My heart dropped into my stomach acid. Surely he wasn’t asking what I thought he was asking. Did he suspect something? I’d covered my tracks, or at least I thought I had.

Maybe I’d misheard him. “What?”

He taped the gauze in place. “I did a little digging of my own, pardon the pun, and found out your mother died a few months ago and your father, Vince Gallant, was a longtime resident of Browerton. He disappeared a few years ago. Last place he was seen?” He glanced up. “Millbrook County, with my sister.”

I stuttered, and my mind blanked as he pressed the gauze onto a particularly tender spot.

He continued, “So that begs the question of what you are really doing out here. Seems like you would have mentioned your connection to Browerton first thing—to the sheriff, or me; hell, even Bonnie. But you didn’t. Why is that?”

“It didn’t really matter.” Oh, shit. “I’m here to dig for Choctaw artifacts, that’s all. My parents have nothing to do with it.”

He stopped taping my leg and sat back, his gaze settling on mine and locking. “You’re good at a lot of things—getting into trouble, sticking your nose where it doesn’t belong, and getting under my skin—but one thing you’re not good at?” He shook his head. “Lying.”

He unspooled a length of tape and bit it off before returning to my leg. I didn’t respond, only watched as he kept working, steadily patching me up. What could I tell him? That I suspected him or his family to have had something to do with my father’s death? I almost laughed at the thought. I’m sure that would go over almost as well as his “I like to chase chicks through the woods and fuck them” explanation.

“I’ve met him. You know that?”

I twitched as he finished taping me up. “Who?”

“Still playing dumb, I see.” He sat all the way back, planting his ass on the floor and staring up at me with an openness I’d never thought I’d see on him. It was as if telling me his dark secret freed a part of him. “Your dad. I met your dad.”

“What?” I leaned forward, my need to know sparking to life. “When? Where?”

“Red, maybe if you’d just asked me right off, I would have told you. No sneaking around needed.”

I gave him a look that matched the incredulous laughter inside my head. “You barely opened the door for me the first day. You ordered me off your property. And I’m supposed to believe you were just going to offer up information to me?”

He clasped his hands, his forearms flexing. “Good point. But you’ve been staying here for almost two weeks, and you didn’t say a word.”

“You aren’t exactly chatty.” I dropped my gaze to the floor. If I were looking at the situation fairly, I’d have to say he’d been more open with me than I’d been with him. But I had my reasons.

“Well, we’re chatting now, aren’t we?”

“Yes.”

“So tell me the truth.” He slid his gaze up my body to my face. “For once.”

I hesitated only for a moment. “I’m here for my doctorate. That’s all.”

Disappointment flashed in his eyes. “Then I guess I don’t need to tell you about the time I met your dad.” Rising to his feet, he turned his back and strode to the door.

“Wait!” I tried to stand on my good leg, but the sudden movement sent needles stabbing into the reopened wounds. The room swam, and I thought I might vomit.

“Fuck, sit down.” He walked back to me and eased me onto the bed.

“My dad. I need to know.” I gripped his wrists, refusing to let him go until he told me what he knew.

“Just lie down.”

“No! Tell me what you know.” I couldn’t let this lead slip away.

“You being here has nothing to do with your parents, huh?” He pried my hands off his wrists. “Lie back and I’ll tell you, okay?” He lifted under my arms and helped me back to the pillows, then sat on the edge of the bed.

“Garrett, please.”

He closed his eyes. It was as if that word on my lips turned him inside out.

I snugged my legs under the cover, ignoring the stings rippling beneath the gauze. “I need to know.”

He met my eyes and reached up to my face. I didn’t flinch as he brushed a few strands of hair away and smoothed them into the rest of my locks. A faint smile played along his lips, as if he were pleased I let him touch me.

I should have been afraid. I had been when we were alone in the woods, but the more he’d explained, the more everything seemed to click into place. His kink had cost him his career and who knew what else, but he’d shared it with me. I didn’t know how big of a concession it was for him to open up to me, but—given his hermit ways—I could guess.

He ran his thumb down my cheek, then dropped his hand to the bed next to me. “A few years ago, he came to the house. Lillian brought him. She’d been back from California for a while, and I’d come home for the weekend to visit. This was when I was still teaching. I walked into the house and found him and Lillian making out on the couch in the sitting room.” He took my hand and squeezed it. “No offense to your mom.”

I snorted. “Don’t worry. They were on the outs before I was born. Never married.”

“Sorry.” He rubbed the skin along the back of my hand with his thumb.

