Southern Heart (Southern 5)

"There is a gap," I say, looking at the board. "For three years, he was quiet." I look at the board. “The answers are there."

"Well, if anyone can find it, you can,” he says. "This is what I need." He points at the board. "Think about it,” he says. "Something tells me you aren’t leaving when all this is done."

He stops right before he walks out. "I’m happy for you," he says, and I look over at him. "But if I’m honest, I’m happier for Chelsea. She’s loved you for a long time."

"Did everyone know but me?" I ask, and he laughs.

"No, I think you and Beau were the only ones who didn’t know," he says, laughing now. "Thank you for that. I will never let him live it down." He walks out at the same time Ethan walks in.

"Quinn is with the girls,” he says, handing me a cup of coffee. "He wants it on record that he took one for the team." I laugh. "He was not kidding."

"I’ll put a sticker next to his name,” I say, looking back at the timeline. "I want to make a couple of phone calls,” I say.

"Who are you going to call?" he asks as I sit down at the big desk in the middle of the room.

“Every single neighbor he ever had during that time.” I pick up a pen and start to make a list. “Someone had to have had a run-in with him. There has to be someone somewhere.” I look down at the blank paper now. “If my father was there, trust me, he made enemies."

Chapter 28

Chelsea

"We have to leave in twenty minutes,” I say as I walk into the closet and look for something to wear. It’s been three weeks since he made me his. Every single day for the past three weeks, he gets more and more on edge, and I have no idea how to make it okay for him. Three weeks without one sighting of his father. No sign of him, and I secretly wish he was dead somewhere in a ditch.

"Then stop walking around naked," he says from behind me, wrapping his arms around my waist. The only time he lets go just a bit is when we are home and locked in.

"I’m not naked,” I say. "I’m wearing a thong and a bra." I turn to the side, and he kisses my lips, his tongue slipping in with mine.

"Same as being naked," he says, and I turn in his arms now. "I can’t get enough of you,” he says between kisses. Both of us forget we only have twenty minutes as he carries me back to bed and makes love to me.

"I can nap right now." I look over at him as he gets out of bed.

"There is no time to nap. We’re already going to be late," he says. "We were late last week, too."

"Two weeks ago, we showed up at the barbecue when they were eating dessert," I remind him.

"That was your fault." He points at me. "You wanted to ride." I laugh, shaking my head.

"I did,” I say, getting out of bed now and walking to the bathroom. “I’m going to take a quick shower.”

“I’ll text your mother this time,” he says. “She is the only civil one.”

I laugh at him. “They are all civil. They just like to tease you."

My family has always accepted him, even from before, but when we walked into the barbecue on Sunday at my grandparents’ holding hands, there were whispers and then a couple of fingers pointing. I was nervous as hell, and I almost threw up in the car on the way there, but they treated him just like they did the last time. No one treated him any different, and I think it was a relief even to Mayson, even if he pretends it wasn’t.

When I get out of the shower, he is dressed in jeans and a black shirt, his hands going nuts on his phone. "Everything okay?"

"Yeah, we are just chasing a lead,” he says as I walk into the closet to put back on the thong he just took off me and the same strapless bra.

I slip on my blue jeans with holes in the middle of my thighs and one in the knee. I grab my yellow off-the-shoulder loose shirt. I slip my arms in the sleeves and tie the little bows at the bottom. I walk out, and he looks up and smiles. "You look beautiful," he says, getting up and kissing my bare shoulder. "Ready to go?"

"Almost," I say, walking into the bathroom and grabbing the necklace he gave me two weeks ago.

"Let me," he says, coming in, and I hold up my hair so he can clasp the necklace. The heart pendant falls in the middle of my chest. I hold the heart in my hand and smile at him through the mirror. "Ready?"