"Nash wanted to be more than friends. He was infatuated with Len and had been for years. She thought it was innocent, and even cute, until it started to seem obsessive. I was afraid something similar would happen with Ava, especially if they had taken things further and she changed her mind later. It also didn't help that Ava looks a lot like Len did. They could have passed as sisters, and it's another reason that even Nash and Ava's friendship bothered me."
If blood can actually run cold, then mine does at hearing this. I reach for the blanket I abandoned after my nap and pull it around me.
"Len kept a journal," Phoenix continues. "She wrote a few things about Nash's behavior after she and Matt broke their engagement off. She also told me he was being pretty intense when she called me the day after I left rehab. The case being built for his trial will try to prove it was a heat-of-the-moment crime of passion after Len kept turning him down romantically."
"Wow." The one stunned word is all I can get out. Here I was, teasing Ava about Nash and encouraging her to date him, thinking they were perfect for one another. I thought Phoenix was overreacting, when he really was worried about her physical safety.
My thoughts must be written all over my face, or maybe I shudder, because Phoenix rubs his hands up and down over my arms like he's trying to restore warmth to my body.
"Are you okay?" he asks.
Physically, I'm fine, but the thoughts that have my mind in a vice grip are chilling me in places no amount of arm rubbing or being wrapped up in blankets can touch. I knew Len had a striking resemblance to Avaâit was one of the first things I noticed when I began research for my book. Is that why Nash was drawn to her? If it was, what could have happened to Ava if they had become intimate, or maybe worse, if she'd changed her mind? It's too sickening to think about.
"Not really," I admit. "I'm realizing a lot all at once. When did Len know that Nash wanted more than friendship?"
"He wanted to date her in high school, and again during college. She thought ended there since she only saw him as her childhood best friend and treated him like a brother, and Nash seemed to like and get along with Matt. But the day he found out she and Matt broke up, he was already trying to put the moves on her. She didn't think turning him down again would be a big deal, since she'd done it before. She told him she'd just ended her engagement and wasn't ready for anything new."
"Was that when he...?" I can't finish the sentence out loud. Was that when he killed her?
"Not that day, but that's when the red flags started. The last time I talked to her, she was rattled by something that had happened earlier in the week. She'd been out with friends to see a band, and Nash showed up at the same bar. She was drinking plain ginger ale, and Nash bought her another one she didn't ask him for. It's the only drink she didn't have her eyes on from the time it was poured at the bar. Later on, she felt sick and woozy, and then she couldn't stand up without someone helping her. Nash insisted on taking her home, but one of her friends claimed Len was staying at her place that night and it made more sense to bring Len there. Nash got more aggressive about it, but he was outnumbered by her other friends. Len said she had been putting distance between the two of them since that night, and that he seemed agitated and was getting bolder about showing up at her house unannounced. He refused to take no for an answer if she didn't want to go somewhere with him. She documented all of it in her journal, which her family turned over to the police."
"You didn't say anything to him when he joined the search party for her?"
"No. It was before I was asked to get involved with the investigation. At the time, I saw him as a guy who'd lost his lifelong best friend and the woman he had always wanted to date. I didn't like what Len had told me about what happened at the bar, and how he behaved after that, but I thought he'd been cleared by police at the time."
Something he mentioned about Len and Nash's night at the bar is stuck in my brain. We need to go back to that. "What you said about how Len got sick when she was out at the barâdid he drug her ginger ale?"
"She thought he might have. She wrote it about in her journal but knew that even if she had been drugged, she couldn't prove if it was him or the bartender or someone else who did it, or if she'd gotten sick from something she ate."
"Ava also got sick after a night out with Nash."
It's as much a question as it is an observation, even if the inflection in my voice makes it a statement of fact. Did Phoenix make the connection when I told him about Ava's text? It would explain a lot about his shift in mood during our drive to Willow Beach, beyond the news about the break in Len's case.
"It was too similar to be a coincidence," he agrees. "I'm grateful Torin was there. He can't stand me these days, but he's always been a good guy who watches out for you and Ava."
"Torin feels a little differently about you today, so you know." Ava's voice floats into the room from a location that sounds like the kitchen. "Although he also said, and I quote, 'Tell Phoenix I'll still break his kneecaps if he does anything to hurt Del. Otherwise, he's solid in my book.' So I'm passing his message along."
Her light footsteps get closer. When she walks into the room, she has her phone in one hand and her bag slung over her shoulder. "My Uber is almost here. Let's talk tomorrow."
With her confident gait and her breezy tone, a stranger might easily look at Ava and see her as the human definition of calm, cool, and collected. But I'm not a stranger. I catch the quiver in her voice, and the way she avoids eye contact by glancing down at her phone. How much of what Phoenix just told me about Nash's romantic interest in Len and her possibly-drugged drink did she overhear?
