Trust the liar a small t.., p.1
Trust the Liar: A Small Town Romantic Suspense Novel (Lucy Falls), page 1
Trust the Liar
A Small Town Romantic Suspense Novel
E.R. Whyte
Whyte House Publications
Copyright © 2023 by E.R. WHYTE
All rights reserved.
No portion of this book may be reproduced in any form without written permission from the publisher or author, except as permitted by U.S. copyright law.
Contents
Dedication and Content Warning
Playlist
Chapter One
Chapter Two
Chapter Three
Chapter Four
Chapter Five
Chapter Six
Chapter Seven
Chapter Eight
Chapter Nine
Chapter Ten
Chapter Eleven
Chapter Twelve
Chapter Thirteen
Chapter Fourteen
Chapter Fifteen
Chapter Sixteen
Chapter Seventeen
Chapter Eighteen
Chapter Nineteen
Chapter Twenty
Chapter Twenty-One
Chapter Twenty-Two
Chapter Twenty-Three
Chapter Twenty-Four
Chapter Twenty-Five
Chapter Twenty-Six
Chapter Twenty-Seven
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Epilogue
Thank You
About the Author
Also By the Author
To every survivor of sexual assault and molestation:
Your RISE. Their RUIN.
Content Warning:
As the dedication suggests, this book deals heavily with themes of recovering from the trauma of sexual assault. Please do not read if this will cause you pain or discomfort. Much respect and endless love,
-Elle.
Playlist
Listen
Feels Like Home – Chantal Kreviazuk
Give In To Me – Garrett Hedlund, Leighton Meester
A Safe Place to Land – Sara Bareilles, John Legend
It’s On Us – AJR
Gasoline - Halsey
Til It Happens to You – Lady Gaga
Easy Silence – The Chicks
Godspeed – The Chicks
My Songs Know What You Did in the Dark - Fall Out Boy
I’ll Be There - Jess Glynne
I Will Wait – Mumford & Sons
Praying – Kesha
Heart Attack – Wild Rivers
Nearly Forgot My Broken Heart – Chris Cornell
Landslide - Dixie Chicks
Bad Moon Rising – Creedence Clearwater Revival
Into the Mystic – Van Morrison
Hell and High Water – Black Stone Cherry
A Safe Place to Land – Sara Bareilles, John Legend
Broken – Seether
Wild Horses - Alicia Keys, Adam Levine
Chapter One
Cotton
My hands clenched around the steering wheel as I navigated the two-lane highway.. It was nearing midnight, and a mixture of sleet and rain fell outside the confines of the compact rental, the windshield wipers swooshing softly into the silence.
I was finally coming home to Lucy Falls after being too-long gone, and I couldn’t help but feel like I’d been pulled onto concrete after falling in the deep end of the swimming pool. It scraped, and it hurt, but I could breathe.
I needed to breathe, for a few minutes, anyway. I was supposed to begin a new job shortly and I needed to get my head on straight.
I’d turned the radio off after settling into the vehicle at the Richmond airport, preferring the relative quiet of my racing thoughts to any Top Forty station. Now, I wondered if that had been a mistake. All that time to do nothing more than think…it wasn’t fun.
I needed to see someone, a professional. Talk all this shit out. It was the only way I would truly relieve myself of the poison that tainted every memory of the past months. The only way to heal.
With my free hand, I lifted the cup of coffee I’d grabbed at Sheetz on my way out of the city. I took a sip of the brew that had faded way too fast to cold, noticing that my hand shook now that my fingers weren’t wrapped around the wheel. I shook them out and returned them to their former position.
The problem was, I couldn’t talk to anyone. Couldn’t see a therapist, couldn’t let all of this rage and hurt festering inside out. Even though a therapist would be bound to privacy, there were too many ways for the motivated individual to uncover a secret. Blackmail. Torture. Money.
Hacking.
And he was nothing if not motivated. He knew my secrets could destroy him, if they didn’t destroy me first.
The trembling in my hands was radiating upwards now into my arms and the tense posture of my shoulders. And my breathing was growing shallow.
Panic attack.
I recognized the signs for what they were and pulled onto the shoulder of the sleeping highway. Although no one was around, I dutifully put my hazards on and shifted into park, then rooted around in the bag beside me for my meds.
The pills helped. A friend and psychiatrist back on base had written the script for Valium, telling me it would help calm me without totally knocking me out. I swallowed one down with the cold coffee, resolutely ignoring the voice inside my head clamoring for attention.
He got you the pills, and now he’s dead.
Stop it. It wasn’t my fault.
Wasn’t it?
No! It had nothing to do with me. He had a heart attack.
Because healthy, thirty-two-year-old marathon runners have heart
attacks and die all the time.
Shut up!
Dropping my head back against the headrest, I closed my eyes, waiting for the calm to settle over me like a blanket. It was like floating once the Valium took hold. I was still perfectly conscious and alert to my surroundings, but it was akin to viewing them through a bokeh filter. Everything was muted and dreamy. Better, I just wouldn’t care anymore. Give me a few more minutes, and I wouldn’t care that I hated to drive in the rain— particularly at nighttime. I wouldn’t care that the windshield wipers squeaked on the down swipe. I wouldn’t care that no one would be awake to greet me when I arrived home for the first time in over a year.
