Chapter Twenty-Six

Harper knocked at the door that was now becoming a familiar sight. She stepped back, her heart skipping several beats as it seemed to do whenever she would soon be in his presence. The door opened, and he stood there, staring at her with a look on his face that was at least a little less wary than it'd been the first two times she'd shown up unannounced. Not that she really had any way to announce herself other than the sound of her truck a few minutes before she arrived, but…

"Hi."

"Hi."

She reached inside the large purse she had slung over her shoulder and retrieved the notebooks that had once belonged to her mother. "These are yours."

Surprise flickered over his face. "They're not mine. I only found them. They belong to you."

Harper shook her head and took the book she'd brought out of her purse. She handed The Count of Monte Cristo to Lucas and watched him as his eyes flared with surprised pleasure. "I also thought you might want this, so you can make more sense of those notes."

He didn't attempt to reject the book as he'd attempted to reject the notes. He took it and held it to his chest as though it were precious.

Harper looked over his shoulder at the dancing firelight on the walls. "Can I come in? I won't stay long."

He didn't answer, but he stepped back, and she went inside, shutting the door behind her. She put the notebooks on the empty bed closest to the door, and his gaze remained on them for a moment before he met her eyes again. "I want you to keep my mother's notes."

"Why?"

"Because…I think they were meant for you."

He frowned. "What do you mean?"

Harper sighed, moving closer to him. "I'm not sure what I mean. I just…have this feeling. And I'm not always one to follow my gut or my intuition or whatever you want to call it, but I think those notebooks belong with you, and that's all. I didn't think it through. I drove them out here, and I hope that's okay. Also, I found something out this afternoon, and I wanted…well, I wanted to ask you about it, to see what you think because—"

"Harper." He said her name, nothing more, but there was a gentle beseeching in his tone— slow down, breathe, I'm trying to understand you, it seemed to say—and that one word was enough for her to stop her aimless rambling and gather herself. She felt seen by him in a way she hadn't been seen by anyone in a long time, even if he didn't always understand her words.

"Agent Gallagher called me this afternoon and told me they'd found evidence that my parents were shot."

"Shot? With an…arrow?"

"No, no. With a gun."

"I thought they died in the car accident."

Harper sat on the bed next to his, the metal springs making a soft creaking sound. "I've always believed that. I've always assumed the three of us were involved in an accident and the car had never been found. I believed that all my life. Despite the location being odd"—she wrinkled her brow—"finding the car at the bottom of that canyon was confirmation of that. I'm so, so confused, and…I don't know how to feel." She paused for a moment. "Did you see anyone near that wreck? Or know anything that could explain what happened to them?"

Lucas took the few steps to his bed and sat on it, the springs making a deeper creaking sound than the springs on which Harper had sat. She became even more aware of him, his knee only inches away from her own, his size seeming to increase along with the close proximity. "I don't have any answers for you. I climbed down the canyon one day when I saw sun shine off something at the bottom. It was almost all covered with branches and leaves. When I looked in the window, I…saw them in there. The necklace was on the seat. The trunk was open, and the only thing inside was the blue backpack. I took it with me and climbed back up. I went back sometimes, I don't know why. Maybe because your mother felt…real to me. I wanted to…I don't know, Harper. I wanted to thank her. She…the words… They made me want to stay alive."

Harper blinked, tears burning the backs of her eyes. He'd told her it was so they weren't alone, but it was also so he wasn't either. You're breaking my heart, she thought with a catch of breath. "I knew I was right."

"About what?"

"That those notes are meant to be yours."

He smiled in that unpracticed way of his, and Harper smiled back, her finger tracing one of the uncovered springs. "What did you learn from her?"

"From your mother?" He squinted out the window for a moment, obviously considering her question seriously. When he looked back at her, he asked, "Have you read it? The book your mother was teaching her class about?"

" The Count of Monte Cristo ?" Harper smiled. "Yes, twice, and I've seen the movie too."

"There's a movie."

She smiled. She liked the way he posed his questions as more of a statement, as though reiterating something to himself that he'd just learned rather than asking for confirmation. "Yes. It's very good actually, and that's not always true of books turned into movies. Have you…ever seen a movie?" She felt awkward asking it, but she wanted so badly to know about him, and she never would if she didn't ask the questions that came to her mind. She'd spent enough time with him to know he didn't offer information freely.

"I've never seen a movie, but I heard of them when I was a kid. And I've seen TV."

"A movie is just TV but on a bigger screen." How strange to utter a sentence like that to a man who was approximately her age, if she was assuming correctly. "Anyway, The Count of Monte Cristo is one of my favorite stories. It's about vengeance, but more so, it's about forgiveness."

