by Vanessa Vale
“Chief, we have a 10-16 in progress.” The voice through the radio was the daytime station manager. She’d been at the job for decades, knew the town inside and out. Knew the people in it in more detail than any gossiping busybody.
With one hand on the steering wheel, I ran the other over my face again.
“There a reason you’re telling me specifically about a domestic dispute, Noreen?” She could’ve sent any of the deputies on duty. Unless Bunky was still at the station filling out the police report for the fire, then Graham was most likely free.
“Affirmative, Chief. O’Banyons Auto Shop. Someone was walking by and heard shouting. Figured you might want to check it out.”
The location perked me up better than any cup of coffee. She knew my history with Sarah. Knew she’d bought me at the auction. I doubted Noreen had any idea I’d been handcuffed to my bed, but I wouldn’t be surprised if she did.
I appreciated her letting me know. I had a feeling Sarah had finally had that chat with her daddy. And that she’d had enough. If someone called it in, it had to be pretty heated. Sarah had stood up to me the other night, but I wasn’t sure how she’d do with Bill. Which meant it was finally time for me to step in.
“Copy that. On my way.”
11
SARAH
* * *
“Why are you so angry about me going to the accident?” I asked my dad, pretty upset myself. “You didn’t answer Graham’s call and neither did Roy.”
I’d finally gotten the totaled car off-loaded to the lot behind the shop, and I needed an IV of coffee. When Dad came in, I’d been in the service bay washing my hands at the industrial sink. He went over to the wall and slapped the button that opened one of the garage doors. It rose with a loud whir. The breeze came in and made my hair blow into my face. He was stalling.
“Where were you?” I asked. “And is Roy even alive?” After seeing the dead body earlier, I shouldn’t have asked the question, but really, where was the guy?
I’d sat in the cab until about six, dozing on and off, before I could winch the car out of the ditch. The sun had just peeked over the horizon. The coroner had come and gone by then, along with the dead body. I wasn’t going to forget that sight for a long time. From what Huck had said, it was assumed the driver had been the one to start the fire at the preschool. No one had been hurt, but the building was pretty damaged. A witness had seen him flee in the car that was flipped. By the scent of liquor wafting from the interior, he’d had too much to drink and got himself killed.
“I’m angry because I don’t want you going on calls,” he snapped. “How many times do I have to tell you the same thing?”
I was exhausted. Riled. Confused. Ever since I’d found out about Huck and Claire Manning, I’d been completely out of whack. My average, boring life had somehow changed. I saw things I hadn’t noticed before.
One became very obvious. He was stringing me along. “You’re never going to give me the shop, are you?” I asked, setting my damp hands on my hips.
It had been my assumption that I’d take over from him. He’d taught me the foundation for all I knew about fixing a car; then continued those skills in Bozeman while in college. I knew engines. I did the books. The ordering. I could handle the tow truck. I could do it all probably better than my dad. Hell, he couldn’t do it without me.
“Why can’t you be like your sister?” he shouted, glaring.
I crossed my arms over my chest, leaned against the sink. “You want me to marry an asshole who isn’t faithful?”
“This life isn’t for you.” He waved his arm through the air, indicating the shop where three cars sat waiting to be worked on.
“Why not? Because I should marry a guy with money? Who plays golf and gets me a fancy car?”
“Yes!”
“You think Lynn is happy?”
“Of course she’s happy,” he snapped back. His dark eyes sparked with anger, completely irrational in his thinking.
“Bunky can’t keep it in his pants, Dad,” I said. How did he not know that? “Why would you want a guy like that for me?”
The idea was insulting.
I thought of Huck. I’d assumed he’d dumped me and moved on to another woman within a month. That was the reason I’d never gone back to him. Never even approached him to ask what had happened. He’d had a baby. I’d thought he hadn’t been able to keep it in his pants like Bunky.
I’d thought about calling Huck so many times. Had typed his number in, then deleted it. But I wasn’t going to be unhappy like Lynn.
I had standards that obviously my dad didn’t even care about. I wanted a solid relationship. One built on trust. On love. I’d thought I had that with Huck. But then everything I believed had been wrong.
“I’m right, aren’t I?” I tucked my hair back behind my ear again. Even though it was pulled back in a sloppy ponytail, long strands had come free, and the summer breeze swirled through the open bay. Fresh air cut the tang of oil and metal. “You’re not going to give me the shop.”
He pointed to himself in his Harley T-shirt and old jeans. There was a stain on the denim and a slight tear at the hem of the shirt. “Do I look like I’m old enough to retire?”
“You’re old enough to know that Roy is a deadbeat and that your own daughter does his job and all the bookkeeping. And yours sometimes too.”
He ignored my words. “You don’t know what you want.”
I stared at him, wide-eyed. “I’m twenty-six years old! You don’t get to decide for me.”
“Like you make the best choices. You were going down the wrong path. You’re doing it again. Friday night proves it.”
I stilled. My heart kicked up a notch. “The auction. You mean Huck Manning.”
“Yes.”
“You didn’t answer my question.”
“About what? Manning? I told you he wasn’t good enough for you.”
