My knees buckled.
The world melted away.
His arm clamped around my belly.
“Judge.” That was Bowie’s growl.
My hair flew when Judge pulled my crossbody over my head and my body jerked when he tossed it.
“Drive her car to my place,” he ordered, probably Rix.
“Gotcha.”
Yes, Rix.
“Judge.” Again, Bowie.
“I got her.” Judge.
He was pulling me to the Cherokee.
“Chloe, Coco, Chloe, God, that was…it wasn’t right. God, I’m so sorry. That so wasn’t cool.” Sasha, up close.
To me.
“You need to step away from her.” Judge, polite, but steely. “Now.” No longer polite, furious, impatient.
Demanding.
Reaching beyond me, he pulled open the passenger door to his Jeep and whistled to Zeke, who jumped out. Then he practically lifted me into the seat.
I tried to do the seatbelt, but my fingers felt numb, and it flew out of my grasp.
So Judge nabbed it, leaned in and did it for me.
“Darling.” Mom, agonized.
“I think she needs some time, please.” Judge, respectful.
“Come here, honey.” Bowie, to Mom.
A sob.
Sasha.
My door closed.
I watched my Evoque roll away, Rix behind the wheel, Zeke in my passenger seat, head out the window.
And then we were going, and I didn’t look to the side, where I knew Mom, Bowie and Sasha were standing.
We cleared Bowie’s drive, and I stared at the back of my car, finding it strange it was there, and I wasn’t.
“You with me?” Judge asked.
“I’m not a cheater,” I said through stiff lips, not tearing my gaze off my car. “I didn’t know he was married. I ended it the first moment I could when I found out.”
“Give me your hand, baby,” he ordered softly.
I kept my hands in my lap.
“Okay, we’ll be home soon,” he relented gently.
Home?
I didn’t ask.
Eventually, after an interminable, silent drive, I watched Rix pull my car into Judge’s drive and idle until Judge opened the garage door. He then pulled in.
Judge did too.
We all got out.
I stood between my vehicle and Judge’s, wondering why Rix had parked my car in Judge’s garage, also not knowing what to do.
Rix and Judge did the handoff of my bag, and I heard Judge murmur, “Take Zeke?” and Rix reply. “Yeah.” Then Rix again, “Turned her ringer off, man. Her phone’s blowin’ up.” And Judge, “Thanks.”
Then I had my chin caught between the side of an index finger and the pad of a thumb.
I looked up.
At Rix.
He said nothing, but the kind look in his eyes unraveled the only part left knitted together inside me.
My lips quivered.
He stroked my chin in an affectionate gesture, a gentle squeeze to the tip, as he moved his fingers away.
Then he was gone, my hand was in Judge’s, and he was pulling me inside.
I was right.
His fingers…
Tailored to fit my hand.
We went up some steps, and he dumped my bag on a counter in the kitchen and then let me go and was all about turning on lights against the waning sun of a winter afternoon.
Distractedly, being fully in it, I noticed his space was far more upscale than I expected it to be. It was also far roomier than the outside indicated.
A trick of architecture. A façade for safety’s sake.
Outside it was Nothing to See Here.
Inside, it was a mountain home fit for the vehemently touted heir to the dual thrones of the Texas and New York Oakleys.
Judge was suddenly standing right in front of me.
I tipped my head back to look at him.
“Do you want a drink?” he offered.
“I researched you.”
He made no noise and showed no reaction.
“You played tennis with my father.”
“Yeah, Dad called yesterday. Guess they talked. He told me. I was too young to remember.”
“I researched you,” I repeated like he didn’t speak.
“Chloe, baby, you’re kinda freaking me out,” he said softly.
“He left me,” I whispered.
“That guy who cheat—?”
“He left me all alone. All alone to take care of them. All by myself.”
“Who, honey?”
“Uncle Corey,” I croaked.
And that was when I totally lost it.
I had no idea how I got from where I was standing with Judge to being tangled in him lying side by side on one of his leather couches, my face shoved in his throat, sobbing.
But when I finally surfaced enough from the emotion that had dragged me under to be aware of anything but it, that was where I was.
That said, my surfacing wasn’t about rescue. It was about gasping for air, because the emotion still had hold of me, trying to tug me back down.
“Mom and Dad were golden. Shining. Ethereal,” I blubbered against the skin of his throat.
“Yeah,” he said quietly.
“I lived my life knowing that was mine. Mine because I basked in their glow. Mine because one day, I knew I’d have that same thing.”
Hazily, I felt Judge’s body tighten.
But I needed to say the words, let them out, so that hold would loosen. That hold that had been constricting its death grip, inch by inch, day by day, from the minute Uncle Corey took his own life.