Wind Chime Wedding (A Wind Chime Novel Book 2) Read online

  As long as she and Taylor were his, no one was going to hurt them ever again.

  He reached for the doorknob. “Stay upstairs until I come back.”

  A brief flicker of understanding registered in her green eyes. “Someone’s down there.”

  He nodded, half expecting her to say she was coming down with him. Annie had been a single mother for a long time before he’d come into her life. She was used to taking care of things, of protecting Taylor on her own. It would be a shift for both of them when he moved back to the island. They were going to have to make some adjustments in their new lives together—adjustments and compromises. But she needed to let him do this. She needed to let him step into this role from now on.

  It was what he did. It was what he’d spent his whole life doing—protecting people.

  She crossed the room to where he stood and touched her lips lightly to his. “I’ll check on Taylor.”

  Relieved, he opened the door, letting her walk through it first. She slipped quietly into Taylor’s bedroom and he crossed the small, second story apartment to the stairs. It was still dark out and Main Street should have been empty except for a few watermen heading down to the docks for the day. When he got to the bottom of the steps, he spotted Ryan’s silver Chevy parked in front of the café.

  His friend was standing in the yard, talking to a woman with a stiff helmet of blond hair and a black suit that looked glaringly formal compared to his friend’s sweatshirt, Carhartts, and faded ball cap. Across the street, a man was unloading a giant camera bag from the back of a white Channel Six news van.

  The string of silver chimes hanging from the knob rang softly as Will opened the door and stepped out onto the porch.

  The camera flashed through the darkness, blinding him. He waited for his vision to come back into focus, looking straight at the source, into the lens, not moving for several long beats until the man across the street slowly lowered the device.

  A second man stepped out of a small blue sedan parked under the oak tree. He was wearing jeans and a button down shirt so wrinkled it looked like he might have slept in his car overnight. He carried a small tape recorder and a notebook in one hand—a newspaper reporter, most likely.

  Ryan’s black lab, Zoey, let out a low growl when he stepped onto the lawn.

  The man glared at the animal. “What’s wrong with your dog?”

  “She doesn’t like you,” Ryan said.

  “Well, hang onto her,” he snapped. “I came for breakfast, not to get attacked by some redneck’s dog.”

  Zoey growled again.

  “The café doesn’t open for another hour,” Will said, his voice measured and calm, despite the anger building inside him.

  The reporter flashed him a smile. “I think I’ll sit on the steps until it opens. I heard this place has the best sweet rolls in Maryland. Don’t want to miss the first batch out of the oven.”

  Will stepped into his path.

  The reporter’s smile faded. “Look, man. I don’t know who the hell you are, but this is a public restaurant and I have just as much of a right to be here as you do.”

  Will’s hand shot out, grabbing the recording device from the man’s hand before he had a chance to blink. Will snapped it in half, letting the pieces fall onto the lawn.

  Before the man had a chance to say anything, the blonde jogged across the lawn, stepping between them. “Sir, excuse me. Hi.” She smiled, batting her eyelashes up at him. “I’m Miranda. I’m with Channel Six News out of Baltimore. My producer is willing to pay a very competitive rate for an exclusive interview with Annie and Taylor.”

  She laid her hand on Will’s arm, giving it a flirtatious squeeze in case he hadn’t gotten the message. “If you’d just come back over to the van and let me discuss the terms, I think you’d be more than satisfied with the arrangement.”

  Will looked down at where her fingers rested on his arm.

  The blond helmet quivered as she quickly pulled her hand back.

  The other reporter grabbed what was left of his recording device off the grass, narrowing his eyes at Will. “You’ll be getting a bill for this.”

  Will barely looked at him. “I wouldn’t hold your breath waiting for a check.”

  The man walked away and Will looked back at the woman. He didn’t smile. He didn’t say anything. He just continued to stare at her overly made up face until she huffed out a breath and stepped back.

  Frustrated that he hadn’t fallen for her feminine charms, she tugged on the hem of her blazer, pulling the top down a half an inch to expose what, under different circumstances, he might have considered an impressive display of cleavage.

  “Is that how you get your stories?” Will asked, his gaze flicking down, then back up with complete disinterest. “Because, if it is, that’s just sad.”

  Her smile vanished, her face flushing bright red. She started to turn, but her heel wobbled over a loose patch of dirt and she stumbled. “Gary,” she said to her cameraman, as she tromped back across the yard. “I think we should go.”

  The man stepped out from behind his camera, which he’d set up on a tripod aimed toward the front door of the café. “Our producer really wants this clip.”

  Another car drove up the street from the opposite direction and pulled up to the curb outside the café. Della stepped out of the driver’s seat, her arms loaded with containers of fresh baked pastries. She took one look at the gathering of people in the yard and her eyes widened. “What’s going on here?”

  The cameraman snapped her picture and Della staggered back, blinking against the bright flash.

  Ryan walked over to her, taking the baked goods from her arms and holding her elbow to steady her until her vision came back.

  Will crossed the yard slowly to where the cameraman stood. He held out his hand. The cameraman started to protest, but when he looked up and caught the expression in Will’s eyes, he simply handed his camera over.

