“Yes,” Sun said, waving them forward and gesturing toward the small kitchen table. “Mom, Dad, can you guys sit down a minute?”

  “Oh,” her mom said, tossing a grin over her shoulder at her father. “This must be serious.”

  “It is,” Auri said, bouncing from one foot to another.

  Sun didn’t miss the fact that Levi took Auri’s hand into his. She squeezed it to her chest as they waited for the Freyrs to settle, and the look he gave her held so much love Sun thought her heart would burst. Or possibly a blood vessel in her brain. It would be just like her to have an aneurysm when she was so close to having everything she’d dreamed of since puberty.

  They gathered around the table, Auri taking the seat between Levi and her grandmother while Sun took the one separating him from her father, disappointed they didn’t have time to round up the firearms in the house. For now, she’d be the buffer between the two. She could be buff when she needed to be.

  “Well?” her mother asked, rubbing her hands together.

  “Levi’s going to be my dad!” Auri shouted, unable to contain herself any longer.

  Sun’s lungs turned to concrete and she and Levi sat stock still, waiting for their reaction.

  Her mom covered her mouth with both hands and looked between them. Her dad waited for more intel before making a decision.

  “Are you two getting married?” her mom asked, hope glittering in her eyes.

  “Yes!” Auri shouted again, and that time Levi chuckled.

  The bubbling enigma known as Elaine Freyr jumped up to hug them, but Sun formed a T with her hands, signaling a time-out.

  Her mom put on a pretty pout and sat back down. “Isn’t this a good thing?”

  “Yes, Mom, it is, but there’s a little more to the story.”

  “Ah. Well”—she checked with her sidekick—“we’re all ears.”

  Her dad nodded, though he seemed a bit more concerned.

  Levi took the lead before Auri could say anything else. “Mr. and Mrs. Freyr, I’m actually Auri’s biological father.”

  Her mom blinked at them like the lightbulb was on but no one was home.

  “I have been her whole life,” he added, as though unsure about what else to say.

  Her mom looked between them, her gaze bouncing back and forth several times. “You were right,” she said to her husband. “They didn’t know.”

  “Looks like,” he said.

  Sun hated gaping. It was so unladylike, but no one had ever, not once in her entire life, accused her of being a lady. “You mean, you’ve suspected all this time?”

  “Frankly, darling, we thought you did, too.”

  “No, Mother, I did not.”

  Levi looked at them, his expression as horrified as Sun’s. “Did you … did you think I abducted her?” he asked, almost unable to get the words out.

  “What?” It was her mother’s turn to be horrified. “No, Levi. Honey, look at the hospital surveillance tape. It’s clearly a young man. A man who loves the girl he’s brought in.”

  “We’ve known for years you were the one who saved her, son,” her dad said. “It just took us a few more to figure out the father part, but it became clear to us around Auri’s ninth birthday.”

  “What happened on my ninth birthday?”

  “Auri got a moped,” her mother said.

  “A moped nobody in the entire town fessed up to getting her,” her dad added.

  Auri looked at Levi. “That was you? All those anonymous presents?”

  “Guys,” Sun said, everything clicking into place, “I always thought it was you getting her those things, and you didn’t want me to force you to take them back, so you denied getting them.”

  They both shook their heads.

  “If I had known, I would’ve investigated.”

  “Which is exactly what we did,” her mother said. “Once it became clear Auri had a secret admirer, we did a little investigating of our own.”

  Levi scowled. “Roe Farkas at the sporting goods store sold me out, didn’t he?”

  “Like a two-dollar whore,” her dad said.

  “Dad!” Sun chastised him with her best glare, but Auri was too busy beaming at … at her father to notice. Her father. The concept was going to take a while for Sun to wrap her head around completely. But for now, she unleashed her admonishment on Levi. “You got a nine-year-old a moped?”

  “And that’s why I didn’t tell you,” he said, lying through his teeth. “She wanted a dirt bike. I figured this was safer.”