I wouldn’t care that I couldn’t shut my fucking brain off, or that Michael was dead, or that I hadn’t slept—really slept—in close to a month.
Sign me up for not giving a shit. I volunteer.
Reaching out without opening my eyes, I felt for the radio dial and turned it on. The low, jazzy strains of some seventy’s ballad filled the car, and I let my hand drop to my lap. Maybe some noise would drown out everything that was fucked up with my world.
Language, Emery.
I could hear my mother now, and a faint smirk settled on my lips.
Cursing is so unrefined. It’s what people with limited vocabularies use to express themselves.
She was about to find out that my vocabulary had become extremely limited since entering the military. She hadn’t wanted me to join in the first place. She and my stepfather had wanted Bryn Mawr or Brown and could not fathom why someone with my grades and potential would want to…shudder…enlist.
The answer was simple. Enlisting in the army had been nothing more than the mother of all eff you’s after I’d graduated high school. Eff you, Mom, and eff you, Paul. And let’s not forget Dad and Jamie. The most incredible father and the sweetest big brother I could have imagined. Eff you, too, for dying and leaving me to put up with their bullshit all by myself. I could trace nearly everything awful in my life back to the boating accident that had occurred when I was little. We were happy, and then we weren’t. Mother was a mom, lavishing hugs and kisses and time upon us, and then she wasn’t. She changed, grew distant. Moody. Reserved.
Enlisting had been the only way I could see myself moving on from her and Paul, and the tragedy that had shaped our lives. I imagined her and Paul having to tell all of their richie-rich friends that their daughter, their precious negotiating piece in the game of mergers and acquisitions, had become a cog in our country’s war machine.
I could see the pinch in Mom’s mouth, the frown lines on Paul’s forehead.
It was too perfect.
Too bad it had backfired the way it did.
I inhaled deeply, an attempt at a calming breath, and released. It was fine. Everything was fine, and at least the parents would be satisfied that I was now out of active duty and able to work in the civilian sector. I’d put my time in, learned a lot, and had a great job lined up in D.C. They couldn’t complain about that.
Well. They’d find something to complain about, I was sure.
They always did.
Beside me, in the cup holder, my phone rang. I picked it up, reading the screen curiously. This was a new phone, a new number. I’d only given it to one person and that was— “Shiloh! What are you doing up so late? It’s past midnight.”
My friend’s voice was husky with the late hour. “You sent me a text saying you’d be home by eight, and you’re not here yet! What is going on? I’m worried.”
“Plane was late. I’m almost there…maybe twenty minutes out.”
The low rumble of a man’s voice sounded, and Shiloh said something in return, muffling the phone with her hand.
“Is Gunner still okay with me staying the night ?”
“Cotton, we want you to stay as long as you want. There’s plenty of room, and I’ve missed you, damn it.”
“I’m sure my mother will throw a fit if I don’t at least make an appearance, but I’m taking you up on that.” I flipped my hazards to a left-hand blinker even though there was no traffic and shifted into drive. I was just pulling out from the shoulder when a bike roared past, rocking the car with its backdraft. “Shit!” I stomped the brake flat and sat back in my seat, my hand over my galloping heart. “Fucking idiot!”
“Are you okay?”
“Fine.” I watched the taillight disappear around a bend in the road and pulled back onto the highway. “Just an idiot on a motorcycle.”
“Huh. Okay. Well, talk to me while you’re driving because this party is pooped and I’m not going to have the energy when you get here. What’s the plan? You said you would only be here a week?”
“I’m supposed to be in D.C. for the tech writer position by the beginning of April, so I have a little time. If I’m going to take the job, I’d like to be there a couple of weeks before my start date. I want to settle in first and find the best Starbucks, you know. And as much as I love them, I cannot spend any more time than absolutely necessary with my parents.”
“I understand that. But why do you say if you take the job? Are you undecided?”
“Yeah. I haven’t made my mind up yet.” I didn’t go into detail, and she continued.
“Oh. But regardless, you’re out of the Army, right?”
“I’m on inactive duty, so not completely out of it, but for all intents and purposes, a civilian.”
“I’m so excited. Even if you will still be hours away, it’s not Texas. I am fully planning on camping out in your apartment or wherever you settle.”
“For now, it’ll be a long-term residential hotel. This job comes with the potential for remote work, so I fully plan on trying to grab that and maybe come back here.” I paused, concentrating on the liquid spitting against the windshield. “Look at that; it’s snowing.”
“It does that a lot here in ole Lucy Falls.” Shiloh’s tone was wry. “Mountains. Elevation. Winter.”
“You’re such a joker.”
“All right, so where are you now?”
I laughed, thankful Shiloh was filling my ears with her light chatter. It kept me from thinking too hard about other things, things out of my control.