“I mean about taking over O’Banyons.”
He took a step closer and used his height to his advantage. I never thought he’d hurt me physically, but he was playing games with me. Trying to intimidate me and keep me cowered. Like I had been ever since I’d returned from school.
He stared me down, and I refused to be the first who looked away. “No. I won’t have you taking it over.”
Even though I’d figured the truth, the words hurt. The finality of it. The proof of what I’d been suspecting. I took a deep breath, tried to will back the tears. The last thing I wanted was for him to see how much he’d hurt me. “So you were going to, what, just use me?”
He frowned. He actually looked confused. “Use you? You pay yourself, don’t you?”
I looked at my father, the man I’d wanted to emulate ever since I was little.
“Why’d you show me how to fix cars if you never wanted me to do it?” Yeah, the tears were winning, and they clogged my throat.
He shrugged. “It was cheaper than a babysitter. I had work to do, and I couldn’t just leave you at home.”
Wow. Holy fuck.
I tossed the paper towel in the barrel trash can, then threw up my hands. “I’m out. Find yourself a new Girl Friday.”
“What the fuck’s a Girl Friday?” he shouted. “Pumpkin, I don’t know what’s gotten into you.”
It wasn’t Huck Manning, that was for sure. My pussy clenched with a need for him. I remembered how he’d held me earlier in the darkness. How he’d kissed me in the bar’s parking lot. How he’d made me come all over his face.
He’d saved a baby from a bad situation. He gave and gave while people like my dad thought shit about him.
Maybe I had too.
“I’ll make it clearer for you. I quit.”
I cut down the space between one of the cars and the wall. My dad stepped into my path, blocking my exit. I looked up at him, tipped my chin, defiant.
“What are you going to do?” he asked as if I was nothing without him. Like I would be out on the street if I didn’t stick around.
He laughed, set his hands on his hips. “Right.”
Disbelief laced that one word. He had zero faith. He didn’t believe in me or anything I did.
“A stupid decision just like you buying Manning the other night. What is it, that time of the month?”
God, my father was an asshole! What had Huck told me? That my father had some explaining to do?
The only story I knew was that Huck hadn’t wanted me and then came home with a baby. A baby I’d thought he’d made after tossing me aside.
But that wasn’t true. I knew now that Huck hadn’t broken up with me and moved on. If I took Claire out of the picture, it was much clearer.
What was the truth? We’d been in love, made plans. I’d given him my virginity, which he’d said made me his. Then he’d come to the house. Broke up with me. My dad had been there. Observing it all.
“What did you do?” I asked. “All those years ago. With Huck Manning.”
The corner of his mouth tipped up. “He wasn’t good enough for you.”
“Yeah, you’ve always said that.”
“I told him he was holding you back.”
I frowned. “When?”
He gave a small shrug as if it didn’t mean anything to him. “Before you went to school.”
“Why would you do that?”
“You were headed to college. He could offer you nothing.”
He’d given me his love. His protection. His promises that he’d keep me safe. Keep me happy.
“He’s not nothing, Dad. He’s the chief of police! I’d say he’s made a man of himself.”
“He had a baby with another woman right after he dumped you.”
I knew the truth of that now. He hadn’t. Huck was right, people in this town were going to judge no matter what had actually happened, and I had no intention of setting my dad straight.
“I’m not talking about then. I’m talking before I left for school. He came and said he was breaking up with me because of school. Because he was bad for me. Why would he all of a sudden say that?”
“Because I told him the truth.”
My dad had talked to Huck. “What did you say?” My throat ached, trying to ask the question.
Dad shrugged. “That he needed to leave you alone or I’d step in.”
“That wasn’t stepping in?” I shouted. I pushed at his chest, and he stepped back, more out of surprise than because of my strength. “You drove him away!”
“I did it for you.”
“I know Huck. We were in love. He would have fought for me. He’d have taken me away.”
He didn’t say anything, but he wasn’t bending in his thoughts toward Huck Manning.
“You threatened him.” He was stone-faced. “Oh my God. What did you do?”
“I told him I wasn’t going to put you through college. That I’d take all the money away.”
I’d had a scholarship, but it had been a partial one. My dad had told me he’d pay for the rest of tuition and room and board, and I’d been thankful for that. Maybe that was why I’d stuck around all these years helping him, as if I owed him or felt indebted.
But it had all been a lie.
“I did it for you, pumpkin.”
“You didn’t do it for me. You did it because you hate Huck Manning. I have no idea what he did or why, but he’s not what you think. He never was.” Tears slid down my cheeks.
I turned away, felt sick. Six years. Six years and I never knew the truth. “All this time, I thought he hated me. That I wasn’t special enough. Good enough. That what we’d shared had been a lie.”
That he’d taken my virginity as a feat to achieve instead of something special. A beginning for us.
I thought of the baby we’d made that night. When I’d learned I was pregnant, I was already at school. Huck had been gone. The baby was a culmination of our love, but it hadn’t been real. For a bit I’d hated the baby I’d carried because it was a reminder of the lie of our relationship.