  “Oh, good thinking. Wait, how did you know what she wanted?”

  “I asked her.”

  “You did?” Auri asked.

  “When we went for ice cream that summer you fell off your bike.”

  “Oh, yeah. My knee was bleeding and you cleaned it up and bought me ice cream.”

  Sun crossed her arms. “Do you tell your secrets to any strange man who buys you ice cream?”

  “Duh. Ice cream.”

  She shook her head and turned to her mom. “Why didn’t you guys tell me? Why would you keep this from me all these years?”

  “First off,” her mother said, “it took us a while to figure out why some strange man was buying our granddaughter gifts.”

  “But once it clicked into place, everything made sense.” Her dad gave Levi a sympathetic nod. “Even Kubrick. We realized later he’d disappeared—a fact few people knew—and we figured Levi may have had something to do with that.”

  “Wait,” Auri said, surprised. “You saved my mom from him?”

  “Barely. It almost ended badly for all of us.”

  She leaned into him and he wrapped his arms around her, kissing her softly on the head.

  “Second,” her mom continued after taking a moment to enjoy the scene, “you weren’t ready.”

  That got Sun’s attention. “What do you mean I wasn’t ready?”

  “You weren’t … here. You were still running and we worried that telling you would send you even farther away from us. Farther away from Levi. We wanted you to figure it out on your own.”

  “But I didn’t,” she said, her voice cracking.

  Her mom patted her hand. “It took you a little while, but you got there in the end.”

  “With a lot of help,” she argued.

  “We all need help sometimes, Sunshine.”

  Sun sat stunned.

  * * *

  After staying up far too late, Sun insisted Auri go to bed. She stayed with her grandparents so Sun and Levi could have some quality time.

  And boy was it. Sun lay in Levi’s arms, soaking in the warmth wafting off him, and played with his hands.

  “Do you read palms now?” he asked as she ran two fingers along his lifeline.

  “I wish I were that intuitive.”

  “You are. It’s what makes you a good investigator.”

  “Yeah. Then how did I miss all of this for so long?”

  “Because all the good was wrapped up with all the bad and your mind couldn’t separate it. It’s hardly your fault. Even the most intuitive people can’t see their own destinies. It’s a forest-for-the-trees thing.”

  She propped her head up on an elbow and ran those same fingers over the outline of his full mouth. The sculpted one that had filled many of her deepest, darkest fantasies. “You’re much deeper than you appear.”

  “Thanks?”

  She laughed softly and looked over at the nightstand. “You didn’t drink your wine.”

  He followed her gaze, then turned back. “Yeah, I don’t drink.”

  “Since when?”

  “For some time now.”

  She narrowed her gaze. “When you say you don’t drink, you mean, other than for work?”

  He shook his head. “Not even then.”

  “But you own a distillery. Your family owns a bar.”

  “So, surely I drink the inventory?”

  “Well, no. But the distillery?”

  “That’s where my cousin Joshua comes in. You’d never know it by looking at him, but that man has a very sophisticated palate.”

  “I never thought I’d hear his name and sophisticated anything in the same sentence.”

  “I rinse.”

  “You don’t swallow?”

  “I’m going to pretend you didn’t ask me that.”

  She reached over him and took his glass of wine. “I don’t want to interfere with your sobriety.”

  He took it out of her hands and drank it down in one gulp. “It’s not about sobriety. There was just never anyone else I wanted to share a drink with.”

  “Else?”

  “If you’ll remember, we almost hooked up at the lake when you were a freshman.”

  “How could I forget that? You were drunk on your family’s moonshine and you kissed me.”

  “I wasn’t that drunk.”

  She smiled. “You’re saying you wanted to kiss me?”

  “I wanted to do a lot more than that.”

  “It wasn’t just the booze talking?”

  “Booze rarely talks, and when it does, it has nothing interesting to say.”

  “Rather like televangelists.”

