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  Chace poured coffee and gave him the bad news. “I don’t have half and half. Just milk.”

  “You don’t have half and half?”

  His tone was off in a way that Chace couldn’t read but it still set him on edge. Or more on edge.

  He looked over his shoulder at the man even as he reached for the sugar.

  “No.”

  Silas Goodknight locked eyes with him and announced, “My Faye, she puts half and half in her coffee. Hazelnut flavored.”

  There it was. A feeler.

  Chace and Faye were not seeing each other on the sly. By now, the whole town knew they were dating. Regardless, Faye had told Chace that she’d told her folks they were seeing each other when she was at dinner at their place last weekend.

  Now, Silas Goodknight knew that his daughter was not waking up and making her coffee at Chace’s house.

  Chace mentally added hazelnut flavored half and half to his grocery list and replied to Silas, “Buy her coffees at La-La Land, Silas. Know she likes hazelnut. Haven’t had occasion to see her usin’ half and half.”

  Silas held his eyes a moment before murmuring, “Right.”

  Chace turned away, prepared Silas’s coffee and handed the mug to the man before returning the milk to the fridge, tagging his own mug, turning toward him and resting his hips against the counter. Silas had the side of his hip to the island.

  Neither man spoke as they both sipped.

  Finally, Chace cut to it, “What brings you out this way, Silas?”

  Silas moved his gaze from contemplating the view out the picture window to Chace.

  “Been meanin’ to do it for a while so decided to do it. Wanted to tell you I admire what you did. That kinda thing doesn’t take bravery, it takes balls. Big ones. Not a lotta men would make the decision you made and carry it through. The kinda thing that was happening beats a man down. Most men think they have two choices and all the others took one of those two choices. Either he joins in or he cuts his losses and moves on. You didn’t do either ‘a those. You saw wrong bein’ done, stomached it for as long as you could then set about rightin’ it. Took guts. Took balls. Not a lotta men have either. You do. I admire that.”

  “Obliged but not sure I agree,” Chace muttered politely. Surprised this was his opener, not wanting to be on this subject, he braced because he had a strong feeling Silas didn’t seek him out to share gratitude a week after he found out Chace was dating his daughter.

  Silas’s focus grew intense and his voice went quiet when he returned, “Then you’d be wrong, son. Arnie Fuller was a piss-ant as a kid. His Dad was an asshole. His Granddaddy was an even bigger one. Then he got himself a uniform and he was no less a piss-ant. But a piss-ant with a badge is not a good thing. Grew from there ‘cause, see, that man had no way to go except bein’ an asshole like his kin. Problem was, he was better at it than both of ‘em. You may not have been here then but you know it grew and how it grew. It wasn’t bad when you started but that kinda shit is always bad, just the level of shit you gotta negotiate rising. Got to the point we were all drownin’ in it. You and Dolinski cleared that away. Not one man before you, even Tate Jackson, took that on. Two decades of shit at a rising level. So, I disagree with you not agreein’. You did a thing no man before you would do and a lot of people are grateful.”

  Not wanting to talk about this but definitely wanting to shut it down, Chace accepted the gratitude with a chin lift then he took another sip of coffee.

  Silas took a sip of his and his gaze returned to the window.

  Silas didn’t speak. Chace didn’t either. This stretched on awhile and Chace tired of it.

  “Silas, there more you wanted to share?”

  Silas’s eyes cut to him and he didn’t hesitate lowering the boom.

  “I don’t want you datin’ my daughter.”

  Chace felt his body go solid.

  Fuck, shit, there it was.

  Fuck.

  Shit.

  “Silas –” he started.

  Silas lifted a hand. “Grateful, son, told you that. But I’m an honest man so I came here to share that gratitude and lay it out. I wish you happiness. You deserve it but not with my daughter.”

  “That doesn’t sync, Silas,” Chace said quietly.

