“I freaked out when I couldn’t reach you. I’m not angry. I’m scared. Iwasscared. Now, I’m just so sorry, Linds. I should have been here.” He pulls me back against his chest, and my hands claw at the center of his T-shirt, balling it into my fists as I press my tear-soaked face against him.
“She’s a little over-tired,” my mom explains.
“I get it,” he says.
“I fixed up the spare room. Lindsey and Renleigh’s old room. There’s more space in there now, so why don’t you both head upstairs and try to get some rest. I put Holly in my room sinceit’s quiet. If she wakes up tonight, I’ll get her.” My mom squints with a kind but slightly guilty smile. “I owe my daughters plenty of favors.”
“Thanks, Mom,” I croak, slipping from Brooks’s arms to give my mom one more hug and a kiss on the cheek.
“Come on,” I say to Brooks, nodding toward the stairs. “It’ll be like high school, when I used to kick Ren out of the room so I could sneak a boy in.”
“Hush your mouth, Lindsey Blackwood!” my mom chastises. She winks at me as I pass, though.
Brooks and I peek into my mom’s room where Holly is out like a light. My mom created a sleep-space for her with rolled-up quilts. I don’t rush Brooks as he hovers in the doorway. He needs to see his daughter breathe. I get it. I’ve done that with the boys.
When he’s finally satisfied, we cross the hallway and step into the spare room.
“Your mom didn’t even flinch that we’re sharing a bed,” Brooks says as he shuts my childhood door behind him. The Nirvana poster Ren hung on the back of the door is still there, and I snicker when I see it.
“She had us figured out before I did, I’m pretty sure,” I say, too tired to mind my words before I utter them.
Brooks’s gaze traps mine, and heat creeps up the back of my neck. So much for avoiding a talk aboutus.Nothing like being the victim of a class four felony to make one loose with their lips.
Brooks glances at the poster on the door, pointing at the somehow still vivid blue eyes on the print of Kurt Cobain. I’m pretty sure it was Nirvana’s third wave of resurgence when my sister bought that poster. Kurt really held up.
“I feel a little inadequate. Not gonna lie,” he jokes.
“Why? Because he was a celebrated rock legend and you’re playing triple-A ball in a shit town in Oklahoma?” I quirk a brow as Brooks stares at me with his mouth agape. He shakes with asilent laugh, then steps into me, wrapping his arms around me and taking me down on the bed with him. We quickly settle into a comfortable position, his chest on my back. Spooning. That’s something Brandon quit doing when the boys came along. He always said my body didn’t fit against his the same. My hips were too wide.
What a dick.
“Did you really sneak boys in here under your mom and dad’s noses?” His voice is like velvet against my ear, and I close my eyes easily to the sound.
“I mean, it’s not like she was actually here when I did the sneaking,” I explain. “Dad’s really who I pulled one over on. And frankly, it wasn’t very hard.”
Brooks chuckles, and his body vibrates against my back. His warmth relaxes me, and for the first time since I saw the pried-open door, my pulse isn’t drumming in my ear.
“My dad was always so exhausted after spending the day out on the field coaching. I could usually count on him being out like a light in his chair by eight-thirty, the nightly sports news humming like a lullaby. All I had to do was set Ren up with a tablet and some ice cream, and I was covered for a good hour of make-out time.”
Brooks vibrates with another silent laugh, but it fades after a few seconds, leaving the two of us alone, spooning, in a room I can only describe as nineties shabby chic.
“My mom’s not great at decorating. I think it was better how my sister and I had it,” I joke. My eyes scan the wall, taking in the weird shelf with potpourri and random books I don’t think my mom’s ever read.
“I got pretty scared,” Brooks says softly.
My hands move to hold on to his right one where it rests at the center of my ribs. His left arm is bent under my head in sucha way that his fingertips are able to brush the hair on top of my head.
“I didn’t mean to scare you. The voicemail cut off, and I had a feeling my message wouldn’t sound right. I was going to text you, but next thing I knew, the detectives were here, and my phone died, and?—”
“I was afraid someone hurt Holly. Or that they hurt . . .” He swallows, then rests his forehead on the back of my skull. He’s talking about me. He doesn’t have to say it.
“Holly is safe. She was with my parents. And I was at my class. The one where I get to hear all the ways I’m a shitty parent . . . and a shitty wife, apparently.”
Brandon’s smug comments filter through my mind, sending a rush of adrenaline and anger through my belly. I need to bottle the feelings up again, but no matter how hard I try, the pain still sinks into my diaphragm like a fat silver bullet.
“You’re not a shitty parent, Linds,” Brooks says.
My thumbs graze over his knuckles. I want to be tender with him. I want to be his. “Thanks,” I say, my voice cracking in spite of my efforts to hold in the pain.
