Page 94 of Roughing It

“Yeah, I mean, there are assholes like anywhere—Jacob Ashford springs to mind; that guy’s a massive tool—but for the most part, it’s a friendly town. Why?”

Her noncommittal hum and shrug won’t work.

“Blakely, what’s going on?” My eyes narrow. There’s more to her question than she’s letting on.

With a sigh, she says, “I grew up in a town the same size as Trail Creek. And honestly? It was awful. People gossiped and knew all my business, but when I needed them…”

“Hey, finish that thought.” I brush my lips against her temple.

She stiffens like she’s preparing for a blow. What the fuck is she about to tell me?

“I’ve never told anyone the whole story. Not even Kirk. He knows the gist, but that’s all.”

I save her lip from being gnawed by her teeth. “Go on, baby.”

“People knew I didn’t have enough food or clean clothes. They knew my mom disappeared for days at a time, leaving me on my own. Knew the men she brought around were scumbags. And no one did anything. Except judge me.”

Anger bubbles in my gut. What is wrong with people? She admitted she grew up poor and didn’t have a relationship with her parents, but shit. This is straight-up neglect.

Tears well in her eyes, turning them the color of the ocean after a storm. “I told you I left home at seventeen because of a fallout with my mom?”

“Yeah.”

“It was April of my senior year. I was getting ready for school one morning. Mom was on day three of a bender, but her current live-in, Wayne, was home.”

My instincts drive me, and suddenly, Blakely is in my lap, her head pressed to my chest. If it’s something universe-shattering, I need my hands on her. Need to keep her safe.

“He tried to kiss me. Thankfully, it wasn’t more than that.”

I exhale.

“But it was enough. I kneed him in the balls, ran out of the trailer straight to school, and told the counselor what happened.”

A surge of pride prickles in my chest. “Good for you.”

She presses her nose to my neck and breathes me in. If it comforts her, she can stay this way forever.

With a humorless laugh, she says, “Instead of helping me or calling the cops or anything, she said it was my fault for walking around in such distracting clothes. You know, Bible Belt, sins of the flesh bullshit.”

“What the fuck?”

“By the time I got home from school, the rumor mill was already abuzz and everything I owned was in my car. I tried to talk to my mom, but the trailer door was locked. I sat on the rotted, sagging porch steps—the same ones I’d spent so many nights on, wishing on stars—listening to my mom yell at me through the thin walls. Wayne told her I attacked him, and when I tried to explain what happened, she accused me of being jealous and trying to steal him from her.”

The urge to smash something rides me hard. The wood pile will be replenished by the end of the day. That much is sure.

“I tried to find somewhere to stay, but it wasn’t like I had many friends. Thanks to the counselor, Wayne, and my mom, it was already all over town that I’d tried to kiss my mom’s boyfriend, gotten mad when he turned me down, and hurt him in retaliation. I left that night. Drove for hours, anything to get out of west Texas and away from Hawthorne.”

“You were seventeen. No one came looking for you?”

She shakes her head. “I didn’t have a cell phone or a bank account. My whole existence could fit in the backseat of a used Chevy Metro.”

“Where’d you go?”

“Austin.” A grin tugs at her lips. “Everyone in Hawthorne used to talk about Austin like it was this den of depravity, so I hightailed it there. The bright lights and endless city sounds were so different. I loved it. I mean, I hated it too, but at that point, it seemed about as far away from Hawthorne as I could get.”

I shelter her in the warmth of my larger body. “What happened when you got there?”

“I got lucky. I’d been sleeping in my car. Shit, Hudson, you’re crushing me.”

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