“I know.” She gave herself a little shake. “I think we’re done here for the day.”
Everly gave my dad a quick hug and then moved to give one to my sister, but Shiloh stiffened. Ev didn’t miss a beat, simply gave her a light shoulder bump instead. I could’ve kissed her in that moment. She seemed to be so in tune with Shy and didn’t make her feel out of place. Shy wasn’t one for casual affection. It was as if she needed space in all things. And Everly gave her that.
“How about Friday?” Ev glanced at me. “Will I be free by then, warden?”
“Depends if you’re on your best behavior.”
She looked at Shy. “I’m going to short-sheet his bed, I swear.”
“You could always put pink dye in his shampoo,” my sister offered.
“Traitor. My own flesh and blood, stabbing me in the back.”
Shiloh shrugged. “You’re bossy. It gets annoying. I’m team Everly on this one.”
Ev crossed her arms over her chest, the action causing my focus to zero in on the swells peeking out from her tank top. “Face it, you’re done for, Easton.”
I forced my gaze up to her face. “I guess I’ll just have to watch my back.”
“Sleep with one eye open,” Shy warned as she headed towards her truck with Dad.
“Come on, Mr. Bossypants. I’ll show you to the guest room.”
“I’m not sure I’m a fan of that nickname.”
Koda lumbered to his feet, and I picked up the blanket he’d been resting on. Everly gave him a scratch behind his ears. “And what nickname would you like?”
“Oh, I don’t know…ruggedly handsome. Ruthlessly charming.”
“Those aren’t nicknames.”
“But they work.”
Everly shook her head. “I think I’ll stick with Hayes.”
“That works, too.”
We headed up the steps to the small front porch, and Everly pulled open the screen door. “Welcome to Chez Kemper.”
I’d been inside once or twice before, but this time, I took a few moments to really study the space. It was small but homey. The cabin’s rustic history somehow worked with the slightly feminine décor—an overstuffed, light gray sofa scattered with pink and cream pillows, two chairs, and a coffee table. A small TV on a console against the wall—though I doubted she got cable up here since I hadn’t seen a dish on her roof.
“Worrying about how you’re going to watch the ballgame?” she asked.
“It might have crossed my mind.”
“You might be able to pick it up on the radio.”
I scrubbed a hand over my jaw. “You know how to wound me.”
The corners of her mouth tipped up. “You’re the one who wanted to stay here.”
A flash of fur flew across the room, making me stumble back again. “Shit. Let me get a shovel. I think I can get it.” Apparently, with the rustic history of this place came rodents.
“Don’t you dare.” Everly moved to the kitchen and pulled out a bag of nuts. Crouching down, she made a clicking noise behind her teeth. A small chipmunk appeared from around the corner.
I took hold of Koda’s collar, so he didn’t get any ideas about chasing down a snack. Everly held out an almond, and I watched in fascination as the little guy took it right from her fingers. Then he darted back across the room into a small hole in a cabinet. “What was that?”
“That’s Chip. He lives here, too, so you have to be friendly.”
I blinked a few times, looking from the cabinet to Everly and back again. “Whatever floats your boat. Chip just better not try to snuggle with me.”
Ev shook her head. “He’s very happy in his home in the cabinet there.” She pointed to an open door on the opposite side of the living space. “That’s your room. We’ll have to share the bathroom here.” She inclined her head to another door off a small hallway. “And my room is next to it. I’m going to hop in the shower and get cleaned up. You can start one of the frozen pizzas if you want. I’ll make a salad.”
I was lost as soon as she said the word shower. All sorts of images that I didn’t need, roamed through my head. I cleared my throat. “Pizza. I can handle that.”
Who was I kidding? Nothing about being in such close proximity to Everly for who knew how long was something I could handle. But I’d have to figure out how to keep my thoughts in check and my hands to myself.
