Slow & Steady #3: A Shameless Southern Nights Novel Read online

  "Are these reservations you made at that cabin you told me about this morning?" This was a bit of a drive away, but then I would need to collect the bag I packed from my car. Which we were about to leave behind in the parking lot of the library. "Are we leaving town?"

  "I'll tell you when we get there," he said, keeping up the mystery of appearing at my work and insisting on whisking me off somewhere.

  I shifted in my seat to face him, sneaking a last glance at my car before we turned the corner and I couldn't see it any longer. "Fine, but just know that if we are leaving town, you're going to have to drive back to fetch my bag. It was right there in the car."

  "Maybe you won't need clothes where we're going,” he replied with a grin.

  Well, that certainly caught my attention. Heat flared between my legs and made me press my thighs together to ease the ache building there. Sonny seemed unaffected though, drumming out a beat on his steering wheel as he drove.

  Not wanting him to catch onto the fact I wasn't as calm and collected as he was, I folded my arms. "I could do without clothes, but what about a toothbrush?"

  He reached over to lay a hand on my thigh, sending tingles down my skin. "I've got this covered. Don't worry."

  "I wasn't worried," I muttered. "Just pointing out the importance of dental hygiene."

  Laughing, he squeezed my leg. "Your dental hygiene isn't in danger, I promise. Just relax, enjoy the ride."

  I settled back in my seat, deciding to let go and let whatever was about to happen, happen. Sonny pointed out landmarks to me as we drove out of town on a road to a neighboring town I had never visited before.

  The scenery was beautiful and serene. Rolling green hills and farms flanked the road, and I relaxed, taking it all in.

  About thirty minutes later, he turned off the main highway and down a dirt road that ended in what I could only describe as a fairy garden. Lights were strung in the trees, and cobblestone paths threaded through the area.

  The paths led to a small building resembling a cottage with smoke coming out of the chimney and a small sign that read Nonna's Italian Eatery. I opened my door to hear the soft sounds of authentic Italian music and what sounded like water running over rocks.

  Sonny came to stand next to me and took my hand again. I looked up at him, wondering what this was all about. "Where are we?"

  "One of the state's best-kept secrets,” he replied, leading me down one of the paths to the entrance of the restaurant. A short, elderly woman was waiting for us. Her black hair was flecked with silver, and she smiled as she opened her arms to us.

  "You must be Sonny and Niki." She surprised me by knowing our names. "Welcome. Please follow me."

  There were several other diners in the restaurant, but the tables were placed so everyone had some privacy. We walked through another door and were back outside, where there were only a few tables and more fairy lights and lanterns all around.

  She seated us and assured us she would be back soon. I lifted my eyes to Sonny's, in absolute awe of the restaurant. "This place is breathtaking. What did I do to deserve a surprise like this?"

  "You helped me make detective." He reached for my hand and filled me in on what Darren told him that morning. A sense of pride washed through me. I was pleased to have been able to help him but mostly proud he’d made detective.

  "I'm so proud of you. This is the best news."

  Stroking my knuckles with his thumb, his gaze was so intense, my breath caught in my throat. "It is, and it wouldn't have happened without you. Thank you, Niki."

  "You got all the information and chased down all the leads. I only followed the crumbs to tie it together. But you are very welcome. Did Darren tell you what's going to happen to Harris now?"

  "They're questioning him. When he gives up who he works for, I may get what I was looking for about my father."

  "Wow." I breathed out, overwhelmed by what this all could mean. Sonny might finally get some peace of mind, and his father, if innocent, would be one step closer to being a free man. "That's incredible."

  We kept talking throughout one of the most delicious meals I'd ever had. I was so full when we were done; I felt like I was going to burst. Even then, I still managed to squeeze in some of the ice cream Sonny and I shared for dessert.

  "You up for taking a walk? There's a stream we could walk behind the restaurant."