“I’m just about to drive past Karla’s, you loon.”
“Stop! Get me a donut?”
“Are you kidding me?” Despite my question, I obligingly pulled into Karla’s Kuppa’s parking lot. We had spent untold hours in this place when we were in high school, testing every variety of Karla’s donuts and flirting with whichever guy happened to be working Friday night. They stayed open until early in the morning on the weekends, providing sweets and coffee to all of us idiot kids out getting plastered and high.
“You know I never kid about donuts. Get me a Boston cream? I’ve been yearning for one all day.”
“What about Gunner?”
“Whatever. He’s not picky.”
“Okay. I’ll see you in a few, chickadee.”
Disconnecting, I climbed out of the rental and glanced around the lot before I walked into Karla’s. A motorcycle was parked in a space at the end of the row. Was it the same one that had blown by me at a hundred miles an hour?
There was no line this late at night, just a single customer standing at the counter. I stepped behind him and studied him; he was tall and intimidating in a pair of dark jeans and a black leather jacket. Because, of course, if you rode a motorcycle, you wore leather. He had long, reddish-brown hair pulled back in a tangled man bun high on his head. I tried to find effeminacy in the bun, but his body was so solid in front of me, so well-proportioned, I couldn’t. Even from the back, he was masculinity defined.
The cashier passed a cup of steaming liquid to him, and as he turned, I caught a whiff of freshly brewed coffee. He paused to keep from walking into me, and I side-stepped, my regard lifting from the cup, up, up along the expanse of chest clad in a soft-looking thermal, to finally meet his eyes.
They rested curiously on me, the deep liquid color of whiskey. After being around men that were always clean-shaven, I liked the scruff that covered his jaw.
He dipped his chin in a slow nod. “Evening.” His voice was deep and strangely musical, with a lilting accent that made me want to sit down and listen to him talk. He could talk about anything, I decided. He could read the phone book, and I’d listen, enthralled.
One corner of his mouth crooked up as I stared, revealing a disarming divot in one cheek.
I’d always been a sucker for dimples.
I could feel my body responding to his nearness, my stomach tightening, my chest flushing with heat. But he was too close, and in spite of his bedroom eyes and sexy voice, my spine stiffened. He was near enough I could smell his scent, cold and clean despite a faint tang of exhaust. I took another step to the side, giving him a curt nod in return, and decided not to mention the incident on the bike. It was too late. I was tired. And he was too big.
Stepping around him to the counter, I started to place my order, ignoring the rush of air that signaled his departure.
Chapter Two
Brodie
Outside the donut shop, I stood in front of my motorcycle and drank my coffee, trying not to be obvious in my perusal of the woman inside. Jessup Falls was a small town, and I hadn’t seen her around in the month or more I’d been here. I’d have remembered her, for sure. She was a right stunner.
I’d need to be moving on soon. I was surprised Donegal hadn’t called with something for me to do other than that one quick job in December. I liked it here, though, had found myself settling into the slow pattern of days and the warm hospitality of the people. I was an outsider, but people were neighborly. The old men who seemed to live in the diner where I took meals periodically had moved from nods to lively discussions of the weather and women.
It reminded me of the little village I’d hailed from in County Clare, with its lakes and hills and foliage that was dead now but would soon be turning to green. A pang of longing hit me, and I turned my attention back to the woman inside.
She was short and slender, leanly proportioned rather than boasting the usual curves I appreciated. She had an ass, though, that looked right for gripping. I’d always been a bit of an ass man. And that hair. It reminded me of that pretty bird in that Game of Thrones show…the one with the dragons.
All silvery like the moon. And though it was pulled back at the moment, I could tell it was long enough to wrap around my hand several times.
One final swallow of my coffee and I tossed the cup, landing it in the bin a few feet away. I straddled my bike, taking my time with my helmet and watching as she finished up her order and accepted the box of pastries. I had no reason to linger. She was easy to read, and I could tell by the flicker of her eyes that something about me made her uneasy.
And yet, I found myself prolonging the seconds it took to put my bike in gear and pull out of the lot, consigning her face to memory and hoping that she wasn’t just passing through.
She was one I needed to know.
The vibration of my phone against the mahogany nightstand awakened me.
The sound slipped wraithlike between layers of sleep, one layer thick and dark, and the other thinning with the morning sun peeping through the crack in the drapes.
Fucking voyeur, that sun.
I roused myself enough to sit and reach for the phone, the sheet slipping to my lap.
King: assignment in your secure email.
I sighed and thumbed the email app, looking for Donegal’s message.
Donegal was “King” in both text and email contacts, as he was the undisputed head of the east coast Irish mob. When Donegal messaged, you listened.
The only problem was, I was getting tired of listening. Killing people was growing old. I’d been serving as an enforcer in King’s army of Irish since I was in my teens, specializing in distance contracts. I took care of the runners, the distant threats, and the occasional contract for a cohort of King who needed a favor…and while the men I handled undoubtedly deserved the justice I dispensed, there was no joy in it. I’d never dreamed of becoming a killer by trade.
