Page 14 of Justice for Radar

“You knew somebody?” she asked softly. “The way you said that…”

I nodded. “The girls’ mother. It got her in the end.”

“I’m so sorry,” she said.

“You?” I asked curiously.

She rolled her lips together and looked guarded a moment and I thought to myself,direct hit, I may have just sunk one of her battleships.

“My ex-husband turned to alcohol to deal with some of the things… some of the things he saw on deployment. He came back very different from when he left,” she said quietly and shuddered as though someone had just walked over her grave and I don’t know, maybe I had with the question.

“I’m sorry,” I said, and she nodded.

“Me too.”

We lapsed into silence, the moment heavy. That heaviness dispelled when she bent to pick up another small shell, rinsing it in the surf before dropping it into her fro-yo container.

“Thank you,” she finally murmured. “For everything. I know you don’t know me, and that you’re taking a risk by inviting me into your home like you have, but I promise, I’m a good person.”

I met her gaze and said truthfully, “Somehow I knew that about you. I have a radar for these things. It’s how I got my road name.”

“Road name?” she asked. “I don’t know what that means.”

“It means my nickname was given to me. That’s how it works in a club. Your name is earned. It’s bestowed upon you like sort of an honor.”

“Oh, I see,” she murmured, so quietly that had I not been fixated on her lips, the words would have been lost to the wind.

She didn’t press further or ask any more questions. In fact, she seemed doubly lost in thought over the information she’d already received.

Truthfully, she earned major points with me for not being any sort of judgmental when my cut had come out. I low-key worried she was afraid, and I sincerely hoped not.

Nobody in this town that was from this town meant her any harm… that guy had left already and fuck him. He would get what was coming to him.

She stopped suddenly and looked back up the beach in the direction from which we’d come, and at our footprints dissipating in the sand.

“Getting tired? Ready to turn back?” I asked.

“If you are and you don’t mind?” she asked. I shook my head.

“Not at all, you’ve had a big day,” I reminded her gently.

“Oh, I don’t know,” she said with a nervous laugh turning around with me.

“No, you have. Mental and emotional lifting can be just as heavy as any physical activity,” I told her, and she nodded mutely.

“Sage wisdom,” she observed.

“I have my moments,” I said with a smile and a shrug. It teased another genuine smile from her lips which looked soft as all get out.

“Don’t sell yourself short,” she said softly, and I smiled and nodded.

“Fair enough,” I said. “Don’t you do it either.”

“Deal,” she said, and the smile stayed this time; lighter than air. We moved back up the beach and toward the house.

I got the door for her, as much to be a gentleman as to ease any weirdness about her just opening up my house to waltz in. It was only day one but honestly, she felt right – like she’d been here longer than that. Was that weird? That was weird, wasn’t it?

Except it didn’t feel weird, which was what was sort of weirding me out… like what the fuck?

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