28
Everly
My fingers clawed at the arm dragging me by the hair. “Ian, please.” But he didn’t seem to hear me at all. He simply kept pulling as I tried to gain my footing in the dirt, my bare feet scrabbling for any sort of purchase.
“Mom!” I yelled, but she was in the greenhouse, far from where my shouts could reach her. And Ian knew that.
His hand slapped out with such force that I barely saw it coming. And there was no way I could escape. The blow hit me across the mouth. For a moment, I didn’t feel anything at all. Then pain bloomed, along with the taste of blood.
“Don’t you dare cry for her. You’re a fucking traitor.” He threw me to the dirt.
“Ian, no!” Addie wailed, but her father held her back.
I could just make out Allen’s cold gaze. “She’s earned this punishment. If she doesn’t want to be cast out, she’ll take it, and she won’t say a word to her mother.”
Spit hit my face as Ian’s boot collided with my stomach. All the air was forced out of me. “Stop. Please.”
“You took him from us. You deserve worse than I could ever give you.”
The next blow hit my ribs with a sickening crack, and I couldn’t hold in my scream.
I shot up in bed, barely holding back the scream that had escaped in my dreams. My chest heaved, and my t-shirt and sleep shorts clung to my body with sweat. “Just a nightmare.” I said the words over and over as I climbed out of bed.
It was my mantra as I stripped the sheets off the mattress and put on fresh ones. I’d learned long ago to have a spare set ready to go. “Just a nightmare,” I whispered one more time. Only that wasn’t entirely true. It was a memory. The images and pain carved so deeply into my body that I knew I’d never get them out.
“You’re safe.” I mouthed the words to an empty room. But I wasn’t sure how true they were, either. The angry note flashed in my mind. The feel of that hand covering my mouth.
My fingers dug into my comforter as I pulled it up. “I’m safe.” Hayes was just down the hall. There was a tug along my sternum. A pull to go to him and ask him to chase all of the bad dreams away.
I pushed the thought out of my brain as quickly as it appeared. Now wasn’t the time to be reckless. Instead, I pulled a fresh set of PJs out of my drawer and went to the bathroom. I turned on the shower as cold as I could stand it—I needed the shock to my system. Anything to clear out those last haunting memories.
The blast of water did the trick. I rinsed the sweat from my body and lifted my face to the spray as if that pounding force could erase whatever lurked in my brain.
I dried off quickly, reapplying my favorite lotion and letting the fresh scent soothe me. Tossing my old PJs into my laundry basket, I moved down the hall as quietly as possible. I listened for a moment, but only the familiar sound of crickets greeted me.
I heated a mug of water in the small microwave I’d purchased, pulling it out before the beeping could wake Hayes. I went for chamomile tonight, with just a touch of honey. The simple process of preparing the tea was a comfort. Soothing before I’d even had my first sip.
I grabbed a throw from the basket at the end of the couch and moved to the back deck. The night was cold, but I welcomed that, too. The stars were clear as diamonds against black velvet. I eased into one of the two chairs I’d picked up at a secondhand shop in town. They were the Adirondack kind with wide arms and reclined backs. They almost felt like a warm hug.
I wasn’t sure why I’d gotten two. It wasn’t as if I expected anyone to use the other one. But it felt depressing to buy only one.
I t
ipped my face to the sky and began looking for constellations, but the tears blurring my vision hampered my quest. How had a father who’d taught his daughter to trace the stars had such cruelty and sickness in him? How had that grown ten-fold in his son?
I didn’t think I’d ever find the answers, no matter how hard I looked. I wanted to find a way to be at peace with it all. But how did you find that with violence?
I wasn’t sure I could get my way there. Ian didn’t want my forgiveness. And he certainly hadn’t changed. So, what did it mean to let go of it all?
Footsteps sounded on the boards of the back deck, but I didn’t look up. I kept my gaze focused on the forest behind the cabin as Hayes lowered himself into the chair next to me. The one I thought might never be filled.
“Couldn’t sleep?”
“Bad dream.”