I shrugged. “Mom had me when she was nineteen, and she raised me almost singlehandedly. Dad always paid child support, sent birthday cards, visited for Christmas, stuff like that. He wasn’t a bad guy, and I loved him.” My eyes began to water, but I willed the tears away. “He was never meant to settle down. My dad was a love ‘em and leave ‘em kind of guy, at least that’s what Mom always said. She loved him, but she wasn’t in love with him, you know?”

“I found your mom’s obituary. I’m sorry.” How could the man who’d just been a feral beast in the woods be such a gentle soul? I peered into his eyes, still trying to get a bead on which one of him was the true Garrett.

“Thanks. My mom was my best friend and number one cheerleader.” Everyone in our hometown said I looked just like her—long dark hair and bright hazel eyes. I’d always thought she was the most beautiful woman in the world. I still told her so, even after the cancer had taken everything from her. “I miss her.” I cleared my throat. “Please go on about my dad.”

“All right. After I interrupted, he introduced himself and headed out. Lillian told me he was her newest victim.”

My eyes opened wide. “Victim?”

He coughed into his hand. “Let’s just say I’m not the only one in the family with kinks. Lillian’s were different, but she still had a strong dominant streak. Hart does too; he just hasn’t realized it yet. I don’t know why. We all had good childhoods as far as I know. It’s just in our DNA or something.”

I tried to distance myself from any thoughts of Lillian tying my dad up. “So they were an item?”

“Right.” He pulled his hand away from mine and loosened the blanket around my bad leg.

“Then what happened?”

Once satisfied with the bed, he shrugged. “I don’t know. I never saw him again. I went back to Alabama, taught the rest of the semester. That’s when Joan and I began our affair, so I spent most of my free time sneaking around with her.” His tone darkened. “Until it all ended, and she didn’t say a word to defend me.”

My thoughts were on fire, each flash sending off sparks that set another idea ablaze. I needed information, all I could get. But first, I needed to know if I could trust Garrett. “What happened that night when you got caught with Joan?”

His jaw tightened, and bitterness creased his brow. “I’d rigged her, tied her to the bed and”—He glanced at me—“caned her legs and stomach. She was bruised and nearly bloody when her husband walked in.” He glowered. “Of course she failed to mention how she’d begged for the cane.”

“Caned?” I conjured images of corporal punishment in other countries. “Like with a stick?”

“Just a yew rod. Thin, flexible. Leaves some vicious marks if you use it right.”

“Sounds painful.”

“Yes, but it also releases endorphins. The pain heightens the pleasure.”

It was the wrong time for a rush of blood to parts south, for anything remotely like attraction, but I couldn’t stop it. “Your pleasure, too?”

He licked his lips. “Yes.”

“You’d hit her and then…” I let my words trail away as that flicker of jealousy ignited in my heart.

“Yes. Then we’d fuck.”

I flinched at his directness. “So it was all consensual?”

“Yes.”

I chewed my lip as I searched his face for any sign of dishonesty. I found none.

He squeezed my hand. “I swear it was, Elise.”

My eyes widened. “Wow.”

“What?”

“That was the first time you’ve ever said my real name. Not Red.”

“Don’t get used to it, Red.” His familiar smirk reappeared.

“What happened next?”

“How did this turn from me asking your real reasons for being here into you interrogating me?”

A smile crept across my lips. “Just answer the question.”

“You sure you’re into archaeology and not law?” The smirk widened.

I wrinkled my nose. “I dig in the dirt. I don’t cover it up. Definitely not the traits of an attorney.”

“Noted. Tell me something first, and then I’ll tell you the rest of my sordid tale.”

I swallowed hard. “Okay.”

“Do you think your father is still alive?”

I dropped my gaze. “No. He’s not. I know it.”

“I’m sorry.” He shook his head.

“Me too.” I swallowed my tears. “Now tell me the rest.”

He looked away. “After the scandal, I left in disgrace and thought I could come home and lick my wounds. Lillian was always good at smoothing over trouble. I talked to her on the phone the day it all went down. She told me to come home and we’d sort it all out. I left school and drove straight here.” He closed his eyes, memory coating his voice. “It was near the end of spring session. Everything was in bloom on the road home—yellow honeysuckle and purple wisteria hanging from the trees. Despite what had happened, I began to feel hopeful. Lillian would know how to fix it. She’d charmed her way out of tons of trouble. I didn’t have half her ability, but with her help, I don’t know…I thought maybe I had a chance, you know? Maybe she could talk to Dean Farraway or Joan.”

He shrugged and stared at the corner of the room, his eyes roving the wooden planks as if he could see to the bottom floor. To Lillian’s room. “I got home right at sunset. The house was lit up, welcoming. It wasn’t like it is now.” He waved a hand at the walls. “Dying.” He paused, as if trying to wrestle the unhappy words out. “When I got here, everything was quiet. I called for Lillian. She didn’t answer. I went to her room, and that’s where I found her. She’d hung—” He stopped, emotion welling up and drowning out his voice like a flash flood.

