by T. Thomas
He gently squeezed my hand before turning down a long, dirt drive.
Max stayed faithfully at my side as Chase held my hand, leading me to a barn a few feet from us. I could hear a woman talking softly, and soon, she came into view.
She was stunning. Her curly, brown hair was up in a messy knot on the top of her head. She was wearing a pair of rubber boots and leggings, a black sweatshirt on over what looked to possibly be a yellow shirt. She turned to face us as we walked in, and I was a bit blown away by how much she looked like Chase.
“Chase!” she exclaimed, a broad smile pulling at her lips. She looked at me, and her eyes lit up. “Oh, my God, are you Meredith?” she asked, setting down the brush she’d been holding. “My poor brother won’t shut up about you,” she laughed.
I smiled, my nerves easing. She was definitely a lot more eccentric and hyper than Chase, but she was already so sweet and kind to me.
“Come on; Grayson is out this morning – something about a fence,” she explained, walking past us to lead us back out of the barn.
“Grayson is my best friend,” Chase explained to me. “Farrah,” he said, gesturing to his sister’s back, “does a lot of work with the animals for him.”
“He’s a grump,” Farrah said. “He’s always been grumpy and moody – never understood why,” she huffed.
Chase just smiled and shook his head. “Grayson is actually a nice guy,” Chase informed me. “My sister just wears on his last nerve.”
I laughed softly when Farrah scoffed, shooting her brother a scowl over her shoulder.
We followed her inside of the small house. Chase pulled out a chair for me at the dining room table before he sat down beside me. His sister made us all a cup of coffee before sitting down with us.
“So, do you carry any other books like the one Chase snagged for me?” Farrah asked me.
My cheeks tinted pink, but I nodded. “I carry a wide selection,” I informed her. “You should swing by sometime, grab some coffee, and peruse the books.”
She smiled. “Trust me, it’s on my endless list of things to do,” she laughed. “So, where are you from?”
I gripped Max’s fur in my hand, trying to steady myself. “I’m from a small town in Georgia,” I told her. “It was a little bit bigger than this one here.”
“Oh?” She hummed. “Why move from one small town to another?”
“Farrah,” Chase quietly scolded.
I shook my head at him. “No, it’s fine,” I said softly, reaching forward to gently squeeze his hand. He quickly laced our fingers together and lifted my hand to his lips, pressing a kiss to my knuckles. My cheeks heated all while my heart knocked hard against my breastbone and my belly clenched.
I looked back at his sister as he set our joined hands back on the table. “My mother passed,” I explained, leaving it at that.
Farrah’s face fell. “Oh, hun, I’m so sorry for prying,” she quickly apologized. “It’s one of my worst flaws. I don’t know when to stop asking questions.”
I gave her a small smile. “No worries,” I assured her. I suddenly needed air, though. “Um, do you mind if we look at the horses?” I asked her.
She brightened and quickly stood up from the table. “Of course!” she exclaimed. “I’ll get the most docile one – Ginger. She’s a sweetheart. Chase will lead you out to the field,” she said, gently squeezing her older brother’s shoulder as she passed him.
Chase gently gripped my chin and turned my head to face him once we were standing. “Are you okay?”
I nodded, tightening my hand in Max’s fur. “I just need some air,” I told him.
Without another word, he quickly led me outside. I drew in a deep breath, my anxiety and the painful memory of my mother easing.
“Ah, hell,” I heard a man groan as he came around the side of the house, spooking me, “what’s a man got to do to keep your ugly face from around here?”
Chase barked out a laugh. “Screw you, Grayson.”
I looked around Chase, and instantly, I tensed, my chest constricting, my lungs tightening.
He was the spitting image of a younger version of him – the monster of mine and my mother’s life.
The last thing I heard was Chase calling my name and catching me in his arms.
When I came to, I was laying on a very comfortable couch. I felt a little disoriented for a moment, but I knew Chase was sitting next to my hip, his hand holding mine, his worried gaze roving over my face.
“Chase?” I croaked.
He brushed his thumb over the back of my hand. “I’m here, sweetheart. You okay?”
I licked my dry lips and slowly sat up. Chase gripped my waist, holding me steady. I looked around, swallowing thickly when my eyes landed on the man Chase had called Grayson, the man his little sister worked for.
“Do you know him?” I blurted.
Grayson frowned at me. “Know who?” he asked me.
I swallowed thickly, my fingers trembling. Chase tightened his hold around my hand, soothing me for a moment. Max whined and pressed his head against my stomach. I dug the fingers of my free hand into his fur.
“Gerald Lawson,” I whispered. Grayson’s face went pale. “So, you do know him?”
“How do you know him?” Grayson demanded, looking like his entire world had been tilted on his axis.
I felt like throwing up. My chest was tightening. I squeezed my eyes shut, drawing in a deep breath, trying to steady myself before I had an anxiety attack, or worse, passed out again.
