Southaven Chapter 4

Chapter 4

Ava sat straight up in bed. Sammy. She took a minute to acclimate herself to the room. She wasn’t at home.  Maybe a safe house, she couldn’t be sure. Her eyes focused on the blue walls and the moonlight from the window. Southaven. Gray House. “Sammy,” she screamed.
    She stumbled to her feet, still fighting to focus her eyes from sleep. Her mind raced but her body moved slowly, struggling to stay balanced. Sammy’s nightmares about his father, on top of her own revolving around Cecilia’s murder, were wearing her thin.
    His door sat ajar and a strange shadow flicked from in the room. “Sammy.” He didn’t answer.
    Mark!  Her blood froze in her veins. How could he have found them in Southaven? How?
    She pushed the door open, panic seizing her chest. A shadow danced across the wall, and a man, completely naked, stood over Sammy’s bed.
    “Get the hell away from him!” Ava crossed the room in two steps and forced her way between the bed and the man. Her fist’s clinched, ready to pound the hell out of his flesh if he came a step closer. Flashes of Mark, snarling at her the night she ran with Sammy, flashed through, replacing the strangers feature’s with his.
    The stranger backed up.  His wide eyes glistened in the narrow strip of moonlight from the window. “Who the hell are you?”
  “Mamma.” Sammy’s panicked cry shattered the second of silence between them.
    She snatched him up in her arms and backed across the room to the door, never taking her eyes off the stranger. She didn’t need to answer any questions, just get this man away from Sammy and out of their house. She eyed the phone on the dresser. Had this guy cut the phone line like Mark had the night he killed Cecilia?
  “Get out of my house,” she yelled again. Goose flesh covered her arms and legs at the sound of fear in her own voice. She squared her shoulder to ward off the impending panic. She’d taken on Mark Sander’s during his now infamous fit of rage. This guy didn’t have a chance. Is Mark wanted her dead he’d have to do better than sending one of his cronies to do the job. He’d have to come for her himself.
    The man’s teeth glistened in the moonlight and she saw a hint of a smile. “Your house?”
    She backed against the wall until the phone came into reach, and waited for his attention to wonder. She fought to catch her breath. “Yes. My house.”
    His body relaxed, and she held tighter to Sammy now standing to her side, trembling. The stranger didn’t plan to leave, and she had nothing but the paddle hair brush from the dresser to protect them.  What had she been thinking when she picked that weapon up? The naked stranger took a step towards the bed, and Ava held the brush in the air, ready to beat his head to a pulp.
    “Whow.” He stopped and held his hands over his head, exposing his slim, muscular chest. “I’m just trying to grab the sheet to cover myself. Do you mind?”
    She hadn’t even thought to look at him other than to notice he was in fact completely in the buff. She nodded and he grabbed the fabric and wrapped it around his midsection.
    “Now,” he began again, holding his hands out in clear view after tying the sheet in a knot around his waist. “Who are you?” He inched forward but stopped when she pulled the brush back overhead, ready to strike.
    “Let’s start with who you are?” She stepped back, ramming her back into the sharp door frame. His gaze followed her, making reaching the phone impossible. He made a move towards her when she moaned from the pain, and she raised the brush higher over her head.
    “All right.” He stopped in place, holding his hands out in view again. “My name is Ethan Collins. This is my house.” His leaned forward and his face moved into the thin light from the window.
    The name sounded familiar. Shaggy cut brown hair hung loose over pale eyes and sun darkened skin.
      “I signed a lease for this house yesterday.”
      Ethan laughed. “Let me guess.” He took a step closer. She tensed around Sammy.  She did recognize him, but that didn’t change the fact he had been naked and in Sammy’s bedroom. He made a slow move forward. “I promise. I’m not going to hurt you, or the boy.  This is my house. This was my daughter’s room. Ruth, who I’m sure is at the bottom if this mess, is my mother-in-law.” He took another step and Ava jerked Sammy further behind her. “Give me a chance to get some clothes on and we can figure this thing out together.”
    So he knew Ruth, and now that the moonlight illuminated his face, she’d seen him in the bar. The guy Nancy told her had a boat and a charter business. So he wasn’t one of Mark’s paid hit men. Her chest eased a little at that realization, but her senses stayed on alert. Strange guy. . . naked strange guy in Sammy’s bedroom, didn’t exactly give her the warm and fuzzies.
