’s not safe for us, not with Bastian and Remy around.”
“I think we should go to the police before we do that.”
Jack gestured at the blood appearing on some of their scrapes. “About this?”
“About all of it—this, the duffel bag, the picture of Lyssa, Bastian’s alarming behavior, Remy’s possessiveness...”
“You know the Windsors have a lot of influence here.”
“I know. When Lyssa died in that fire, they stepped in to make sure Remy and Bastian walked away without any consequences.” They might try to do the same now, but it was high time someone fought them for the sake of truth and justice. “But I’m an attorney, Jack. I believe in upholding the law.”
He scowled before finally relenting with a sigh. “O-kay,” he said with a heavy emphasis on the second syllable. “We’ll try that. But if it doesn’t work, I’m getting you off this island.”