When I’d lost it… I’d thought it was meant to be. I hadn’t been worthy of being a mother. Since our relationship was dead, so was any proof of it.
He’d walked away for me.
“So? Like I said, not even a year later he came back with another woman’s baby. Proof I was right.”
The only thing it proved was how wrong my dad had been. Huck was a good man. He’d walked away from me because, while threatened, he’d done what was best for me. Same went with Claire. He hadn’t cared what people thought of him, only of doing the right thing.
And everyone thought he’d been a fuckup. He’d thought that of himself.
God, was he so wrong.
“He might not have even left if you hadn’t interfered.” I was done remaining calm. I was shouting now, wiping at my eyes. I could barely see him through the tears.
“Then you’d have learned what kind of man he was the hard way.”
“Like I am now with you.”
I was done here. Done with him. Dad had interfered in my relationship with Huck. Broke us up. Destroyed my heart. Let me believe lies.
“Sarah!” he shouted. “You leave and you’re done here. You’re out. You won’t make it in this town as a mechanic. I’ll see to it.”
I looked back at him. This was what he’d done with Huck six years ago. But the threat he’d made to Huck had been directed at me. Huck had walked because of the consequences. But now, me?
How had I never seen this side of my dad? I took in his threat. He wanted me to be scared, to tuck my shoulders under and cower. Remember my place. Cede to him. Again.
Now I saw the man for what he was. A loser. He was barely doing his job, slacking because he knew his own daughter would take care of any issues for him. But when things didn’t go just his way, he got pissed. Tossed out ridiculous threats.
He didn’t give a shit about me. Or if he did, he had a horrible way of showing it.
He was the one who was scared. The one who was losing everything, because if I walked, he’d actually have to do some work.
His words had no weight.
I had no idea what I was going to do, but I wasn’t afraid any longer. I wasn’t going to hold myself back from what I wanted. I knew what it was. Who it was.
I didn’t say a word, only turned around to leave. I froze in my tracks when I saw Huck. He stood just outside the open garage door, hands on hips. He was in his police uniform, just as I’d seen him on the call before dawn. His eyes were narrowed, his jaw clenched. He wasn’t looking at me, but past me to my dad.
My heart lurched and… God. He was here. For me. He seemed bigger. Broader. More intense. Just… more.
He’d walked away all those years ago to make me happy. Now he was here when I needed him most.
I had no idea how much he’d heard, but based on the look on his face, enough.
We both knew the truth of what had happened. How my dad had ripped us apart. How he was willing to do anything to… keep tabs on me? Control me? Steer my life in the direction he wanted it to go?
Huck didn’t say anything, just held out his hand. It was right then that I had a choice. I could go to Huck. Take back what we’d lost all those years ago. To take him for the man he was now. Go blindly into a thing with Huck based on the man I’d known all those years ago. Not the lies. The whispers. Not even my assumptions, but based on the fact that he’d loved me once. Proved it. Walked away to do so.
I went to him. Put my hand in his, and walked out of the shop.
12
HUCK
* * *
I helped her into my police SUV, taking care with her as if she were breakable, even though I was in a rush to get the fuck out of here. Reaching across, I buckled her seat belt. She took my hand, looked up at me, her eyes watery and desperate. “Don’t leave.”
I gritted my teeth for a second, willing back the desire to go and shoot Bill like a rabid dog. �
��No, baby girl. No more leaving.”
When she released me, I went around and climbed into the driver’s seat. I gave the dark garage bay a long look. I didn’t see Bill anywhere, but that was fine with me. I didn’t want to see the fucker’s face again.
He’d made Sarah cry. Said cruel shit. What kind of father gave an ultimatum? That he’d ensure she couldn’t get a job in a career she loved solely out of spite? Out of… jealousy? He might set shit in motion, but there was no fucking way he was taking Sarah down. I might have cowered once at his threats. No longer.
Tears slid down her cheeks, but she remained quiet looking out the side window as I cut across town. She had on the same clothes from earlier, jeans and a T-shirt, but she’d ditched the sweatshirt.
I got on the radio with Noreen. “I’m 10-7,” I said to her, telling her I was off duty.
“That’s what I figured, Chief. We’ve got you covered, and the other guys will tackle any leftover paperwork.”
“Copy that. Thanks.”
I took a right at the central intersection on Main.
“It slipped out of gear,” she murmured.
I glanced at her, confused. “Huh?”
“Your transmission’s going.”
I chuckled and slowly shook my head. I knew what she was talking about, the lag, but had never considered what it was. “I can change my truck’s oil. Replace a fan belt. That’s as far as I can go when it comes to car repairs. As for police vehicles, Noreen takes care of handling any fixes.”
With O’Banyons. No fucking longer. I’d learn how to replace a transmission myself before I gave Bill any more business.
Five minutes later we pulled up in front of Sarah’s place. I wanted to take her to the ranch and handcuff her to my bed, but I’d dropped Kelsey off only a little while ago. Between Alice, Claire, and Kelsey in the main house, there would be no privacy. The first time I was with Sarah after six years, we’d be alone, that was for fucking sure. And her place was in town and a hell of a lot closer.