Page 46 of Hard Wood Daddy

She pulls me toward my pickup. “You’ve stopped him. It’s enough. Come on, Daddy—get me out of here.”

Get me out of here, Daddy. My little girl’s wishes are commands to me.

If she wants me to forget Patron, I’ll forget him.

If she changes her mind and wants me to take off his fucking head, I’ll do that too.

She climbs into my pickup. I catch a glimpse of myself in the mirror. I’m spattered in Patron’s blood, and he’s still not getting up.

Maybe I already killed him.

Maybe I don’t give a shit if I did.

I get my woman out of there, and I leave Patron behind to bleed.

Or bleed out.

There’s one big issue we have to take care of before Tess and I can relax: signing the lease for the Paint Forest Program. She explains how she read all the documents.

“I’m not a lawyer, obviously,” she says. “But the lease is in plain English. It’s safe.”

“I trust you,” I say.

Even if Tess were wrong about the lease, I’d still sign it just because she told me to.

So we go back to Lindsay’s office and sign it.

My signature’s not much. A couple slashes on the page. But it’s enough to lift a horrible weight off of me, and I didn’t even realize how much it was hurting me until it was gone.

Lindsay looks delirious with relief, too. “Thank you, thank you,” she says, hugging me and Tess. She smells like patchouli. Her ceramic earrings are cold on my arm. I hug her back, patting awkwardly and making eye contact with her filing cabinet over her head. “You don’t know how much this means to me. This program has been amazing, and knowing we can continue for years to come—just—thank you.”

“Thank Tess,” I say gruffly.

“Both of you.” Lindsay beams at us. “I can’t imagine any of this turning out any better. This is the perfect ending.”

“Yeah,” I say.

Okay, so I’m still not good with words.

I’m walking back to the cabin with Tess on my arm when she makes a suggestion. “This could get a little better,” she says, smiling up at me. The sunlight shines on her face through the trees, highlighting her freckles in gold. “Everything could be a little more perfect.”

For a second, I’m lost, gazing at her beauty. “How?”

“You should join the classes. You’re naturally so talented. I think if you got a little guided practice, you could be even more amazing than you already are. And maybe you would enjoy it, too.”

Has anyone ever cared about what I’d enjoy? I can’t remember it happening before.

Nobody besides Tess sees anything but a reclusive monster when they look at me.

She sees potential for art and happiness.

Fuck, but I would have done a lot more than sign the land away for this woman.

“About my reading,” I start to say.

“You’ve lived in the forest your whole life. Your grandparents took good care of you, but they probably weren’t intellectuals, huh? I mean, when would you have learned?” Tess so readily shrugs it off. Everything that’s haunted me for years doesn’t matter to her. “It’s okay. I can help teach you to read if you want, and in the meantime, I’ll take care of anything you need.”

Fuck. This woman is destroying me, and she doesn’t even know it.

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