Page 66 of Three to Fall

Grayson steered the car out onto the road, but in the opposite direction of the clubhouse.

I frowned at him. “Where are we going?”

“Hayley Jade seems like she needs a…” He glanced at her in the rearview mirror. “Milkshake?”

She smiled widely.

“Candy too,” Hawk added, ruffling her hair. “She definitely looks like she needs some candy.”

I gave all three of them a disapproving frown, but it was mostly playful. She’d be on a sugar high for the rest of theafternoon, but I was on a high of my own and I wasn’t quite ready to come back down to earth yet.

Kyle’s phone full of my sister’s texts was waiting for me back at the clubhouse, along with the stress and grief of needing to read them all.

I could stand living in the bubble of happiness I’d found here with two men and a little girl for a few hours longer.

Hayden met us at a café not far from his work, and we all ate a ridiculous amount of sugar considering we were having dinner in a couple of hours.

But I couldn’t stop watching Hayley Jade. The way her eyes were bright. The way she lit up when Grayson asked her about her friends at school and she was able to make a few simple signs to tell him she was friends with two girls and one boy.

Hayden and Hawk both frowned at the mention of a boy, but I elbowed Hawk and kicked Hayden under the table, and both schooled their “overprotective dad” expressions into something more neutral.

But my heart saw it. The way all three of them were with her. Grayson had taken on more of a friend and teacher role, rather than a fatherly one. And that was okay with me, and clearly with Hayley Jade as well. I didn’t expect any of them to be her dad and I didn’t want to pressure their relationships in any way.

They would develop in their own time.

But Hayden, and especially Hawk, were gazing at my daughter like she’d hung the moon, and I knew in my heart while Hayden had loved her since the day she was born, Hawk had fallen for her as much as he’d fallen for me.

I smoothed her hair back off her face tenderly, and in that moment, made peace with the fact she might never speak again.

Even if that were true, I wasn’t to blame. I wasn’t the one who’d taken her from me. I wasn’t the one who’d made threats against her life, forcing us to run.

All I’d ever done was love her.

By the time we got back to the clubhouse, after a day away from the place and some time with the people I cared most about, I felt more ready to deal with the texts on Kyle’s phone. Hayley Jade tugged on Grayson’s hand, holding up a book Hawk, Hayden, and I had already read a hundred times each, but Grayson trotted after her into her bedroom, the two of them settling side by side in pink beanbags so he could read the story to her.

With Hayley Jade taken care of, I picked up Kyle’s phone, and yet again, lost myself in my sister’s whirlwind affair with a man who had probably killed her.

Golden:

You ever just feel like you don’t belong anywhere?

Tulip:

Every day. I don’t fit here. Never have. My sister is married to our spiritual leader. So she’s obviously the golden child in our family these days. The way my parents brag about her to every other member of the community is so gross. My other sisters aren’t much better. They all have their heads stuck up their asses, their only interests in marrying a man of the Lord and bearing his children. Yawn. I can’t think of anything worse. I need to get out of here before I end up in front of an altar, marrying a man three times my age.

Golden:

You have no idea how lucky you are to have a family. People who respect you. Care about you enough to want you married to a man who can take care of you.

Tulip:

Did you miss the bit about me marrying a man I don’t love? Or even like?

Golden:

I didn’t. But I focused on the good things about your family so I wouldn’t type words I know I shouldn’t.

Tulip:

---