“That’s better.” Kate let out a breath of relief. She wasn’t used to dealing with minors. If only most clients did what she said so quickly. “Can you tell me why you came to Lost Harbor?”
He didn’t answer, apparently determined to wait for Darius.
“Okay, let’s try something else.” She turned to S.G.. “How did you get to know Dylan? You don’t have to share any of his personal details.”
S.G. waited until Dylan gave her a go-ahead nod, then answered. “He’s a runaway like me. We started talking at the high school pool. Anyone can swim there, and take a shower afterwards. I was curious about him because he was just like me when I first came here, afraid and lonely. So I followed him after swimming and found out that he was camping near the playground. No one else is camping yet, it’s still too cold and muddy. No wonder he had to take so many showers.”
A runaway. Well, that complicated things. Where were his parents? Who was responsible for him? Denaina had signed his work permission slip.
“You told us you were staying at Denaina’s,” she told him sternly. “Was that not true?”
“I am staying there. But…” He ducked his head. “She doesn’t know it. I’ve been staying in the well house. It’s heated and no one goes in there. Except S.G..”
Lovely. This just got more and more complicated. Would that be trespassing?
“Did you forge Denaina’s signature when you applied for the job here?”
Neither of them answered that, which served as answer enough to her.
“Okey-doke. So far we have arson, destruction of property, forgery, and trespassing. Not to mention pissing off Emma Gordon, which ought to be a crime in and of itself. And then there’s getting your friend into trouble.”
Dylan threw S.G. an anguished glance. “I didn’t mean to. You shouldn’t have followed me, S.G.. Why are you so good at that?”
“Tracking wild game,” the girl said matter-of-factly. “You have to be very very quiet. You’re lucky I didn’t have my bow and arrows with me.”
Dylan’s eyes widened.
“Welcome to Alaska, kid,” Kate told him. “You’re not from around here, are you?”
“I’m from Texas,” he muttered. Finally, some information. Maybe S.G.’s offhanded comment about bows and arrows had distracted him.
“Texas is a very long way from Alaska. How’d you get here? That must have been quite a trip.”
For the first time, he answered a question with something like eagerness. “It was great. Part of it was on the bus and part was hitchhiking. I used a fake ID at the border.”
“Great. Let’s add that to the list.”
His face closed up again. “I know I’m in trouble. You don’t have to keep telling me.”
“Look, kid, if you’re going to work with me, you’ll have to get used to my sense of humor. It’s how I deal with shit.”
One corner of his mouth drew up, and she had an odd sense of familiarity. Maybe she was seeing her teenage self in him.
“That’s cool. Me too.”
Emma came back into the room with three mugs of tea, which she planted on the old captain’s trunk that served as a coffee table. She looked marginally calmer than before.
“Kate, if you actually want to help this boy, you should take the Alaska bar exam like I keep telling you.”
Kate had to laugh. Trust Emma to jump on any opportunity to encourage her to stay in Lost Harbor. “Nice try,” she told her. “Right now, we’re just talking.”
“Better talk fast.” Darius stood in the doorway, wiping his sooty hands on his pants. A smudge of ash darkened his cheek, adding to the effect of his overnight stubble. His expression was extremely forbidding. The atmosphere in the room instantly changed to one of dead seriousness. “You put my crew at risk with your stunts. Emma, too. Her shed, her chickens, her flowers, her livelihood. You want to talk now or after I call the police chief?”
Dylan’s face shut down and he huddled deeper into his hoodie, like a turtle into its shell.
S.G. jumped to her feet. “Don’t call Maya yet! Really. You have to wait until he explains.”
Darius’ eyebrows drew together in a fierce frown. “Why? He set a damn fire, S.G.. Maybe all the fires. Why shouldn’t I call the police?” He paused for a beat, maybe waiting for Dylan to say something.
When he didn’t, Darius pulled out his phone and scrolled through his numbers.
“Dylan!” S.G. cried. “Tell him.”
No response from the boy.
Kate wondered if she should step in, but she held her tongue. Darius was playing the “bad cop” magnificently. Also, he had every right to be pissed off.
Darius hovered his thumb over his phone. Before he could press it, S.G. launched herself into the air to tackle him.
If Darius weren’t such an oak tree of a man, he might have staggered. Instead, he caught her with one arm and quickly set her back on her feet.
“Don’t!” S.G. cried again. “Please don’t.”
“Why not?” he demanded.
“Because you’re Dylan’s father!”
Chapter Twenty-Seven
The phone slid from Darius’ hand and hit the floor. He barely noticed. He stared at S.G. while her words seemed to bounce off a funhouse mirror. He must have misunderstood. Or she was making things up to keep him from calling Maya. But her wide eyes showed nothing but sincerity, and he’d never known S.G. to be deceptive.
Other than hiding out in his damn firehouse.
Since then, she’d been entirely honest.
Slowly, he swung toward the kid, Dylan. He hadn’t paid much attention to him when he’d been sitting in the truck. A wet boy in a hoodie, that was the sum total of his observations.
The boy was staring down at the floor, as if he wanted to sink right through it. Under the weight of Darius’ scrutiny, he slowly raised his head. And Darius saw in his eyes that it was true—or at least that he believed it to be true.
“Explain,” he ordered the boy, causing him to flinch.
“Darius, lighten up,” Kate said softly. She came next to him and touched his arm. “He came a long way. Seems he’s from Texas.”
He did a quick calculation. Gillian.
Holy fuck. It couldn’t be. Could it? She’d wanted to have a child—they both did. If she’d gotten pregnant, why hadn’t she told him?
“Is your mother—” He broke off because his voice was so hoarse he scared even himself.
“Gillian O’Connor,” muttered Dylan.
He stared at the boy, noting the ski-jump nose that was just like Gillian’s, and the rounded shape of his face—a male version of Gillian’s. No doubt in his mind; this was Gillian’s son. But was Dylan his son?
“Who’s the O’Connor?”
“O’Connor is my stepfather’s last name. Buck O’Connor.”
“O’Connor….” That rang a bell. The memory came swimming back. “Her boss. The owner of the restaurant chain she worked at.”
“Yeah. He’s a big shot, all right.” His bitter tone made Darius do a double take. “I knew he wasn’t my real father. He didn’t really bother to pretend after I was about six.”