“I’ve known her for many years!” Mom shouts, placing the knife on the countertop. “I became good friends with her mom when you left for basic training, and I know he was abusive to her.”
“Who?” I ask.
“Lily’s dad.” She worries her lip. “Before her mom… died, she asked me to look out for Lily, and I didn’t… I failed. I was scared after everything…” She leaves it hanging in the air, but the sadness in her eyes and the way the room drops in temperature tells me she’s right there. Back in her own hell where I was right there next to her.
Standing up, I don’t hesitate before stepping toward her and wrapping my arms around her. “I know, Mom. I know.”
I rock her sideways as she balls my black t-shirt in her fist, her breath catching in her throat. “I just don’t want to see another person go through what I did, not if I can help.” She pulls away a little, and tilts her head up, looking at me. “You get that, right?”
“Yeah, I get it.” I let my head hang back, groaning. “I just won’t insert myself into someone else’s business.” Mom frowns, but before she can say anything, I continue, “This isn’t my fight to get involved with.”
She pulls back, shaking her head as she murmurs something I can’t hear. It doesn’t matter what she says because it won’t make a difference. I have enough shit going on in my own head; I don’t need someone else’s too.
Stepping back, I scrub my hand down my face, rubbing my eyes. I know she sees it; the redness, the way my eyelids are drooping.
“Still can’t sleep?”
I don’t answer her as I head into the living room with a bottle of beer, throwing myself down on the sofa and staring at the wall. I’m not gonna sit and talk about the demons in my own head, the memories that only come back when my eyes close. And this shit with Mom going on about someone who she barely even knows isn’t helping matters.
A knock on the front door reverberates through the house, and after a beat, Mom shouts, “It’s open!”
I don’t look away from the wall as Lily walks inside. I can feel the air change as she gets closer, but I deny it even to myself. I see her standing at the edge of the sofa out of the corner of my eye, and when I look over at her fully, I start searching for bruises.
Shit, am I really entertaining this?
Hell no, I’m leaving well enough alone.
“Well sit down then, I ain’t gonna bite.”
Her eyes widen, her gaze clashing with mine. And reflected back at me is the same thing that’s always there when someone who doesn’t know me looks into my cold eyes. Terror, apprehension. But is that also a little spark of something else mixed in there too?
“I’m Lily,” she whispers, her soft voice fuckin’ floating through the air.
I already know who she is, but I stay silent as I continue to stare, watching her as she moves closer before tentatively sitting down on the other end of the sofa. She keeps her gaze connected to mine, not backing down. Girl has spunk, I think I like that. Shit, no. No, I don’t fuckin’ like that.
I grunt as she lifts her lips into a small smile before I look away and take a long pull of my beer.
“I’ll be in in a minute, Lily! I’m just making pasta!”
“Okay,” she replies.
I grit my teeth, a muscle in my jaw ticking. I don’t know if I can sit in the same goddamn room as her for the next couple of hours. I’m on edge—an edge I haven’t felt in a long-ass time.
I’m standing up before I know it and walking toward the stairs. Even though I only lived with Mom until I was eighteen and went to basic training, she still keeps my room just how it was back then.
I can feel Lily’s eyes on me, burning a path through my skin, so I halt when I get to the bottom step. I grip onto the railing, taking a deep breath before turning my head to face her. Her blond hair whips around as she looks away, but now I’m the one staring.
Her nose is straight, lips full and plump, her hair—fuck. Am I really standing here doing this?
Grunting, I take one final look before stomping up the stairs and slamming my door just like I used to when I was sixteen.
LUKE
“Luke?” I roll over, my neck aching with the movement. “Luke?” A hand lands on my shoulder before gently shaking.
My eyes spring open. “What—” My gaze bats around the room, frantic as I sit up. What the hell?
“You fell asleep last night,” Mom tells me, a smile on her face as she places her purse over her shoulder. “I need to get to the shop to open up.”
I grab my cell off the bedside table and check the time. “You woke me at four in the mornin’?” I raise a brow before settling back down, closing my eyes briefly.
“Well, I didn’t want you being late and I didn’t know if you set an alarm.”
“It’s set,” I mumble, already falling back asleep.
The door clicks shut as she walks out of my room and I’m out like a light, feeling like my alarm is waking me up only minutes later. I click snooze, rolling over.
I never click snooze; I love my sleep but after years in the Marines, my body has got used to the early mornings. But when I’m at Mom’s something happens and I revert back to the teenager I used to be where I’d have to set several alarms to get up in the morning.
The incessant sound goes off over and over again, and when I finally push up off the bed, I see it’s past nine.
“Fuck!”
I run out of my room and into the bathroom, brushing my teeth and jumping in the shower. I then pull on the same clothes I was wearing yesterday as I don’t have any spare clothes here that will fit. It’s not often I sleep at Mom’s but when I do it’s never intentional. Hence the tight muscle in my neck from the fuck old pillows.
Picking up my keys before heading out the door, I lock it behind me and click the fob to open up my SUV.
I’m about to pull the door open when something out the corner of my eye gains my attention. I frown at the hunched figure as she walks along the sidewalk on the other side, her blond hair shadowing her face from view.