“I’m so sorry.” I pressed his hand between mine. I knew she’d committed suicide, but other than her brief obituary, there was no information on it. The then-sheriff of Millbrook covered up the details. I always assumed he’d swept it under the rug so as not to tarnish the family. Suicide was an unbreakable taboo, especially in this notch of the Bible Belt.

“It was unbelievable. When I saw her, it was like I couldn’t process, like it wasn’t real. But then I touched her, and she was…” He wiped at his eyes, the lashes wet.

Seeing him in pain broke a part of me. I wanted to take it away, to pluck the thorn from his paw, but some things—like some people—were beyond saving. “Did she leave a note?”

“No. I demanded Sheriff Pennington investigate it as a homicide. Lillian wouldn’t have done that. I refused to believe it.”

“You think she was killed?”

“I did back then. Sheriff Pennington performed the investigation like he did everything else—half-assed. He told me that because her prints were on the chair, the electrical cord, and the light fixture, he had no evidence of any assailant or explanation besides the obvious. I raised hell, and”—He shifted his gaze away from mine—“I made your father my number one suspect. I knew it was him. It had to be, and I wanted to make him pay.”

Motive. I tensed and glanced to the knife on the bedside table. Was Garrett confessing to killing my father?

He followed the direction of my gaze. “Take it if it makes you feel better.” The sadness in his tone made me feel like shit. He’d just opened up some wounds, ones that clearly cut him deep, and here I was still refusing to trust him.

“I’m sorry.” I ignored the blade and focused on him. “It’s all so…new, I guess. Please go on.”

“Not much more to tell. I always suspected your father of killing Lil, but he disappeared right after her death. The coincidence wasn’t lost on me. I paid a private investigator to find him. But your dad covered his tracks so well that all traces led right back here, to Blackwood. A dead end.”

He seemed to deflate as he relived his failure to find the man he suspected of killing his sister. I wanted to reassure him that Dad would never have harmed Lillian, but my words wouldn’t do anything to ease his pain. His sister was gone, and there was no reason for it.

More than that, my gut told me he had no idea my dad’s car was rusting on his property. He was just as in the dark as I was. Relief washed through me like the first hit of anesthesia. He had nothing to do with my dad’s disappearance. I knew it in my bones.

I took a chance. “What if I told you that I think all trails lead back here because my father never left Millbrook County—never left Blackwood—alive?”

He let his head loll back and stared at the ceiling. “Nothing would surprise me anymore. Remember when you first knocked on the door, and I told you this place was full of ghosts?”

“Yes.”

“The longer I stay here, the truer it becomes. Ghosts, secrets, lies. All here, all just beyond my sight.” Despair laced his words.

“Why do you stay here? Why not move somewhere else and start over?”

“After Lillian, I couldn’t seem to leave. It’s in my head.” He stroked his temple. “I know it is. I realize I can drive out of the gate and never come back, but I think I’m…”

I knew the feeling. “Broken? You think you’re broken.”

“I would have said fucked up, but yes.”

“I don’t think you are.” I ran my hand down his scruffy cheek. “I think you’ve been through some traumatizing events. And I think you’re afraid. But you’re not fucked up.”

He looked at me with heartbreaking surprise, as if he’d never seen himself as anything other than a monster.

“That’s why you pushed me away, why you’ve been pushing me away this whole time?” I cupped his face in my hands, and he closed his eyes and leaned into my touch. “You’re afraid you’ll hurt me or that I’ll be … what?”

“Disgusted.”

“I’m not.” I stroked my thumbs through his rough beard. “Not even close.”

He drew his brows together. “You heard the part about how I’d like to chase you through the woods? How I want to tie you up and leave my marks on your skin? How I want to fuck you so hard it hurts?”

My stomach clenched at his words. “I heard, though this is the first time you’ve said you wanted to do all those things to me.”

He grabbed my wrists and gave me a hard stare. “Are you kidding? You are the worst temptation. When I’m near you, something short circuits in my brain. Fuck.” He pressed his lips together, as if forcing himself to stop talking. “Let’s just say that every depraved fantasy I’ve had since you came knocking on my door involves a red coat.”

The tips of my ears began to burn, and I stared at his mouth. It took every ounce of willpower I owned to keep from kissing him.

Instead of giving in, I asked something that I’d been wondering for days. “Did you love her—Joan?” I cringed at my question as soon as it rolled off my tongue. It was none of my business, and I should have been asking more questions about my father. Instead, I was waiting for Garrett to tell me if he loved someone else.