“Easy, sweetheart,” Chase crooned. I slowly opened my eyes, locking them on his soulful, blue eyes. “Breathe. It’s going to be okay.” He looked at his best friend. “Grayson, answer her question.”
“Gerald Lawson is my biological father,” Grayson bitterly responded.
Vomit rose up my throat with barely any warning. “I’m going to throw up,” I blurted.
Grayson quickly snatched up a trashcan before Chase or I could move and thrust it towards me. I gripped it and threw up into it as Chase held my hair back from my face. I dry-heaved a couple more times before it passed. Chase handed me a stick of gum, and I quickly shoved it into my mouth.
“Now, how do you know him?” Grayson repeated his earlier question.
“My mother and I are the reason he’s rotting in a prison cell right now,” I bitterly responded, my heart knocking crazily against my breastbone. I closed my eyes, drawing in a deep breath, tightening my hand on Max. He just pushed more against me in response. “Can we not talk about this?” I whispered. “I just really want to go home.”
Chase stood and helped me up from the couch. My legs were wobbly, and I had to grip his arm for support as Max pushed against the other side of my legs.
Grayson was frowning at me, sadness and regret in his eyes. “For what it’s worth, Meredith, I’m sorry he tainted your life, too.”
So am I, Grayson.
When I got home that evening, Chase made sure I made it upstairs safely before promising me he would help get the store closed up before coming back up.
I was exhausted and tired. My emotions were at an all-time high, and my anxiety levels were spiking horribly.
I curled up on the couch. Max managed to squish himself onto the couch with me and nestled against my abdomen with his head right beneath my chin. I ran my fingers through his fur.
Of all the places to have to face a reminder of that tragic night, I found it here in a small town, smaller than I grew up in.
How did this happen?
Why couldn’t I just escape it?
My cell phone rang on the table in front of me. With a sigh, I grabbed it, thinking it might be Chase needing help with something downstairs. Instead, the police department from my hometown was calling me.
My already bad day instantly got worse, and a horrible feeling settled in the pit of my stomach.
“Hello?” I quietly asked.
“Is this Miss Meredith Shaw?” a woman asked on the other end of the line, her
voice kind.
“This is. How can I help you?”
I tightened my fingers in Max’s further, my chest already tightening. “Miss Shaw, I’m calling to inform you that Gerald Lawson was released this morning on parole. The chief of police asked me to give you a call to ask if you’d like a restraining order put in place.”
I couldn’t answer. My vision was tunneling. I couldn’t breathe. The phone dropped from my hand. Max barked and pushed against me, but I couldn’t focus.
My head was spinning.
This wasn’t happening – couldn’t be happening.
Chase burst into the apartment. My lips trembled. Max barked again.
“Help me,” I cried.
“Hey, hey now,” Chase crooned as he gripped my upper arms, squatting in front of me. “Breathe, Meredith,” he ordered. “Just breathe. I’m here. No one can hurt you as long as I’m around,” he swore.
I closed my eyes and drew in a long, deep breath. I fisted my hands in Chase’s shirt, trying to calm my erratic breathing, trying to calm my mind. Max whined, pushing his head against my chest, his way of reminding me to breathe and suck air into my lungs.
“You’re safe,” Chase soothed.
I clung to those words in my mind with a vice-like grip.
Chase continued holding my upper arms, his eyes steady on mine as he waited for my breathing to regulate. Once I was mostly breathing normally again, he brushed his fingers over my cheek, his eyes intent on my face.
“You scared the hell out of me,” he said softly. I cast my eyes to my lap. He gripped my chin, forcing my gaze back on his. “I heard Max bark, and I knew something was wrong.” I gave him a weak smile. “You’re pale as a sheet, Meredith. What happened, sweetheart?”
“He got released,” I whispered. My hands shook, so I pressed them between my thighs as I drew in a deep breath, trying to keep myself calm. “The sheriff from my hometown called me to inform me.”
Chase clenched his jaw, anger swirling in his gaze. “Sweetheart, I need you to tell me what he did to you,” he coaxed. “I could pull records, but I don’t want to do that.” Oh, this man. “I want you to tell me.”
Tears burned in my eyes. “It’s a crappy story,” I croaked.
Chase sat on the old, worn coffee table in front of me, his hands smoothing down my arms, but he never released them from his grip. His firm hold on my upper arms helped keep me grounded.
Max pushed against my chin, sensing my anxiety.
The night I was about to tell Chase about was the entire reason I had a support animal.
“He was our next-door neighbor,” I said softly, my eyes on my lap, unable to look at Chase. His grip stayed firm on my arms, somehow holding me together. “He was always kind of strange – the way he kept flirting with my mother—” I shook my head, my skin crawling at the memories. “It wasn’t normal flirting. It was so . . . creepy, and he freaked my mother out every single time. She always urged me to keep my head down and not look at him.”