"You're leaving? Are you sure you want to be by yourself tonight?" I'm off the sofa and at her side before I finish the second question.
"I won't be. ÂÂTorin just got on a flight here and is staying with me. He needs the company, and I could do with sleeping in my own bed tonight."
Unlike her voice, her hug is fierce. I hug her just as fiercely. Neither of us will ever know if last weekend could have turned out much differently than it did if Torin hadn't stepped in and refused to let her leave with Nash. Even the possibility that she could have been physically harmed or worse has tears welling up in my eyes.
Ava releases her arms and pulls back first. She swipes at her own Âglassy eyes with the back of her hand then turns to address Phoenix.
"For the record, what Torin said about your kneecaps also goes for me, but I appreciate what you did to make sure we were safe. Keep my girl happy and I promise to give you less of a hard time."
She steps over to the sofa and opens her arms to him. My jaw barely stays in place, because Ava asking Phoenix for a hug is something I haven't witnessed in years and didn't think I'd ever see again.
Phoenix gets to his feet and hugs Ava without hesitation. There's genuine shock in his expression, but it's mixed with relief and happiness. For me, the gesture is like watching a peace negotiation in action. The two of them were friends once, even if it was a long time ago. It's still the early stages, and maybe I'm overly optimistic, but what's happening in front of me is a glimmer of hope that they may become real friends again one day.
"All right, I'm out." Ava's arms return to her sides. She takes a few steps away from Phoenix, toward the door, then glances over her shoulder at us. "You two should finish talking things out and then go make a baby or something."
"Ava!" I exclaim. Just like that, my cheeks have gone from being damp with tears to feeling like a raging inferno.
The smirk she gives both of us is nearly diabolical. "What? It's a figure of speech. I'm sure you'll be safe about it and I didn't really mean he should knock you up." She pauses and eyes Phoenix and me, as if she's reconsidering what she just said. "Well, actually--"
I interrupt her. "I'll call you tomorrow."
"I'm only saying you could get a head start on what's probably inevitable. Hope you got that ring after all and held onto it, Alden." Ava winks at me, then pulls the door open and flounces out, shutting it behind her and leaving us in her wake.
"She did not just say all of that," I mutter.
"She could have said worse," Phoenix points out. He isn't wrong. We likely were spared from what she may have come out with under a more normal circumstance.
"True," I admit.
"And you're pretty adorable when your face is on fire."
He cups my cheek in his hand, which only adds to the problem and sends another wave of heat through my chest and up my neck. When our eyes meet, though, I forget to be mortified. In retrospect, Ava's parting comments were the perfect send-off for the somber mood that had settled over us, and Phoenix teasing me now is the closest thing to normal we've been in days.
"Only pretty adorable?" I pretend to swat his shoulder, but then rest my hand against it instead. "Have I lost my touch?"
"Pretty and adorable." When he punctuates this with a heartfelt smile turned up to full blast, it's game over for me. A laugh tumbles past my lips for the first time since last weekend.
"Nice save." I move my hand away from his shoulder but gently takes hold of it.
"Am I pushing my luck if I ask you for a hug now?"
"The instructions Ava left us with went far past hugging, but sure. We can start there."
It's his turn to chuckle as he pulls me into his arms. He rests his head on top of mine. "Does this mean we're okay?"
"I hope, so because I really want to be." I tighten my arms around him.
Heaven knowns we still have things to work through. In this moment, though, there's nothing else but the two of us and the gratitude for forgiveness and second chances that floods through me from head to toe. We stay like that until Phoenix kisses the tip of my nose and leads me back to the sofa, where we settle in together with his arm around my shoulder and my head against his chest. I breathe in his soap and aftershave, and the warmth of his skin is like a cozy cocoon. When I snuggle in closer to him and close my eyes, the thud of his heartbeat below my ear is more soothing than any sound I've heard.
It could be an hour later, or it could be only a few minutes later, when I open my eyes again and shift my position on the sofa so I can look at him. "Will you stay here with me tonight?"
He tucks a lock of my hair behind my ear before he answers. "I'll stay here until you kick me out."
"There will be no kicking you out, mister." I run my hand along his jaw, which has hints of a five o'clock shadow. "Not even to shave."
"Be careful with that. You could be stuck with me for the long haul, and even worse, have to watch me try to grow a beard."
"That's my plan. Well, maybe not the beard part." I wrinkle my nose, but then grin.
"You're a mastermind, because I love your plan. I also love you."
When his lips brush against mine, and when I press my mouth to his, our kiss doesn't make me feel like twenty-two or twenty-three-year-old me, and I'm not transported to a memory from our earlier days. There's something in this kiss that's different. It's less giddy, and less infatuated, because it goes deeper than either of those feelings. It's wiser, it's stronger, and it's filled with possibility and hope.
More than that, it feels like coming home, and like we're here to stay.