My dad was in a chair at her bedside. His hand was holding one of hers and he was bent over, speaking to her.
“I’ll always love you, my girl,” he said. “I’ll never move on. You may have wanted me to, just like you always wanted me to go to parties without you. But just like then, when I refused to go anywhere without you when you were alive, I refuse to move on with you gone. You can just sit there and wait for me to come to you, because you’re my girl. I’m your man. Even if it takes me twenty years to follow.”
Hopefully it would take him more than twenty years. Hopefully it’d take him upward to forty. Fifty would be even better.
My mom—and him—were only fifty-seven. They were three months apart, my mother having been the older one of the two.
It shouldn’t have happened this young. I should’ve never had to experience this.
This wasn’t right.
None of this was right.
“You ready to go, Daddy?” I asked.Chapter 9Snow in November happens because people prematurely decorate for Christmas.
-Castiel’s secret thoughts
Castiel
My stomach had been tied in knots for at least an hour.
When I’d woken up to her phone ringing, I’d been pissed.
I’d literally taken two hours to go to sleep. Knowing that she was there, under my roof, in my space? It had shaken me.
And not because I didn’t want her there, but because I did.
I’d never, not once, brought a woman home. I’d never wanted them here.
Consequently, for her to be here, and not be driving me absolutely insane with her presence? That was a pretty big deal.
So there I was, wearing my clothes from the night before because I was scared that I’d have to piss in the middle of the night when I never did, asleep, when I jolted awake at the loudest ringtone in the history of ringtones.
I’d jackknifed out of the bed, stalked to the door, and had it open and glaring at the woman responsible all in about ten seconds flat.
Granted, I was used to being woken up out of a dead sleep since I was on the police department and being one of four detectives meant that I was called if anything nefarious was underfoot. But literally I’d done everything in my power to go into my room last night, and there I was being woken up by her only to have to fall asleep all over again.
Except, her phone call had changed my life, and my entire outlook, on Turner Hooch.
After following her father home, and getting the extra set of keys that he had to Turner’s house as well as her truck, I’d had a decision to make.
Did I take her home and let her figure it out on her own? Or did I take her back to my place?
Because I was leaning toward taking her to my place.
I didn’t think she needed to be alone.
Her father, who looked steady and clear-headed enough now to be on his own, and for me to believe he wanted to be, was doing good enough that I thought it’d be okay.
Turner on the other hand? I didn’t think that she’d be okay if I didn’t keep her with me.
But then she got the first phone call, and I had my answer.
“Hello?” Turner said into the silent cab.
She’d turned the phone onto speaker, and her head was rested against the padded headrest while the phone sat on the center console. She sounded so exhausted and desolate.
“Honey? It’s your aunt.” The woman on the other end of the line let out a shaky breath. “Is…is it true?”
Turner shook her head, but said, “Yes.” As if she hadn’t wanted to say the words. Hadn’t wanted them to be true.
“What…what hospital? What happened?” she asked.
Turner swallowed hard. “They suspect that she passed away due to a pulmonary embolism. But, since we’re not doing an autopsy, the official cause of death will be heart attack.”
The woman on the other end of the line started to cry, and I reached out my hand to capture Turner’s.
She squeezed it so hard that her hand started to turn white.
“I’m sorry, Aunt Pidge,” Turner said softly. “Does everyone else know?”
She swallowed hard, and I heard the audible gulp.
“Your uncle went to Momma and Daddy’s to talk to them,” she said. “They know…everyone knows.”
Turner blew out a breath. “Good.”
“All right, honey. Well, I’ll talk to you tomorrow,” the woman, Aunt ‘Pidge’ said. “I’m so sorry, baby.”
“It’s okay,” Turner lied. “I’m going to make it.”
Nobody acknowledged the lie for what it was, but she hung up anyway.
“One down, fifty to go,” she said once the line once again went silent.
“Your brother will call soon,” I said. “It takes the Red Cross a while to get all their ducks in a row. I don’t know why, have never understood why they had to verify all the facts that were given before they went telling the people, but it is what it is. He’ll call as soon as they find him.”