Page 5 of Won't Back Down

The kitchen held a sour smell that I traced to a partly filled bowl of what had probably been cereal. Judging from the pile of dishes, it had been there for a few days. Evidence of multiple partly eaten meals told me I’d need to be having a conversation with him about proper nutrition. Maybe I’d just start coming out here for meals every day.

A sharp bark interrupted my mental list.

“Roy?”

He barked again, more urgently this time, followed by a whine.

Something’s wrong.

I hurried through the house, pulling up short when I saw age-spotted legs in worn plaid slippers sticking out from around a corner.

“Granddaddy?” I whispered it once, then said it again as I rushed forward.

He was sprawled on the floor, propped partly against a wall. It looked as if he’d staggered against it and simply slid down.

I knew without touching him that he was gone. No one could have that pallor and live.

Grief rose in my throat, huge and hot, too hard to speak around as Roy whined and nudged Granddaddy’s shoulder. His body slumped over like a puppet with cut strings.

The wash of fear was instant and visceral, stealing my breath.

Danger. Not safe. Run.

My vision blurred, flashing white, then black, then white again.

On a cry, I staggered back and?—

There was something wet on my face. Groaning, I lifted my hands, fending off… a tongue? Roy. He nosed my face, whining.

What the hell?

Blinking, I stared up at the ceiling, absently registering that one of the bulbs in the hall chandelier was out. I was on the floor. How the hell had I gotten here? Had I blacked out?

Cautiously, I sat up, but the room didn’t spin.

Then reality slammed into me like a storm surge as I saw the body again.

Granddaddy was dead, and I was truly alone in the world.

CHAPTER 2

SAWYER

From the forward rail of the ferry, I watched Hatterwick Island creep ever closer as the engines rumbled beneath my feet. The bottom of the chain of islands making up North Carolina’s Outer Banks, there was nothing imposing about its sweep of sandy beaches or the sole village of Sutter’s Ferry that occupied the southern tip, but my heart sped up, nonetheless. When I’d joined the Navy all those years ago, I’d had no idea I’d be coming home so infrequently. Since the island wasn’t exactly quick and easy to get to, short spans of leave had often been spent with my brothers in other locations. But beyond that, a lot of it had to do with the fact that I had no real home to come back to.

The house where I’d lived with my dad had been a rental. I’d let it go after he’d died and I’d enlisted. There’d been no memories I wanted to hang onto there. While I was rich in found family, visiting Rios’s sister or Ford’s moms still wasn’t the same as having a true home waiting for me, and I’d been the guy to turn down leave in the name of taking the jobs others didn’t want—a move which had helped me climb the ranks. I’d needed to make something of myself.

For all the good that did me now.

I was coming home with little more to my name than I’d left with. At least my bank account was healthier, so taking things one day at a time for a while wasn’t a problem. I had time to figure out what came next.

For today, that was a birthday party.

Would Willa be there?

Though we corresponded regularly through texts and emails, it had been nearly two years since I’d seen her. She’d been on a rare off-island trip the last time I’d been home for a visit, and I’d been simultaneously relieved and disappointed. She was the friend I’d always expected her to be. Nothing more, nothing less.

But things had never been the same between us. I blamed myself for the fact that she’d nearly drowned. Never mind that it had been my hands, my breath, that had brought her back. If not for me, she wouldn’t have been out in that storm to begin with. If not for me, she’d never have been dragged away from Hatterwick and had to endure… whatever she’d endured that had put those shadows in her eyes that she never spoke of.

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