On the Fly (39 page)

Brenden led me up the steps and
inside, and we found a table along a quiet wall. I sat down,
gawking at the mix of antiques and gaudy gold accents, the Buddha
statues looking over us at various intervals and the Victorian
wallpaper on the walls. It was the most unusual and perfect little
restaurant I’d ever seen.

He took my hand from across the table.
“Will this work?”

“
I’ve never had Thai food
before,” I answered.

“
I suppose we’ll see if
it’s spicy enough to count as spicy to a Texan, then.”

It turned out to be pretty spicy. The
food was amazing, the service was unhurried, and the atmosphere was
everything I could have hoped for. He told me that he was in the
clear in terms of being traded, at least for now, but once he got
back into the lineup he would have to convince Scotty that he
deserved to stay. I got so caught up talking to Brenden and
enjoying myself that I forgot all about calling to check on my kids
until we were being ushered out the front door because they were
closing the restaurant for the night.

It was nine o’clock, so I hoped they
were in bed and asleep. Whether they were or not, calling them now
didn’t make much sense. The drive home wasn’t very long. I left my
phone in my purse.

The washing machine and dryer were
running when we opened the door to my place.

Jamie was sitting on the couch with
Pumpkin curled up on his lap. For some reason, Pumpkin didn’t react
to Jamie like he did to most men. Jamie was playing a game on his
phone, but neither of my kids was in sight. He looked up when we
came in. “Sorry. The bathtub kind of exploded during Tuck’s bath,”
he said. “Maddie helped me find enough towels to dry it all up, but
it took pretty much every towel you had. I figured we’d better wash
them so you could shower tomorrow.”

Saying that the tub exploded during
Tuck’s bath gave the tub way too much credit for the destruction
that must have taken place. My boy could create a tsunami if he
thought he could get away with it.

“
Thanks for cleaning that
up,” I said. “Did they give you too many problems beyond that?” I
headed into the kitchen to fix up a baggie of ice for Brenden’s
ankle, since he hadn’t put it up in at least a few
hours.

“
Nah. Kids are just kids.
They’re both in bed, but I think they were up a little later than
normal because of the flood.”

By the time I came back to the living
room with the ice, Brenden was on the couch with his ankle up,
Pumpkin was sitting next to his foot and hissing at him, and Jamie
was heading for the door. “You don’t have to leave,” I
said.

“
I do if I don’t want Soupy
to break my nose for not taking a hint,” Jamie replied, grinning.
“’Night. See you two tomorrow.”

“
Thank you,” I called out
to the closing door. I handed Brenden the baggie, and he situated
it on his ankle. “You wouldn’t break his nose, would
you?”

He shrugged and gave me a look that
sent shivers racing up my spine. “Not here.” He held out his hand,
reaching to pull me down to the sofa with him.

My pulse raced through me, and every
nerve ending in my body wanted to take his hands and let him do
whatever he wanted. I held back, though. “In a minute. I just need
to check on the kids first.”

“
Okay.”

The way he said that one word was like
a promise. His voice rumbled through me, crashed over me. I hurried
down the hall before I forgot what I needed to do.

Tuck was sleeping
like a log when I peeked into his bedroom. He’d
somehow twisted himself around so that he was sleeping on the bed
sideways with his head hanging off the edge. I took a minute and
got him back to the middle of the bed so hopefully he wouldn’t fall
out, hit his head, and get a concussion of his own. I wouldn’t put
it past him to do something like that just so he could keep up with
Maddie.

When I went across to her bedroom and
opened the door, her eyes popped open and reflected the hall
light.

“
Sorry,” I whispered. I
went into her room and sat on the edge of the bed. “Did I wake
you?”

“
I wasn’t asleep
yet.”

I brushed her hair back from her
forehead. “Was everything okay tonight?”

“
Tuck flooded the bathroom,
but Mr. Jamie and I cleaned it up. We went to the Spaghetti Factory
for supper. Tuck made a mess there, too, but Mr. Jamie said it was
okay. He didn’t get mad or anything.”

The fact that she was telling me about
Tuck making messes and not about someone touching her or hurting
her helped me breathe a little more freely.

“
Jamie said you were a big
help.”

“
Yeah.” But then she
frowned, scrunching her eyebrows together in a way that made her
look a lot more serious than she ought to be at her age.
“Mommy?”

I tried not to worry. That expression
might just be because of a headache from her concussion. “Yeah,
baby?”

“
When we were at the
arcade, my eyes hurt because of the bright lights,” she said, and I
started to breathe again. It
was
just about the concussion. “I told Mr. Jamie and I
went to sit in a dark corner so he and Tuck could keep playing. But
a man sat too close to me. I didn’t like how close he was, but I
didn’t know what to do. I was a little scared.”

I stopped breathing halfway through
her telling me, and I was gripping the edge of her bed so hard the
fingers of my left hand hurt. Nothing could hurt as much as my
heart, though.