There was no point in lying. Hayes saw too much. In everyone, but especially in me.
“About the note?”
I wrapped my hands around my mug of tea, staring down into its swirling depths. “Something else.”
“Your brother?”
My head snapped up. “What are you talking about?”
I saw a gentleness in Hayes I’d never seen before. As if he were approaching an injured, wild animal. “It doesn’t take a genius to figure out there’s something there.”
I turned my focus back to my drink. I ran my thumb up and down the handle of the cup, unsure of what to say.
“Let me in, Ev.”
Hayes didn’t realize how much he was asking with that single request. And yet, I wanted to tell him. To unburden myself of something I’d carried with me for years. I hadn’t ever spoken of it. Not even to Jacey when I went to live with her. My mom had tended to my wounds, stitching my lip and wrapping my ribs, but only after my bruises had faded and the stitches had been removed did she take me to my sister’s.
“After my father’s sentencing, Ian was angry. He took it out on me.”
Hayes’ eyes hardened. “He hit you? You were only eleven. He was a teenager.”
I remembered how big Ian had seemed at the time, towering over me as his boot made contact with my ribs.
“How bad?”
The two words were rough, grating over my skin. “Split lip. Broken ribs. Probably a concussion.”
Hayes’ fingers dug into the arms of the chair, his knuckles bleaching white. “No one called the goddamned sheriff?”
“That’s not how my family operates. It’s why they were so angry with me. They didn’t think that what my father had done was right, but they thought I should’ve waited until my mom came home so she could’ve talked Dad down or gone to get Allen.”
“If you had waited another couple of days, Shiloh could’ve died.”
“I know,” I whispered. “The only thing I regret is not going sooner. I’d take the beating again if it meant she was okay.”
“Fuck.” Hayes pushed to his feet and began pacing. The back deck wasn’t large, but he used every inch.
I rose slowly, setting my tea on the chair. I moved into his path, stopping Hayes in his tracks. “I’m okay.”
His rough hands came up to frame my face as he bent down and got close. “You’re not okay. How could you be? All I can think about is what you’ve had to endure. And the words I threw at you the first day I came up here. I’m so fucking sorry, Ev.”
I tipped my face forward so our foreheads touched, then just rested there and circled his wrists with my hands. “I am okay. Or I will be. I stuffed a lot of this down. Haven’t dealt with it the way I should have. But I’m facing it now. It’s not easy, but it’s good for me to be back here.”
Hayes was silent for a moment, the only sound that of his ragged breathing. “You’re the bravest person I’ve ever met.”
“It’s just twenty breaths—”
“It’s not only twenty damn breaths. It’s you. Whatever’s running through those veins that makes you stronger than everyone else.” Hayes tipped up my face so that our lips were only a breath apart. “Ev?”
“Yes?”
“I need to kiss you.”
I wanted it so badly. The feel of his mouth on mine. To know that I wasn’t alone in that moment. I was the one who closed the distance. His lips were softer than expected, the pressure so gentle, it was as if he worried that I might break.
But the moment his tongue slipped into my mouth, everything changed. Hunger and need took over. We were both searching for something, yet not quite sure what that was. My fingers fisted in his t-shirt, and I pulled Hayes closer until I wasn’t sure where he ended, and I began.
An owl cried out in the night, likely swooping down in search of a snack. It was a bucket of cold water dumped right over my head. I jumped back, my hand going to my mouth. My lips tingled as I took in the man before me. I waited for him to say something about this being a mistake. He didn’t. He simply stood there with a grin curving his mouth.
“That—that—we shouldn’t have done that.”
Hayes moved in closer. “Why not? You hiding a husband here somewhere?”
“No…I just…it’s too complicated. There’s too much water under too many bridges.”
His hands came back to my face, his thumbs sweeping across my cheeks. “I don’t give a damn about any water. You and me, that’s what matters.”