"I had to try to understand the story from what your mother wrote about it. And from the questions she asked. I didn't know that word before— vengeance . It means feeling mad and then getting even. But your mother was like you. She thought the story was more about forgiveness. Your mother thought that most humans are good. She hoped her students would think that too."

"Do you?"

His lips tipped. "Am I one of her students?"

"Of course you are. You've probably studied her thoughts and ideas—her values—more closely than any one of the boys or girls in her classrooms."

That seemed to please him. "Maybe. But…I don't know if I believe more people are good than bad. I don't think I know enough about the world outside of that one book. And I haven't even read it yet. Your mother, though, she made me feel…"

He looked to be searching for a word, and so Harper attempted to supply it. "Hopeful?" she asked softly.

His eyes met hers. "Hopeful," he repeated. "Yes. Your mother gave me…hope. She taught me that there is both good and bad in the world. Before that, I didn't know."

"Meaning you only thought there was bad in the world?"

"I…wasn't sure. Driscoll thought so."

"Driscoll?" She frowned. "What else did Driscoll think?"

"I don't know. I didn't care."

He turned his head away. He obviously wasn't interested in talking about Driscoll any further. After a moment, though, he looked back at her, and Harper tilted her head, her gaze moving over his features. He had such beautiful eyes—that blue and gold, sunset blue, and almond-shaped with long, full lashes. His eyes were a contrast to the stark masculinity of the rest of his face—his sun-darkened skin, sharp cheekbones, his square, scruff-covered jaw. And the obvious masculinity of his strong, muscular body. But she wasn't looking at his body. She refused to do that. She was already distracted enough as it was. Shaken up. Confused. He didn't want to talk about Driscoll, so she wouldn't continue questioning Lucas about him. "In some ways…you might know my mother better than I do. Or at least…a different side of her," Harper said, returning to the subject he'd seemed comfortable talking about. "But to me, she was comfort and home and the things I haven't had since." She looked behind him, considering her words. "I don't know, maybe I'm afraid that reading those"—she nodded her head toward the notes—"will dim those other memories of her somehow, and so I'm afraid to."

He regarded her, and she couldn't read the expression that had settled on his face. "What? Why are you looking at me like that?"

"Because you're an honest person. I can tell. I've wondered…if I'd be able to."

Harper didn't know exactly what that meant, but she felt it was a compliment. Even so, he wasn't completely right. "I'm not always honest," she blurted. "I keep things inside sometimes." She paused. "A lot of times."

"You do?" He looked confused about that, and she laughed quietly. "Sometimes I talk the most when I'm avoiding a topic or keeping something to myself."

He appeared to think about that and then smiled as though she'd cleared something up that had confused him. He was so very sweet; he really was. "Keeping your feelings to yourself is different than lies. Isn't it?"

"I suppose. What do you keep to yourself, Lucas?"

He released a breath that may or may not have contained a chuckle. "What don't I keep to myself? I don't have another choice."

She blushed, grimacing at her insensitivity. "That was a stupid question. I'm—"

"It wasn't stupid. The trees and the birds and all the forest animals know my secrets. I go outside and shout them to the mountaintops sometimes. They all stop to listen."

She laughed softly. "Does it feel better to get them out? Even to the forest?"

"Yes." He grinned, and her heart tripped all over itself. "Try it sometime."

"Maybe I will."

They sat there smiling at each other, the moment heavy with whatever the thing was that flowed between them. Chemistry. Awareness. Deep curiosity. All elements of the undeniable lure that had been flowing between men and women who were attracted to each other since the beginning of time. At dances and in restaurants. At bars and in offices. In caves and in cabins in the middle of the deep, dark forest.

"Anyway," Harper said, standing and grabbing the purse she'd dropped on the floor next to the bed she was sitting on. "I brought something, and I hope you'll help me. And a bribe so you won't say no."

His eyebrows lowered. "A…bribe?"

She smiled. "A payment of sorts. But I was just kidding. It's more of a gift, and there are no strings attached." She pulled the bottle of orange Crush from her bag, grinning at Lucas when she held it up.

His eyes widened, lighting up. "Orange drink with bubbles. Crush."

"Yes." She twisted off the cap, slowly so it wouldn't explode, and handed it to him. He looked at it for a second and then tipped it back, taking a big sip. He lowered it, the expression on his face…less than impressed. He held the bottle before him, studying it again as he swallowed with obvious effort, cringing. Clearly revolted.

"Not as good as you remember?" she asked, holding back a giggle.

"Not…quite."

She laughed then. She couldn't help it. She wanted to kiss him and taste the orange Crush on his lips. She moved that thought aside rapidly. "Anyway, about this thing I need your help with."