  A full moon had risen while we were eating, and I nodded, eager to see more of the beautiful surroundings but even more so to take a moonlit walk with Sonny. "Lead the way."

  The stream was gorgeous, clear water running over dark grey pebbles. Sonny and I walked as far as we could until the restaurant was nothing but a tiny blip of light behind us. We sat down on a fallen log, and he put his arm around my shoulders, pulling me close to his side.

  The walk was the perfect way to end our perfect evening. My feelings for him were bubbling under the surface of every moment. I kept biting my tongue about it and trying to follow Karen's advice by ignoring it. I didn’t want to scare him off with the intensity of my feelings for him, but it was becoming really hard not to say anything. Especially sitting next to him like this, in this setting.

  The only thing that stopped me was the possibility of ruining our perfect night. I thought Sonny loved me too, but he hadn't said it yet. If I said it now and I was wrong, I didn't know what I would do or how I would ever look him in the eye again.

  Just let the night be what it is, I urged myself. I had a fierce internal debate, the competing opinions trying to shout each other down—one saying I shouldn't take the coward's way out and the other telling me not to ruin what we had over a couple of simple words.

  In the end, I simply didn’t know what was best. This was all new to me, and I didn’t want to ruin it by rushing things. One day soon, I would tell him, I swore to myself. But today wasn't that day.

  Swallowing back the words on the tip of my tongue, I rested my head on his shoulder and listened to the first voice; I'd just let the night be what it was. It was absolutely perfect that way.

  Chapter Seventeen

  Sonny

  I whistled on my way into Evan’s garage. Nothing was going to wipe the smile off my face today, not even the conversation I came here to have with my brother.

  Last night with Niki was—Wow. Mind-blowing. Nothing earth-shattering happened, and nothing quantifiable changed between us, yet it felt like everything had. The connection between us was so strong now; it almost hurt me to be away from her. Like something was pulling me back to her side.

  If this was how Jeremy felt about Marie, I suddenly completely understood the lengths he went to for her. At the time, I thought he was crazy and irresponsible, especially when he told me he went to Dad for the money.

  But it made complete sense to me now. There wasn’t anything I wouldn’t do for Niki. No mountain I wouldn’t climb, no stone I would leave unturned. Love hadn’t turned me into a superhero, but it sure made me feel like I could be one if the circumstances called for it.

  I felt better than I ever had before. I—

  A damp rag hit me in the side of the face, cutting off my thoughts. I looked up to find Evan watching me with an amused expression in his sage green eyes. “Sorry, it flew right out of my hand. If you hadn’t been spacing out, I’m sure you’d have caught it.”

  I flipped him off, still not able to stop grinning. “I was just thinking.”

  He raised his eyebrows at me, walking over to scoop up the rag before motioning for me to follow him. “Isn’t that kind of the same thing?”

  “Nope. Spacing is, well, spacing. Thinking is just thinking.”

  He laughed and rolled his eyes. “Thanks, that clears it up.”

  “Always happy to help,” I shot back. We left the noise and clutter of the garage and walked into his office in the back.

  He shut the door behind us, bending down to grab two bottles of water from his mini-fridge. “In that case, I have a few hoods you could pop. I can use any help I can g
et. Business is booming lately.”

  “That’s great,” I told him earnestly. Evan worked hard. He put everything he had into the shop, and I was glad his risk was paying off.

  He shrugged, tossing one of the bottles of water at me. “Yeah. It is, but that’s not why you’re here. Unless you’re just saying hi.”

  “I’m not.” I grabbed onto the joyous feeling that had been coursing through me since last night and hung onto it with both hands. I didn’t want to lose the feeling yet, but this conversation wasn’t going to be easy. “I came to talk to you about something.”

  “Could you make that sound more ominous?”

  “Sure thing. I came to talk to you about something with Dad.”

  The smirk he was wearing froze on his face, then disappeared. “Fuck, Sonny. I was kidding. You didn’t really have to make it more ominous.”

