Drew pressed the phone against his ear with one hand while the other hand rubbed the back of his head. He sat on the edge of his seat with his head down, certain he was going to be sick.
“I should have been there for her,” Drew said, more to himself than Lilly.
Lilly sighed. “Your sister left behind a little boy who’s frightened and grieving over the loss of his mother. Be there for him.”
Drew nodded, as if Lilly could see him on the other side of the phone. “I’ll be there soon. Does Ashley know I’m coming back?”
There was a pause on the other end, followed by an, “Umm.”
“I get it,” Drew said. “She doesn’t want to speak to me.”
Another pause.
“It’s rough,” Lilly said.
Trying to frame your answers so she doesn’t know that I’m asking about her?
“She’s going to have to deal with me. I’ll be there soon.”
“I know,” Lilly said. “I agree.”
“Can you tell her I love her? And I’m sorry.”
Lilly sighed again.
“Give me a minute,” she said.
The sound on the other end muted. The voice was muffled and he couldn’t make out the words, but he was sure it was Lilly. Positive she was relaying his message.
He waited. He imagined his sister rolling the words around in her head, trying to decide what to say. There was movement and Lilly came back on the phone. “Hold on, she wants to talk to you.”
Drew’s heart caught in his throat. Did she just want to hear him say it himself? He could do that. Did she want to chew him out? He could take it.
He sensed her on the other side, listening, waiting. Her breath the only sound he heard.
“Ashley?”
“Fuck this.”
The line went dead.
“That was so mature,” Lilly said. “I’m calling him back and you’re talking to him.”
“Oh no,” Ashley said. “We’ve got nothing to say to him.”
She held the phone high in the air, well above where Lilly could get it unless she got a step stool. Ashley had long legs and arms. All the Duncan kids were blessed with height. Something Lilly never was.
While Ashley was just over six feet tall, Lilly stood at only five feet six, and that was in two inch heels. Still, Lilly never once let herself be intimidated by anyone taller than her, and she wasn’t about the start now.
“Ashley Duncan, give me my phone so I can call your brother back. If you want to act like a little brat, that’s your business, but your sister made her feelings clear to me. She was very much hoping Drew would be a part of Cole’s life.”
“What the hell did she know,” Ashley said. “He’s a damn bastard just like the rest of the male species, and Cole doesn’t need to have anything to do with him.”
Lilly refused to play the game of trying to grab the phone out of Ashley’s hand. Instead, she crossed her arms, arched an eyebrow, and fixed the best ‘don’t fuck with me’ expression on her face.
“I want my phone back, right this instant.”
Ashley, who never knew when enough was enough, simply shrugged. “Here, catch.”
Ashley tossed it well over Lilly’s head and across the room where it splash dunked right into the fish tank.
“Jesus Christ!” Lilly ran over, found the long, green net used to capture things, including sick and dead fish, and started to fish for her phone. “Ashley, that’s an expensive phone, and it’s ruined. I can’t believe you did that.”
She managed to get it out and wasn’t surprised it was dead. Lilly had half a mind to chuck it at Ashley, but she didn’t. She would have, if her childhood friend wasn’t acting out of grief and pain.
Instead, she reached down for patience. “Ashley, he’s your brother. He just found out his sister was killed. He’s coming back.”
“Well, I don’t want him to come back,” Ashley said. “He’s had plenty of time to come back when it counted. Bastard got himself good and gone, he can just stay gone. I never asked him to come back. I don’t need him, and neither does Cole.”
Lilly moved into the kitchen where she used a towel to dry off her phone. “Cole needs his family. All of his family. You know Kelli wanted him to be a part of her son’s life. He was going to come back before he heard. Something I’m sure is not easy for him.” She removed the battery and kept drying. “Drew had good reason to leave. You know that.”
Ashley jutted out her chin in defiance. “Yeah, he’s a bastard. A selfish, no good bastard who didn’t give a rat’s ass about me or Kelli.”