  “Rather like.”

  She fell asleep in his arms, her mind swimming in all the unanswered questions and uncertainties they still faced. The logistics of their situation. The complications. How all of this would affect Auri.

  Fortunately, they had all summer to figure it out. They might have to actually do that camping thing for some alone time with her … their daughter.

  But he was hers. And that was enough.

  She slept approximately twelve seconds before waking up to the call of nature. She lay curled up with an arm wrapped around her. Levi’s mouth rested at her ear, his deep breaths fanning across her cheek. She hated to disturb him, but as her mother would say, when you gotta go, you gotta go.

  She untangled their limbs and slid under his arms. He protested and pulled her back against him, so she waited until his breathing was even and tried again. Huzzah.

  As a career law enforcement officer, when Sun walked to the bathroom wearing a Three Doors Down T-shirt and nothing else, she really should have noticed the man sitting in her living room. More to the point, she should have noticed the man standing in her kitchen holding a gun.

  22

  If she said she missed you and

  normally that would be good

  but she’s reloading, take cover immediately.

  —PRO TIP FROM DEL SOL SPORTING GOODS

  “Dad?” she said, forgetting she had nothing on below her T-shirt. Fortunately, it was long enough to disguise that fact. She opened the refrigerator door and bathed him in light. “Whatcha doin’?”

  He stood lounging against her sink, arms crossed, 9 mm at the ready. He gestured toward her living room with a nod.

  Her catlike reflexes kicking in—as they were wont to do—she spun around and saw yet another man sitting in her living room. Same chair. Different guy. This intruder was blonder than the one she’d had the night before.

  She stepped around the island to glare at the escaped convict who’d invaded her sanctum sanctorum. Levi’s uncle Wynn sat staring at her, a charming grin lifting one corner of his mouth. It was odd how he looked nothing like his nephew, but he was just as handsome in a hardened criminal, shot caller kind of way. He wore plain clothes—a T-shirt and jeans—and had a baseball cap resting on one knee. Part of his brilliant disguise, she was sure.

  “What is it with you Ravinder men? Do any of you just knock?”

  “I would have,” he said, raising an unapologetic brow, “but you and my nephew looked pretty chummy. I thought I’d give you guys some time to catch up.”

  “So you just let yourself in?”

  “I could hardly hang around outside. Not with half the cops in the state looking for me.”

  “Yeah.” She crossed her arms over her chest. “Thanks for that. The US marshal assigned to the case is about ninety percent certain I helped, since I was at the hospital when it happened.”

  “I saw you. In my defense, I had no idea you’d be there.”

  “Who was your accomplice?”

  “Come on, apple blossom. You know I can’t answer that.”

  She turned on a lamp and gave him a once-over. “You’ve looked better.”

  “I’ve felt better. But you look amazing.”

  “I’m not wearing pants,” she said the second it hit her.

  “You won’t hear me complaining.”

  “Excuse me.” Not wanting to bring Levi into it just yet, she hurried to the bathroom and threw on her robe which, unfortunately, wasn’t one of those thick things that hide body parts. It was a shiny, silky thing that did anything but hide her girl parts, but at least it was something.

  He seemed mildly disappointed when she came out wearing it, so clearly it was doing its job.

  “Dad, you want to sit down?”

  “I’m fine, pumpkin.”

  She figured as much. He could keep a better eye on the intruder from his current position.

  She sat on the sofa catty-cornered across from him. “What are you doing here?”

  “We need to coordinate our efforts.”

  “What efforts?”

  “I told you when you came to see me, I needed two weeks to see to Clay.”

  That was something she had yet to tell Levi. She checked her room. The door was still closed. “You said you needed two weeks to get the evidence to bring him down. Not that you were going to escape from prison.”

  “Yeah, well, that wasn’t going as well as I’d hoped, so I improvised.”

  “By purposely inducing a heart attack?”

  He confirmed by lifting a shoulder.

