Charged

by Jay Crownover

  She shook her head at me and took a step to the side. A lopsided grin twisted her pretty mouth and it made me want to break every single thing in my office.

  “Send me the bill, Quaid. I’ll get it paid somehow. I know you mentioned not wanting checks and balances between us but they were always there.”

  I growled at her and took a step towards her but she held her hands up in front of her like she was trying to ward me off. “I don’t care about the fucking bill, Avett. I care about you and keeping you safe and that you stop trying to destroy everything good in your life to make something up to a dead girl.” I motioned between us with an angry sweep of my arm. “This is good between us, better than good, and you can’t abide by it. You’ve been looking for a way to twist it into something else from the inception.”

  My words were harsh, accusatory, and I knew better than to go after someone feeling vulnerable that way. I’d seen too many witnesses shut completely down after similar tactics used by the prosecution.

  “Maybe I have been waiting for it to go bad because—let’s be honest with each other, Quaid—how many good things really come from the bad decisions we make?” She blinked at me and her eyes narrowed. “I’m never going to be proper or suitable. I’m never going to be the kind of girl you can take with you to some fancy office party … a party you never mentioned to me.” I cringed because she had a point. I’d never mentioned the event because it was still a month away and her current situation with the loss of her house and the unknown bad guys after her seemed more pressing than some snotty shindig I didn’t even want to attend.

  She shrugged at me and headed for the open door. “I grew up in the back of a bar. My dad’s half biker and half saint. My mom is a short-order cook with almost as many issues as I have, and I look supercute with pink hair, so I’m not planning on changing it, or me, anytime soon. I like where I come from and I’m finally starting to like who I’m coming to be.” She cleared her throat and if I hadn’t been watching her like a hawk I would have missed the sheen of tears that covered her eyes as she tossed over her shoulder, “I’m not trying to atone to a dead girl anymore, mostly because of you, but there are still a lot of people in my life that I do owe apologies and repentance to. I’m not interested in adding you to that list, Counselor.”

  She moved to the door and shut it behind her with a soft click as I stalked back to my desk and picked up the lunch she brought me and tossed it in the trash with more force than necessary. I kicked the side of my desk, which only led to my wingtip getting scuffed and my mood getting sourer. I threw my big body into my leather chair and glared at the crooked achievements that looked like they were barely hanging on to their place on my office wall. I’d worked so hard for all of those pieces of paper. I was so sure that they were going to ensure me the life I wanted and guarantee me everything that I thought would make me happy.

  I saw them for exactly what they were, pieces of paper that meant nothing unless the man that possessed them did something worthwhile with his time and his talent.

  It wasn’t until I left for the day after ignoring more than one email from Orsen demanding that I take on his friend’s case that it occurred to me that Avett hadn’t left because she was hurt about what Orsen said to her; she left because she was hurt about what he said to me. She would weather blow after blow that landed on her because that’s how she operated, but she couldn’t stand to see someone she cared about, maybe even loved, in the line of fire. She didn’t want me to put my job and possible promotion in jeopardy because of our relationship. I’d made no secret about how important my career was to me. She was protecting me the only way she knew how … by destroying the good and forgoing her own happiness. She would blame herself if my position at the firm was threatened because we were together and she was cutting off that culpability at the pass.

  I called myself every kind of idiot I could think of for not recognizing her motivations sooner. I was too busy formulating my counterargument and dialing in my cross-examination that I fully planned to level at her that I’d forgotten that the girl I was falling for was equal parts whirlwind and martyr.

  CHAPTER 15

  Avett

  It took a few days of moping around my mom’s house and refusing to take Quaid’s calls for my parents to ask what had happened with the handsome attorney. My mom didn’t ask so much as give me pleading looks every time our eyes met that indicated she thought I should do whatever it took to fix the situation. I wanted to tell her for once I broke things for the right reasons and not because I purposely wanted to feel like I had ripped my heart out and left it resting at Quaid’s feet. I wounded myself but I did it so that the man I was pretty sure I was in love with didn’t have to hurt, and hurt he would if we stayed on the course we were on. Quaid deserved more than being caught circling a ceaseless dead end because he wanted to be with me.

  There was no mistaking the disdain or judgment on his boss’s face when he saw the easy affection that existed between the two of us and his hostile words were as true as they were painful to hear. I wasn’t suitable or proper to the lifestyle Quaid lived and I wouldn’t ever fit in with the kinds of people he worked with and longed to impress.

  I’d finally felt the level of pain and agony that I had been hunting since the night everything went wrong. My heart felt like it wouldn’t ever work right again and everything on the inside of me ached and throbbed like it had taken the worse beating imaginable. I would never feel like I had paid my dues to Autumn, and I would always carry around blame and responsibility for what happened to her, but Quaid had helped me to see that we were all responsible for our own actions and the only thing we could control was ourselves and the person that our choices molded us into. Making bad choices, repeatedly, hadn’t made me into a bad person, but the way I handled those bad choices and let them twist into something worse had made me into a person that was desperately out of control and in need of guidance.