    She pushed Sammy behind her until he cleared the doorway and stood out in the hall. “I’m not figuring anything out tonight. I have a lease for the house and the owner is out at sea.” She flinched. Why did she keep advertizing they were in the house alone?  “I don’t know who you are or what you want from us, but please just get out of my house.”
      Ethan moaned and she braced herself against the frame. He wasn’t leaving and she wasn’t planning on letting him stay.
    “All right, I understand you’re afraid waking up to a strange man in your son’s room. Or. . . the room you think is your son’s. Let me get my clothes from my room and I’ll sleep on my boat tonight. We can call Ruth in the morning and straighten the whole thing out.”
    He took a step. Ice prickled up her spin. A few more steps and he’d reach her.
  His eyes landed on her and his hands flew into the air again.  “I can’t leave without walking past you, and I can’t leave without clothes. You are going to have to trust me enough to let me pass you. Hands in the air. You could even lock yourself in the guest room if you want. The key is in the top draw of the dresser.”
    Ava’s feet sank into the floor.  She wasn’t about to trust anyone, even if he did know about a key. She’d bet if one key locked the guest room, he had another to open it.  Mark would have. Her gaze shifted back to the phone.
  “Go ahead,” he said, nodding at the dresser.  “Nine-one-one works here. If you’d feel better, call them.  They’ll tell you who I am. I’m not lying.  This is my house.”
    “How’d you get in?”          
    “With my key, the one I keep under the pot by the front door.”
    She hadn’t known about that one and he must have sensed it.
    “I guess Ruth didn’t tell you about that key, or about me.”
    Ava only shook her head. Her fingers pressed into Sammy’s skin, ready to shove him to safety if needed. “We’ll see what Ruth has to say about this. If she’s your mother-in-law you know her number.”
    The same smartalec smile returned to his face. “I do, but it’s also on speed dial. Just hit number one.”
    Ava wasn’t sure she could trust him, but he left her little choice unless she wanted to spend the next several hours standing in the doorway looking at his sleek and slender body covered with a small yellow bed sheet. She dialed one and waited for Ruth to answer.

*****
   
    Ava had just pulled the bacon out of the fry pan when she heard a knock on the front door.
    “Oh, honey,” Ruth blurted before pushing her way in. “What’s wrong?”
    “Everything,” Ava answered, guessing her puffy eyes and messy ponytail told the story better than she could. “Ethan scared the crap out of Sammy and…”
    Ruth spoke over her. “Is he still here?”
    “No.”
    “Good.” Ruth sighed. “He can come off as a bit of a brute, but deep down he’s as harmless as a kitten.”
    “Didn’t seem that harmless bare naked last night.” Ava pushed the door shut while shaking her head.
    “Bare naked? You didn’t mention that on the phone last night.”
    “Kind of hard to say while being stared down by the perpetrator. Seems we caught him on the way to take a shower. He went in Sammy’s room and…”
    “Aubrey’s room.” Ruth sucked in a stiff breath.  “I hadn’t thought he’d go there. Seeing Sammy in Aubrey’s bed must have done a number on him.” Ruth folded her arms over her chest and smirked. “Then again Ethan needs a dose of reality. Chasing ghosts will never get him married.”
  Ava swallowed back an escaping tinge of anger. She’d taken deep breathes all morning in preparation for this conversation with Ruth.
    Someone knocked at the front door and before Ruth could stop her, Ava opened it, revealing Ruth’s annoyed looking son-in-law.
    “I never thought I’d have to knock on my own front door.” Ethan turned his attention from Ruth to Ava. “I wore clothes this time. Think you could let me in?”
    Ruth’s eyes darted away from Ethan’s heated stare. “Why don’t we take this in the kitchen? By the smell of things, Ava’s already started breakfast.”
    “Ava.” Ethan’s gaze softened when it landed on her. “So that’s your name.”  He ran his hand over his scraggly hair before extending it to her. “Nice to actually meet you.”
****
    Ethan had every right to be pissed. Ruth had her charms, but her meddling in his life grated on his very last nerve. The part he really couldn’t stomach was why she, the mother of his late wife, would want him to move on.
    If he had in fact thought of moving on, Ava would register on his radar. Standing only a few inches shorter than him, she had a small but sturdy frame.  Her midnight black hair hung loose down her back coming close to brushing her backside, and her steel grey eyes hinted at trouble.
