I wanted to beg her to return. To return the money she’d taken or find a way to help us repay it. Tell her we’d forgive her either way. Tell her she could go back and make it right.
“Miss Murphy! Miss Murphy!” Gage came bounding in through the archway, jarring me from the daze. “What are we gonna have for dinner? I’m so the hungriest, and you’re the best cook ever, even better than Uncle Logan, but don’t tell him that. It’s a secret. Can I help?”
Affection burst. The emotion I was trying to contain shifting and reshaping, taking new form.
“You’re hungry, huh? What do you think we should make?”
“Pigs in a blanket?” he asked way too excited.
A giggle slipped free, and I ran my hand over the top of his head. “We had that last night. How about we make something different? How about some chicken and broccoli?”
“Broccoli. Blech.” He curled his nose.
“It’s good for you.”
“I already take the vitamins. I’m as healthy as can be.” He showed off his tiny biceps.
I laughed. Couldn’t help it. He was a whip. A sweet little whip that had me completely wrapped around his finger.
The week that I’d been staying there had passed in a blur of worry and bliss.
I’d leave here each morning in the car Trent had rented for me, and he’d follow me to the school. I’d had to make an excuse to Tessa that my car had broken down and I’d gotten a rental upgrade.
“Lucky bitch,” she’d said.
She had no idea.
Trent would drop Gage off at the curb, the man watching me from afar, all that heat and intensity touching me from across the space.
He’d tried to convince me to take off the week like he’d done with Absolution, but I’d convinced him I needed to work. That I couldn’t leave my father in the lurch like that.
Besides, I still had a debt I needed to pay.
So, he’d post himself at the coffee shop across the street. Watching. Waiting. Continually on guard.
Then he’d pick Gage up and follow me home.
Home.
To this house that had started to feel that way.
Where we ate together. Laughed together. Worried together.
Loved together.
I gazed down at Gage.
That’s what this was, wasn’t it? This joyful fear that burned so bright?
The way I sparked and shivered every time Trent touched me. The way my heart felt lighter every time he took me into the safety of his arms. The way my spirit shouted each time I wrapped mine around his son.
It was exactly what I did right then.
I hoisted Gage into my arms, hugging him as I said, “Let’s make a deal…you eat some broccoli, and I’ll make corn on the cob, too.”
His sweet eyes doubled in size. Pure excitement.
“Deal!” Then his voice went gravely serious. “But we gotta shake on it because I don’t want you to go trickin’ me the way my uncles like to do.”
“Smart boy,” I teased.
“That’s why I got all the As, Miss Murphy.” He said it so matter of fact, and I was laughing again, emotion twining through the sound. I squeezed him tight. If I could, I’d just hold him like that forever.
Reluctantly, I set him on the island and stuck out my hand. “This is a binding deal, Gage Michael Lawson. Once I shake on it, I can’t take it back.”
“Like a promise?” he asked, words twisting up with resolute sincerity. Sprinkled with all that sweet innocence that he exuded. “Because promises are really important. You don’t go breakin’ those. No way, not ever.”
My chest ached. Brimming. So close to being full. “Like a promise, Gage, and I promise, if I make one of those to you, I won’t break it.”
He slammed his hand into mine, shaking it with all his might. “Then it’s a deal. And I promise I love you so much. All the way to the highest mountain in the world.”
He stretched his arms as high as he could over his head.
I felt impaled by his words.
Stricken.
Wrecked.
Whole.
And for the first time, I said it aloud. I whispered, “I love you, Gage. So very much. I promise you that.”
And I wanted to make a thousand promises right then. That I would love him forever, which was true. But more than that, I wanted to promise that I would stay. That I would never leave him. That I’d be his mommy if he wanted me to.
A fool.
A fool.
Because I could hear the mutterings from the other room. The hushed voices where Trent and his brothers talked below their breaths.
I had no idea how to break through the barriers Trent had resurrected between us this last week.
He treated me like a queen. Like his love. Like his life. Like he would throw himself in front of a train, sacrifice himself, if it meant keeping me safe.
But he was also keeping me in the dark. His fears and demons a writhing, living obstruction that separated us.