Where I felt relief, Rex seemed to be in . . . shock.
Frenzied, he pulled her against him, hugging her tight, refusing to let her go.
I inched closer to them. Dread sank into my spirit when I glanced at Rex again. When I glimpsed his eyes.
Turmoil and fear and desperation.
I wanted to reach out and touch him. Tell him it was okay. Promise him that Frankie was fine. Erase whatever had condemned him to this kind of torture. But he was hugging her to his chest, his jaw clenched so tightly I was sure he was fighting tears. Fighting whatever chaos raged inside him.
So instead, I turned my attention on Frankie. Gently, I reached out and brushed back the tangle of hair that had fallen across her eyes. A slick of mud covered her from her chin up the side of her face, but I didn’t see any blood.
“Are you hurt anywhere, Frankie?” My words were scratchy.
Frankie crooked her arm, showing off the flaming-red scrape on her elbow. The shallow wound was quickly filling with blood. “I fink a need a Band-Aid.”
Rex winced.
I looked back up the trail, realizing she couldn’t have rolled more than four feet. That she’d just tripped. Something little kids did all the time.
Taking a chance, I set a hand on Rex’s arm, hoping it would break through the terror that tremored through his body. Muscles twitching. Jaw clenching. “Hey . . . she’s okay. She’s okay. She didn’t fall far. It was just an accident. She’s okay. It’s okay.”
He didn’t respond. He just shifted and climbed to standing, keeping her cradled in his arms. His cautious movements seemed at complete odds with the intimidating power of his stance, with the almost vicious steps he took when he headed straight for the trail.
Unsure of what to do, I rushed and grabbed Milo’s leash where he’d scampered just off the trail. I followed close behind, surprised when Rex headed directly for his truck instead of going back to the picnic spot.
He loaded Frankie in her booster seat, peppering a bunch of kisses on her forehead and murmuring, “We’re going to get you checked out, baby girl. You’re fine. I promise, you’re fine.”
He said it as if he were trying to convince himself.
Still, he said absolutely nothing to me when I slid into the cab.
He turned over the engine. It roared to life. We rode in silence back in to town, tension wound tight as the truck jostled back over the crude path. He drove straight to the emergency room where we’d taken Frankie that night weeks ago.
Somehow, it felt as if years had passed since that night.
So much had changed in such a short amount of time.
Rex killed the engine. Silence descended, so thick it stole the air. I could almost feel the magnitude of the breath Rex inhaled as he stared through the windshield at the ER sliding doors. His gaze remained trained on that spot when he finally spoke. “Told you before I don’t take chances.”
I reached out, hand trembling as I set it on his forearm. Corded, sinewy muscle flexed, bunching and straining beneath the tanned skin and tattoos that wound down his arm.
“It’s about taking the right ones, Rex.”
He swallowed. My eyes traced the tremor of his throat, my gaze going soft when he looked over at me.
There was something there.
A plea.
The man begging me for understanding.
To get it.
I thought maybe he was waiting on me to run. To spook. To leave him like the woman who was supposed to be Frankie’s mother.
In that second, I hated her a little more.
I nuzzled the top of Milo’s head. “Take her inside. I’m going to call Nikki and see if she can pick up Milo, then I’ll be in.”
I’m not going anywhere.
A reluctant, disbelieving smile pull to one side of his mouth. The man so brilliant and good it wasn’t fair that all that life was hidden behind whatever had beaten him down.
“Okay,” he said.
He hopped out and unbuckled Frankie, and when I looked back at them from over my shoulder, Rex was pulling his daughter into his arms, her head on his shoulder.
She stretched her little fingers toward me.
I did the same.
Our fingertips met.
A flash of energy.
That connection profound.
“I’ll be right in, Sweet Pea,” I promised through a murmur.
“Hurry . . . I needs you.”
“I need you, too,” I whispered.
I’d never been playing games.
But now I was playing for keeps.
Rynna – Seventeen Years Old
“You bitch,” Janel whispered her hatred from behind me, and I jerked to look over my shoulder. Janel stood in the doorway, seething mad with tears in her eyes. Janel’s momma had just rushed out, pressing a hand over her mouth, as if she were either trying to accept what I had just told her or was wanting to reject it.
“I’m sorry, Janel. But I . . . I can’t continue keeping these secrets for you. Lying for you. You need help.”
“I need help? You don’t know anything.”
“I know you’ve been stealing from my gramma, I know you stole from the dance fund at the school, and I know I’ve been covering for you, and I’m not willing to do it anymore. Your momma needed to know.”
Janel scoffed out a hard laugh. “You just want to make yourself look good, same way as you always do.” Her voice sing-songed with bitterness. “Rynna Dayne, angel of Gingham Lakes. Holier than thou when she’s nothing but a self-righteous bitch.” She sank back, shaking her head. “You’re gonna pay for this, Rynna Dayne.”
28
Rex
Dusk hovered in the atmosphere, and the sky had dimmed from pink to gray. I sat on my front porch on the rocker watching this clusterfuck of a day slip away. Bugs droned from the stilled trees, the air calm while my heart still banged around, lashing with unstable beats.
I looked up when the front door slowly creaked open. Rynna’s footsteps were quiet as she stepped outside into the encroaching night. “I just checked in on Frankie. She’s asleep.”
I nodded at her, and she stepped all the way out, Milo trotting out beside her. She drew the door closed, all but an inch so we could hear if Frankie needed us.
She’d been fine. Of course, she was fine. My freak out uncalled for, which was something Kale had been all too eager to tease me about. I’d demanded he check her for any unseen injuries that we could have missed just by looking at her. He’d shot off some statistic on the average number of falls a kid Frankie’s age had a day, pointing out that it wasn’t like she’d taken a tumble over the cliff.
I didn’t care. When it came to Frankie, I didn’t take chances.
Rynna handed me a fresh beer. “Thought you could use this.”
My laughter was soft. Incredulous. Disbelief that this girl could come battering into my life and the only thing it took for her to knock down my walls was all that kindness and faith. “Thanks,” I muttered.
After twisting off the cap, I took a long pull.
Ice-cold amber glided down my throat.
Rynna eased out onto the porch and sat on the steps. Her back was to me, her arms wrapped around her knees as she stared out at the peace that hummed around us.
Lost in thought.
Contemplation.
The girl was so damned gorgeous I was having a hard time differentiating the emotions that thrummed and danced and glowed. It was a war against the ones that screamed and warned and howled. The chaos in my heart and mind made me want to rip the hair from my head.
Crazy how everything I’d lived my life on suddenly felt like a lie.
With Rynna, I knew it was all or nothing. I couldn’t keep shutting her down and shutting her out. Couldn’t keep giving her these warnings without giving her a reason.
It was time I gave her all of me.
I needed to fess up the bullshit that haunted my life. Tell her everything. I just didn’t fucking know how to drag it all out into the open. If she would run. Hate me like I deserved for her to.
Agony cinched down on my chest, and my mouth flopped open and closed. The words too thick on my tongue. Finally, I forced them out into the stilled, deepening night. “Warned you that you don’t want my mess.” It came out hoarse. Choked.
Rynna didn’t look back at me. She just sent all that belief floating out to the stars that were beginning to blink in the sky. “And I told you I wasn’t afraid.”