Page 108 of Lucky Haven

I am the problem here. He doesn’t know how to talk to me, doesn’t like to look at me. He’s overwhelmed by any flash of my body, like my flesh-and-blood grown womanness is painful to look at.

Instead of feeling shame for that, it gives me a burst of unexpected power.

I think about Cash, how he loves my body so much. How proximity to me soothes him, makes him loving and attentive.

I hate that I made three words a dealbreaker when he gave me everything else. I swallow a sob before Jeb hears it, because I can’t make him any more mad.

If I die in this cabin, I’ll never get to tell Cash it’s okay. I can be patient and wait for him to heal. I can love him how he is, not how I want him to be.

I will not die in this cabin.

Chapter Thirty-Seven

Cash

Twelve years ago, I made this drive in a van full of kids I had nothing in common with, only to make my mother happy. She hated that I got a tattoo before I was old enough, and thought a bit of church might be good balance.

Since that’s how I got to know Haven, she wasn’t wrong in the end.

But I didn’t pay close attention on that trip.

Didn’t know I’d need to memorize this road. When I hit gravel, which is loud as hell under the tires, I pull off onto the shoulder and kill the engine and the lights.

Looking at my phone, I estimate I’ve got maybe five hundred meters to cover on foot.

I text Jasper a pin of my location.

Cash

Had an idea. Checking out this cabin the church uses sometimes. Ask Bingham about it if he’s still with you.

And then I put my phone on silent and begin my approach under cover.

I go on foot, cutting into the treeline. The ground is uneven and it’s dark as hell, but I go slow enough to be silent, and my eyes adjust. I don’t appreciate much about my time in the military, but they taught me reconnaissance skills that come in fucking handy.

And never more than right now.

The cabin comes into sight as I climb onto the high ground.

Lights blaze from the windows.

And the New Harvest van is parked close to the front steps.

I pull my phone from my pocket. Ignoring a reply from Lane I don’t want to read, I send another update, a photo of the van.

Cash

Affirmative sighting.

Staying in the trees, always keeping something between me and the windows, I circle the building, cataloguing the rooms. None of the rooms on the second floor have lights on, or any visible movement.

On the ground floor, there’s movement in what looks like a kitchen, but the windows are dirty and it’s hard to see who is where.

There’s thirty feet of cleared ground between the tree line and the cabin. No cover, wide open space where I’ll be spotted in the moonlight if I move at the wrong time.

Moving faster, I circle back to where the van is, and line myself up so I can use his own vehicle against him, getting low enough that I’m blocked from sight.

I test the driver’s side door, and it opens with a creak.