Back To Us (Shore Secrets 3) (3 page)

Ward figured he’d throw the blame bomb on Joel’s behalf. “Professor, that is totally your fault.”

Zane dipped his head, brown hair falling forward onto his forehead. “Point taken. But Dawn got back three weeks ago. I’m not taking the blame for this latest holdup.”

Ah. Ward thought he knew exactly who to blame. Every bit as much as he knew Joel would never cop to the real reason. But for a supposed
ex
-soldier, he sure disappeared with regularity and returned with bruises, gashes and a weak-ass cover story.

“Pretty sure that’s Uncle Sam’s fault. Or are you still going to try and convince us—” Ward poked Joel’s sneaker with the tip of his oar “—that your recent surprise trip, where you gave your boss no notice and left in literally the dead of night, was a vacation?”

“What he said,” chimed in Gray, the boss in question. He managed the Mayhew Manor hotel where Joel was the executive chef. Gray had been caught off guard when Joel vanished. But his fiancée, Ella, who owned the joint, had assured him that it was just something they had to put up with every so often to keep the CIA-trained kitchen wizard around. And Joel always used his vacation time for the missed days.

Joel plucked his sunglasses from where they hung at the collar of his shirt and shoved them onto his nose. “No comment.”

“Thought so.” Ward would get it out of him someday. Probably wouldn’t succeed unless he interrogated Joel under laughing gas at his next cavity filling, but he wouldn’t give up. Curiosity, sure. But also because Ward was certain the man deserved the kind of heartfelt thanks for his service that a paycheck, or even a slew of medals, never covered.

“The point is, we’re going on a date. Our first date.”

Whoop-de-fricking-do. First dates were only scary when you didn’t know the person. When you weren’t sure if they’d laugh at your jokes or share your addiction to buffalo chicken pizza. “No big deal. You’ve been friends since the day you came to town. She’s literally cried on your shoulder, gotten drunk with you and cooked you dinner a hundred times already. What’s left to be nervous about?”

“Everything.” Joel jabbed his oar at the water. “Everything will be different. Everything will matter more.” He jabbed twice more, turning them in a complete three-sixty.

Yeah. Ward knew the feeling. Or at least, he could imagine it. If, by some miracle, Piper ever quit holding her grudge against him and gave Ward a second chance, it would
so
matter.

“Don’t be a pansy.” Gray swished them back around with short, hard swats. “The only thing that’s different is that you get to kiss her at the end of the night. If a fourteen-year-old virgin can muster up the balls to get through a first date, so can you.”

Normally, Gray was easygoing and fun. Exactly the kind of person you’d want out in a boat with you predawn. This short-tempered version might as well be a clone of Ward himself. And
nobody
wanted more of that. Ward reached out to bat the brim of Gray’s cap. “You really woke up on the wrong side of the bed, Locke.”

“That’s assuming I slept in a bed, Cantrell. Which I most assuredly did not do.”

“You guys go nuts and sleep out on the balcony?”

“No. There was a girl emergency last night.” Gray curled a hand around his neck and rotated into it. “Piper called after midnight, all worked up. She and Ella were on the phone for God knows how long. I finally gave up and slept on the couch. Which is not actually a couch, but a love seat. Only two cushions long. Misery.”

Zane sucked in air between his teeth. “Ouch. On the bright side, rowing this morning is probably great for you. It’s stretching out all those kinked-up muscles in your back.”

“I’m not feeling that particular silver lining just yet.”

Were they really talking about stiff muscles? Everyone in the boat loved Piper. Was Ward really the only one with his stomach up in his throat right now? “Can we get back to the emergency? Is Piper okay?”

“Isn’t she always?” Joel noted with an approving smile. “That’s one cool customer.”

“Gray just said she had an emergency. Don’t dick around with me on this.”

“Chill,” Gray ordered, his voice with a sharper edge than it had all morning. “You know if there was truly something wrong, I would’ve rallied the troops last night.”

He stared off at the silver flash of a fish jumping, and the glimmering ripples it left behind. Eased his finger off the hair trigger of his temper. “Yeah. I know.”

“Here’s what I know,” Gray said in a more measured tone. “She got all worked up because her dad turned down her proposal to expand into doing a line of port at the winery. And he delivered the bad news over email, no less. Piper’s hurt as a daughter, and frustrated, no, mad as hell as an employee.”