He didn’t answer for a long time, the silence building up like bricks in a foundation. After a while, he took a deep breath and blew it out. “I thought I did. Now, though…”

Why did everything in me vibrate to whatever frequency he was putting out? I wanted to run my fingers down the back of his hand, hug him, do anything that would connect us as more than two people in an old house, each haunted by our own ghosts.

“Now, I’m not so sure.” He pulled away from me and stood. “You need to rest.”

“Don’t go.” The words flew out of my mouth before I could stop them. Maybe I’d lost more blood than I realized, or maybe I was foolishly letting my guard down. Either way, I didn’t want him to lock himself away in his room, to withdraw from me despite what we’d shared. “Will you stay with me?”

He backed up a step. “No, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

“I won’t hurt you.” I gave him a wry smile and pushed away the sting of his refusal.

“I think you know that’s not what I’m worried about.” He scanned the shape of my body beneath the blanket.

“You said you’d never force a woman, remember?”

“I won’t. I’d never take something that wasn’t freely given.” He backed up another step.

“You’re afraid.” I smirked as amusement flitted through me. “You’re afraid of me. Or what’s the word—intimacy. You’re afraid of intimacy.”

“I could pin you and rope you before you had a chance to scream.” He crossed his arms over his chest. “I’m not afraid of you.”

“You’re not afraid to do those things to me, no, but you’re afraid to sleep here with me.” I grinned. “I want to cuddle.”

He flinched. “Cuddle?”

“Yeah.” I flipped the blanket and the sheet off the other side of the bed. “Come on. Get in. Unless you’re scared?”

“I’m not scared, but cuddling may be a hard limit for me. Aftercare, yes. Cuddling, no.” He wrinkled his nose.

“Aftercare?”

“After a session in the woods, I would hold Melinda as she came down from the high.”

“And a hard limit, that’s—”

“Something I won’t do.”

“Right.” I grinned. “Because you’re scared.”

“Not scared.” He shook his head.

“I have an idea. Let’s have a safe word. I’ve seen enough movies to know that’s a thing, right?”

“Yes, that’s a thing.” He shrugged. “But I’m still not getting into bed with you without fucking you.”

Jesus. He had no qualms expressing what he wanted.

I wasn’t going to let his directness rattle me. “So you’re afraid of spending the night with me without fucking me?”

“Stop saying I’m afraid.” His voice lowered an octave, and heat pooled in my stomach.

I put on my best poker face. “If you get scared, just call out your safe word. What is it?”

He laughed, chagrin giving him an unexpected youth. “I’ve never had to come up with a safe word. That’s only for my subs.”

“Well, there’s a first time for everything. So, let’s make up one. Like, I don’t know, excelsior. That’s a good word.” I nodded at him, as if the added movement would make it more convincing.

“No, it needs to be simple, something you, or I guess I can remember with ease. Red is out. So we’ll have to go with black. Simple.”

“So if you say black, then that means I stop whatever I’m doing?”

He sighed. “I can’t believe this conversation is happening. But yes, if I say black, that means you’ve reached my hard limit.” He raked my body with a predatory gaze. “Same for you. You can call black, and I’ll know to stop.”

“So the word stop won’t work?”

He smirked and started unbuttoning his shirt. “No.”

Oh, shit. He really did intend to take me up on my offer.

“What about the word no?”

“Definitely won’t work. The only thing a no will get you is choked.”

I pressed my thighs together. Why was the threat so fucking hot?

He peeled his shirt off, and I finally got a good look at the black ink curling up his arms and across his chest. A tangle of swirls and skulls danced along his skin and under the dark hair of his chest. His nipples were a dusky rose color and the right one was pierced with a silver barbell.

He unbuckled his jeans. I leaned over and flicked off the lamp to keep from staring. Settling into the mattress, I heard his boots drop onto the floor, followed by the clatter of his belt. He stalked around the bed, his wiry muscles thrown into sharp relief against the faint light from my bathroom.

Focus. “So the deal is that we’re sleeping together, but no sex. Unless you’re scared, and we can call the whole thing off.”

“I can’t believe I’m agreeing to this.” He sighed. “I’ve never gotten in bed with a woman without fucking her. This is dumb.”

I smiled at the gruffness in his voice and continued my examination. “What if I said stop?”

The bed shifted as he eased down next to me. “I wouldn’t, but the fact that you said it would guarantee a brutal fuck. Just black. That’s the only word that will save you.”

I turned toward him as best I could. He’d thrown my quilt over his legs and hips and laced his fingers under his head as he stared at the ceiling.

“But what if I said please?”

He turned his head toward me, his eyes deep pools of desire. “If you said ‘please’, I’d fuck you so hard that you wouldn’t be able to sit down, walk, or breathe for days without thinking of my cock inside you.”

Fuck.