  “I get that. But I’m guessin’ you also get me,” Silas returned quietly. “See, Chace, I pay attention. Knew the kind of man you are the minute I laid eyes on you. Don’t know the story. Know it’s not a good one. It’s none of my business and I don’t wanna know. So I’m not askin’. What I do know is my daughter’s a dreamer. She hides those stars in her eyes but you don’t gotta look deep to see ‘em. As her father, I want her to live out whatever dream she’s cookin’ in that pretty head ‘a hers. I also know that you married a woman under the eyes of God and even if you didn’t wanna have your ring on her finger, it was. Then you went about your business like you hadn’t made those vows under the eyes of God. I figure you had your reasons but whatever they were, I’m a man, a husband, a father and I want good for my daughter. I hope somewhere inside you that you get me when I say that no matter what the reason, breakin’ that vow to your wife, to God, don’t sit good with me when it comes to you spendin’ time with my girl.”

  “We were married by a Justice of the Peace,” Chace shot back immediately when Silas stopped talking and he watched Silas blink.

  “Come again, son?”

  Chace straightened away from the counter and held the man’s eyes.

  “At the time, didn’t think I’d have another shot. What I did know was that if I married a woman I intended to love and cherish until death did us part, I’d be happy to stand in front of a preacher in God’s house and make that vow with the intention of keepin’ it. Misty wanted a church wedding. She did not get one for precisely that reason. I was not going to make a vow in God’s house that I intended to break. So I didn’t. Now, if I’m lucky enough to find a woman I love and cherish, I will make that vow to her and to God to stand by her side in sickness and in health until death do us part. And if that woman happens to be a woman I chose, a woman I actually love and cherish, make no mistake, Silas, when I make that vow, I’ll mean it.”

  He took in breath, Silas opened his mouth to speak but Chace beat him to it.

  “And I want you to know, I don’t take offense. You’re right. I get you. You just don’t get me. I even appreciate you comin’ here, lookin’ after your girl. You’re also right, what went down is none of your business. I’m not gonna tell you what that is, not ever. What I can promise you is that, if what’s bloomin’ between me and Faye keeps takin’ root, grows and blossoms, she will know everything. I will not keep anything from her. It’ll be up to her to make the decision whether she wants to stick with me on this path I’m on tryin’ to get back to the man I wanted to be. When she learns, if she decides to share that with you, that’s her call. I won’t get in the middle of family and how they communicate. I won’t ask her not to share. I’ll let her decide what she needs to do. I’m fortunate her folks are the folks they are ‘cause I already know without havin’ to ask that you and your wife won’t share if Faye does.”

  “Tryin’ to get back to the man you wanted to be?” Silas asked softly.

  “You swim in filth, Silas, it seeps in through your pores.”

  At that, Silas shifted away from the counter and whispered, “Son, you cannot take that on.”

  “Too late. I did that when I married Misty. I’ll give you a little. I got caught in that trap six years ago. I worked with IA for fourteen months. I reckon you can do the math.”

  “But –”

  Chace talked over him. He had shit to do. He didn’t want to talk about this. Even with a good man like Silas Goodknight deserving his time, reminding him he wasn’t good enough for Faye and why, he had no intention of backing off.

  “I didn’t take offense and I hope you won’t either when I say I’m not gonna back off Faye. She’s pretty, she’s sweet, she’s kind and she’s fun
ny. She makes me laugh. She gives me hope. I already know it’s selfish to be with her and I don’t care. Haven’t ever had the beauty she brings to my life, Silas, and six years ago I lost the hope I ever would. Selfish or not, I’ve experienced it now so I’m holdin’ on. No way I’m lettin’ that go. But because I respect the man I know you are, including the fact that you’re the kind of father who created that beauty, I’ll give you somethin’ so you can walk away with a little peace of mind. I’ll bend over backward, tie myself in knots and break my neck to do what I can to return the beauty she’s giving me. This isn’t God’s house but it cannot be denied my house is in God’s country so you can take that as you will when you get that vow.”

  Silas Goodknight stared at Chace without saying a word but Chace saw his eyes working. He just had no chance to prompt him to spit it out or find some way to shut this down because his cell rang.

  He yanked it out of his pocket, looked at the display and muttered a distracted, “Sorry, need a minute,” as he set down his coffee mug, took the call and wandered to the sink as he greeted, “Hey baby.”

  “The boy wrote us a note!” Faye screeched in his ear.