“Screwed two ways as only family can.” Ward knew the feeling. Intimately. He remembered the day the lawyer told him his dad left him the farm...along with its mountain of debts. Screwed didn’t begin to describe it.

“It gets worse. Apparently her Grandpa Will always wanted to make port. It was his ‘dabble during retirement’ pipe dream.”

Ward knew he should bring the newcomers up to speed. “Will Morrissey died two years ago. Just six months after retiring. Cancer. Barely got the diagnosis before he went in the ground. Piper took it hard.”

Gray looked sideways and down. “I guess she made him a deathbed promise to make that port line happen.”

He knew how close she’d been to her grandfather. But he’d never heard about this promise—which sounded gut-wrenching. Even though Piper didn’t confide in him the same way anymore, she did confide in the group made up of Ward, Ella and Casey. Why hadn’t she told them?

Hell, Ward knew the answer to that. She liked to play things close to the vest. Never wanted to risk failing at something and having people know about it. Piper never told them which parts she auditioned for in the school musicals. Didn’t tell her parents which colleges she applied to—only the ones that accepted her. Hell, he’d done the same thing. Hadn’t mentioned to the girls so much as a whisper about his plan to expand. Good thing too, now that it didn’t look like it’d pan out.

There had to be more to explain the midnight phone call. “What’s the sticking point?” Ward asked.

Gray rubbed his thumb and forefinger together. “Money. She’d need to take over a plot of land from the existing vineyard. Her dad just doesn’t want to give up the space or the grapes for what he calls a vanity project.”

Ward wasn’t dialed in to the begats and family trees of all of Seneca Lake. Small as the town was, he just didn’t care. But he did know the major players of the people who mattered to him. “But Grandpa Will was Mr. Morrissey’s dad.”

Zane’s jaw dropped. “He’s dissing the deathbed wish of his own father? Talk about a Class-A jerk.”

That was the kindest thing Ward would ever call the uptight, unloving man who never thought whatever Piper did was good enough. “This still doesn’t make sense. She’s got money. Her grandfather left her a trust fund. I’m sure it’d be complicated, but there’s got to be enough to liquidate for this project. Why doesn’t she just rent the land from a farmer? Wineries do that all the time.”

Gray raised his hand. “Even trying to ignore the whole thing from the couch, hearing only half the conversation, I can answer that one. Piper’s been trying to do just that for the last two years since the first time he brushed aside her proposal. She made the rounds. Every vineyard and farmer turned her down. Not just here on Seneca Lake, but over at Keuka and Canandaigua Lakes too.”

“Why?” asked Zane.

Shit. This just got worse and worse. No wonder Piper had been chewing Ella’s ear off for hours. Ward had always loved his hometown, even when a good chunk of its residents turned on him. The pros of living on Seneca Lake usually outweighed the cons. But every once in a while, something happened that made him choke on the small town atmosphere. No way would Piper be run in circles like this in a big city.

Ward dunked his hands in the water, then rubbed the cool wetness across his face. “Let me guess. They’re all scared of pissing off her father.”

Touching his index finger to his nose, Gray said, “Exactly. The way I hear it, he’s the top of the dog pile around here. Has major pull in the local community and the winemaking community.”

Unfortunately, the assessment was right on the money. “The man’s a big, snarling barracuda in a very small goldfish bowl. Gets off on power plays and acting like he owns this corner of the world.”

“Piper wanted to do this by herself...or partnered with just the memory of her grandfather. That’s why she tried so hard to get a foot in the door everywhere else. Doing it in-house, under her dad, was her last choice. And her last option. Now she’s got nowhere else to go.”

Ward knew that feeling. Was still smarting over the bank’s refusal to give him a loan two days ago.

Leaning forward, Zane clapped Gray on the shoulder. “That sucks. No wonder she kept you up all night. Hard to let a dream die.”

Yeah. Ward knew that feeling too.

“Too bad none of us could help her.” Gray gave Zane the double-finger point like he had a killer idea. “Couldn’t Casey whack down all the trees in a corner of her state forest to make room for a couple of hundred grape plants?”

“Maybe if she wasn’t head ranger she could get away with it...”

“Shut up,” Ward ordered.

