River scolded himself for caring that Ash had taken one frightfully electric look at him and fled.
Ash was obviously dealing with difficult news, thanks to Lester, and River had a good guess what it was.
Hell, the best guess. Ash’s sea-green eyes didn’t resemble Lester’s by accident.
But how are they related?
He forced the thoughts aside and drove home to his obscene pillared mansion, much like all the others this side of Greenville.
He walked through the veined marble foyer, through the reception, and found Ben and his brother Landon draped on a sofa in the east living room, their go-to room for chilling out after working in their upstairs science lab. Those two were the geekiest geeks he knew.
Ben was eating McDonald’s fries, and Landon was unsuccessfully trying to steal one.
River perched on the arm of an overstuffed beige armchair. Don’t make everything about Lester. They’ve had enough of that last year. Focus on anything else.
“How was Silver Pines?” he asked Ben. Fail.
“Running smoothly, as always. What are your plans tonight? Not Club Twenty-One, I hope.”
“How’d you know about that?”
“Duke dropped in.”
“He wants you to hit Club Twenty-One?” Landon’s face pinched. “You need better friends.”
River cocked a brow. “You need real friends.”
“Hey!” Ben said, throwing a fry at him.
River caught it and popped it into his mouth. “Aw, Ben, you’re like a brother.”
“A brother?” Ben squished his nose up distastefully and sought Landon for a contradiction, but Landon was flicking from a bird documentary to the local sports channel. “Really?”
“Eating the contents of our fridges. Leaving your sweat-soaked towel on the weight bench in the gym. Sounds brotherlike to me.”
Ben threw another fry. River ate that one too.
“You are also annoying,” Ben said. “So your theory might be valid.”
They smirked.
“If I bug you,” Landon said, “will you chuck fries in my mouth?”
“River privilege only,” Ben said. “If I start with you, I won’t have any fries left.”
River left them battling for fries and dashed to the kitchen. He poured himself a drink of water, in the vain hope it would settle his mind’s ceaseless questions about Lester and Ash.
Ben sauntered into the kitchen, chucking his empty fries container in the trash. “You left a list at the store.” He pulled out a crumpled piece of paper from his pocket and stuck it to the fridge with a smiley face magnet. “Befriend and help Ash with Silver Pines? What’s that about?”
River downed his water. “Have I told you how much I love your dedication to butting into my business?”
“I do it well. You’re welcome.”
River laughed, glancing at the list. He had not expected to be so rattled when Ash Heartford opened his door.
“Wha’cha choking that glass for?”
River set it in the sink. Mused. “How hard would it have been to tell me who Ash was?”
“Who is he?”
River whipped out his phone. “What day is it?”
“Finish this sentence. Thank God It’s . . .?”
River paused, blinking at Ben lounging against the fridge. “Point proven, brother.”
“I’m not that irritating.”
River gave a fond snort and checked his phone. “The Beauview Book Club is tonight!”
“Sounds amazing. But there’s this three-hour, one-person dramatic performance tonight. So . . .”
“During Lester’s help-him-and-he’s-off-limits speech he mentioned Ash working at the library.”
“We’ll talk about that fun speech later. Who is Ash?”
River slipped his phone into his pocket. “I don’t know yet.” But he intended to find out.
“How do you feel about rescheduling your three-hour one-person dramatic performance?”
“Better if we can convince Landon to join us. But I have to bail if it goes past eight. Got tightrope training at the circus, later.”
“How’s that going?”
“Every time I get up on the platform, I almost pee myself.”
“I look forward to see you do it.”
“Peeing myself?”
River punched him playfully. “Tightrope walking. Your show is at the end of the month, right?”
“It’s not much a show as it is amateur night.” Ben bit his lip and glanced toward the room where Landon was.
River smiled gently. “He’ll be impressed. He loves you.”
“Yeah.” Ben sighed, and they moved back into the living room. “I’m like a brother.”
River asked Landon to join them on their book club visit, but he refused. “Greenville Goats are playing. Haven’t missed a game this season.”
River wished he had. Six months after a weeklong fling with millionaire playboy Chance Roosevelt-Sutton, Landon still hadn’t gotten over him.
It physically hurt watching his brother hibernate every weekend on the faint hope that Chance might realize he wanted to be with a man after all.
On the television screen, Chance’s basketball team jogged onto the court.
Ben sighed, grabbed his wallet, and murmured River’s own thought. “He’ll never love you.”