"What is it?"

"It's a map." She stepped to the table they'd eaten at the last time she'd been there and sat down on one of the stools, spreading the map over the tabletop and setting a red pen next to it.

Dusk had fallen, and Lucas took a moment to light the two candles by the window, bringing them to the table so they could see better. He sat down on the stool next to her and looked at the map. "What do you need my help with?"

"I thought it might be helpful to mark this up for Agent Gallagher. I need to do something to help solve my parents' murders." A chill went down her spine. She still couldn't believe she was saying the words or that the words were true. My parents were murdered. It didn't exactly make the loss sharper, didn't make her suddenly grieve them more than she had. But it lit a fire under her. She'd answered the question of where that she'd been asking all her life, and now she had another two she hadn't expected: who? and why? She gave her head a small shake, attempting to bring herself back to the moment. "But, um, I'd like your input before I do."

"Okay."

She picked up the pen and brought it to the map that was folded to show Missoula and the surrounding areas. "Okay, so this is the highway from Missoula to Helena Springs." She used the pen to trace the highway. There were also unnamed caverns a few miles off that highway that she'd always assumed had been the ones the hikers had been looking for, but she supposed that wasn't necessarily accurate, considering where her parents' car had been found.

She moved her eyes to another area on the map. "This is the approximate location of Driscoll's cabin." She drew a square over the green area of wilderness. "And this is yours," she said, drawing another square near Driscoll's. Harper glanced up at Lucas, and he had a small crease between his brows as he concentrated on what she did.

"All right," she went on, "this is the Owlwood River." She traced the long, winding line that represented the river, going from the highway that connected Missoula to Helena Springs, down past Lucas's house and beyond. "And this is where my parents' car was found," she said, drawing an X far downriver, near the base of a group of mountain ranges.

"Okay," Lucas said, bringing his head slightly closer to hers. The candlelight flickered, and it suddenly felt intimate, the way their heads were bowed together, the way they were speaking in hushed voices, the way it was only them and no one else for miles and miles. She wondered what his lips would feel like if he kissed her, wondered if he'd know what to do.

"Okay," Harper repeated, her voice emerging on a whisper that was far more breathy than she'd meant it to be. She cleared her throat, heat moving slowly up her neck and then sweeping through her limbs with a suddenness that made her break out in chills.

"Are you cold?" he asked when she rubbed at her arms.

"No. No. Ah…" She focused on the map again, trying to get her mind on what they had been doing. "All right, so up here"—she tapped at the wilderness area between the highway connecting Helena Springs and Missoula and the Owlwood River—"is where I generally do my guide work. And where I've focused my own search efforts for my parents' car." She put the end of the pen to her lips, biting softly at the tip.

"Why?" he asked, and when she glanced at him, she saw his gaze was focused on her mouth. She pulled the pen from her lips, their eyes meeting, his widening before he glanced away.

"Why? Ah, well, because it's good for camping and hunting but also because the road that I assumed they'd been traveling is close by.

"The hikers who found me couldn't say exactly where, but the authorities picked us up here," she said, tapping the map. "It all pointed to my parents' car being in this area. I've never typically searched any farther than this because the river veers off here"—she tapped the map again—"into Amity Falls. I obviously didn't tumble into a three-hundred-foot waterfall or I'd be dead. The helicopters focused their initial search here too." Harper tapped the pen against her teeth again, thinking. After a moment, she released a frustrated breath. "In any case, I still don't know what any of this has to do with my parents being murdered. I just thought maybe drawing it all out might help in some way."

Lucas was quiet, his eyes remaining on the map in front of them, the candle flickering over it, casting the peaks and valleys that might hold answers to the many questions swirling around them both in light and shadow. When he met her eyes again, his expression was grave, a hint of apprehension in the set of his mouth.

"I think I saw the helicopters that were looking for your parents. And if I did, then I was left here on the same night your parents were murdered."

A spear of shock arrowed through Harper. "How is that… Are you sure? That seems highly…I don't know, coincidental?"

"I've never seen helicopters again. And they were flying right over this spot." He pointed to the place on the map where she'd said she always thought her parents' car had crashed.

Harper's gaze stayed on the spot where his index finger had tapped for a moment before looking up at him. She was completely bewildered. How was it possible that they'd both ended up out here on the same night? Her rescued. Him… not .

"I, uh…" He pressed his lips together, his eyes deep and dark in the flickering candlelight. "I've been lying to you. Lying to the agent."

She blinked. "Lying?" she whispered, fear spiking. "About what?"

"About my name. My name isn't Lucas. It's Jak."