Chase gently squeezed my arms when I paused for a good moment, not speaking. “I’m here, Meredith,” he said softly. “I’m here, and I promise, you’re not alone.”
Swallowing thickly, I continued. “I was fifteen when it happened. My mother was yelling outside, telling him to leave her alone, to get his hands off of her.” A shudder wracked my frame. “I went to go help her.” I shook my head. “I should have just called the police,” I whispered.
Max whined, pushing his body further against me. I dug my fingers into his soft fur. “He took advantage of the door being open and shoved my mom inside, coming in with her. There was this crazy gleam in his eyes – I’ll never forget it.” I drew in a shuddering breath. “He knocked me unconscious when I tried pushing him away from my mom, yelling at him to get out of our house.”
My lips trembled, tears clogging my throat. I tried to swallow them down.
“When I came to, he was – he was—” I couldn’t get it out. Chase rubbed my arms. “I shoved him off of her.” My entire body was trembling. “He was furious, and he decided to – to—” I stopped.
“I guess our neighbors next door heard the commotion. When cops came pouring into the house, I was naked, barely coherent. Mom was still knocked out on the floor.”
“Easy,” Chase soothed, coming to sit beside me on the couch. He pulled me onto his lap, wrapping his strong, tatted arms around me. “I’ve got you,” he promised.
Tears streamed down my face. I wrapped my arms tight around his midsection, holding him to me as shudders wracked my frame, sobs tearing themselves from my throat. Max draped his head over my legs.
Chase didn’t leave at all that night. When my tears finally began to slow and my eyelids began to droop, he simply picked me up, cradling me to his chest. He maneuvered his way around my apartment, carrying me to my bedroom.
I didn’t even have to ask him to stay.
He simply kicked off his shoes and crawled into bed behind me, wrapping me up tight in his arms. Max pressed himself to the front of my body, the two of them sandwiching me between them.
Not a word was needed. I understood what Chase was telling me without me even having to ask.
He was here. He wasn’t going anywhere.
I wasn’t alone – not anymore and not ever again.
I jerked awake to the bed moving, my heart thumping rapidly in my chest. Chase soothed his hand over my side, pressing a kiss to my temple until I relaxed again. “Easy. I have to go home and change for work,” he said softly.
I sat up and rubbed my eyes before looking up at him. He was still standing next to my bed, and despite how tired I knew he must have been, he still seemed bright-eyed and alert.
Me? I felt like I’d been run through a cheese grinder or something. I was exhausted. My entire body ached. And my temples were pulsing with the beginnings of a migraine.
“I need to get up as well,” I mumbled, yawning.
Chase frowned at me. “You need more sleep, sweetheart.”
I shook my head and slid from the bed. “I don’t want to sleep. The flashbacks—”
Understanding settled in his gentle, blue eyes. He grabbed the back of my neck and pressed a kiss to my forehead. “Okay,” he said softly. “I’m only a phone call away if you need me, you hear? I’ll be by for coffee in a little bit.”
I smiled up at him, glad that his routine wasn’t changing despite the mess going on around us. He aimed a crooked grin down at me in return. “Have a good day, yeah?”
I nodded. “I’ll do my best,” I assured him.
He pressed another kiss to my forehead before he yanked his shoes on and left my apartment. I went about my daily routine – start the coffee pot, take a shower, make a cup of coffee, get dressed, drink said coffee with my multivitamin, dry my hair, and brush my teeth. My routine never changed; it was always the same.
It gave me structure.
The only thing that was different was how early I was getting up.
Max followed me downstairs, and since I was already up and awake way before it was time to open my store, I went about rearranging shelves and putting new stock up. I also changed my window displays and set up my new center of the store display with sweet romance indie author books, making sure I had the author Taylor Jade up front and center since she seemed to have been popular with Emily. I was hoping I could make her popular with some of the other girls and women, too.
By the time I did all of that, it was eight o’clock, and it was time to open the store. It was nice and cool outside, so taking advantage of the temperature, I propped the door open, allowing the fresh, Autumn air to come inside and mix with the smell of books and coffee.
It was the perfect mixture, actually.
A bit more cheerful now with Fall in the air, I set about making myself a cup of coffee. I called out a hello to Mrs. Eldana as she walked inside. She instantly set about knitting her blanket. She’d come so far with it, and it was beginning to look absolutely gorgeous.
I
brought her a cup of hot chocolate just like I did every morning. She smiled warmly up at me and gently squeezed my hand in thanks before going back to what she was doing.
I was wiping down one of the coffee machines when Chase strolled in. He was in his uniform, the shirt pulled taut over his muscular body. His sleeves were rolled down today, most likely against the cooler weather. He flashed me a warm smile as I walked towards him, warming my insides. He cupped my face in his hands and pressed a soft kiss to my lips.