She walks gingerly, careful not to jostle herself, and the way she holds her arm against her middle tells me she’s in pain.
She didn’t look like that last night.
I stand here, my muscles taut and ready to stalk over to her, but my brain stops me. I told Mom to stay out of it and yet my instinct is to protect her. Something about her is calling to me, and when she looks up, her dark-blue eyes capturing mine right away, I know I can’t not see if she’s okay.
That’s all I’ll do: see if she’s okay and then leave it alone.
I take a step toward her and she flinches, but I don’t let it bother me, I continue forward, stopping about ten feet away from her.
“Lily?” Her name leaves my lips forcefully, throaty and angry, but I don’t mean it to.
Her gaze flits over to Mom’s house and then behind her to the little alley that leads to a poppy field.
“I… yeah.” She tilts her head back, looking up at me.
Narrowing my eyes, I watch her, assessing the look buried deep inside her eyes. Pain; so much pain I can almost feel it vibrating off her.
“You okay?” Fuck, why did I ask that?
“Me?” She points at her chest, pulling her lips into a forced smile. “Yeah, sure. I’m just running late for school and—”
“You want a ride?” I blurt out. What the fuck am I doing?
Her gaze bats between me and my SUV, unsure. I’m about to tell her to forget it when she slowly nods her head, wrapping her arms around her middle and shuffling from foot to foot.
Nodding my head to the other side of the road, I hold my hand out, signaling she go first. She hesitates before I watch her chest rise and fall, her lips moving silently before she crosses the road.
I follow her to the passenger side, reaching around her to open the door, but halt my movements when she squeaks. I stay still, waiting for her to take a breath before gently telling her, “I’m jus
t gonna open the door for you.”
What is it about her that makes me want to not be so brash? I almost wish I wasn’t six foot three and built like a bodybuilder. I wish I was more like Evan in this moment. Not that he’s scrawny by any means, but he has a way of talking to people, making them feel at ease with a joke or his placating voice. Me? I’ve never been good at that. I grunt, mumble, say it as it is with “fuck” being every other word.
But when she turns her head slightly, my gaze zones in on the bruise forming on her face. How the fuck didn’t I notice that when she was looking at me before?
“What—” I cut myself off, knowing if I ask she won’t tell me—they never do. Something is going on with her, Mom was right. I have no doubt she’ll keep it locked up inside. I’ve seen it before, and I know what it takes to get victims of abuse to tell their story—to get help.
Shaking my head, I pull her door open, watching as she lifts up into the SUV, her breaths gasps as a muscle in her jaw tics.
Closing the door before heading to the other side, I jump in and back out of the driveway.
The silence is deafening. I love silence, but this one is one I want to fill with something—anything.
“I’m guessing you go to Halow High?”
“Yeah,” she answers, her soft voice making me relax in my seat.
My gaze flicks over to her several times as I’m driving before it clashes with hers when I pull up outside the front of the school.
I don’t know what she’s trying to say silently, but I can feel it screaming at me. I frown, my hand lifting off the steering wheel and moving slowly toward her.
What the hell is going on? It’s like she has some kind of spell over me, and I have no control over my own body.
This time she doesn’t flinch—this time when I get a hair's breadth away from her face, she closes her eyes, her chest expanding on a deep breath.
Something in the air crackles and everything fades away—the school I’m parked in front of, the fact I don’t know her very well if at all—but I feel like I do know her. Something pulls her to me, an invisible thread.
My palm touches her cheek, my thumb rubbing softly over the bruise. I hear her suck in a breath at the contact, my own heart pumping so fast in my chest I’m sure it’s going to escape with the force.
I should want to ask her what’s going on; I should tell her that if she explains everything to me, I can help. But I don’t. I can’t go there again—not with her, not with anyone.
Her eyelids open, the dark blue becoming glassy with tears as her hand comes up and wraps around my forearm. The feel of her palm has me going hot and then cold, sensations rolling through me I’ve never had before.
What’s going on? What’s—
A tear escapes and that one tear guts me completely. My stomach rolls as I wipe it away, watching her like she’s the last thing on earth.
I swallow, my thoughts running a mile a minute, but the one screaming at me louder than the rest is we’re sitting in the parking lot of her school. She’s seventeen—a minor. Fuck.
Snapping my palm away from her skin, my muscles grow taut as I focus my attention out the windshield and not on her. I never should have offered her a ride.
Her exhale resonates through the closed space before the car door opens. I watch her out of the corner of my eye as she shuffles half off the seat but halts.
“No one ever asks,” she whispers. I look over at her fully, but there’s a mask pulled over her face. The emotion and raw honesty is gone, replaced by a brick wall so high nobody can climb it. She pulls her lips up into a fake smile before saying, “Thanks for the ride,” and jumps out before closing the door behind her.
My hands tighten on the steering wheel as I watch her walking over the grassed area out front of the school and up the steps before she pulls the large blue door open. Not once does she look back, no matter how much I silently beg her to.
What the hell am I doing? I’m ten years older than her, and she’s underage. I need to push her to the back of my mind, no matter how angelic she is.
