Total pages in book: 128
Estimated words: 121210 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 606(@200wpm)___ 485(@250wpm)___ 404(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 121210 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 606(@200wpm)___ 485(@250wpm)___ 404(@300wpm)
Norah and Breezy are ahead of me on a jog, but I hang back to fall in beside Josie. Her body is tense, just like mine, and the stress permeating the air might as well be a warning on the weather station about dense fog.
“I’m worried,” Josie whispers. They’re the first words she’s spoken to me without prompting in years. I place a gentle hand on the small of her back for a brief moment—seconds, at most—but old feelings of being her protector flow through me like hot lava.
To everyone else, Josie’s a fireball, a go-getter, and a confident, secure woman who can handle her shit. But behind closed doors, she’s soft and vulnerable and affectionate.
Her giving me a touch of that hidden side now is a gift I don’t take for granted.
“It’s going to be okay,” I assure her confidently. Whatever it takes to make it that way, I’ll do it.
“You promise?”
“I promise.”
I love her. I’ll never stop.
I grab the door and keep it open for all three women to walk inside the station, Breezy leading the charge toward the viper den that’s brought Bennett down here in the first place.
Pete, Bennett, Josie’s cunt of a mother Eleanor Ellis, and Norah’s piece-of-shit ex are all squared up in the middle of the pit, right next to Deputy Rice’s desk, and Bennett’s face is a mask of feelings I haven’t seen on him in a long time. It’s not anger; it’s rage.
And I can’t fucking blame him.
“What the hell is going on here?” Breezy shouts, her voice a harsh demand and her face a steel-toed boot that’s ready to kick ass.
“Thomas…Mom?” Norah cries as soon as she sees Eleanor Ellis and her asshole ex. “This is your doing?”
I immediately walk over to Ben’s side, positioning myself to get involved physically if I need to. “You okay, man?”
He nods, his jaw grinding. “Just want to get home.”
His words stab like a knife, knowing what he’s missing—precious moments with his little girl that can’t be replaced or made up for. I clap a hand to his shoulder. “I know.”
“You’ve truly lost your mind, Eleanor,” Josie spits unchecked. “Siding with an abuser?”
Her mother scoffs, her face a pinched-up expression that reeks of her usual self-entitled demeanor. “Thomas is hardly an abuser, Josie. Be serious.”
“I am serious,” Josie snaps back. “He put his hands on Norah and left a mark. Nearly dragged her out of my shop and would have if Bennett here hadn’t stopped him. He’s a piece of shit, and everyone here knows it.”
“Folks, folks,” Pete tries to interject, but the train has already left the station.
“He’s a lot more than that,” Norah cuts in, pulling a manila envelope from under her arm. Her voice is shaky and nervous, and her eyes keep flitting over to Ben, whose body is strung like a cocked bow. I move just barely in front of him, readying myself even more. “I have evidence here of blackmail and coercion and a pretty good feeling that there have been multiple girls the two of you have forced into abortions and other things.”
“Where the hell did you get that?” Norah’s hoity-toity ex asks on a shout, his voice a slithering snake of disdain.
Norah shakes her head. “It doesn’t matter where I got it. What matters is that I have it. And I’m going to pursue it to the fullest extent of the law, even if that means a long, drawn-out trial against you.”
Josie wraps an arm around Norah’s shoulders in both comfort and pride. As it turns out, both Ellis sisters have one hell of a backbone.
“What the hell is she doing here?” Breezy snaps, pulling my attention away from Josie and Norah and over to Pete’s office door. Recognition is immediate, and the hair stands up on the back of my neck.
Jessica fucking Folger. This fucking bitch. A goon in a sloppy suit trails behind her, but I don’t pay him much mind.
“I’m here for my daughter,” Jessica says, making the air leave my lungs in a rush. Josie’s gasp sounds close to the same.
We were there in the beginning, with Bennett, as he navigated his new role in fatherhood. We were there for the stories about Jessica turning her baby away. We were there, and this bitch was nowhere to be found. The fucking audacity of her to come here and say that shit is mind-blowing.
“Don’t give me that bullshit, Jessica Folger,” Breezy spits, evidently feeling a lot like me. She points an accusing finger at the woman. “That girl is not your daughter. Your role was giving birth, and that was the extent of it.”
“Because he paid me to leave!” Jessica shouts.
“He paid you a generous sum of money, yes, but you didn’t need any convincing to leave, Jess. You and I both know you didn’t want anything to do with that baby.”