  Will unfastened the back, taking out the memory card and the battery, and pocketed them both. “Do you want to keep this camera?” he asked quietly, the threat unmistakable in his voice.

  “It’s against the law to assault a reporter,” the man said, but his voice shook and he took a step back.

  “I said,” Will repeated slowly, “do you want to keep this camera?”

  “Yes,” the man squeaked.

  “Then I suggest, you leave.”

  The man snatched the camera back and grabbed his tripod, dashing back across the street to where the female reporter was already waiting in the van. Within seconds, his door had slammed and they were driving away.

  Della walked over to Will, her expression livid. Rubbing her eyes to get the spots out of her vision from the blinding flash, she blinked a few more times, then took the container of scones back from Ryan. “When did this start?”

  “A few minutes ago.” Ryan ran his hand over Zoey’s sleek black head when the dog walked over and nudged his leg with her nose. Looking out at the street as another flash of headlights came over the bridge, he shook his head. “Here comes another one.”

  Will reached into his aunt’s container, taking an almond scone for himself and handing one to Ryan. “I hope you didn’t have any plans today.” Breaking off a corner of the pastry, he fed a bite to the dog. “I have a feeling we’re going to be doing this for a while.”

  Spraying up water from the still slick roads, Colin steered his truck around a fallen branch and took in the long stretches of corn and soybean fields through the windshield. Farmhouses and oak trees dotted the flat, rural landscape, and early morning sunlight filtered through the rows of crops, glistening green from last night’s rain.

  He was only a few miles away from Heron Island, but the two hour drive from Annapolis had done nothing to calm him down. As soon as Grace had told him last night that she was running the article without a quote from Annie, he knew his plan had backfired.

  He had tried calling the café all evening, but Annie had refused to
answer, and he didn’t blame her. The press was having a field day at the notion of another public battle between Nick Foley and his ex-wife, and the real story—the one about Taylor and the other children potentially losing their school—had gotten buried in the frenzy.

  He would have driven down the night before, as soon as the article had released online, but Will had already been on his way home by then. As soon as Colin had called his friend and filled him in on the news, Will had dropped everything and headed back to the island to be with his fiancée and future step-daughter, not only to make sure that they were okay, but to run interference if any reporters came to the café.

  Will had been pissed at Colin, understandably, for not telling him right away. Colin knew now that that had been a mistake. He had wanted to take care of the situation, to fix it before anyone else found out. He hadn’t wanted the islanders to know that he was responsible for those budget cuts, that he was the one who was responsible for shutting down their school.

  Now that everyone knew the role he’d played, he wasn’t sure where he stood anymore. His whole life he had felt like an outsider. He had never fit into his father’s political world. He had been an afterthought to his mother as soon as she’d given birth to a child of her own blood. Even on the SEAL teams, when he’d finally found the family he’d never had before, he had unintentionally gravitated toward a specialty that had set him apart, that had isolated him behind the scope of a sniper rifle.

  It shouldn’t have surprised him that that was where he’d felt most natural—alone, separated, detached. Even if it hadn’t been what he’d wanted. Even if all he’d ever wanted was to belong, to be accepted, to be recognized—not for some political role he could fill, not for his skill with a firearm, not for the way he’d looked in his uniform—but for who he was.

  He had hoped, maybe foolishly, that Heron Island could be that place for him. But what if the islanders didn’t see him the same way he saw them? What if they still saw him as an outsider?

  What if they would always see him that way?

  A thin grove of white pines blocked the sun, casting long shadows over the road. When he came out on the other side of the trees, the land narrowed and wetlands wove in and out of the freshly planted fields. A flash of bright orange caught the corner of his eye, and he glanced out the passenger side window, spotting a figure walking along the edge of the water. His first thought was that it was probably one of the farmers checking his crops, but when he took a closer look, he saw that it was a child wearing a backpack.

  Glancing in the rear view mirror to see if there was a yellow bus lumbering down the long road to pick him up, he realized that he hadn’t seen another vehicle on the road for several miles. It seemed odd that the kid was walking toward St. Michaels instead of Heron Island. If his family lived all the way out here, wouldn’t he go to school on the island? And shouldn’t he be heading that way fairly soon?

  Slowing the truck, Colin scanned the fields for a home that could belong to the kid’s family, but the only farmhouse he could see was on the opposite side of the road. Trusting his gut instinct that there was something wrong with this picture, he veered onto a dirt road reserved for tractors and farm equipment. His truck rumbled over the deep grooves and ruts filled with rainwater. Mud sprayed up from the back tires and sunlight streamed through the rain soaked leaves of the sycamores bordering the fields.

  When he was a few hundred feet away, the kid stopped abruptly and turned, meeting his eyes through the windshield. Colin got a good look at his face for the first time. The kid couldn’t be more than seven or eight years old. He was wearing a fleece jacket that was a few sizes too big. His ripped jeans were splattered with mud and his blue eyes seemed vaguely familiar.

  Colin rolled to a stop. “Hey,” he said, leaning his arm out the window and keeping his tone light and friendly. “You need a ride somewhere?”