LILY
“Who is he?” I startle at the deep voice, my hand flying to my chest as I spin around in the empty hallway.
“W-what?” I blink in rapid succession, trying to get my bearings and wondering where the hell Jonah came from.
He steps closer, towering over me, his lips spread into a grim line. “Who. Is. He?”
I frown. “Who’s wh—”
“Don’t play me, Lily.” He comes even closer, and I step back, my body colliding with the row of lockers. “I saw him drop you off… I watched as he—” He cuts himself off, looking at my face.
At first, I think he’s looking at the bruise courtesy of my dad last night when he came home and his dinner wasn’t ready, but when his nostrils flare, I realize that’s not why he’s looking at me. He saw Luke touching me. I can still feel him touching me.
I wanted him to ask me, to demand I tell him how I got the bruise. But deep down I know that even if I did tell him, he wouldn’t have believed me. No one ever does, not when it concerns the preacher of this town.
“Jonah—”
“He fucking touched you!” he roars, causing me to squeak as he comes so close we’re almost touching. “So I’ll ask one more time.” He takes a breath, seemingly calming himself down. “Who is he?”
“He’s Kim’s son… Kim from church.” I hold my hands out between us, my eyes widening when it registers that he could tell my dad. Crap. I need to— “He saw that I was late.” I laugh, trying to lighten the atmosphere surrounding him. “He said he was coming this way anyway so—”
“It doesn’t happen again. Am I clear?”
Something inside of me snaps. I’m not doing this. No way am I letting him control me too.
Shaking my head, I stand up to my full height, silently telling him to back off. He takes the hint and steps back. “You don’t get to tell me what to do, Jonah.” Spinning around, I grab my books, already knowing I’ll have missed most of my first class this morning.
“That’s where you’re wrong, Lily. It’s only a matter of time now.” There’s something in his voice. Is it a threat? “You’ll do well to remember your dad will believe me over you.”
Turning my head slightly, I look at him out of the corner of my eye. “What?”
“I wouldn’t want to have to tell him I witnessed you getting out of the car of a man he doesn’t know.” He shrugs like he’s talking about the latest football score. “Or that you were late for school.” He looks up at the ceiling, the water stains creating patterns. “What was it he asked of us in church? To make sure you stay on your path?” He raises a brow as his attention lands on my face. “I’m only doing my Christian duty.”
My heart beats harder in my chest as he flashes me a grin; a grin that everyone else would find charming but I see right through.
“Now we have that sorted.” What sorted? “I’ll walk you to class.” He moves toward me and wraps his hand around my forearm. “If you need a ride, you come and ask me from now on.”
I stay silent, watching him with new eyes as we walk down the hallway. He’s revealed a side of him I’m not sure he meant to. He’s no longer the annoying boy at school who likes to throw insults at me and continuously bait me while simultaneously trying to get me to go out with him.
He’s dangerous, but it’s the kind of dangerous I already know. I just wish I knew how to avoid it.
He shakes my arm, gaining my attention before he stops outside my class. “Do you understand me?”
“I… sure,” is out of my mouth before I even realize it.
What the hell did I just agree to?
LUKE
My eyes narrow, watching Dean and Kitty as they stand near Evan’s desk. He shifts closer to it, and my hands clench tighter. After Ty said there was a listening device planted in the warehouse, my gut told me it was him. My gut never fails me; it’s instinct; instinct that’s saved my life many times over.
>
Being a medic in the Marines meant I had to act quick, rely on my instincts or someone could die on my watch. I was the one person on our team who always had a feeling about a situation or mission we were on. And I was never wrong.
I earned my reputation, not only as a good shot and a great medic but also for being able to feel out a certain situation. I became the person on my team people would look to when out on patrol. The thing is with instinct, the more you use it, the better you become at listening to it.
And right now, I’m listening to it more than ever, and it doesn’t want to sit and wait for the danger to find us, it wants to take it out before it gets that far.
Ty walks out of the office, his gaze flicking to Dean and then me as he comes closer. I read the unspoken signal in his eyes, knowing whatever is about to happen I’m not gonna like, but when it comes to the job, it doesn’t matter.
What we do saves lives, saves people from themselves, and gets the bad guys off the streets. I’m not naive, I know for every one we put away, another five pop up. But locking up that one means they can cause less damage.
When everyone is sitting around the table, they start talking about Darrell Le’Fraine; different ideas and theories thrown back and forth.
I stay silent, analyzing like I always do. I’m the kind of person who doesn’t talk often, but when I do, it means people listen. I don’t wanna spout a load of bullshit just to hear my own goddamn voice. Sitting back and watching how people talk, how they communicate, what their bodies are saying, tells me more than anything else ever could.
Ty pushes a folder toward me and then one toward Dean, leaning back in his seat before he says, “New job, came in this morning.”
Grunting, I open the folder and scan the contents, looking at the photos before closing it again.
“Goal?” I ask, looking over at Ty.
“Surveillance. Charlie can’t get approval.” I nod, crossing my arms over my chest as Ty continues, “Charlie said to go to the precinct and he’ll fill you in.”
Catching Teardrops Page 5