  Chace blinked at the landscape out his window. “What?”

  “The boy wrote us a note! His name is Malachi!”

  Jesus, Malachi? What the hell kind of name was Malachi?

  “He says he likes Snickers,” she went on excitedly in a quick rush. “He says the sleeping bag is super warm. He says he wants to read Holes and he wants the next Harry Potter. And he says he was able to get into the showers at the campsite north of town and take a shower! Isn’t… that… awesome?” she finished on a cry.

  “Yeah, honey,” Chace agreed on a smile.

  “We broke through!” she exclaimed.

  “Yeah,” he repeated.

  “It was in the return bin. My hands were shaking when I read it. Heck, they’re still shaking.”

  Christ, she was cute.

  And she was right. It was awesome so Chace made a decision.

  “Steppin’ it up,” Chace told her.

  She hesitated before she asked, “What?”

  “Done with sittin’ in your SUV watchin’ him grab his stash. Monday, I’m in my truck on the street, you’re standin’ by the return bin. If you can talk to him, good. I think this is a sign he might be willin’ to slip through that opening we created. Your mission will be to get him to come into the library and talk to us both. We get his story. We feel him out. See what he’ll give us. See if he’ll trust us and trust that CPS can look after him.”

  “Don’t you think it’s too soon?” she asked anxiously. “He just wrote us a note.”

  “Faye, honey, we been doing this for near on two weeks and he’s sleepin’ rough. We’re givin’ him shit but he’s still takin’ care of himself and he’s a little kid. He needs a roof over his head. Hot, good food in his belly. A guiding hand. Schooling. We can have no idea how long he’s been out there. He isn’t safe. We gotta get him safe and not in three weeks. If we can manage it, Monday.” She didn’t respond so he prompted, “You with me on this plan?”

  “Uh… okay,” she answered with zero enthusiasm.

  Clearly, she wasn’t with him.

  “We’ll go cautious,” he said quietly. “I might be a threat. You hopefully won’t. So it’s you at the returns. He doesn’t want to go into the library, you give him an alternate option. A home-cooked dinner and a hot shower in a real bathroom on Monday night. No strings, he can walk away. But we’ll talk to him while he’s eatin’ and do what we can to make him not want to walk away. You good with that?”

  “Um… sure.”

  Still hesitant, no enthusiasm, worried.

  “Baby,” he tried gentle this time, “we’re not gonna swoop down on him, cuff him and throw him in a cage. Ask him what his favorite meal is. Promise him you’ll make it. You make it, the way you cook, him livin’ rough, he’ll love it. We broke through. Now we push the advantage.”

  “Get to him through his stomach,” she whispered.

  “It’s worked so far,” he replied and heard her soft, melodic giggle.

  “Okay, Chace,” she agreed more firmly.

  “Okay,” he said through a smile.

  “I’m bringing champagne over tonight to celebrate,” she declared.

  “I’ll pick some up today, you just bring you.”

  A pause, this one slightly annoyed then, “Chace, I can afford champagne.”

  She was right and she was wrong. She had a junker car, lived on the cheap in a rental that was kickass but mostly because she made it that way and, until recently, she walked pretty much everywhere she needed to go unless it was to the mall, her parents’ or her sister’s.

  He’d been looking into the shit with the library and her salary was a matter of public record. She had a Master’s Degree and got paid just above half of his salary. It wasn’t poverty line but it also wasn’t what you’d expect someone with that level of education and increasing experience to get. She ran the library. Her job description was three pages long. Budgets, accounting, acquisitions, promotion, programs and managing a volunteer staff that Faye had told him numbered at five. She was a one-woman show. Her salary was peanuts for that level of responsibility.

  Chace had found this disturbing, especially with the threat of closure. He didn’t know a lot about it but he was looking into it and it didn’t look good, particularly with the cutbacks at CPD. In fact, it hinted at further corruption in the City Council which would surprise him and annoy him. They didn’t need any more of that shit and he didn’t want to have to deal with it. He just hadn’t had the chance to dig deeper.