Lilly sighed as she went into one cabinet, grabbing a small, white bowl, then another where she retrieved a box of uncooked white rice. “You know that’s not true. How many beatings did he take for you?” Lilly placed the phone in the bowl and started to cover it with rice. “You used to tell me all about it. Your father hurt all of you, but he brutalized Drew. Drew always tried to stand between you and him. How many times were you shocked that your father didn’t actually pull the trigger and kill him?”
“Plenty,” Ashley admitted, her arms folded across her chest. She was less insolent and more defensive. “He made his choice. He left us.”
Lilly nodded as she put the rice away. “He did. You moved in with me. Kelli was living with David after she got pregnant with Cole. I don’t think Drew even knew why, he just knew you’d both moved out, away from your father. Look, I’m not saying he shouldn’t have said goodbye or wrote, but think about what he’d gone through. A year in jail awaiting trial. God knows what happened in there.”
“Don’t,” Ashley said, holding up a finger in warning. “Don’t you dare try and make me feel guilty for not going to see him. I tried. You know I tried.”
Lilly nodded. “I know. But he probably didn’t.”
Ashley seemed to consider for a moment, but she wasn’t in a mood to feel charitable toward Drew or anyone else. “Who gives a damn? I’m sure the family of Molly Winters doesn’t. She’s still gone, and Drew is coming home.”
Lilly remembered Molly. She was one of the prettiest girls in their class, but there was a hardness to Molly that always unnerved her, and Lilly wasn’t easily unnerved, even back then.
“We don’t know what happened with Molly,” Lilly said. “We never heard Drew’s side of it. Just what we read in the papers. Heard what everyone else was saying.”
Ashley scowled as she leaned against the counter. “I was there at homecoming. They had a rip roaring fight and he left her in the middle of the dance floor.”
Lilly moved over to stand next to Ashley, wanting to close the distance between them. “I know, I was there too. She was drunk. They both were acting like idiots. She said something that pissed him off and when he reacted she slapped his face and laughed. She told him to go and he did. I lost track of her at the dance. I was too busy trying to keep my date from feeling me up.”
Ashley smirked. “I was too busy encouraging mine to feel me up, and down. So yeah, I remember seeing her here or there, but I couldn’t swear when or where.”
Lilly scooted a little closer. “Neither of us saw Drew come back. Who knows who the hell she disappeared with? Or what happened? We all knew they had a flimsy case against him, accusing him of murder when they didn’t even have a body. Nobody knows what happened.”
“Except Drew,” Ashley said.
“Except Drew, but for all that time he was being held, awaiting trial, you never wavered in your belief that your brother was innocent. And your sister believed it without a doubt.”
Ashley rolled her shoulders. “We were the exceptions. Ollie was never sure. The entire town believed he killed her and hid the body. Still do.”
“Which is why Drew didn’t want to come back, but he is.”
“Yeah,” Ashley said. “And Cole gets an uncle everyone in town hates. How is that good? How is he going to recover from everything with that hanging over his head?”
Lilly took Ashley’s hand, and gave i
t a reassuring squeeze. “Because we’ll help him. He’s got us. Both of us. And if Drew can help him, we should let him. It’s not about us anymore. We’ve got to do what’s best for Cole.”
Ashley struggled against the tears. It was easier to yell and scream and be angry at Drew. At Lilly. She’d even yelled at Ollie this morning for no reason. All to avoid feeling what she was feeling.
“Whatever’s best for Cole,” Ashley said. “My sister was convinced having my brother back would be good for him. I’m not. Cole doesn’t need someone coming here pretending to love him and not be able to stick around. Cole needs stability. And that’s not my brother.”
Determined not to cry, Ashley let go of Lilly’s hand, pushed off the counter and walked out of the kitchen. She would be damned if she was going to let Drew come waltzing back into town, have Cole start to depend on him, only to break his heart by leaving. Cole couldn’t take it.
And neither could she.
