Page 46 of The Story Between Us

He wouldn’t run.

He knew that even as he thought about it. He wouldn’t pack the truck and disappear, because the house stood here, and Emma’s notebooks sat here, and the seven pages—pathetic as they looked—existed here. Because running wouldn’t solve anything. Because tomorrow he’d still be stuck, still be empty, still be the fraud he’d always been.

And because Livvie would come back.

And oh, how he wanted her to come back.

He looked at the dogs. They looked back at him.

“I’m in trouble,” he said.

Huck sighed heavily, like this was nothing new.

Finn had already returned to the couch, making himself comfortable in the warm spot Livvie had left behind.

The light faded. The house grew dark.

And Nate just stood in the darkness.

Nine

The watercolors were sitting on Aunt Lila’s porch railing when Livvie left for the lake house that morning.

A small tin set—not cheap, not extravagant. The kind of paints someone who knew nothing about art but everything about quality would choose. No note. No explanation. Just twelve small circles of color arranged in a neat silver case, waiting in the early light like a quiet dare.

She stood there for a long moment, holding the tin in both hands, and felt something she didn’t have a name for crack open behind her ribs.

She tucked them into her bag without mentioning it to anyone. But at breakfast, something wasn’t right.

Nate greeted her with a too-bright, too-wide, good-morning-isn’t-it-a-beautiful-day smile that made every instinct she had start screaming. Nate Rivers did not smile like that. Nate Rivers barely smiled at all. And yet here he was, offering to make her coffee, asking if she’d slept well, acting like a man who had absolutely nothing to hide.

Livvie didn’t trust it for a second.

And maybe that was simply her guilt talking. After all, she’d barely slept (so, no to his question), because Emma’s sketches had played on a loop every time she’d closed her eyes. The Storybook Corner. The sketches. The joy in every line.

So no, she wasn’t going to admit to her thievery. Or her lack of sleep.

“You seem…cheerful,” she said, accepting the coffee mug.

“I’m in a good mood.”

“Any particular reason?”

“The writing’s going well.”

“Is it?”

“Mm-hmm.” He took a sip of his own coffee, still smiling. “I’ve been in the office since six. Really flowing today.”

“That’s great.” She wrapped her hands around the warm ceramic. “That’s really great, Nate.”

He nodded and disappeared back down the hall. The office door closed with a soft click.

Livvie stood in the kitchen, listening. No typing. No sound at all except the tick of the clock above the stove and Huck’s tail thumping against the floor.

Huh.

The man was up to something.