  Walking away from Quaid and the goodness he offered didn’t necessarily feel like the right choice, but I knew I was making the decision for all the right reasons and that was leaps and bounds ahead of where I had been before meeting him. I finally met the right guy; it was a shame I would always be the wrong girl for him.

  My dad was more direct than my mother. He always had been. He waited until Mom went to bed one night and then sat down with me on the couch when I was deep into an Archer marathon, wishing I could be as kickass and as strong as Lana was. It was a pretty sad state of affairs and a pretty clear indication that my heart was hurting that the hilarious superspy hadn’t managed to make me laugh once in the two hours I’d been zoned out in front of the TV. It wasn’t my heart that was broken in this fall; it was all of me.

  My dad threw a beefy arm around my shoulders and pulled me into his side so that my head was resting on his chest. I let out a quivering sigh and let my eyes drift closed so that the tears that had been threatening to fall since I walked out of Quaid’s office once again gathered behind my eyelids.

  “You want to tell me what happened?” My dad’s voice rumbled deep and soothing over my head as I breathed in his comforting Dad scent. “Despite his terrible taste in motorcycles, I liked the guy. I liked him for you and we both know that never happens.”

  I laughed a little and sniffed as it tried to turn into a sob. “Right guy, wrong place and wrong time. Not to mention, I don’t think I was ever really his type.”

  My dad harrumphed and I felt the hair on the top of my head move with the disgruntled sound. “He tell you that?”

  He sounded offended on my behalf, so I lifted my head so I could look him in the eyes to make sure he knew that I was the one that had walked away, not Quaid. “No, Dad, he never said anything like that but I knew the end was coming before things even really got started. We don’t live in the same kind of world.” I laughed bitterly and laid my head back down. “One of his suits cost as much as my entire wardrobe.”

  My dad made another noise in his throat and c
urled his fingers around my shoulder so he could give me a squeeze. “You know better than to judge a man based on what he puts on his back. All that matters is that it’s a strong back, one that can carry whatever load is stacked on top of it. I know I taught you better than that.”

  “It’s not the clothes, it’s everything. Where he lives. Where he works. Where his future is headed. We have common ground but we only seem to find it when we’re naked.”

  His big body stiffened under me. “Don’t want to hear about my baby girl being naked with anyone, ever.”

  I chuckled a little. “Sorry, Dad.” It was rare he was uncomfortable about anything, but I guess the thought of his only child being anywhere near any kind of sex still had the power to make him squirm.

  “Avett, I don’t know much about your legal eagle, but he helped you out time and time again and refused to let you go about all that Law & Order business alone. He stepped in when he thought you were in danger and he showed up when you needed him when the house burned. That’s some pretty solid evidence that the man is the right one in your old man’s opinion. Those are the kinds of traits a father appreciates in the man his baby girl has her eyes on.”

  I snuggled in closer to him and muttered quietly, “I can’t believe you’re trying to convince me to keep a boy around. You never do that. You’re always shoving them out the door and telling me to do better.”

  I felt his beard move against the top of my head as he sighed. “That’s because Quaid isn’t one of your boys, Avett. He’s a man with his own life and a whole history that he had before you came along. It sounds to me like he’s willing to share both of those things with you, and instead of taking him up on his offer you ran away. The boys were throwaway—this man’s one you might want to consider holding on to, Sprite. Not sure anyone will ever be good enough for my little girl but this man comes pretty close.”

  I frowned at the TV and pushed off my dad so that I could sit up and cross my arms over my chest. “I didn’t run away. I left because one of us was going to have to leave eventually.”

  My dad’s bushy eyebrows lifted up and I saw his teeth flash within the forest of his beard. “Why? Why would one of you have to leave eventually?”

  I opened my mouth to tell him that we didn’t fit, that we didn’t work, and that Quaid needed someone more elegant and refined that would suit his polished and pristine life. I wanted to argue that our backgrounds were too different, that what we valued and held dear were on opposing pages, in completely different books, on opposite sides of the library. I couldn’t get the words out because they weren’t really true. I’d spent my time trying so hard to feel as badly as I possibly could while Quaid spent his trying to feel as good and as successful as possible. Neither one of us had obtained our goal until each other. Right at this moment, I knew I felt as bad as I ever would and I had seen it in Quaid’s eyes when we made love on his mountain that he had never felt that good and that worthy.

  Like recognized like. And while we had both been lost and floundering on our own, when we were together it felt like we were exactly where we were supposed to be.

  I heaved a sigh of defeat and slumped back into the couch. “I was at his office and his boss came in and made a bunch of shitty comments about me. He accused Quaid of only taking my case because he wanted in my pants and then told him he needed to find someone acceptable to bring with him to some office function. Quaid was pissed but all I could see was him trying to take me with him to something like that and it going horribly wrong. He’s done so much for me in such a short time. I don’t want him in hot water at work or at odds with his boss. He wants to make partner and I doubt if we stay together that will happen. I don’t want him to sacrifice his plans or his dreams because of me.”

  My dad narrowed his eyes at me and it was his turn to cross his arms over his barrel-like chest as he glared at me consideringly. “Why not? He’s an adult and if he wants to sacrifice anything, including his career for the woman he cares about, that’s his choice. It’s not up to you to make it for him, Avett.”