* * *
Ash stretched his body to the limit dusting the spines of old atlases in the restricted section.
Although the room was moderately sized and made a cozy meeting room for a dozen people, the task of dusting behind and under books was arduous and time-consuming.
Ten minutes before book club time, two young women and one elderly man had taken their seats around the long table that Ash had prepared.
Shelly insisted he finish the top shelves.
She’d set up a small step stool that lifted him two feet off the ground, just high enough that he had to extend his limbs to reach the top books. He hated the creepy feeling that Shelly was putting him on display. She made it clear that she thought he was hot, hell, she said as much. But there was . . . something that bugged him about some of her requests.
At least he’d found another T-shirt to wear in the Lost and Found box.
Plus, overtime pay.
He tuned out the chatter of arriving guests behind him and daydreamed about the sad-yet-hopeful letter tucked into his pocket.
Shelly’s hand touched his calf, startling him. He fought the urge to shake her off. After all, she reliably pays on time—and far better than his other cleaning gigs.
He needed money for rent, and lately, he needed even more to care for his sick cat.
His vet thought he was a fool for not putting her down, but with pills, her condition was manageable, and Ash would scrub his knuckles bare to give her that chance.
Chucky wasn’t just a cat.
She was family.
For a while, the only family he had. He’d found her a year after his mom kicked him out. She’d been the forgotten runt of a litter too. Chucked out with the trash.
Her name showed his morbid teenage mind at work, but it had stuck. So had Chucky.
He’d make sure she got those pills.
“Ash, could you put these books on the top shelf with the German lexicons?”
Ash half-twisted toward her, balance fragile. He dropped the duster onto a lower shelf and took the four hefty books from her.
Shelly smiled widely and backed away with an admiring glance to his ass.
Ash’s grip on the books doubled as he glanced around the room and found himself staring at none other than Roy Riverton. He was sitting at the end of the table closest to Ash’s feet, gaze clasped on him.
Already trembling from lack of sleep and hours of dusting, Ash’s knees buckled.
He steadied himself with an elbow on the nearest shelf and forced back the questions bubbling up his throat. Questions that weren’t appropriate for a book club meeting.
Still, one managed to escape. “What are you doing here?”
River stood and moved over to him. Close enough that Ash noticed navy flecks in those startling blue eyes.
River glanced at the man that had been sitting next to him at the table. “Ben and I decided this was better than a one-man play.”
Ash didn’t believe it for a second.
His expression must have said as much, because River laughed. “We’re here to scout out the Beauview Book Club?”
“Try again.” Ash was poor, not stupid.
“You got me.” River gave him a devastatingly slow smile. “I came to scout you out.”
Ash adjusted his grip on the old books.
Ben laughed at something on his phone and turned toward them. His gaze flickered over Ash to River. “Your brother has the balls to ask us to bring him some grub.” He pointed a finger. “Is this Ash?”
“He’s the one,” River murmured.
Ben smiled broadly and introduced himself. “Lester did a great job with Silver Pines. You’re lucky.”
Silver Pines. Granddad. Lucky.
It made his head spin.
He refocused on River. He felt cornered, and he didn’t like it. “I’m surprised.”
River hitched his brows. “Surprised?”
“For someone with such a fancy phone, I thought you’d know how to use it.” River was having difficulty following, so Ash helped him. “You could have called to talk.”
Ben quickly hunched over his phone. River shoved a hand through his hair. “Yeah.”
Ash hadn’t expected River to acknowledge that he had a good point. In his life, everything was usually a fight.
He didn’t know how to respond.
River pulled out his phone. He swiped the screen and a few moments later, Ash’s electronic brick buzzed in his back pocket. River’s gaze lifted to his and held.
“Cute,” Ash said.
“You’re not so bad yourself.”
Startled laughter bubbled through him, and the shoddy stepstool wobbled. He lost his grip on the books, jerked to catch them—and fell.
Books thumped to the floor, and arms shot out, grabbing him tightly around the waist. A huff of shocked breath burst over Ash’s cheek as he knocked against a warm chest.
Ash blinked, his face an inch from River’s, his hands clutching firm shoulders. A smattering of freckles bridged River’s nose, and his cheek dimpled.
Ash deepened the bite of his fingers into River. “Fine, you caught me and my attention.”
River’s breath fanned over his jaw with a soft laugh. “You have Lester’s gift with words.”
Ash scrambled back from River so dizzyingly fast he almost toppled again.
