Page 4 of The Fence Between Us

The door swung open and revealed Gayle Wellington, second wife of Shiloh Hills’s mayor. Her hair was a warm cinnamon color from the roots to the tips—not her natural color but the result of expensive taste and a well-trained hairstylist. Willowy thin but proud, she coifed her hair perfectly, not a strand out of place or root left untouched, and accentuated her figure in a pink plaid suit jacket and pencil skirt. Rubies dangled from her ears and rested at the hollow of her throat. As she opened the door wider, her disapproving brown eyes slid over Skye and dismissed her. She always expected Skye to show up and be less than. Silently, Skye followed her stepmother into the house.

A staircase lined the wall on both sides, curving elegantly toward the second floor. They passed under the obnoxiously grand, crystal chandelier, Gayle’s daringly tall heels clicked loudly against the cream marble tiles beneath their feet. She led Skye through the foyer and past the expansive library to the formal dining hall at the back of the house. One entire wall consisted of windows that provided a gorgeous view of the extensive backyard and endless woods beyond. Skye’s father sat at the head of the needlessly long, dark-wood table. The cream-cushioned seat to his right, pulled out slightly, waited for Gayle to take her seat again.

Across the table from Gayle, where Skye typically cowered, another guest stood and angled his body toward her.

“What are you doing here?” Skye could have smacked herself the minute the words flew from her mouth.

Gayle paled and sputtered while her father’s face soured to an unholy shade of red.

Dylan cracked a furtive smile, the mockery of pleasantness didn’t reach his eyes. “Skye, it’s been a long time.”

About four years actually. Not nearly long enough.

Dylan Santoro was not someone Skye would have willingly dined with ever again. She hid her clenched fists behind her back; she not only despised his presence at this family dinner, but also what it might imply. They’d briefly dated in college at the behest and urging of her parents. Considering she had royally disappointed them by changing her major to education, Skye had agreed to a first date with Dylan. His father was a state senator, a powerful ally for power-hungry couples and small-town politicians like Max and Gayle.

Apparently, Skye had been the only one to think their relationship was obviously going nowhere because he’d proposed to her after only a few dates, the ring a spectacular show of dazzling wealth and influence. She doubted he would forgive her for turning him down, not that his smiling face spoke of any ill will today. But despite his waving blond hair and crystalline blue eyes, something behind the pretty-boy facade made her skin crawl. Skye slid into the chair Dylan pulled out for her, noting the pristine Armani suit he wore and rolled her eyes. She slid closer to the table and took a healthy swig of the red wine already in her crystal glass. This was going to be a long night.

Chapter 3

Rabble

Rabble spent the next two days organizing the specifics of moving Catherine, now Bekah, to Shiloh Hills, down to the last detail. Much of that time was on the phone, coordinating the pieces and parts of the relocation plan to keep her safe and give her the tools she needed to start over. He had to admit the amount of time he spent on the phone was beginning to annoy him. With face-to-face communication, truths and lies were easier to decipher and harder to hide. Long ago, he’d accepted these alternate methods of conversing, email and phone calls, but that didn’t mean he had to like it.

If he were being honest though, his mood had plummeted steadily since they’d decided to spend the Independence Day holiday in Shiloh Hills. Since that conversation, he’d thrown himself into work, desperate for any distraction. He spent hours going over new government contracts, updating previous client details, and generally completing busy work that kept his brain numbed. Still, a part of Rabble looked forward to seeing some of his favorite places, like the quiet library where he’d spent a goodamount of time while his mother worked at the diner on the other end of the town. He missed the old mill, the faded murals painted on the sides of red brick buildings, and wondered if Mr. Jack still worked at the mom-and-pop pharmacy on the corner by the railroad tracks. Rabble hoped not. Mr. Jack had been ancient before; the man deserved to retire. His chair groaned as Rabble leaned back, folding his hands over his stomach.

Rabble frowned, his mood dropping further, his mind straying to so many other elements of the town he’d rather never see again. He had spent years avoiding thoughts about anything remotely related to that town, so much so that he committed a grave sin he needed to rectify during this trip. In the years since he had left, he had never returned to visit his mother’s grave, to the tree beside his dilapidated childhood house where he had placed a homemade cross to remember her. That was all he could give her at the time. The longer he thought about it, the sicker he felt until he rubbed at his chest to soothe away the ache that had taken up residence right over his heart.

Thinking about the tree where he lovingly buried his mother’s remains conjured images of the fence rows just behind it. The fence and that giggling, curious little girl who stared at him that first day, when he’d moved to town. The fence rows Skye peeked through, her young face alight with a child’s nosey nature. He had years upon years of wonderful memories with Skye beneath the fence, ones where they shared their thoughts and dreams and others where they simply lay in silence, basking in each other’s calming presence.

When he’d walked away from his hometown, he’d never intended on returning, hadn’t planned to ever see that girl again. She’d gone off to an Ivy League school long ago, though he had left before she’d chosen which prestigious university she’d attend. Without him around to distract her from her goals, he wondered just how far she’d travelled, how much she’d achieved.He comforted himself with the knowledge that, even though he’d been cleaved in two, he’d freed Skye to become all she could be.