I would’ve given anything to believe that. But I knew it couldn’t be. Whenever something reminded him of who my father was and what he had stolen from Hayes’ family, it would kill something inside of him. And I couldn’t stand around and watch that happen. So, I did the only thing I could. I ran.
29
Hayes
“You’re whistling.”
I stole a glance at Young in my passenger seat. “So?”
“You never whistle.”
I turned my focus back to the road, but my neck felt hot. “Guess I have a tune stuck in my head.”
I could feel her gaze on my face, studying me. “Something’s different.”
“Is this your weird mom radar going off?”
Young chuckled. “Raising two little hooligans definitely helps the spidey senses. What gives, boss?”
I shifted in my seat. What gave was that I could still taste Everly. The tea and the hint of mint from her toothpaste. She might have hightailed it back to her room and left before I’d gotten up, but that didn’t change anything. There was something between us. “Guess I’m just in a good mood this morning.”
“Fine. Keep your secrets.”
I would. This wasn’t something I was ready to share with anyone. And I knew moving forward would be more akin to dismantling a bomb than pursuing a woman. Everly was right. It wouldn’t be easy. More than a few moments would be complicated. But I couldn’t walk away, either. She seemed to pull me in. And each layer she revealed tethered me to her. Amazed me and sliced at any sort of defenses I’d built up.
The wheel creaked as I adjusted my grip, Everly’s pale face flashing in my mind. She’d given me a gift last night. The most precious thing she had—her truth. But that had me resisting the urge to betray the oaths I’d taken and search out Ian Kemper for myself.
“How’s Everly doing?”
Young’s voice cut through my spiraling thoughts. “What?”
“How is Everly after what happened? She hanging in there okay?”
“I think she’s doing as well as she can be.” But I knew that what had happened—the attack and the note—had brought on those nightmares last night. “I’m hoping there’s something on the note. I asked them to bump it to the front of the line.”
Young raised a brow. “Calling in favors?”
“We have to figure out who’s behind this.” We hadn’t had a case this serious in years. Certainly never a serial offender stalking our county.
“I know. I’m just giving you a hard time because I know you like her.”
“What?” I almost drove off the road.
Young gripped the handle above her head. “Hell. P
lease don’t kill us because I know you have a crush.”
“I do not.”
“You sound like my five-year-old.”
I clamped my mouth shut. Anything that came out now would sound like an idiotic denial.
Young grinned. “Now you’re giving me the silent treatment, huh?”
“She’s a good woman. And I’m going to leave it at that.”
“Fine. I’ll let you off the hook for now. Give me the rundown on what we’re driving up on.”
I rolled my shoulders back. “Samuel Miller. We’ve gotten a few calls on him now for animal abuse and neglect. He’s had animals removed from his care before. He’s on parole. If we’ve got enough evidence this time, he’ll see the inside of a prison.”
Young tightened her grip on the handle above her head. “God, I hope so. There’s a special place in hell for people who hurt animals and children.”
“I agree with you there.”
The drive out to Miller’s place wasn’t a quick one. He lived thirty miles outside of town on a five-acre plot. When we drove up, a number of sheriff’s department vehicles were already on scene, and I recognized Miles Taylor’s truck. I nodded in the vehicle’s direction. “Vet’s here, so that’s good.”
“At least, there’s that.”
I pulled into a makeshift spot next to a cruiser and hopped out of my SUV. My gaze immediately went to the scrawny man sitting on a stump with his arms behind his back. He might have been restrained, but he was still cursing up a storm.
Sergeant Ruiz met my gaze. “Well, he took a swing at me, so we can arrest him for assaulting a law enforcement officer, at least.”
“Small mercies,” I muttered. My entire team was beyond frustrated that we were still dealing with this asshole. But animal abuse cases were hard to prove and even harder to get a decent sentence for. I strode forward, meeting Samuel’s angry gaze. “You’re on probation, Mr. Miller.”
“Trumped-up charges. I ain’t did nothing wrong.”
Tattered Stars Page 18
