Page 58 of Defending Casey

But the night was growing cold, and he wanted her inside where it was safe. He kept one arm around her as he ushered her inside, locking the door behind them. “Are you okay?”

She turned slightly in his embrace, and he saw her eyes searching his face. “Yeah, I think I am… now.”

He heard something in her voice. “Do you want to sit down? Talk about it?” Hale moved her toward the table and reached for one of the chairs to pull it out for her. He stopped when he saw her startle and focus her eyes at the tabletop.

“My letters.”

Casey’s fingers trailed over the surface of the envelope closest to her.

“Where… where did you get these?”

Hale heard the disbelief in her voice and a hint of what sounded like pain. He hadn’t meant for her to see them before he could talk to her, but that was water under the bridge now. He cleared his throat to make sure that his voice still worked before he answered her. “My father dropped them off this afternoon.”

Her gaze lifted to his face, but he still saw the confusion in them. “I didn’t know you’d seen him again.”

“Case, please sit so I can explain.”

She moved after a moment, but her gait was stiff. When she went to sit down, she wasn’t quite over the chair, so he helped direct her onto the seat before he pulled the other chair over so he could sit beside her.

“I went to see my father this morning. I don’t know why exactly. I just felt like I needed to see him. Needed to get some answers.”

She was listening to him. She always did. Nodding, she gave him the barest hint of a smile. “And did you? Get some answers?”

“Words, yes. But answers? Nothing that helped me feel like I understood him any better. What he did… going to you… demanding that you- He used guilt to get you to do what he wanted all the while knowing that I loved you. He was more than happy to break us up so he could have what he wanted. And finding out that he knew about the baby. He’d spoken to you and lied saying he didn’t know where I was. I’ve never been so angry at him. I’ve never hated him so much.”

He lifted a hand, intending to bang his fist down on the table, but he felt her take hold of his arm. Looking down at Casey’s hand, some of that anger bled away.

“I’m sorry, Casey. I’m so damn sorry that he turned you away.”

Hale felt her fingers move against his skin and he watched her fingertips as they marked small, gentle circles on his skin. The touch of her fingers were like heaven against his arm.

“I was okay, Hale. I wasn’t alone.”

He heard the strength in her voice, but he also heard the pain.

He covered her hand with his, giving it a soft squeeze. “But you didn’t have me. I don’t know how you don’t hate me for taking ten years to come home.”

Casey looked up at him and the warm depths of her eyes stole his breath away. “Hate you? No. I’d said horrible things to you. I told you to leave town. I told you I didn’t love you, Hale. I don’t know how you even cared to see me when you came back.” She lowered her gaze to the pile of letters on the table. “I poured my heart out in those letters, they must sound so silly now after all these years.”

“They’re beautiful, Casey. I feel like I hear your voice as I read them. It’s like I can feel what you were feeling back then. And I feel like I let you down.”

“Hale-”

“When I sent you the text this morning, I had just seen my dad and I was seething about what he’d said. What he’d done. I couldn’t have you and Nora here when I was barely holding myself together. I called the team, and we went out to do some training. Not all of the others could come, some were working on an assignment, but Zeke and Clint came with me to run the fence of the property.”

He would have laughed at the wide-eyed look of surprise she gave him, but she almost looked worried.

“Hale, that’s miles of fence! You ran that and you’re still walking?” She didn’t even wait for an answer. “There’s a reason why folks use a horse to ride the fence.”

“The builders just started on the barn and some of the ground is uneven so taking the truck doesn’t make any sense. Besides, we’ve run longer and over worse ground while we were in the military doing training. Some of the places we went made us feel more like mountain goats than men at times.

“Besides, I was doing it to run out the anger, so it was great. The guys didn’t ask me what happened. They know I’ll get my shit together and tell them when I’m ready. They all want to meet you and Nora. They know that I love you.”

Tears sprang up in her eyes and he reached out a hand to wipe away her tears with his thumb.

“They know that I’m trying to put the past where it belongs, but they also know that you and Nora are front and center in my plans for the future.”

He lifted her hand from his arm and brought it up to his lips. He pressed a kiss to each fingertip that he could reach.

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