“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t ask.”
“It’s okay. The thing about time is, the more it passes, the further the past gets. Beth is still a part of my life and always will be, but she’s smaller and smaller.”
“That must be hard.”
“No, I think it’s a good thing. If I lived entirely in the past, I wouldn’t be able to move forward.” I put my hand on her knee and tilt my head. “I’d be stuck trying to get revenge instead of trying to keep my daughter safe and happy.”
“And that’s no way to live.”
“No, it’s not,” I agree.
“Listen, I’m sorry I asked about her. I think you’re going to be happy here though. At least for a little while.”
“Tab will be,” I agree. “She’ll love this house. So much space to run around. Lots of trouble to get in. I hope your mother doesn’t mind having a toddler around.”
Delia laughs. “She won’t even notice, but I think she’d like it. Believe it or not, she was pretty active in our lives growing up. We had nannies and stuff, but Mother was always there.”
“That’s what I want for my girl. I just wish she could know her mom.”
Delia smiles and squeezes my hand.
We sit there and watch Tab play in the grass. It’s a good moment, a quiet moment. I have to admit, I feel happy and content.
But I know it won’t last. Those men are out there, and I don’t plan on letting them keep lingering around. They pulled Delia into this, and now they’re going to have to pay for that.
They killed my wife, and I let that go for my daughter’s sake. I was ready to ride off and murder them all, or at least as many as I could until they got me or the law caught up. But Taylor made me see reason back then, and reminded me that I have more than just revenge to live for.
I have my daughter.
So I ran, I went into hiding, and I kept my girl safe.
Now they’re back, and I’m not running again. I’m not hiding anymore.
I’m going to rip them to fucking shreds.15DeliaI was afraid having Max around all the time would be a bad thing. I was afraid we’d get tired of each other.
But it’s not like that at all. I wake up every day smiling to myself, excited to see him, excited to see his little girl. We don’t get to spend every second together since he’s still working, but I do spend a lot of time with Tab. She’s a sweet girl, even if she is a little tornado.
A week passes and things are good. I don’t see much of my family, which isn’t a surprise. Father’s on a hunting trip in Canada and Mother’s lost in her own little world, making paintings and going to art galleries and such. The only way I know she’s still in the house is by tracking the number of paintings delivered every day. The more art that appears, the more likely it is that she’s around.
I’m sitting in the living room with my feet up on the couch and my nose buried in a book when Lora flops down on the chair across from me. She tilts her head at me and frowns. “Hey,” she says.
I look over and drop my book right on my face. She laughs as I grumble and set it aside. “That hurt,” I say.
“What’s up?”
“Well, I was reading, and then I dropped my book in my face. And you thought that was hilarious.”
She grins. “Oh, yeah. It really was.”
“And now you’re all caught up.”
Lora arches an eyebrow at me and kicks her feet up on an ottoman. “I feel like we haven’t talked much lately.”
“Weren’t you at a music festival all week?”
She pauses. “Well, yeah. There’s that.”
“I’ve just been lounging around the house.”
“Spending time with your new boyfriend.”
“He’s not my boyfriend,” I say, almost automatically.
“Huh, really? Because you look at him like you want to jump his bones all the time. And you spend hours with his daughter, who is super cute, by the way.”
“Isn’t she?” I sigh and sit up. “What do you want me to say? We’re not together.”
“But he’s living with you.”
“He’s living with you, too. And Mom and Dad.”
“True. But none of us are sleeping with him.”
“Lora.” I glare at her. “I’m not—”
“Don’t lie to me,” she says, her voice soft. “Okay? Just don’t.”
I frown and look away. “We’re not actively sleeping together. Just…”
“Sometimes.”
“Yeah. I guess. I don’t know, it’s confusing.”
“That’s the problem though, right? It shouldn’t be confusing. When it’s right, it’s not.”
“How do you know?” I shoot back. “I’ve never seen you date a guy in your life.”
She looks down at her shoes. “I guess not.”
“So you have no clue what it can be like.”
She fidgets in the chair. “Look, I’ve seen it, okay? With Jacob and Brent. And my friends from school.”