Free The Ties That Bind by Liliana Hart Page A

the streets emptied as people went home to their families and little league practices. He passed the Sheriff’s Office and saw the unit parked out front. He could see Lane, his deputy, through the front window sitting behind the desk doing paperwork, the little TV flickering from the top of the file cabinet.
    But it wasn’t the sight of his office that made his heart pound faster in his chest. It was the sight of the little white compact car parked in front of the library across the street. Claire was still at work, and part of him thought it might be best to keep driving and meet her at home, but he pulled into the space beside her instead and got out of the car, locking it behind him.
    The Surrender Public Library wasn’t a huge building, but it was pretty. The rest of the connected buildings in town were a mixture of brick and clapboard siding. But the library was two stories of stone built more than a hundred years before, though its original purpose had been as a bank.
    The builder had carved faces along the roofline, and what Cooper’s grandmother had told him—as told to her by her mother—was that the builder had been wildly in love when he’d started the carvings. He eventually married the girl and continued work on the library, but as the years went on his love for her dimmed and turned to bitterness and hatred, as it was said that she was something of a shrew and quite difficult to get along with. So the face of his wife he’d been carving into the building once started as beautiful, but with each carving she became a little more haggard, until the last face he’d sculpted was nothing more than an unrecognizable monster.
    Cooper’s boots scraped against the concrete of the steps leading to the front door and it creaked as he opened it, the wood swollen with age. The hush of quiet was overwhelming—almost smothering—and he breathed in the scent of books and the new carpet that had been laid over the weekend. He’d never felt at home in a library or school, and those old feelings of inadequacy came rushing back. He’d been a lot better with his fists than he’d ever been with a book. And after his parents had died and he’d been discharged from the army, it hadn’t taken him long to realize he’d better learn to be damned good with his hands if he wanted to keep the family homestead from falling down around his and his brothers’ ears.
    The library was empty as far as he could see. The children’s area had already been picked up and everything was in its place. He passed by the front desk, thinking Claire might be finishing up in her office or cataloguing books, but she was nowhere to be seen.
    And then he heard her humming and frowned.
    They’d only been married for six months, but spending that much time with someone, you couldn’t help but pick up on little quirks or habits. And the only time Claire hummed was when she was worried about something. He wasn’t even sure she realized she did it. But it was always a nameless tune, slow and sad.
    He breathed out a sigh of relief. Focusing on her gave him the reprieve he needed. There’d always be time later to confess his own sins.
     

Chapter Two
     
     
    Claire was a fool.
    And it certainly wasn’t in her personality to not confront situations head on, but that’s exactly what she’d done with her husband. She knew he’d been lying to her. And yet each time she’d look at him, watching and waiting for the truth, but it never came.
    She wasn’t so naïve to think that Cooper should share all his secrets with her. Being the wife of a cop was an adjustment, and she could see the burdens he carried, though she might not know the cause. And she didn’t expect to know. But she also hadn’t expected him to look her in the face and tell her he was going fishing when she knew damned good and well he didn’t need leather pants and his nipple rings to go fishing.
    Which brought her to something else that was feeding her insecurities. Was Cooper