Cole heard Aunt Ash heading towards the living room, so he scrambled away from the top of the stairs. He was fast, but he was quiet. He was good at that. He’d learned to be as silent as possible. Sometimes, it was enough, but often it wasn’t.
He was ready to hide in bed, pretending to sleep, in case Aunt Ash came to check on him. He liked her, but he didn’t know what to say to her. He had a hard time looking at her since he’d been told about his mom.
I couldn’t protect Mom. I was weak and I couldn’t do anything right.
A door slammed and Cole looked out his bedroom window. Aunt Ash was heading out. Maybe to go see that cop she was friends with, Deputy Miller. Ollie. He’d told Cole he could call him Ollie.
There was something about Ollie that made Cole want to trust him. Something gentle in the way he’d talked to his mother.
But Cole didn’t trust Ollie, any more than he trusted Aunt Ash or Lilly. Cole wasn’t big on trust. The only person he trusted was dead, but he liked both Aunt Ash and Lilly, and even Ollie.
Now, he was going to meet his Uncle Drew.
His mom told him stories about Uncle Drew. She thought he could help them, but he hadn’t helped his mom, had he? He wasn’t around to stop someone from taking her away from him, so what the hell good was he?
Of course, you couldn’t stop it either.
Whenever he thought about his mom being killed, it was easy to blame someone else, but he couldn’t escape the truth. He’d been too weak to protect her. Too afraid. Too powerless.
Cole moved over to his bed, knelt by the foot of it and reached underneath. He pulled out a backpack and unzipped the side pouch, shoved his hand into his pocket and pulled out a ten he’d snatched earlier. He didn’t like to steal from his aunt, but sometimes he had to.
If he needed to, he’d run. Right now, his step-father was behind bars. That’s where he belonged, but Cole doubted he’d stay there. If he got out and tried to come for him, he wouldn’t go. He’d never go back, but he wouldn’t let his aunt or Lilly get in the way. He wouldn’t let them get hurt for him.
So he’d run. And nobody would ever find him.
Chapter 3
Who Said You Can’t Go Home Again?
Samantha Rossi wasn’t sure what to say to her partner of only nine months. The look on his face let her know he was in a bad place. He’d been in that bad place since the death of his old friend, Kelli Duncan. It was eating him up inside, but now there was another layer.
Ollie had gotten a text, one he didn’t share with her, but it had pissed him off. He hadn’t said a word about it. In fact, he’d barely said a word at all since receiving the message and that wasn’t like Ollie Miller. Not at all.
When she’d started on the force and been assigned to be Miller’s partner, she’d realized he was definitely a talker, a joker, and just a plain old wise ass, but unlike a lot of the other deputies, he didn’t spend all of his time looking at her ass and making lame attempts to flirt with her.
Not that Sam minded men flirting with her. She was quite aware of how she looked. She had long, dark hair that reached her shoulders, and a curvy yet athletic figure that filled out her police uniform very well. She’d inherited an olive skin complexion from her father’s side of the family, and big, brown eyes from her mother. She toned down her looks while on patrol. Her hair in a ponytail, minimum makeup, and no jewelry. Still, guys noticed. That was natural and even nice as long as they weren’t assholes about it, which some of them were. One particular Detective, named Wilson, was a true and utter asshole after she’d refused his advances.
Ollie Miller had definitely not been an asshole. He was the son of the town sheriff, so when she got paired with him she was afraid he’d come across as someone who came across with an air of entitlement. He didn’t do that either.
He’d been patient and kind from day one, with his friendly smile and goofball grin. Her Nana adored him, and with good reason. While Ollie never flirted with Sam, he flirted with her sixty-two-year-old grandmother on more than one occasion. Just enough to bring a flush of girly giddiness to Nana’s cheeks.
The first time she’d introduced them, Ollie picked Sam up for work because her car was in the shop. Nana insisted Ollie stay for dinner and when he left, Nana wanted to know why she wasn’t going after Ollie.
“Because Nana, he’s my partner.”
