“I just might,” Logan tossed out as he fought laughter, his green eyes dancing with mirth. Asshole ran stocks for his clients. Made a ton of them millionaires, same as he’d made himself. Pretty sure he was stacked with the smarts.
My baby brother had the same black hair as me and our middle brother, Jud. But he’d gotten our mother’s eyes, these crystal-cut emeralds that sparked and played. Always bright and shining. Got her soft spirit, too.
Same as Nathan had possessed.
Grief tried to squeeze its way through, guilt twisting through me like the gutting of a blade.
I wrestled it back so it could fester where the demons writhed within.
I watched Logan with my son. With all the shit we’d been through, how my brother had turned out halfway normal, I didn’t know. Going through his life like every day of his childhood hadn’t been jacked.
It was the reason he was the only person I trusted with Gage. Reason the poor sucker had to play babysitter to a five-year-old every fuckin’ night where he lived three doors down.
Jud?
He was like me, through and through, though bearded and twice as thick. He owned a bike shop in the warehouse out behind the bar, living out an old dream the best that he could.
Two of us had built a small empire out of the rubble.
“Well, we better get going then if we’re gonna be to school on time, Uncle,” Gage told him. “We can’t be late. School starts at eight o’clock, on the dots.”
Anxiety rolled my spine. Hated the idea of my kid being in someone else’s care.
But I’d promised myself he would have as close to normal of a life as I could give him, and keeping him home, hidden away like some recluse, wasn’t going to give him that.
Logan lifted him from under the arms and set him onto the ground. “Sorry, shorty, but I think I’m gonna have to pass on school today. I might get in trouble if I don’t show up at work.”
“Then you might have to go to time out?” Kid asked it like the punishment might be a war crime.
That was the way I wanted it, and I was going to spend my life making sure he never knew about the cruelties of this world.
One life.
One loyalty.
One reason.
“And I don’t want that, do I?” Logan answered, voice deep. Like he got it, too. “Now get over here and give me a big hug before you go off and have your best day ever.”
Four
Eden
Rays of afternoon light streaked from the sun-kissed sky, the heavens the bluest blue. It wrapped our mountain town in a warmth that chased away the cool breeze that blew through the towering pines and oaks.
Lifting my face to it for a quick second, I inhaled and drew the crisp air into my lungs. Appreciating the things that I had and refusing the grief that wanted to squeeze out through the wobble in my spirit.
Squeals of joy rang out, and I returned my attention to the playground where my kindergarten class ran and played. I tried to hide my smile when Tessa started to saunter my way as her class joined mine for their last recess of the day.
My best friend was all sly smiles and curiosity as she sidled up next to me where I stood on the quad close to the playground.
“Someone looks like death warmed over.” She’d angled in close to my ear and whispered like it was a horrible secret.
“Wow. I appreciate that.” I drew it out with as much sarcasm as I could muster.
Tessa laughed, her strawberry ponytail swishing around her shoulders. “Hey, remember when we promised we would always be honest with each other? What kind of best friend would I be if I broke that pact now?”
“Um…a nice, good, sweet one?”
With a scoff, she knocked her shoulder into mine. “Hardly. You know you love me because you can count on me to tell it straight. And believe me, I’m telling it straight.”
She gagged like she was repulsed, all through the smile she was trying to suppress.
I laughed through the exhaustion. “Fine. Considering that’s exactly what I feel like, I’m not surprised in the least to know it’s showing.”
Last night I’d known I would be a walking zombie today. A very irate, disgruntled, broke-ass zombie.
But thanks to the guy who still had me feeling rattled—one who’d left me tossing and turning all night, unable to escape that strange energy that had seeped into my bloodstream—I was just a smidgen less broke.
I had no idea what to make of my new boss, other than the plain truth that I needed to stay as far away from him as possible. Yeah, I was a fool because I already knew I’d go crawling back there again tonight.
“But you got the job? That’s good, right?” she pressed.
No doubt, she’d been dying to ask me the details the entire workday, but we hadn’t had a second to ourselves. The first day of school was always chaos.
Parents late. Children crying and confused, while others refused to listen to the rules and tested just how far they could push it. Lunches were forgotten and little hearts were broken because some of them had been left for the first time.
I’d poured all my love and energy into each of them, showing them that this was a safe place. A place where they were going to learn and grow and have a blast while doing it.
It was what mattered.
Instilling hope and knowledge into the children who were offered into my care.
It was my greatest joy, the greatest gift.
My heart tremored with the thought of losing it. For this place to just be…shut down. Gone.
Tessa and I taught at a private Christian academy in Redemption Hills. A school my father owned. We had a wait list a mile long since we had a reputation of offering the best private education in the area. No, the tuition wasn’t exactly cheap, but we barely ran a profit since my daddy poured most of it back into the community.
I was proud to share in it. I helped out in every area that I could, but none of us were exactly raking in the dough.
We’d always made it work.
Dread wrapped around my ribs and squeezed tight.
Stretched thin was one thing. On the verge of losing it all was another.
The real possibility of it was what had sent me crawling into Absolution last night, even though I had doubted my meager efforts would really make that much of a difference.
But God, that stack of cash sitting in my purse was whispering that maybe I could pull it off. Earn enough to get us by until my daddy figured out what he was going to do.
How to recoup.
How to restore.
How to rebuild both his finances and his spirit.
Tessa nudged me out of the reverie. “Um, hello, Eden? You actually worked, right? I’ve been dying for the details.”
“Yep. I started last night.” I fought the flutter that buzzed in my chest. Every thought filled with the memory of the sharp angles of his face. As if they’d somehow cut in and taken hold.
Impossible.
Maybe it was a cruel side effect of sleep deprivation, the fact I couldn’t take my mind off the man.
I didn’t believe in insta-love or even insta-infatuation or…I guessed I had to admit I’d even given up on the belief of attraction. In the possibility that I could feel it.
I’d come to believe my devastated heart no longer beat quite right.
Tessa’s brow rose around her ice-blue eyes, and the freckles that matched her hair danced when she curled her nose. “And it left you looking like this? That sounds…brutal.”