  So she could afford champagne but not only would he rather she spend her money on the kid, dresses and boots like she wore to The Rooster, he was the kind of man who took care of his woman. Furthermore, he was going to the grocery store. He wanted her at his place to eat and then do other things, not making stops before she got there.

  “Faye, I’m goin’ to the store in about ten minutes. No need for us both to go,” he pointed out. “I’ll get champagne.”

  That bought him a quiet, sweet, “Oh. Right. Of course.”

  Chace grinned at the window again.

  “Well, I suppose I should climb down from cloud nine and get to work,” she remarked and he heard it as he often did. Even when she was cute, sleepy and hot on the phone in the morning, she didn’t like to let him go. She didn’t say it flat out, even tried to hide it, but it was there.

  Chace liked that.

  “Get to work and I’ll see you tonight.”

  “Okay, honey. See you tonight.”

  “Later, Faye.”

  “’Bye Chace and…” she paused then whispered, “Malachi. Yay.”

  She wasn’t cute. She was fucking cute.

  Through his grin, he muttered, “Bye, baby.”

  He disconnected, turned and his body gave an involuntary start, a reaction he showed and couldn’t bury, an unusual occurrence.

  This was because, first, he’d forgotten Silas Goodknight was even there.

  And second, Silas Goodknight was smiling at him huge.

  “Right!” Silas stated smartly and put his mug on the island with more force than needed. “That’s that. I’ll expect you and Faye over for dinner next Saturday night. Be there at six. Sondra likes flowers, pink ones. Just tell Holly, Holly’ll know what to do. Or tell Faye, she’ll know what to do too. Other than that, bring you and a big appetite. Sondra may bitch about me takin’ care of myself but that don’t mean when company comes, she don’t like to show off.”

  As Chace processed going from Silas’s surprise visit the reason for which was to tell him he didn’t want Chace dating his daughter to Silas asking Chace and Faye to dinner, Silas moved toward the front door.

  With no other choice, Chace followed him.

  They were outside, Chace at the top of the steps opening his mouth to give his farewell or say something else altogether, Silas at the botto
m when Silas turned, locked eyes with Chace and beat him to speaking.

  “Don’t know the path you’re on to the man you want to be. Do know that in any man’s life, the journey includes dark places we find ourselves in where we don’t wanna be. I get that you were in a dark place. I get you were there for a good while. I also know you made your way out. I don’t understand why you don’t think you’ve found the light and I won’t ask. You already told me you won’t share. I get that too. I probably wouldn’t either. But I know from the way you spoke about my daughter, the look on her face when she was talkin’ to me and Sondra about you last weekend, what she told us you were doin’ for that boy she took to lookin’ after and what I heard just now on the phone, you’ve already found that man. You just haven’t realized it yet.”

  As Chace stood in the cold in his jeans, shirt, sweater and socks staring down the stairs, Silas lifted a hand and finished, “See you next weekend.”

  Then he sauntered down Chace’s walk to his Wrangler.

  Chace watched him give another short wave through the windshield before he did a three-point turn and drove down Chace’s lane.

  Chace continued to stare after him as the Wrangler turned left and motored toward Carnal.

  Then he grinned and muttered, “Fuck me,” before he turned on his foot and walked back into his house.

  * * * * *

  As Chace drove up the drive to Tate Jackson’s house in the hills, he noted Tate had the company that Chace suggested he have. Deke’s beat up pickup truck. Wood’s Ford F-150. Ty’s Landcruiser. And a Cherokee Chace couldn’t place but he suspected it was Holden Maxwell’s considering Chace suggested Max get a call.

  Deke Hightower was a drifter but he had a strict path that he drifted between. Carnal to Sturgis. He lived simple. Beat up pickup. Harley. Roof over his head. Jeans on his ass. Food in his belly. And beer at Bubba’s or the All American Roadhouse in Sturgis, whisky if he felt like living it up. He took odd jobs along the way in order to facilitate this life. The man was rough, monosyllabic and enormous in height and breadth. This hid the fact that he was smart as a whip. But he didn’t try to hide the fact that he was loyal. He had Tate’s back when Tate and Laurie were getting to know each other and all that went down with that. He had Ty’s back during his drama.