  The kid shook his head.

  Colin cut the engine and opened the door, stepping out of the truck. As far as this kid was concerned, he was probably no more than a stranger. He understood why he might be wary of getting in the car with him, but he wasn’t going to let him wander off alone into the wilderness on a school day. If his parents hadn’t realized he was missing yet, they would probably be worried sick when they did. “Where are you going?”

  The kid started walking again. “Nowhere.”

  Colin closed the door and started after him. “What’s your name?”

  The kid said nothing. He simply adjusted the straps of his pack and continued to tromp through the muddy field toward the next line of trees where he would be able to disappear from sight for a while.

  “My name’s Colin Foley.”

  “I know who you are,” the kid shot back.

  Interesting, Colin thought, taking in the shaggy brown hair and the bright orange backpack that was crammed so tight that whatever was inside was straining the tattered seams. If this kid knew who he was, then he was probably from the island. “Where do you live?”

  The kid jerked a thumb over his shoulder, pointing back toward the island.

  Colin kept his steps light and soft, maintaining a comfortable, nonthreatening distance between them. “Shouldn’t you be going to school soon?”

  “I’m not going.”

  “Why not?”

  The kid shrugged. “The school’s closing anyway. What’s the point?”

  Colin let that sink in. “It might not close,” he said after a few moments. “And even if it does, you’ll still have to go to school somewhere, even if it’s in a different town.”

  “Whatever.”

  Colin continued to follow him through the rows of soybeans. “What grade are you in?”

  “Second.”

  Second, Colin thought. That meant he was in Becca’s class. Looking down at the kid’s shoes, he saw that they were soaking wet. The laces were untied, dragging behind him, tangled in mud-caked knots. From the look of things, he’d probably been walking for a few hours. How could have gotten so far from the island without anyone coming after him yet?

  It wasn’t like he’d been that hard to spot from the road.

  “Don’t you think your friends are going to wonder where you are when you don’t show up at school today?” Colin asked.

  The kid shrugged, picking up his pace.

  “What about your parents?” Colin asked. “Don’t you think they might be worried about you?”

  “No.”

  “No?”

  The kid shook his head.

  “I doubt that,” Colin murmured.

  “Really?” The kid spun around, facing him for the first time since they’d left the dirt road. “I bet no one’s even noticed I’m gone.”

  Colin stopped walking. If that was true, then they had a much bigger problem. “Why would you think that?”

  The kid squeezed his hands into fists at his sides. “I know it.”

  Colin studied the kid’s face again. There was definitely something familiar about his features, but he still couldn’t place him. “Look,” he said, switching tactics. “Maybe you’re right, but how about I give your mother a quick call anyway, just to let her know you’re safe?”

  The kid shook his head. “My mom’s at work.”

  “That’s okay,” Colin said, pulling out his phone. “Where does she work? I can look up the number.”

  “She can’t take calls at work.”

  Colin paused. That seemed unlikely. “Does she have a cell phone?”

  “She never remembers to charge it.”

  “Okay,” Colin said slowly, “what about your dad?”

  “My dad’s dead.”

  Colin lowered the phone back to his side, the words hanging between them. He’d lost enough friends to know there was nothing anyone could say to make the grief feel better, so he just stood there, watching as the kid swiped at a tear.

  A bluebird trilled from the branches of a flowering dogwood at the edge of the field as he tried to remember who had died r
ecently on the island. When he recalled that Jimmy Faulkner’s brother had lost a short and sudden battle to pancreatic cancer over the winter, he took a closer look at the kid. Yeah, that was why he looked so familiar. He must have seen him hanging around the inn from time to time when Jimmy was working. “Are you Luke Faulkner?”

  The kid nodded.

  “Is Jimmy Faulkner your uncle?”

  He nodded again.

  “I know Jimmy pretty well,” Colin said. “I could give him a call. Maybe he could take the day off and you guys could hang out for a while.”

  Luke looked down, shaking his head.

  “Why not?”

  Luke jammed the toe of his sneaker into a row of soybeans. “He and my mom had a big fight last night.”

  “About what?”

  Luke lifted a shoulder, like he didn’t really care, but Colin knew he cared. He cared a lot—enough to run away because of whatever had been said during that fight. “There’s this thing at school on Friday.”

  “What kind of thing?”

  “We’re supposed to bring a parent with us.” Luke glanced up, then back down, embarrassed. “You know, like to spend the day with us.”

  “Your mom can’t go?” Colin guessed.

  Luke shook his head. “She has to work, so she asked Uncle Jimmy if he could go with me.”

  “What did he say?”

  “He said, no.”

  Colin reached out, laying a hand on Luke’s shoulder. “Hey,” he said gently, “don’t worry. We’ll find someone to go with you.”

  Luke’s gaze flickered back up. “Who?”

  “I don’t know yet, but trust me. We’ll find someone.” Colin squeezed his shoulder, frowning again when he felt how bony it was. Eyeing the bulging pack hanging off Luke’s back, he nodded toward it. “Do you have any food in there?”