Page 15 of Dirty Like Dylan

I knew Liv didn’t exactly relish having to fire me, and she definitely didn’t want to see me destitute. With the ferry gesture, she was just trying to make up for it a little. She knew I couldn’t afford much in the way of rent, she knew I wouldn’t be staying long, but she also knew I hated taking handouts. I was an independent woman. I worked for my money, I always paid my own way, and it hurt my pride to have to crash at her place. So, she’d offered up a friend’s cabin, “very quiet,” where I could chill, get over my jet-lag, and get caught up on my photo editing, until I figured something else out.

Don’t worry, she’d told me. He never uses it.

As long as it doesn’t belong to Dylan Cope, I’d said. I didn’t particularly want to run into him again after making such an ass of myself—no matter how beautiful he was. Because I’d probably just want to stare at him and take more photos of him, and it would get weird, for us both.

Nope, Liv had assured me as she sent me on my way.

Once I’d gotten over the sting of the embarrassment, I’d decided that I preferred some quiet little island to the city anyway. There wouldn’t exactly be high-paying photography jobs dropping in my lap, but after a little R&R, I’d work that out. Meanwhile, Liv had assured me I’d still be paid for today, even though she’d given me the boot before lunch.

I’d spent the afternoon bumming around the city, browsing some shops on Commercial Drive and walking the seawall before heading to the ferry terminal. Now, as I arrived at the small marina on the eastern side of Isabella Island, it was close to six o’clock. The sun was starting to sink below the horizon. The ferry was quick to unload, since there weren’t many cars onboard.

The island was even smaller than I’d expected; it took me all of fifteen minutes to walk from the marina at the southeast end to the house at the northeast tip.

You can’t miss it, Liv had said. Just follow the road north until you get to the skull gate.

Skull gate? I’d echoed, picturing some gnarly cemetery-like lot overgrown with weeds and an eerie mist rolling in.

Just what I said, Liv said. You can’t miss it.

And she was right, though it was nothing like I’d pictured it in my head.

A narrow driveway veered off the road to the right, just before the road took a hard left. The drive was lined with trees, dense green, others rendered brilliant shades of autumn in the dusk—scarlet and crimson, copper and gold and burnt sienna—reminding me of Dylan Cope’s hair. A couple of planter boxes hammered together out of driftwood were artfully arranged at the sides of the gate, and some hardy flowering plant was still blooming despite the lateness of the season.

The metal gate in the tidy wooden fence was about chest-height, ornamental black scrollwork, and in the middle of it was a Grim Reaper-like figure, a smiling skull peeking out from the cowl of its hood, with one skeletal hand raised. It was flipping me off with a bony middle finger.

Ashley Player.

That’s who instantly came to mind.

Or Connor? Though this skeleton looked nothing like the picture on his biker vest.

I stood in front of the gate and stared at it, as birds twittered in the trees and insects chirped around me, and that oddly haunting feeling of being the only human in the vicinity crept in.

No. No fucking way. My sister would never do that to me. There was no way in hell she would send me to stay at a house owned by that rock star asshole, even if he wasn’t here.

Wasn’t possible.

I looked past the gate, up the short drive through the trees, where I could glimpse the house. Homey-looking, very west coast, all medium-dark stained wood with some green painted trim and pretty plants in the window boxes.

Definitely not some biker clubhouse.

I put the idea out of my mind and pushed through the gate. It was latched but not locked. I closed it behind me, breathing in the incredible, cool green air. There were more planter boxes bursting with foliage and flowers, all along the drive. There were no cars or motorcycles. Just some surf boards stacked up in the car port at the side of the house, and a mountain bike hung up on pegs on the wall.

And the house was… Wow.

As I stood in the driveway looking up at it, I was kind of weirded out. Considering that I was staying here for free and that Liv had used the word “cabin,” I’d expected something a lot more rustic. More like the places I’d been staying these last thirteen months in South America.

This place, compared to those, was a palace.

Really, it was just a house. But a beautiful house that probably cost more than I’d made in—well, my entire career to date. By Liv’s rich friends’ standards, it was probably kinda basic. A cozy little home-away-from-home, with all the luxury fixings of moneyed west coast island life.

I pulled out my phone and wrote a text to my sister.

Me: Who owns this place…?

I sent the text, hoping for a quick response, but none came. So I found the spare key where Liv said it would be, and after knocking on the door, I let myself in.

“Hello?” I slipped out of my sandals and padded through the silent house. The floors were hardwood, polished and shiny. Everything was polished and shiny and sparse. And there was definitely no one here.