I knew something like this
might happen if I went out with Brenden and left my kids behind.
I
knew
it. This
was exactly the reason I had been determined not to
date.

I should never have let them out of my
sight. Jamie wasn’t a parent. He liked my kids, and he wouldn’t
hurt them, but that didn’t mean he was even remotely equipped to
take care of them. To protect them like I would.

Forcing air through my lungs, I willed
myself to release the edge of the bed. “What happened?” My voice
sounded as unsteady as I felt.

Maddie shook her head with a small
smile. “It’s okay, Mommy. He tried to talk to me a couple of times,
but I’m not supposed to talk to strangers so I didn’t say anything
back. Nothing else happened. He didn’t go away, so I went back to
Tuck and Mr. Jamie and stayed with them even though my head
hurt.”

“
You promise?” I said.
“Nothing bad happened?”

“
Pinkie swear,” she said,
putting one hand up with the pinkie out. “Nothing bad
happened.”

But it wasn’t okay. Maybe this time
nothing happened, but the next time we might not be so lucky. She
was being so brave about it, but it had definitely shaken her up
and it could have been disastrous. I should have been with
her.

I put my hand up to meet hers, and she
hooked her pinkie around mine. Then I bent down to kiss her
forehead. “Are you still scared?” I asked.

She shook her head. “Not once I was
with Tuck and Mr. Jamie again.”

“
All right,” I said,
swallowing hard. “You’d better get to sleep now.” I forced myself
to get off her bed and head to the door.

As he always did, Pumpkin raced into
her room when I was leaving, climbing the steps to watch over her
and keep her safe.

I managed to pull the door closed
without falling apart. I even got down the hall and into the living
room without breaking down. But then my eyes fell on Brenden,
sitting there on my couch and looking at me expectantly, and
instead of shattering, I got mad—whether at myself or him or the
whole damn world, I didn’t know.

“
What’s wrong?” he asked,
his expression changing from seductive to concerned in an
instant.

I didn’t want him to be concerned. I
wanted him to be gone, because I’d never be able to think and
figure out a plan if he stayed. “I think you should leave
now.”

He didn’t leave. Instead, he rose and
crossed the room to me, leaving his crutches behind. He tried to
pull me into his arms, but I pushed him away and went into the
kitchen so that the bar was between the two of us. I couldn’t take
it if he tried to comfort me right now. There was no comfort for
what I was feeling. There was nothing in the world that anyone
could do or say to undo what had been done to my daughter, and it
could have happened again tonight—all because I’d made a selfish
decision and left her with someone else.

I made the mistake of looking up at
him and seeing the hurt in his eyes and in the pinched line between
his brows.

“
What happened? Is Maddie
okay?”

“
She’s fine,” I ground out,
but my voice cracked over the words and if I wasn’t careful I would
start crying. A couple of bowls and glasses were in the sink still
from this morning’s breakfast, so I turned on the water and started
to wash them. At least that would give me something to
do.

“
If she’s fine, why are you
acting like this?”

The bowl in my hands was already
perfectly clean, but I kept scrubbing it. “Like what?” I bit
off.

“
Like she’s not fine.”
Brenden came around the bar as though he was going to try to hold
me again.

I backed away, holding the soapy rag
and wet bowl between us. The last thing on earth I could handle
right now was for him to wrap me up in his strong arms and tempt me
to feel for even one second as though he could make the world right
again. Thinking that way was what led to this in the first
place.

The tic in his jaw was going crazy,
pulsing at about the same pace as my heart, but he stopped before
he got to me. He dragged a hand over his face. “Fuck! Talk to me.
Give me a chance to—”

“
You can’t fix this.” No
one could fix it. “Please,” I said, and damn if it didn’t come out
as a sob. Tears stung the backs of my eyes, and I tried to hold
them at bay. “I just can’t right now. I need time.” To think. To
decide what to do. To figure out how I could hold my heart together
if I pushed him out of my life, which seemed like the only right
thing I could do for my little girl. This couldn’t be about me and
what I wanted; it had to be about my kids and what they
needed.

Brenden looked away, his hands balling
into fists and releasing at his sides. “Okay. I’ll give you time.
But you can’t shut me out, Rachel. You have to talk to me about it
eventually. You have to let me help.”

I swallowed hard and moved back to the
sink so I could finish up the dishes.

A minute later, he made his way back
into the living room, got his crutches, and headed for the door. “I
love you,” he said. “You, and Tuck, and Maddie. I love all of you.
I want to be part of this. It’s killing me right now that you won’t
let me take care of you.”

I couldn’t answer because if I opened
my mouth to let out a sound, I might lose my resolve and beg him to
stay or run into his arms to cry on his shoulders or melt into a
puddle of tears on the floor. None of those things would help right
now, so I bit down on my tongue and scrubbed the glass in my hand
so hard I feared I might break it.