Zane’s words burrowed into Ward’s brain. Why couldn’t one of them help her? There had to be a way. He just needed to connect a few dots. Because if he could help Piper, that might be the foot back in the door he’d almost given up hoping for over the past ten years.

“Hey, you didn’t tell us the break was over. Don’t be a douche.”

He sliced his hand through the air. “No, shut up so I can think. One minute.”

The guys looked at him like he’d lost it, but they sat silently.

A plan...no, the
beginnings
of a plan stirred in his brain. It unfurled the way mail-order sea monkeys did when you added water. It was a crazy plan. With almost no chance of working. But Ward never could resist a long shot.

“One of us
can
help her.”

After a round of head swivels where they all looked at each other, Joel asked, “Who?”

With both hands, he tapped the center of his long-sleeved black tee. “Me.”

A low chuckle rumbled out of Joel. “What—are you going to offer to beat up her dad until he caves?”

Well, that was something he’d dreamed about doing since high school. Since the first time he’d watched Piper’s face crumple beneath her father’s disapproval. And every subsequent time—of which there were many. “Tempting for a number of reasons, but no.”

Zane pulled a granola bar from his pocket and ripped it open with his teeth. “What have you got to offer her besides your big muscles and intimidating glare?”

“Land. There’s a whole field that’s been lying fallow. I haven’t done anything with it because it hasn’t been a high priority. There’s nothing I want to do with it. It isn’t big enough to be of interest to lease out to a vineyard. But it’d be just right for Piper’s port line.”

“That’s terrific.” Zane shifted in his seat. Cleared his throat. Rolled his shoulders. “And because you’re friends, you won’t screw her on the price, right? Even though you probably know how much she’s got germinating in that trust fund?”

“I know exactly what the asking price is for my land.” He’d gotten everything appraised when he started making the rounds for his expansion loan. And if Piper bought it, it’d be enough to get him over the hump
without
a loan. “It’s a price she’ll want to refuse, but won’t be able to.”

Joel sighed. “Seriously? It’s not bad enough you memorize pages from that annoying quote-a-day calendar that Casey gave you? Now you’re going to talk in riddles?”

“I’ll charge her less than its worth. I’ll make her work for the difference instead.” The more Ward thought about it, the more perfect—or perfectly insane—it sounded.

“Yeah, right.” Joel jerked his chin forward. “What’s the catch?”

Not so much a catch, as a condition. “She’ll have to date me for a month to get it.”

Zane squinted at him. “Huh?”

Almost simultaneously, Gray shook his head like a dog emerging from the lake. “What?”

Only Joel held his tongue. Instead, he crossed his arms and leveled a steady, assessing look at Ward.

“Oh, I get it.” With a smug smirk, Zane said, “It’s because Gray and I snatched two of your girls, right? Can’t handle always being the bridesmaid, but never a bride?”

“Nah. I think his biological clock is ticking.” Laughing, Gray swiped the second granola bar from Zane.

“Why the hell would you want to saddle yourself with a girlfriend for a month? It cuts you off from putting time and energy into women you
actually
want to hook up with.”

There was absolutely no way they’d ever let him off this boat without at least a partial explanation. “Look, there’s some ancient history between me and Piper. Buried deep.”

“And now you’ve got a sudden interest in archaeology?” Skepticism rolled off Joel like the last of the fog burning off the water.

“Something like that.” The past hadn’t ended well. Ward didn’t so much want to dig it up as he wanted a do-over.

Zane dusted his hands off, then settled them on wide-spread knees. “Do you remember what happened to Howard Carter?”

“Am I supposed to know who the hell Howard Carter is?”

“You don’t...seriously...” Zane shook his head. “Forget the quote-a-day calendar. This Christmas I’m giving you a historical trivia page-a-day calendar. Fill you up with awesome facts like the name of the island where they imprisoned Napoleon....”

After a long moment punctuated only by the whir of a dragonfly’s wings, Joel said, “Elba.”

“Thank you! Anyway, Howard Carter discovered King Tut’s tomb. You’ve heard of him, I hope?”

Ward put his tongue in his cheek. “The rumors of my bad education have been greatly exaggerated.”

“Oh, I see what you did there, with the bastardization of the Mark Twain quote. Nicely done. Long story short, the locals warned Carter not to excavate. Said there was a curse on the tomb that would strike any who tried to dig up history.”