to a big smile that only moved his lips. “Welcome home, Jak.” Then the grandfather left, closing the door behind him.
Jak took a minute to look around the room and then inside the bathroom, walking to the mirror. He stood in front of it, turning his face slowly one way and then the other. Did he look like the man in the photo? His father? He couldn’t see it, but the grandfather said he did. Jak’s face was dark from the sun—both winter and summer—darker than the grandfather’s or Agent Gallagher’s. His cheeks were chapped from the wind and his beard was rough and . . . uneven. He had cut it using only the feel of his fingers.
Jak had a scar under his cheekbone from where the blond boy had cut him that terrible day.
He looked different than all of them. Strange. Wild. And that’s because he was.
He thought of the things he’d done—some because he’d had no choice, others because he had wanted to live. But he could be different now. He could be like them. Harper had accepted his looks and the part of himself he’d shown her, but she never had to know about the way he’d both crawled and killed. Never had to picture him the way he’d been in his lowest times. Never had to know that part of him even existed. Here . . . at Thornland, he could leave all that behind. Only Driscoll knew about that part of him and Driscoll was dead. He could be . . . civilized. He could be a man—all man, only man—so Harper never caught a glimpse of that beast within him.
He picked up a can of something that said shaving foam, looking at the other bottles on the shelf over the sink, swallowing thickly when he saw the things he’d lived without for so many years. Everything felt . . . big. Smelled big. All of it was huge, bigger than he remembered, shinier, more. Very. He stepped back into the bedroom, closing that door behind him.
Welcome home, the grandfather had said.
So why did he still feel lost?
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
“Come in,” Mark called, taking his hands from the keyboard and sitting back in his desk chair. Laurie peeked inside.
“I’m running to the grocery store. Anything specific you want for dinner?” She smiled. “I think we’ve officially finished off all the holiday leftovers.”
Mark chuckled. They’d been eating turkey for breakfast, lunch, and dinner for the last few days—and November had brought its fair share of turkey too—and he had seen about all of that particular bird he wanted to see for a while. “How about steak tonight?”
“Sounds good.” She turned to leave, and Mark sat forward.
“Laurie?”
She turned, her expression surprised, questioning.
“Uh.” Jesus, had he forgotten how to do this? How to talk to his own wife? They’d had a few conversations over the last few weeks—stilted ones, but those counted too—but they were still out of practice. “Other than Jak’s obvious lack of knowledge about common things, what did you think of him?” It’d been several days since Jak and Harper had been to their house, and though they’d recounted the holiday warmly, he hadn’t talked to her about the specifics. But now he was officially back to work and for the last few hours, he’d caught up on emails and wracked his brain about what avenue to follow next. He refused to let these cases grow cold.
Laurie came back into the room hesitantly, as though she was afraid she’d misheard him ask her opinion about a work matter—or, sort of a work matter anyway. She furrowed her brow for a moment as she thought about his question. “He has a sweetness to him, an . . . innocence . . .” She sat in the chair in front of his desk and seeing her there, that thoughtful look on her face, made his chest constrict. “Although he’s clearly all man.” She shot him a raised eyebrow look and he chuckled. He figured any woman would have noticed that. “But . . . I don’t know. He has . . . secrets in his eyes. There’s almost something . . . he wants to hide from everyone else. It could be his lack of confidence but”—she shook her head—“oh, there I go again, offering up my intuition when you’re asking for facts.”
He shook his head slowly. “No, I was looking for your intuition.”
She looked down, a flush coming to her cheeks as she smiled shyly. And