“I’m not giving up the best orgasms I’ve ever had just to quiet small-town gossips.”
Chapter Twelve
Arustling soundin the kitchen awoke Gabriella early. She checked the nightstand clock and realized it was almost dawn and she’d slept straight through the night. Unusual for her with her dreams so often haunted by nightmares. Maybe it was because Clay slept beside her. For years he’d played a role in the most frightening of her dreams, the ones that left her drenched in sweat and tangled in her blankets. Now his strong thigh grazed hers beneath the sheets, his palm curved possessively along her hip.
The rustling in the kitchen reminded her what had awoken her in the first place.
Mia.
Sliding out of the bed, Gabriella reached for the bag of clothes that Clay had retrieved from her motel room. Digging to the bottom, she slid on a pair of drawstring flannel pajama bottoms and an old tee with a big cardigan sweater. She tugged socks on one at a time, hopping along the cold floor. Then she walked quietly to the bedroomdoor and slipped out into the living area, closing the passage behind her.
She was nervous, she realized, to face Mia. The girl had come to mean so much to her. But Gabriella was used to offering advice in emails or via phone. In person…she had no experience. And she regretted letting Mia down so badly.
Taking a deep breath, she drew closer.
In the kitchen Mia wore an outfit she’d picked up at Last Chance Vintage, clothes Gabriella had glimpsed in the shopping bag the girl had brought into the restaurant the day before. She’d paired a sea-washed pink button-down men’s dress shirt over dark denim leggings with tall black boots. With her hair swept in a high ponytail and hoop earrings, she looked cute and youthful, her generous curves downplayed without having to resort to a shapeless tent.
Her earbuds dangling around her neck, Mia pulled a cereal bowl from an upper cabinet and set it softly on the granite counter. Gabby decided to forget about the day before for now and just focus on getting through this one.
“Morning,” Gabriella greeted her, unsure of her welcome. “You look great.”
“Erin chose it.” Mia didn’t smile, but she also didn’t frown, scowl or sigh. All of which felt like a step forward. “She’s really smart about clothes.”
Clothes. Universal teenage language. A bridge to understanding where their head was at—for good or bad. Gabriella would walk that bridge and more. Whatever it took to reestablish the bond with this troubled girl who deserved so much better than life had given her.
“I thought the same thing when I saw her at the salon party the other night. Back in high school, she always dressed in overalls and spent weekends working at constructionsites with her older brother so this turn of events for her career is a fun surprise.” The Finley family had always been so independent, never seeming like they suffered from the need to fit in.
“Well, I’m glad to know there’s still hope for me that I can turn out okay.” Mia poured corn flakes into her bowl and splashed on some milk before she dug into her breakfast, eating standing up. “I mean, thank you, God, we don’t have to stay the same people we are in high school.” She set her phone on the counter beside her bowl and scrolled through whatever was on the screen.
Gabriella was so grateful for an end to yesterday’s standoff and silence that she didn’t want to risk saying anything to upset the new dialogue with Mia. Then again, there was already too much that had gone unsaid.
“I’m nothing like I was in high school.” She’d been so sheltered that her father’s arrest had seemed like the end of the world. And maybe, seeing how fragile her mother had been—breaking down completely after he’d gone to jail—had made Gabriella afraid she was emotionally weak like that, too. “I’ve since found strength I never would have thought possible back then.”
She’d been so quick to decide her life wasn’t worth living when she’d only just barely started the journey. With her father out of her life and her mother rapidly withdrawing, Gabriella had felt so abandoned and alone. She would not allow that to happen to Mia. She needed to make sure the teen knew people cared about her.
“Or else you found it because you got through it.” Mia didn’t even look up as she spoke. Taking another bite of cereal, she chewed and swallowed. “It’s not like you were a dweeb in high school and suddenly you’re kick-ass, right? You got kick-ass by surviving the dweeb days. You find your strengthbecause you’re tested. A rite of passage, according to Shrader.”
“Who’s Shrader?” Gabriella moved around Mia to fill the coffeepot, wondering if she was dating someone new. But she had to admit the girl had her wits about her in the morning. She definitely had made a good point.
“My social studies teacher. He’s sorta scary mean, but also scary smart.” She finished the cereal, put the bowl in the sink and rinsed it. “I’m going to school with Davis. He should be here any minute.”
As fast as that, the teen was trying to close off entry to the dialogue bridge.
Mia hurried out of the kitchen and into the living area, picking up her worn black backpack off the coffee table and stuffing in two giant text books that were already leaving holes in the thin fabric.
“Davis? The boy from the truck incident?” Gabriella lingered in the kitchen, putting away the milk and cereal and hoping that by appearing nonchalant, she could keep up some communication with the teen.
“Surprise, right?” Mia wrestled with the books and then jammed in a pair of shorts and a tee. “He texted last night and offered to drive me to school.”
“And you trust him?” Gabriella’s stomach knotted. This girl was now in her care if only for a few days. She was only sixteen years old. Should she be riding in cars with teenage boys?
Gabriella was seized with the need to give the boy a driving test and maybe do a background check. She wondered what Clay would say about this.
“Some guys would have lost their minds over what happened the other night. Like, really.” The look in Mia’s eyes—as if she she’d seen too much cruelty and hardship—broke Gabriella’s heart. “He could have fought back after what I did. But instead he let me drive his truck home and he called the next day to apologize. Seriously. Apologize. People don’t do that much.” She shrugged and zipped up the backpack as a light strobed through the living room—headlights outside. “There he is.”
She was already halfway across the living room when Gabriella realized the girl was headed out the door whether or not she had Gabby’s permission.
“You have your phone?” she asked, wrapping her sweater tighter as Mia opened the door. “Where’s your coat?”
