Page 133 of What Started In Deception

He shrugged. “I was just checking.”

She laughed again as she rolled her eyes. “You’re ridiculous.”

His smile was back. “You’ve mentioned that before.”

“And I mean it.”

“But I’m kinda cute, though, so…”

She laughed as she shook her head again. “Let’s go.” As she grabbed his hand, she snagged the sleeping bag by the end of the couch that she’d dug out of one of the closets in the main house. They paused by the door to slip their feet into their slides.

“I can’t deny that I’m intrigued,” he said as they stepped outside into the near darkness and walked across the lawn toward the large stretch of trees that separated the Monroe and Donahue properties.

She snagged her lip with her teeth as they moved into the small stretch of forest that she hadn’t walked through in years, following the overgrown path. “I just hope it’s still here.”

“What, exactly?”

“You’ll see. Or maybe.” And then she stopped and looked up at the wooden platform that Grandpa Beau had the gardeners secure to three or four tree trunks decades ago when she’d been a little girl.

Ty frowned. “Is this an old tree fort?”

She nodded as she grinned. “I forgot about it, which makes me a little sad, but I remembered it today when I was reading to the kids.” She looked up again, realizing that it wasn’t nearly as high as it had felt when she’d been seven or eight. “Will, Burke, Asher, and I used to play here.”

“You want to go up there?”

She nodded as she grinned again. “I’ll make sure it’s sturdy first, but even if we were to fall through, we’re not likely to get anything more than a couple of bumps and bruises.”

He shrugged. “I’m game if you are.”

“I definitely am.” She handed him the sleeping bag and climbed the eight creaky ladder rungs to the top, grinning when the weathered wood didn’t look too bad at all. “I think we’re good.” She crawled onto it and beamed down at him. “We’re all set, Ty.”

Shrugging again, he tossed her the sleeping bag and climbed up.

She chuckled as she unzipped the fabric and laid it down for them. “This seemed so much bigger back in the day.” She sighed. “I love how you can still hear the rush of waves, even if you can’t see them.”

He sat next to her in the center of the blue plaid inner lining, looking around. “This is a cool spot.”

She nodded. “The best part will start soon.”

“I can’t wait.”

And then the lightning bugs started to glow—a couple at first, then dozens and dozens as the minutes passed.

She pressed her hand to her heart. “It’s just as magical as I remember.”

He pulled her closer against his side, wrapping his arm around her back. “This is amazing, Lyd.”

She rested her head against his shoulder. “This was our secret place—or I guess not really, since Grandpa Beau had the fort built for us. We played in here for a couple of years until we outgrew it. Then the accident happened a few years after that, and I completely forgot about it until I saw the lightning bugs in the illustrations of the story I read today.”

“I’ve never seen anything like it.”

She nodded, as fascinated by the beauty now as she had been as a child. “I hate that I forgot. It’s been here all along, and I didn’t remember something that meant so much to all of us.”

“But you remember now.” He kissed her temple. “Thank you for sharing it with me.”

She nodded again. “I like that it gets to feel special again. In a different way with you.”

He smiled at her, stroking his fingers along her jaw as the sky grew darker. “I like that, too.”