“Bah,” Nana said. “He’s yummy. Bit of a geek, and he’s too thin, but if I were a little younger, I’d take him out for a spin.”
“I’ll let him know you said so, but we’re partners and friends. That’s all.”
She was glad for that. Besides, Ollie’s heart belonged to another. Not that the person who it belonged to ever noticed Ollie. Sam had to admit, she was a little bit offended on behalf of Ollie, but that was his business.
However, when it made Ollie this angry, it became hers.
“What’s the matter, Ollie?”
Ollie glanced over at his partner. “What makes you ask if something’s the matter?”
She arched an eyebrow in his direction. “Because you’ve been stewing ever since you got that text. Who was it? Ashley?”
Ollie nodded.
“She tell you not to come by after your shift?”
“No.”
“So, what happened?”
“Old ghosts,” Ollie said with a sigh. “Her brother, Drew, is coming back to town. She hasn’t seen or heard from him since he left about eight years ago. Kelli sent him an email before she was killed. Now, he’s on his way back to Ember Falls. Wants to be a brother again. Be an uncle.”
Sam nodded. She remembered Drew from when she was little, back when she had gone to elementary and middle school in Ember Falls, before she and her parents moved away. Drew was two years older than her, but she still remembered having a severe crush on him that lasted from fourth to sixth grade. She was convinced someday she’d marry him before moving south of Albany.
“You don’t think that’s a good idea? Seems to me Cole could use all the family he can get about now.”
Sam only met Cole a few times. He wasn’t much on conversation, but she knew he’d been through a lot. On top of it all to lose his mother, her heart went out to the kid.
“Cole needs people who will care for him,” Ollie said.
“You don’t think Drew will?”
Ollie wanted to give a definitive no, and then hesitated.
“I don’t know,” Ollie said. “I know they had things rough when they grew up. Their mom died when they were seven. The father was… is an alcoholic. I know he was verbally abusive, but you can’t arrest someone for that. When Kelli got back, I talked to her about how her ex was violent towards her. She didn’t want to tell me much. She was embarrassed and all, but I told her I needed to know details to help her get that restraining order. She described some of it. Being hit, slapped, dragged through the house by her hair. When Ashley started to curse about how she hated men, Kelli said, ‘it wasn’t anything new for me.’”
“Their father?”
Oll
ie nodded. “I asked Ashley about it. She wouldn’t talk. Just said that was then, this is now and how unlike her sister, she’d never be some man’s punching bag, again.”
Sam thought about her family. Her beautiful, wonderful mother and her supportive and loving father. Seeing their faces in her mind, she said a silent prayer of thanks for what she had with them. “Ashley should be careful how she talks around Cole. Not all men are like that. My father wasn’t. I know you would never be. Cole needs to understand being a man doesn’t make you violent.”
“She knows that,” Ollie said. After all, wasn’t that the reason why she wanted Ollie to spend time with Cole? So the boy could see how a decent man treated a woman? Of course, Ollie wasn’t sure Ashley even realized he was a man. “Kelli said that too. Said something about how Drew never hurt them. Always tried to get between them and their father.”
“So, that means he’s a good guy, right?”
Ollie frowned. “Not the Drew I remember, no. He took a strong dislike to me for no reason.”
“How so?”
Ollie considered the question as he watched a car go by. It was Dwight Logan’s Buick. He was going a little over the speed limit, but not by much. He’d let it slide.
“He was a bully,” Ollie said. “Tripped me. Pushed me. Called me names. Embarrassed the hell out of me.”
“What’d he do? Make fun of your ears?”
“My ears?” Ollie looked in the mirror. “What’s wrong with my ears?”
Sam tried to fix a look of wide eyed innocence on her face, but she couldn’t help but burst out laughing. “Nothing. I’m just teasing.”
The fact was, Ollie was a pretty good-looking guy. He was tall, lanky, with a mess of blonde hair and baby blue eyes.
Torn Away (The Torn Series Book 1) Page 3
