Jackson’s smile returned and he zoomed off, pumping his fist above his head as he whooped and hollered over the news.
I glanced over at Chase with a smirk.
“If only it were always this easy, huh?” he said, returning my amused glance.
I laughed. “No kidding! I know that Jackson’s an easy kid but I still live in fear over the upcoming teen years.”
Chase wrapped an arm around my shoulders and pulled me into his chest. He didn’t say anything, but a silent understanding passed between us. If everything worked out the way we wanted it to—I wouldn’t have to face Jackson’s teen years alone. And that thought put me more at peace than the quaint little Mexican hideaway.
Over the past few nights on the boat, Chase and I had yet to spend an entire night together, mostly out of fear of confusing Jackson. Still, we’d made love every night and each time became more passionate and intimate than the one before as our feelings grew. When we’re in bed together afterward, we would lie together in our own little cocoon of tangled sheets and covers and talk about what the future might hold.
Chase had told me what Matt had said on the phone about the case Henry was building, but he’d assured me that with Henry’s track record, there was no way he’d escape an investigation by the FBI unscathed. I wanted to believe he was right, but the fear of what Henry was truly capable of overshadowed his assurances from time to time.
“When can we move in?” I asked, setting aside my anxieties. I found distraction was my most reliable coping method.
“I’ll sign the papers in the morning before taking Jackson out fishing and then come back and help you pack up. The house comes with pretty much everything we’ll need. Dishes, pots and pans, all the furniture. There’s even a barbecue pit out back. So all we’ll need to bring with us is clothing and food. I’ll also arrange to have the boat docked for a longer stay and once all of that is done, this little baby will be ours for as long as we want, and then we can relax a little bit.”
“Relax?” I laughed softly. “I’m not even sure I know how to do that anymore.”
Chase pressed a kiss to my forehead, letting his lips linger against my skin. “Well, I’ll tell you what, this is the perfect place to learn.”
He had a point; the cottage was beautiful and remote and about as far away from civilization as we could get while still having access to running water and updated plumbing. It was the kind of place that people paid big money to go to on vacation to rejuvenate and recoup from their stress-filled lives. But looking around the quaint house, I had a feeling that this little gem had gone mostly undiscovered. I actually had no idea how Chase had even found out about it in the first place. He was close to fluent in Spanish and had a knack for working with people. He might have heard about the place from a local or seen it in a newspaper.
In any case, I was just grateful to have a solid roof over my head and even more importantly, solid ground under my feet.
The next morning went just as smoothly as Chase had described to me the night before. He left early, before the sun was even up, to go into town and meet with the owner of the cottage to sign the rental agreement. He’d refused to tell me the price of the home and insisted on covering the cost himself. I tried to argue, reminding him about the stacks of cash tucked inside the locked security drawer under my bed, but he’d had none of it and left before I could force the money into his hands. When he came back, I had everything packed up and had enlisted Jackson’s help to get it topside. Chase found a taxi to take us to the canal so we loaded everything up and off we went.
Later that afternoon, the boys left with their fishing gear to go down the shore a little and try their luck. I waved them off from the small porch of the cottage and watched them walk off into the early afternoon sun. It was an odd realization to stop and take a deep breath and not feel the crushing weight of anxiety slam back into me. Things were far from resolved, but for the time being—we were safe and secure. No one would be able to track us to Manzanilla and even if they could, we were far enough off the grid that they’d be looking for a couple of needles in a haystack. Or, in this case, a large, dense, wild jungle.