“Can we talk?” River asked.
Before Ash could reply, Shelly was there, profusely apologizing to River.
She whirled to Ash and inspected him. “Are you hurt? I never should have let you use that stool.”
Her fingers prodded his face as she thoroughly inspected him for injuries.
“I’m fine. Really,” he said for the third time.
“Better call it a day,” she said, steering him out of the restricted section.
He caught River’s eye. God, he felt so conflicted. He needed to know about his family, but the idea of finding out for sure his father never cared . . .
“I hope that Riverton won’t complain about you landing on him,” Shelly said.
“Wait, you know that guy?”
She finally let go of him at the main library foyer. “Son of one of the wealthiest families in Greenville. If you read a tabloid once in a while, you’d have recognized him too. Now go home and rest.”
Rest. If only.
He had another job to do.
Outside the library, Ash paced the top steps expecting River to follow. He grew disappointed when a minute passed and River hadn’t emerged.
Maybe he was trying to make up for barging in while he was working?
If he wanted River to come out and talk to him, he’d have to ask for it.
He hunched against a cold pillar, slightly wet from a recent summer rainfall. He liked the cool bite—kept him grounded in the moment.
He took out his brick, hesitated, and sent River a message.
Ash: Yes, we can talk.
Thirty seconds later, River strode over the shadowy steps and stopped before him.
“I’m sorry for coming without calling. I am trying to figure things out.” River’s gaze skated Ash’s length with a tickle of electricity. “Why didn’t Lester tell me about you?”
Ash slipped his fingers inside his pocket with the letter. “He let me decide if I wanted anyone to know. Did you guess?”
“I have my suspicions.” River curved a finger under Ash’s chin, gaze sweeping over every crease of his face. “You can’t not have suspicions when your eyes are so much like his.”
Ash’s breath caught. “We’re related.”
“How?” River’s fingers drifted under his chin and down his neck before abruptly dropping. “Is he your dad?”
Ash shook his head. “Granddad.”
River gave him a tender grin. “I wish he’d told me.”
“I think he was trying to do the right thing.”
“Or he didn’t know how to tell me he’d found his real grandson.” A small shrug. “I wish he’d confided in me. I would’ve helped. Would’ve convinced you to visit him before he died.”
“I don’t think he wanted that.”
“He prayed every day to see his son again. I think he would have wanted to see his grandson.”
Ash pulled the letter from his pocket and rubbed his thumb over the folded paper. “Read for yourself.”
“You don’t have to let me read that, Ash,” he said quietly. “Those words are from him to you.”
Ash handed him the paper. “You obviously cared for him.” Like family should.
River looked down at the letter. “I’m jealous of you.”
Ash laughed drily. “There’s a lot to be jealous of. I suppose I might be willing to swap lives for a day, if you really want.” River laughed, and Ash felt the skate of his breath at his cheekbone. “Do you want to keep Silver Pines?”
River shook his head. “It used to be him and me that wrote to each other. Pen pals since I was ten. Wrote for fun from opposite sides of the bookstore and exchanged notes via an old mailbox—” River stopped suddenly. “I’m jealous because you have his last letter.”
Ash regarded the letter they both held at either end. “Read it,” he said, and let go.
He leaned back against the pillar and stared, unfocused, toward the street. From his peripheral vision, he watched River calmly unfold and tilt Ash’s letter toward the moonlight. He heard River’s breathy rush of expletives as he read. Felt the air stir as River shifted in front of him.
They stared at each other, both unsure what to say.
River pressed the letter back into his hand with a warm squeeze. “If he wasn’t sick—if he thought you wouldn’t reject seeing him—he would have done everything to convince you to meet.”
Ash stuffed the letter in his pocket, trying not to feel the tickle of River’s touch.
“Let me show you the legacy he left you,” River said.
Legacy. Family. Stupid electricity. It was too much. “Give me the weekend to soak this all in?”
“Of course.” River stepped back, and cool breezes filled his place.
Ash shifted awkwardly. “What did he die of?”
“Cancer. Kidneys.”
Oh. “I’m sorry.”
“Me too.”
Ash risked looking at River’s eyes. Shiny, but it might have been a trick of the moonlight or a hint of rain in the air. “You knew him well.”
“Better than he did himself sometimes.”
A small envious ache formed in his chest. To be close to someone that you knew better than anyone else. What he wouldn’t have given . . .