    “If I hadn’t stepped in you’d rot away up here until your next charter.”  Ruth continued to wiggle her way out of trouble as she poured coffee. “I did it for your own good.” She turned her attention to Ava, now spooning scrambled eggs on the plates already covered with bacon and pancakes. His stomach did a gurgling flip flop at the smell of bacon and maple syrup. He forced his mind off the food.
  Ruth started in on Ava as she arranged the coffee mugs on the kitchen table. His kitchen table.  “As for you, where would you be right now if I hadn’t offered the house?  Renting a claustrophobic room in the back of a local business? Better yet, sleeping on a cot at Mancini’s.”
    Ethan shouldered in-between the ladies, blocking Ruth and her argument from Ava.  “There’s a ferry back to Maine in a few hours. After breakfast I’ll walk you there. I did promise I’d take you when I got back.” 
    Ava’s glare cut right through him. “I don’t think so.” The way she wheeled the spatula in her hand made him nervous.
    “Whoa.” He stepped back. “It’s just an offer.”
      Ava put down the weapon and picked up three plates. “I have a signed lease. I’m not going anywhere.”
    Stubborn. He’d made that assumption in Mancini’s the first night when they’d met.
    “No one is suggesting you leave,” Ruth added from the safely of the table. Ethan made a mental note to hide all his spare keys and change the locks to the house. Ruth’s free rein over his personal life just came to an end.
    “Yes, I am.” He cut his eyes back to her. “Last time I checked this is still my house, Ruth.”
    “A house you shut yourself up in to avoid living.”
    Her harsh words seemed to go unnoticed by Ava. She sat the plates on the table then made a fourth, no doubt for the son still sleeping in his daughter’s room.
    Ruth’s comment rolled off his back.  Ruth was like a pit bull when it came to her families’ well being and he’d never win the argument without going low. Something he wasn’t willing to do, no matter how much she meddled.
    “What I do with my life is my business. You can’t just lease my house without permission, Ruth. There are laws.”
    “But she did.” Ava stood between him and the table. She looked posed for a fight and not at all scared of his growing temper. “You can call the police if you like, but with a signed lease, there is little they can do.”
  “She’s right, Ethan.” Ruth folded her hands on the table. “The case will have to go to court and a judge will have to rule that you didn’t consent to the lease.”
  “But I didn’t. I wasn’t even on land.”
    “No one knows that but us.” Ava cut in. “Now Sammy thinks we are going to live at the beach in the amazing house for a few weeks, and I’m not about to let anyone take that opportunity away from him.”
    Ethan stared, speechless.
    Her face softened but her stance stayed firm in front of him. “Give us three weeks and we’ll be out of your life. Three weeks is all I ask.” 
    “This is a big house, Ethan. There’s plenty of room for you both.”
      And all your ghosts. Ruth forgot to add that part.  He looked at Ava, now sitting at the table next to his mother-in-law. She wasted little time choosing sides. “You’re willing to share the house with a man you barely know?”
    “If it means giving Sammy what he wants, then yes.”
    “I’ll call the sheriff, Ruth.” He folded his arms over his chest. “He knows I own this house.”
    Ruth smirked from the table. “I already told you. She has a signed lease. The sheriff can’t touch her without a judge, and the case would go to court.  The only way to get her removed it by prosecuting me and paying her the balance on the lease.”
    “But, this is my house.” His stomach flopped again, this time more out of anger than hunger.
  “I know my property law. If you prosecute, I’ll end up in jail and Ava will have a pocket full of your cash. There’s no way around it Ethan, other than living through it.”
    “This is crazy.” He pulled down on his chin with the palms of his hands.  “You both are crazy.”
    Ruth peered across the table at Ava.  Her mouth curled in a sly smile of victory.
    “You seem to have made your minds up.” He paced the kitchen floor. “Three weeks, that’s it.”
    “That’s it,” Ava answered. She’d won, but she didn’t even crack a smile.
    “I can’t believe I’m agreeing to this.  This is my house.”
    “And you can have it all to yourself as soon as Sammy and I are safely on the mainland in a few weeks.”
    He flattened his shaggy hair with one hand and pulled his ball cap on with the other before filling a mug with coffee from the counter. 
    “I’ve got to clean the Aubrey Grace from the weekend.” He grabbed the door handle leading to the deck but stopped short, holding the green glazed mug in the air. “Mind if I take this with me or do you own my cups now too?”
    Ruth snickered, but Ava’s expression didn’t change.