  I inhaled a deep breath, inclining my head a little so he could see I wasn’t kidding either. Annoyance flashed in his eyes as he muttered, “Shit. I wasn’t expecting that.”

  “I know.” I felt guilty for springing it on him, but if I told him I wanted to talk to him about our father sometime, he would probably have told me I could have an appointment with him at half past never. “It’s important.”

  He sighed and sank into the chair behind his disaster zone of a desk. Evan would call it organized chaos, but to me, it always looked like plain old chaos—nothing organized about it. It looked like a bomb made of paperwork and spare parts had gone off in his small office.

  The only part of it that made sense to me was the one side of his desk where he kept his custom-made designs. Those were more ordered and spread out, with several pencils and colored markers around them.

  Closing the lid of the slim laptop in front of him, he propped his booted feet onto the desk and made a rolling motion with his hand. “I’m listening. Can’t promise I’ll agree with your assessment of it being important if it’s about our sperm donor, but I’ll hear you out.”

  “That’s all I’m asking.” If I could protect Evan from ever having to hear any of this, I would do it in a heartbeat. I knew he didn’t want to hear or talk about our father. He was dealing with what happened in his own way, just like I was.

  Hearing him refer to our father as our sperm donor was a new level of hostility I wasn’t prepared for, but I couldn’t say it surprised me. We became outcasts in this town during the trial. Rumors followed our every move and aggressive reporters were always sniffing around, asking us questions about how and why we didn’t see it coming or if we were in on it too.

  As a business owner, Evan was hard hit. We all were, but he was in the opening stages of his own garage back then, and many of his customers left because they didn’t want the son of a criminal touching their precious vehicles. What if he was a criminal too and stole something from them?

  The memories still made a bitter taste creep onto the back of my tongue. Those were tough times for Evan. The people who used to come in were often only posing as customers and were really either busybodies hoping for gossip or reporters trying to get to one of us.

  The rest of us could lie low easier than he could. His place of business was open to the public, and he was the owner who had to deal with them.

  If there were any way around talking to him about this, I would’ve taken it. But there wasn’t. As soon as news of Harris’s and any future arrests were made public, it was only a matter of time before it would be out there that it was all connected to Roy Lovett’s case.

  There would be no hiding that fact forever. Once the dominoes started falling, I was willing to bet our family would be headed into another media circus. Small towns were slow on big news, and Dad’s case had captured the attention of everyone within at least a hundred mile radius.

  The town would be abuzz with it all over again. A consequence I hadn’t intended when I started looking into it. But then, I also hadn’t known the scale of corruption that was involved and would be exposed.

  It was better for Evan to hear about it from me than to have the news explode unexpectedly. Again.

  “Remember I told you I thought there was something more going on with Dad’s case?”

  He nodded curtly; his eyes narrowed on mine. When he didn’t say anything, I continued. “I looked into it, and it’s looking like I was right.”

  “Fuck, Sonny. Why?” He leaned forward, his fist tightening around his water bottle so hard the plastic crunched under his fingers. He didn’t even seem to notice. “Why did you have to go digging all this up again? I told you to leave it alone.”

  “I couldn’t.” I wouldn’t beg for his forgiveness for going against his wishes, but I did want a chance to explain. “All it took was a little scratch at the surface, and you wouldn’t believe the shit that came bubbling up. This is so much bigger than Dad. So much bigger than any of us ever could have realized. I only did my job.”

  “Your job is to prove our guilty father innocent?” he spat, his shoulders locked. His usually calm-against-all-odds demeanor was cracking almost as fast as the water bottle.

  “I’m not saying he’s innocent. He might’ve been set up to take the fall though. I don’t know yet.” For the next hour, I meticulously explained everything that had happened.

  Evan was quiet for the most part, although he cursed under his breath often and looked like he wanted to snap someone’s neck when I told him about having witnessed Maclin’s murder and the threats that came after. “How did I not know about any of this?”