Ash sidled toward the street. “Don’t be surprised when that fancy phone of yours makes shrill sounds on Sunday. It’ll be me. Calling you.”
River snorted and headed back inside.
Ash had two more cleaning gigs across town. Then he needed to sink into his couch-bed for the night. Needed to talk to Danielle and see how she was doing. Needed to remind her to be careful of beautiful boys with navy-flecked blue eyes whose tenderness toward his friends do confusing things to her insides.
* * *
River couldn’t find his damn keys. Too many rooms in this house.
Now didn’t that make him sound like a privileged bastard?
He charged through to the dining room, where Landon and Ben were sitting at opposite sides of a long table.
“Don’t much feel like doing anything today,” Landon said to Ben over his bowl of cereal.
“Jesus, Landon.”
“What?” Landon said.
River scoured the table of condiments, toast, waffles, fresh fruit, and cereal. Had he tossed the keys here when he brought back dinner last night?
Ben turned his attention pointedly on River.
“Cute guy last night,” Ben said.
Landon looked up at Ben sharply over his bowl of cereal.
River stuffed down a frustrated sigh as he searched for his keys. These two. Honestly.
“Cute,” River agreed, searching under the local Greenville Gazette on the chair adjacent to his broken-hearted brother and idiot, “and completely off-limits.”
At this rate, he’d be late to Appaloosa Inn to check up on a pregnant mare. If he hadn’t been so lost in thoughts of Ash last night, he might have hooked his keys in the foyer closet.
“Off-limits?” Ben said. “Sure about that?”
Lester had made himself very clear. River was to help Ash. Give him the support and kindness Lester couldn’t give. River had promised. Simple as that. “He will firmly and forever be in the friend zone.”
Ben winced and glanced at Landon. “Friend zone,” he said, and snagged River’s keys from his pocket. “Looking for these? They were on the table.”
“Toss ’em,” River said.
“For a price.”
River hit him with a playful glare. “Price?” His phone burst into song. Unknown number. He held up his hand to pause Ben and answered.
Immediately, he wished he hadn’t. Birch Lagoon again. “I told you, I don’t own Silver Pines. It’s being gifted.”
Birch Lagoon didn’t give up. They wanted him to name the new owner, something River wasn’t inclined to tell them. But was it his place to turn Birch Lagoon away? If he was passing on Silver Pines, he should pass on this decision too.
With a frustrated sigh, River gave in. “Ash Heartford.” He ended the call, grumpy. “Just give me the keys,” he snapped at Ben.
“Yeah.” Ben lobbed them over Landon’s head.
River snagged them, then forced himself to chill. “Sorry, man. Nothing personal.”
“I understand. Can’t be easy letting go of Silver Pines.”
Right. River jiggled the keys. “What was your price?”
“Slapping some sense into your brother.”
River laughed and backed out of the dining room. “Which one of you?”
* * *
Ash woke to the door buzzer. He lurched out of his couch-bed in a daze. He’d barely slept four hours after his graveyard shift.
Sheets tangled his legs and he tripped with a curse. Danielle pulled back the curtain dividing the room, equally frumpy from sleep. “You expecting someone?”
He shook his head, jamming his legs in a pair of old jeans. No way was he opening his door as he did when River had shown up.
River. Was he buzzing again?
Would he apologize and say it was all a mistake? Say their eye color was a funny coincidence? Say he found the real Ash Heartford?
Heart banging with confusion, he answered the door.
Not River.
Two suited men in their mid-forties wearing wide plastic smiles.
“Ash Heartford? Legal owner of Silver Pines?”
“Yeah?” Ash asked, frowning.
“We’re here on behalf of Birch Lagoon.”
“Birch Lagoon?”
“Second largest property development company in the county.”
“Property development?”
The suits’ smiles broadened. “May we talk?”
Ash didn’t want anyone coming into his apartment. “Can you tell me what you want?”
“We want to make you an offer on the land that has been deeded to you.”
* * *
When the suits left, Ash shut the door in more of a daze than he’d woken in.
Danielle prepared them peppermint tea, a refreshing taste in their otherwise stuffy attic.
“So?” she prompted, planting herself on the bed next to him.
Chucky pounced between them, butting his hand for a pat.
Ash didn’t know where to start. Like, what the hell? Was he still asleep?
“Okay, let me help you,” Danielle said. “They mentioned Silver Pines. That’s the store that’s been gifted to you, right?”