  I poked a finger at my own chest. “I don’t want to be a mistake he makes and suffers from. He’s already lost enough.” I wasn’t comfortable giving my dad Quaid’s story. It was his to tell and if he wanted my father to know the ins and outs of his childhood and his divorce he could share those details, not that I was expecting them to get any bonding time in the near future.

  My dad swore softly and lumbered to his booted feet. He bent over and dropped a soft kiss on the top of my head and I felt those damn tears threatening again. “I understand where you’re coming from, Sprite, and I get that it’s coming from a good place in your too-big heart, but that’s still not your call to make. If the man wants to rearrange his life for you, that’s his choice to make, be it good or bad. You don’t get to corner the market on making risky decisions, Avett. Nothing is guaranteed, especially love, but only a coward doesn’t roll the dice and take a chance on it when it’s right there in front of them. Giving the man that has been there for you, that has shown up time and time again, the benefit of the doubt that he knows what he wants is far braver than tying yourself to all those losers that have been dragging you down for years. You were destined to fail with them, so when everything went south you knew it was inevitable.” His eyebrows lifted and a knowing grin pulled at his mouth. “Look at me and your mom, kiddo. We lost before we won but we wouldn’t have you or each other if we didn’t pony up and gamble on each other in the first place.”

  I groaned. “Thanks for encouraging heartbreak and insanity, old man.” But his words settled around me and taunted me with their wisdom. I was beyond defying his good advice because I knew it was the smart thing to do and I wanted to live unfoolishly. Now I wanted to live the best life possible and be the best Avett possible and that meant no more blowing off dad’s sage wisdom and hard-earned insight.

  He laughed. “Anytime. By the way, I’m meeting Zeb Fuller at the old house tomorrow. He wants to walk through it and see how much damage was done to the foundation and the outside brick. He thinks if there are enough bones left he’ll make an offer and rehab the place.”

  I gaped at my dad in shock. The house looked like a total loss the last time I saw it. But he wasn’t done.

  “If he offers on it I’m making him give half that money to you since the house was half yours.”

  I shook my head in an automatic denial. He’d tried to do the same thing with the insurance payout but I wouldn’t let him. “No, Dad. That money is yours. My name wasn’t on the house and I want you to put all that money back into your retirement or maybe you can take Mom on a tour around the world. I haven’t done anything to deserve that kind of generosity from you.”

  He swore at me again and narrowed his eyes in a way that I knew meant there was no more argument. “It’s half yours, Avett, not because you earned it or deserve it but because you are my daughter, you lived there, and you lost as much as I did. I watched you grow into a young lady that has my whole heart there. It was always as much your home as it was mine. My retirement is fine, not that it’s for you to worry about. I repaid the money I borrowed for your bail, and I haven’t seen a bill from your man, so maybe you can use the money and settle up with him once it comes … though I doubt it ever will. I don’t care what you do with the money, but if Zeb offers on the house, then that’s what’s happening. End of discussion.”

  I sighed in defeat but I couldn’t deny that the idea of writing not only Quaid but also Rome a check for the actual, physical amount I owed them was tempting.

  “Well, the house was a wreck so I doubt he’ll make an offer. Night, Dad.”

  My dad chuckled. “You don’t know those boys like I do, Sprite. They seem to be able to breathe life into anything that needs a second chance. Come with me tomorrow when I go to meet him and you’ll see for yourself.”

  Since I wasn’t spending much time on my own with the baddies still floating around, it was hang with him or at the bar all day and
I still wasn’t one hundred percent ready to have a showdown with Rome. I agreed to go to the house with him and spent the next hour in front of the TV letting his words really soak in.

  He and my mom had both tragedy and triumph woven throughout their story. They both had some seriously bad decisions under their belts but the best choice for both of them was to be together. Neither of them seemed to regret allowing themselves to love one another even when that love had led to terrible heartache. I cared about Quaid enough to let him go, enough to let my heart hurt as it struggled to beat through the pain I had inflicted upon it.

  I could love him and knew I could easily get lost in him and in the goodness he offered. What I wasn’t sure of was if I was strong enough to weather the blizzard of the errors we were both bound to make trying to be together and the consequences that would rain down upon us. I survived my own mistakes and missteps by some kind of miracle. I didn’t want to leave Quaid’s fate and future happiness to that same kind of chance. I was the one who jumped; he was the one that stayed warm and dry. I didn’t want my love to ruin him and I was scared that’s exactly what it would do.

  My dad thought the answer was right in front of me … I wasn’t so sure we were looking at the same thing.

  THE NEXT DAY I was standing in the driveway of my old home staring listlessly at the charred mess of brick and wood. I couldn’t believe the beautifully restored home was nothing more than a scorched shell of its former glory. I couldn’t believe my dad had the emotional strength to tromp through the ashes with Zeb as the big, bearded contractor knocked against walls and crawled all around the debris. The entirety of my father’s earthly possessions were now nothing more than ashes that could be swept up and discarded, and when I said as much he gave me a hug and told me the things that mattered: me and Mom, his memories and experiences. Those were the things that he would be sad to lose … everything else was simply stuff.