  “I didn’t want to tell you unless it was absolutely necessary,” I said quietly. “I know how you feel about Dad, and you told me point blank how you felt about me looking into his case. I didn’t want to worry you or make you think I was disrespecting you, but I had to know.”

  “And then you stumbled onto a massive corruption case, and it all got out of hand.” He sighed, running a hand through his shaggy brown hair. Though lines of tension bracketed his face, he’d relaxed as I explained, seeming resigned to the situation. “Fuck. I can’t believe this. You should’ve come to me. I could’ve helped you.”

  I shook my head. “This is my job, Ev. If Dad weren’t involved, this investigation still would’ve been my job.”

  “I get that, but you were in danger, and you’re my little brother. I’m not saying I would’ve helped you with Dad, but I could’ve helped you.”

  “Thanks.” He was pissed, that much was obvious, but he was still willing to help me. I suddenly felt guilty for not talking to him sooner. He was my brother. I should’ve told him when I told Jeremy, or at least after I talked to Tyson.

  Beau still didn’t know, but that was a worry for a different day. Evan studied my expression, a muscle ticking in his jaw. “There’s more. What is it?”

  “I’m getting closer to finding out the truth about Dad. With Harris's arrest, it’s only a matter of time before that part of the case starts becoming clearer.”

  Pursing his lips, he spun his unopened, slightly mangled water bottle. “Which begs the question, why don’t you just go talk to Dad?”

  “Why would I go talk to him?” The thought had crossed my mind many times. Of course, I knew it was a possibility; I just hadn’t gotten around to doing it. Every time I almost had myself convinced, I managed to come up with a reason why not to do it.

  Evan lifted a brow, shaking his head like I was missing something. “You can speculate all you want. In the end, only Dad may be able to give you the information you need to stop this witch hunt. Seems simple to me. You want to know something about his case? Go to him.”

  “It’s more complicated than that. Dad might not even know about some of the role players involved. Chief Harris, for instance, I don’t think anyone knew about him.”

  Evan cocked his head to the side, his gaze considering. “Maybe, but you’ll never know unless you ask.”

  “Trying to sound deep and meaningful?” I asked, teasing to lighten the mood now that it was all out in the open.

&nbs
p; Narrowing his eyes, he smirked and pretended to rub his nose with his middle finger. “I am deep and meaningful.”

  “Keep telling yourself that.”

  He nodded. “You might be an actual detective now, but your powers of observation need work. Congratulations on that, by the way. It’s huge. I’m proud of you.”

  “Thanks. I’m still waiting on the official paperwork, but I’ve gotten the nod.” I thought I was years away from making detective; it was still sinking in that they were actually promoting me.

  “You deserve it,” he said, no more sarcasm or humor lacing his tone. “Seriously. You’ve worked hard for this, and you’ve overcome more hurdles than anyone. I’m really happy for you.”

  “Me too, but I didn’t do it alone. Without Niki, I never would’ve found a way to tie it all together.” I had to give credit where credit was due, and Niki deserved a lot of it. I would never pretend otherwise, not even to my brother.

  He tilted his eyes, his lips stretching into a knowing grin. “Last time I saw a look like that in one of my brother’s eyes, Jeremy was telling me he was in love with Marie. What’s the deal, little brother? You in loooove too?”

  I blinked, feeling like a deer in the headlights. Evan’s eyes widened as his chin dropped.

  “You’ve got to be kidding me?” he groaned. “Okay, it’s like that. I get it. When do I meet this new girl?”

  “We can have dinner with you tomorrow if you want?”

  “Tomorrow sounds good.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  Niki

  I turned in front of the mirror, casting a critical eye over my outfit. I was wearing a white gypsy skirt with a wide brown belt. At the moment, the skirt was on the chopping block. An off-shoulder white shirt and leather sandals completed the ensemble, but a part of me was seriously considering ditching it all and going with jeans instead.