Ash managed to nod.
“They offered two hundred grand to buy it from you.”
He swallowed. Nodded again.
“Two hundred grand.” Danielle was on her knees, squashing him into a squealing hug. Peppermint tea splashed over the side of his mug and seeped into his shirt. “It’s like my prayers have been answered. Finally the big guy is looking after you. Not just my bro looking after me.”
Ash still couldn’t believe it. “So that whole conversation really did happen?”
“I know, right? Unbelievable.”
She could say that again.
Birch Lagoon would be thrilled to buy out the property at two hundred thousand dollars.
“I have two weeks.” Before the offer was off the table. “I need to think about it.”
“Think about what?” Danielle asked. “I say call them and sign tomorrow. Hell, now, if you can catch them.”
Ash picked up Chucky and settled her on his lap. Two hundred grand. It was an enormous chunk of cash, not to mention a great deal. He could afford Danielle’s college costs. He wouldn’t have to worry about Chucky’s medical bills. He might even manage to buy health insurance and then move out of this dingy apartment and rent a two-bedroom.
Finally he could give Danielle a gift without begging the neighbors to finance the last dollar.
All he had to do was accept the gift deed. Sell it on.
He bit his lip.
It wasn’t as if he knew Lester Mallory. The legacy wasn’t personal for him. But . . .
He forced away the rising uncertainty and guilt.
Setting Danielle up for a solid future? Securing Chucky’s future? It’s a win-win.
He gnawed his bottom lip. “I think I’m going to sign and sell.”
“You think?” Danielle said, softly. Head tilting, trying to read him. “You deserve this break, Ash. For you.”
Ash finished his tea and stared at the sediments that almost formed an A at the bottom of his cup.
He smiled uncertainly.
‘A’ stood for a lot of things in his life. Absent parents. Aching hearts. Avoiding men.
But did it stand for accepting the gift deed as well?
* * *
Ash scrubbed, dusted, and polished until his fingers were raw. The entire day he jumped from job to job, wondering if he could cut back on his schedule if he sold the bookstore.
He finished cleaning Mrs. Hammock’s pool. The heavy smell of chlorine on an empty stomach made him dizzy. Add a dose of indecision and he was the definition of nauseated.
“You’re not wearing your uniform,” Mrs. Hammock grumbled as she approached him on the pool deck.
“Sorry,” Ash said. In his hurry to leave River after the library, he had completely forgotten he’d changed out of his pink tank top and left it next to the Lost and Found box behind Shelly’s desk. “Won’t happen again.”
“I should hope not. These are simple instructions.”
“An oversight, I—”
“I don’t care for excuses.”
Frustration built in Ash’s jaw, and he forced himself not to talk back.
“Eight dollars an hour,” she said. “Others would do the job for less. Do it faster too.”
Two hundred grand would solve all pink-tank-top-and-Mrs.-Hammock problems.
“Don’t mess up again.”
It took all his will to calmly nod and head back inside.
She called after him. “I’m docking half your pay for today.”
Twenty minutes later, Ash stalked back through town, angry and worried. His throat was tight. He counted on every cent of that money for this week’s groceries.
He hoped whatever was in the fridge would stretch another week.
“Stupid!” He should’ve gone back for his uniform instead of hoping for leniency.
He paused on the cobblestone square outside the bright yellow café River had sat in. His stomach flipped. River wouldn’t be happy to hear about the suits and their offer, but it was only fair to tell him.
He sat on a bench in the square, the last touches of day warming his back. Took out his old phone and called.
River answered, voice distant. “It’s just my phone, honey.” Ash shifted on his seat at that soothing voice. River spoke directly into the phone. “Ash! I’ve been looking forward to your call.”
“I don’t think you’ll like what I have to say.”
The line crackled as if River were outside, on the move. “Birch Lagoon find you already?”
Ash startled. “You know about their offer?”
“Unfortunately.”
“Au contraire. Two hundred grand sounds like quite a fortune to me.”
River sighed. “I can see how attractive it must sound.”
“Not just attractive,” Ash said quietly. “Necessary.”
River sighed. “I’m busy right now, and I’d like to talk about this in person.”
“Busy with your honey?” Ash asked, instantly scolding himself for prying. For being curious at all.
River chuckled. “Yeah, I’ll tell you all about him. He’s the best ride in the world.” Ash’s free hand gripped the lip of the bench so hard it might splinter. “How’s tomorrow afternoon?”