This civilian life is making you soft, old man.
But that’s why he’d returned to Shrouded Lake after he’d rang the bell on his role as team lead of his black ops unit. He’d retired nearly two years ago, and his grandfather had begged him to return to Shrouded Lake to heal and grieve the deaths of his men. Nearly a year after his return to the house he was raised in since his middle school years, his grandfather passed away, reminding Santiago that it was his ancestral duty to takehis place as protector of Shrouded Lake and take on the job the now deceased mayor had offered him.
Easing out of bed, Santiago made his way to the kitchen, filled the kettle, and placed it on the stove to simmer. He wanted an easy day today, a calm healing day that for once allowed him to kick up his feet, put his hat over his face, and take a lunchtime nap.
“Definitely getting old,” he said, returning to his bedroom to set out his uniform.
In the bathroom he stepped inside the shower and closed his eyes as cold water flowed over his head. Unbidden, the image of the shrew filled his head, the woman who’d flipped him off, who’d told him he was incompetent and crooked, who’d swayed his own fucking staff to her side.
“As if she hadn’t tried to cave in my damn balls.”
He slammed the water off.
Old and more irritable, he thought as he headed downstairs. But irritable for good reason. He stayed in Shrouded Lake for duty, but this house, the town, the lake, they were helping to grow the emotion that eluded him most of his life, and he would not allow Lauren Green, with her angry eyes and combative violent nature, to steal it away. She better have heeded his warning and left town this morning, because if she didn’t, she was going to quickly regret her defiance.
Naked, he walked out his back door toward the lake, wading in the water just enough to cover his feet. Bending down, he cupped and lowered his hands, and the lake water flowed in for him to pour over his head and body three times in honor of the three lineages that had lived and died here for generations.
“Let me stand in the chasm with honor, courage, and your wise guidance,” he said to the spirits, then opened his eyes. This pocket of heaven was all he had left. All he had left that mattered.
“You were born in the Stillwater River, mijo,” his grandfather had told him when he was four years old. The first of many tellings of his birth. “I was over there.” He pointed toward the far side of the St. James home. “Where the river feeds into the lake, with my daughter, your mother, and your abuela. You were lazy. Two weeks late. But one night your madre said she heard the river calling to her. Me and your abuela followed her to the water where she began to sing, because the waters, she said, they sang to her. At the end of her song the current was flowing strong, fast, so chaotic, and from this turbulence you come, making it impossible to grab hold of you. I knew true terror that day, mijo. You were in the water so long we were certain you had drowned. And my Lydia, my child, she lost consciousness and I grabbed her and pulled her to the side of the river, then we pulled you out.Ipull you out, mijo, and in the darkness all I see are large luminous eyes the color of the river bottom looking at me. You were so calm, so peaceful. And again, I knew terror, but also the greatest joy. Our miracle. My heart, it grew five times its size. I cut you free of your mother and later we all watched as your abuela gave your placenta to the waters. You are of this place. Claimed. They chose you—this land, these waters, they chose you. They are your inheritance.”
His grandfather had laughed softly.
“The human fish, your abuela called you, and fish…” His grandfather tapped him on the nose. “They need water to breathe, to live.”
Santiago stood and breathed in the dawning day. He glanced at the other two homes on the lake. To the right side of the shore’s arc was Julian St. James’s property. Julian stayed to himself for the most part, doing his thing and interacting with the community at his whim. He’d inherited the place nearly five years ago and most in town thought he was a serial killer.
He wasn’t.
To the left about a quarter mile away on the other side of his house was the Moor home. It’s where old Mrs. Willoby lived. She was the only owner up here who was not indigenous to this land. Old Mrs. Willoby’s daughter usually came in the mornings, so he would check in on her this evening when he got off work and didn’t have to socialize with her family.
Speaking of work, he needed to finish getting ready.
He had a feeling the mayor and his mother were going to be a boil on his ass after yesterday. There’d undoubtedly be another threat to his job as that seemed to be their go-to tactic for trying to exert control. He was half ready to let them have their way because the idea of retirement kept worming itself into his conscious, telling him he didn’t have to wear a badge to help maintain the peace. But the idea of the greedy incompetence taking a further hold on the town, in the midst of this drug epidemic... He didn’t want to see Shrouded Lake destroyed in the same way as so many other small towns in the Smoky Mountains.
Do your fucking job!
He growled, grabbed his coffee and muffin and stomped out of the house. That woman… He’d wanted to de-escalate a volatile situation as quickly as possible. Carrying her away was the quickest way; it felt as right as breathing. And that smack on the ass, she deserved that shit, he justified, only to acknowledge seconds later that she’d be well within her rights to file a complaint.
He was sick of this.
The number of times the memory of that woman entered his mind, like a fucking siren call, bringing him back to her again and again, was enough to erase the existence of whatever peace he was trying to hold on to, and that lack of control made him want to punch something. Just the thought of her...
He got in his cruiser and headed down the mountain. He didn’t like that he was allowing her to have space in his life, didn’t like that she so easily made him act out of character. But she was just passing through. His mind would release her once it no longer had anything to feed off. Then everything would return to normal.
Lauren knotted her braids at the crown of her head and let them fall in a sloppy ponytail between her shoulder blades. Wearing loose black pajama bottom pants and an off-the-shoulder black top, she slid off the bed into her flip flops and made her way downstairs where she smelled food cooking. She could practically hear bacon fat sizzling, the scent of coffee beckoning. She wasn’t a coffee snob per se, but she prayed the coffee was as rich and strong as it smelled. She wasn’t in the mood for some watered-down coffee-adjacent substance. She needed the alchemy of flavor and strength to make her an even remotely decent human being because her sleep-beast did not like daylight, morning, or morning conversation. And that was since birth.
“Oh, well look who’s an early riser,” Mrs. Lina Bertrand, the bed and breakfast’s owner, sang out from the stove when Lauren entered the kitchen. “I must say, neither Audrey nor I had any faith that the city girl would be up before noon.”
Lauren stopped to scan the space before acknowledging either woman.
“To avoid any violence or confusion, please point me in the direction of the caffeine. I smell it. I know it’s here. I just need…”
“Oh dear, come sit down. Lina, fill a cup for her. My old Jimmy was an inarticulate beast before he got his first cup. I know the signs of a soul on the edge.”
Ms. Audry sat Lauren down in the chair beside hers and Ms. Lina slid a mug across the island, right below Lauren’s nose. Cream and sugar followed. Lauren dashed in a half teaspoon of sugar and stirred.
Both women looked aghast as she lifted the cup to her mouth.