  “Wynn, I have to take you in.”

  “Sorry, apple. No can do.”

  “Then why are you here?”

  “I told you, we need to coordinate our efforts. And I knew you’d never let me see her.”

  Sun froze, doing everything in her power to show no reaction.

  “The girl,” he added in case she didn’t understand.

  She most definitely understood. “You can’t see her.”

  He pressed his mouth together. “We had a deal.”

  “That was before you became an escaped convict.”

  “So you would’ve brought her to the prison to see me like we agreed?”

  After drawing in a deep breath, she answered honestly. “No. I wouldn’t have.”

  “There you go. Not that I can blame you, apple. Maybe when she’s older?”

  “Maybe. Wynn, I have to ask again, why would you risk an arrest to come here?”

  “I have new infor—” He stopped mid-sentence, and Sun followed his gaze to Levi standing at the bedroom door.

  He stood barefoot with a half-fastened pair of jeans and a smirk stolen from an archangel. He walked over to Wynn as the escaped convict struggled to his feet, and Sun realized Wynn was in much worse shape than she’d imagined. He straightened and put a hand on the side of Levi’s face, taking in every aspect of him, his gaze as loving as a father’s.

  Sun understood. She did the same thing quite often.

  “You’ve grown up,” he said.

  “I’ve gotten old.”

  Wynn laughed softly. “You were born old. I could see it in your eyes, that old soul you kept safe no matter how hard your dad tried to beat it out of you.”

  Sun stifled her surprise at his words, struggling to keep her poker face intact. Not that she would put child abuse past Levi’s father, but to say it out loud made it more real. More palpable.

  Levi let his gaze slide to her dad, who lounged against her sink like he hadn’t a care in the world. “Cyrus,” he said warily.

  Her dad nodded. “Levi.”

  “So, what’s going on?”

  Sun decided to explain the ridiculous situation she found herself in. “Your uncle thought it would be a good idea to come for a visit in the middle of his manhunt, because no law enforcement agent in the world would think to look for relatives who might harbor a fugitive.”

  “No, I meant why are you in a robe?”

  “Oh.” She tugged the lapels together. “It was either this or a towel.”

  Wynn laughed and pulled Levi into a bear hug complete with a couple of slaps on the back. When he set his nephew at arm’s length, he said, “I take it you two have finally worked out your issues?”

  Levi laughed. “We’re getting there. But you didn’t risk a stopover to see how my love life was faring.”

  “I didn’t. I can’t say how I got this information, but whatever Clay is doing, he’s doing it soon. And if I had to take an educated guess, his plan is to kill you.”

  “That’s what we thought all along,” Sun said. “So why now? Why the hurry?”

  “Because Clay suspects he had something to do with Kubrick’s death.”

  “Why should he care?” she asked with a scoff. “It wasn’t like Clay and Kubrick were besties.”

  “No, but family is family. He sees it as his responsibility to retaliate.”

  “Fine. But again, why now?” Sun asked.

  “Because today would have been Kubrick’s birthday. From my understanding, he wants to make a big show of it. Let the higher-ups know he can take care of business and make them money in the process.”

  Sun swept a wary gaze over him. “Wynn, where are you getting your information?”

  “Can’t say.”

  “I don’t suppose you have any proof? Something I can use to bring him in on?”

  “Not a thing, and I wouldn’t reveal my source either way. Just arrest the man already.”

  She stood and started pacing. “Wynn, this isn’t a game. This isn’t the wild, wild West. I can’t just arrest him for breathing my air. I need something.”

  Wynn nodded as though expecting her to say that very thing. “It’s worse than all that, apple.”

  She stopped and turned toward him.

  He bit down and said softly, “Clay knows who Auri is.”

  Sun’s breath caught as she stared at him in absolute disbelief.

  He looked at Levi. “He knows the girl is yours, son. He knows you left her a third of everything, and you know he can’t let that happen.”