Read Online In Too Deep by Tracey Alvarez - Free Book Online Page B

playing
the piano like a girl. He couldn’t remember now if it were Gavin or
his older brother, Seth. Most likely Gav, since he’d always been a
nasty little prick, while Seth, at least, grew out of being a
complete asshat.
    “ So,” Ben said after a comfortable
pause. “Piper gave you a bit of grief then?”
    “ She’s a pain in the butt. A
genetic trait, I reckon.”
    “ You gonna say that around my
mother?”
    “ I may be having a crappy day,
which is turning into a crappier week, but I haven’t got a death
wish. Yet.” West sat up and leaned forward, resting his forearms on
his thighs.
    “ I know some good spots to hide
your body if you want me to permanently end your
misery.”
    West grunted.
    “ You told her to go home, didn’t
you?” Ben said.
    “ What makes you think that,
Einstein?”
    “ Because I know you. And I know
her being here has shoved a burr up your ass.”
    West trained his eyes on a group
of kids racing across the beach, a sand-covered terrier hot on
their heels. Back to that again. This morning Ben’s reaction seemed
a normal, big-brother deal. But now? Ben and West double dated with
Piper and Erin at the girls’ final school ball, but had Ben guessed
he and Piper had been sleeping together for a few weeks before it?
Or was he just fishing? Best mate or not, this was one conversation
they weren’t having.
    “ I don’t care that Piper’s back
and I told her if she couldn’t cut it, she should hop on the next
ferry. You, on the other hand, have a cactus-sized burr up your ass
about your sister, and have had for years.”
    Ben snorted. “There’s nothing up
my ass but the sun shining out of it, thanks.”
    “ You resent her for becoming a cop
when it was your dream.”
    The smile switched off and Ben’s
knuckles flared white around the crutch’s hand grip. “More my old
man’s dream—and that dream’s ancient history. I resent her for much
more mature reasons now.”
    “ Sure. Like coming back here to
help you out?”
    “ You flipping sides now? You
always had a soft spot for her.”
    West cleared his throat and stood.
“Sod off. She’s only here to rub your nose in her generous gesture,
then she’ll swan off back to the city.”
    “ Exactly.” Ben leaned back on the
bench and crossed his ankle on top of his bulky cast. “So she’s
gone to buy a ferry ticket then?”
    “ No.”
    “ You should’ve known better than
to issue a challenge to Piper. She’ll never leave now.”
    West glanced over at Due South.
Piper, Shaye, Kezia, and Kezia’s little girl, Zoe, walked through
the doorway to one of the outside tables, talking and
laughing.
    “ Yeah, she will.”
    As soon as things got tough—and
they would—Piper would run. Just like she always did.
    Only this time she wouldn’t take
his heart with her.
     
    ***
     
    Piper entered Due South, her neck
muscles knotted from the effort of not glancing over her shoulder
at West and Ben still on the beach.
    Touches of Shaye and her mother
were everywhere in the restaurant. Ten years ago the dining room of
Due South could’ve been labeled “shabby chic”—minus the “chic.”
Interior design didn’t figure much in Bill Westlake’s world and he
hadn’t changed anything since his wife left the island.
    But now Piper saw Shaye’s hand in
the turquoise fish-themed watercolors on the whitewashed walls, the
splashes of matching color in the woven flax flower arrangements. A
smattering of late lunch diners lingered over their wine glasses
and desserts—seated on elegant cane chairs that screamed her
mother’s taste. Wicker baskets stacked with firewood sat beside an
open fire, ready to be lit when the temperature dropped.
    Bill must’ve let her mother and
sister go wild with the restaurant’s décor, but he’d left the bar
the same as it’d always been. A man cave.
    A little girl of eight or nine
kneeled on the sofa in front of the fireplace. Sitting beside her,
a woman with a riot of espresso-brown curls read a