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Gage turned away from it. “When we were kids. We promised each other that if we weren’t married by the time we were forty, we’d be together.”
No shit.
“When we were kids being the key part of that phrase there.” A huff worked its way into Evie’s response. “Why are we back here? The fences are in place for a reason.”
I was actually as curious about the place as I was the people. There was an energy here. It should be nothing. Dead. Flat. Lifeless. But something hummed underneath all of that. “We could walk around the outside edge. Get a closer look.”
“We could go in if we wanted.” Gage nodded at an opening in the fence a few feet away.
I should’ve noticed that. Someone had me distracted.
Evie worried her bottom lip, but there was curiosity rather than concern in her eyes. “Yeah, okay. I’m in.”
“Me too.” What the fuck was I doing? I was a forty-eight-year-old man, and I was about to creep around abandoned barracks in the middle of the day with two strangers.
But I couldn’t ignore that the buildings and the company called to me.
Gage held open the fence. “Scout first. That’s you.” He looked at me.
Sure, why not. I crouched enough to slip through the opening in the chain link, then turned and watched them join me.
We started our way down one row between the structures.
“How did you know?” Gage asked as we walked. “That we weren’t together?”
He didn’t really want me to answer that. I was going to anyway. “You’ve spent at least a quarter of the time since I’ve met you staring at her tits and ass.” At my words, pink crept across Evie’s cheeks. “At least as much time looking like a dope when she says something, yet you do your best not to touch her.”
Gage’s expression was growing as dark as the shadows we crept in. “Not everyone is comfortable with public displays of affection.”
“I don’t mean that.” I’d already started, I might as well finish. “I mean the little touches. The intimate finger brushes. The stolen kisses and tiny shoulder bumps. They’re not only missing, but you’re going out of your way to avoid them.”
“You’re more observant than I gave you credit for.” Evie sounded thoughtful.
I shrugged. Best to set a low bar and exceed it every time. “I’m more a lot of things than you gave me credit for.”
“We’re here to see ghosts, let’s look for ghosts.” Gage’s change of subject was less than subtle.
Okay. “How exactly are we doing that?”
“Urban exploration. We wander. We extend our feelers. We… listen?” Gage faltered.
Evie paused near a building and pressed her palm to the faded stain and splintered wood. “Sometimes the ghosts spill their secrets.”
“What does that mean?” I asked.
She resumed walking. “Exactly what it sounds like.” Her tone implied that was the end of that conversation.
We continued our stroll, down one row, and up the next. The conversation fell off as the barracks loomed around us, and even the voices were gone from the other people. The atmosphere here demanded reverence. Silence.
Clouds moved in above us, lengthening the shadows and making the air feel heavier. But not in a bad way. It wasn’t a spooky kind of atmosphere, it was more like the three of us were isolated from the rest of the world, and wrapped in our own little bubble of discovery.
I shook the weird thought aside, and turned my focus to appreciating the view in front of me. Evie’s fascination with each new spot, as well as the sway of her hips and her smooth, tempting exposed shoulders.
Was I looking forward to spending the next week or two in negotiations with her? Yes, I was.
“I want to look inside.” At the abrupt announcement, Evie stopped next to one of the windows. It was nearly a foot above her head.
Gage dropped to one knee without hesitation, propping the other against the side of the house, and offering her a hand.