A wave of solemn acceptance threatened to swamp him and Rabble found himself typing with more force than necessary as he readied and emailed Declan and Dash the final plans for Bekah’s relocation, powered down his laptop, and packed it away. He spent long minutes shredding documents, correspondence, even the stack of menus they’d gathered since they’d opened the security firm. His procrastination tactic may have continued to work, had he not run out of reasonable shredding material. He frowned at the pile of tiny squared paper in the bin and finally gave up on avoiding the inevitable.

The rest of his things were already in the truck, waiting for him to gather the nerve to set course for Shiloh Hills. He slung his backpack over his shoulders, the weight of the laptop inside settled against his middle back. After one last walk-through of the building, he flipped the light switches, killing the florescent overhead bulbs. A final glance around had him considering spit-shining the toilets, just to evade Shiloh Hills for a few moments longer. With a defeated huff, Rabble programmed the security system and stepped into the hallway.

“Quit stalling, big baby,” he chastised himself aloud, shutting the door to the office space and locking it. He turned away from the door, a sense of finality weighing heavily on his shoulders. Grudgingly, Rabble took the stairs down to the main level and ambled out the front doors.

He dragged himself across the parking lot, swiveling his gaze from side to side, taking in as much of his surroundings as he could. After he reached his truck, Rabble stood at the door, his hand on the handle, his mind wandering as a row of little black ants marched by on the hot pavement at his feet. The whisper of the summer breeze through the still growing trees planted outfront of their shared building drew him into memories he’d long ago buried.

An old truck, orange and brown from rust, sat stoically beneath the huge tree by that damned fence. Mama said Matthew wasn’t supposed to say damn, but she wasn’t there, and his dad didn’t care. He didn’t care about anything, and Matthew supposed he shouldn’t care either. He slipped his head beneath the fence, his eyes staring at the tiny cracks in the aging paint. She was already there, studying a line of tiny ants marching silently by. With his head next to hers, he tried to banish the vision behind his eyes, of one of those small bugs crawling in his ear. He shivered, and Skye looked at him knowingly. She’d never laugh at him, but she couldn’t help that twinkle in her eyes either. They stayed together, under the fence, the massive oak tree and flowering bush keeping them company.

They didn’t talk, and Matthew kind of liked that part. He didn’t have to lie or pretend with her like he did at home and school. She didn’t judge him when salty streaks rolled down his cheeks after a day from hell—another word Mama didn’t like.

But the fence was his safe place. It had been since the first time Skye dragged him under the wooden rows when they were five years old. She’d taken one look at his scraped-up palms and oversized dirty shirt and asked him, “Are you Rabble?” He hadn’t been sure what that was, but her smile revealed nothing but kindness. If that’s what she said he was, he supposed it was true, and he’d been Rabble ever since.

The ants continued to march by, unbothered by his presence and completely unaware of the turmoil threatening to consume him. He stood at the tipping point, and the sensation of swaying gingerly on the edge of a sword overcame him. One way or the other, he was going to fall. All it would take was the right gust, and he would be destroyed. Determined to stop that train ofthought, Rabble shook himself, rolled his neck, and convinced his muscles to unlock enough so he could climb into the cab of his truck. Dumping his laptop bag in the passenger seat, he gathered the heather-gray vest he kept there for emergency client meetings and shoved it into the backseat with his other bags.

As he methodically slid the key into the ignition, Rabble listened to the rumble of the engine come to life and made up his mind. He may be returning to Shiloh Hills, but that didn’t mean he had to let the town, or the people in it, get to him. His job and spending the holiday with his family were all that mattered, nothing more. That mindset lasted until he rolled past the welcome sign at the edge of town, heralding his arrival to Shiloh Hills. After his mom passed away and his father left him alone for all intents and purposes, he would walk to the edge of town, take a seat beside the blacktop, and stare at that sign. He dreamed of leaving so often, when he finally did, it hadn’t seemed real. Even then, the relief he thought he would feel hadn’t come, too burdened by what he left behind.

Sometime in the years since his mother passed, the old fence between the properties had finally rotted into worm food. He couldn’t pinpoint exactly when that happened, having not been near the property divider in what felt like a lifetime. Skye’s parents had sprung to replace it with a new one, tall vinyl planks stabbed into the ground, one right after another. Some days he thought, if he pressed his face to the fence boards, would he catch a glimpse of that flowering purple bush Skye loved so much?

That new fence, so cold and imposing made a statement and he received the message, loud and clear.

Rabble sat beneath the oak tree, studying the fence with red and heavy eyes. A lead stone sat where his heart should have been and he wondered if his ability to feel had finallydisappeared. His mind filled with words he wanted to say, and never would. Words that went unsaid in the days, months, years, following that fateful night when she’d kept him from being consumed wholly by the darkness, when she’d stood up to her father, for him, and paid the price for her defiance ever since.

He missed his best friend, missed spending more than a few passing moments with each other in the school halls. Plenty of moments had come and gone where he simply wanted her there, by his side as she had been since they were children. He longed to speak with her, to lean into her when his father had reached new lows, tossing his mother’s ashes to him in a cardboard box, no better than garbage. He wished she could have stood by him as he took a shovel from the shed and buried that box in the most peaceful place he knew, right beneath that towering oak tree.

Skye was graduating today, the decorated princess of the town. Rabble chose not to attend, despite the principal’s look of disappointment. Nothing new there. He wouldn’t walk across that gymnasium floor, the local charity case and a loser to be gawked at.

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