Above and Beyond (Twist of Fate 4)

“We’re super happy to have you home, Lucky,” he admitted in a tight voice. “Missed you like crazy. I hope you know we love you, no matter what.”

I nodded, unable to speak. I did know that, which was why I felt like even more of an ass for keeping secrets from them. But I couldn't do this late at night after being on the road all day. I turned and headed to the den, calling Bear to join me before closing us both in.

I dropped my duffel and pulled off my clothes, sliding between the sheets of the already made up pull-out bed at long last. The smell of my dads’ laundry detergent and the stripe of moonlight cutting across the foot of my bed reminded me I was home.

But it didn’t feel the same and I wasn’t sure why. I loved my family more than anything in the world, and the town of Haven had become a paradise of sorts over the years. I’d expected college to take me away for a few years, but the plan had always been to come back home. Whether it was helping my dads run the family business or settling into some “safe” career, I’d always accepted that Haven was where I belonged. But between the training these past few weeks and my relationship with Zach, something had started to change. I was doomed to fail on both fronts because SAR work was just too dangerous, and I wasn’t sure I could put my fathers through that. And the Zach thing…. well, I refused to even let myself imagine that things had changed when it came to my relationship with him. He’d been sweet and gentle and the sex was off the charts, but he’d never once mentioned pursuing something real.

I sighed and turned over on the bed so I could get more comfortable. I was greeted by a wet lick from Bear who was taking up a good chunk of the small bed.

“Not exactly the goodnight kiss I was hoping for, but I’ll take it, buddy,” I whispered to the dog. As I let my eyes drift shut, I thought about the home I’d left three years earlier to go find myself and wondered what I’d see when I looked in the mirror in the morning. Would it be yet another version of me I still didn’t recognize or would I finally get to see the real me?

Morning came way too soon. Sure enough, it was a baby’s cry that startled me awake, and I was the first one in to grab the troublemaker. The morning went by in a flash of diaper changes, feeding and bathing the twins, and putting off telling my fathers the truth about what I’d been up to the past month. Fortunately, Bennett was too busy dealing with lodge business and the babies to confront me about it, and Xander had gotten called away to deal with some kind of emergency in town. That would have made me beyond happy except for one glaring problem.

Zach hadn’t come home. He’d sent me a text before I’d managed to have a complete and total meltdown, but it had only said that he’d decided to spend the night on Jake and Oz’s couch and he’d see me tomorrow. It was nearing lunchtime and he still hadn’t shown up. There’d been no additional calls or texts to ease my mind, and it was all I could do to keep myself from driving up to Jake and Oz’s place to confront the man. I’d finally broken down and checked Zach’s room, or my room, rather, and his bag had still been there. I hadn’t gone so far as to search through it to see if he’d taken any of his toiletries or much-needed medicine with him, but at the rate I was going, I’d be doing that soon.

I decided to keep busy by taking the twins for a nature walk of sorts. The “walk” wasn’t more than me putting the twins in their stroller and following the path around the lake just behind the lodge, but I used the time to point out every interesting rock, tree, and flower we came across. The babies didn’t seem overly impressed because they fell asleep within minutes, leaving me once again to my thoughts.

Which wasn’t a good place to be because between checking my phone every five seconds for texts and flashing glances in the direction of the lodge’s parking lot in the hopes of spying a familiar dark blue truck, I hadn’t made it more than a few hundred feet during the hour that followed. I finally settled for sitting down at one of the many picnic benches surrounding the lake.

I was in the process of trying to come up with a super casual where-the-hell-are-you text to Zach when I heard someone let out a vicious curse.