Page 30 of After All The Wreckage
As a girl,I’d never been into Barbies or playing house. I’d never wanted to babysit. Even before the divorce and working in Mom’s office, I’d been much more interested in Matchbox cars, racetracks, and skateboards. I’d wanted to beat everyone at whatever game we played at school. Not because I wanted them to lose, but because I wanted to win. I wanted to be the fastest, the smartest, the toughest. I certainly didn’t want to spend time with babies, toddlers, or any human of that variety.
But when Gage had opened the apartment door this morning with Ivy tucked up in his arms, it had done something funny to my stomach. And for the first time ever, I understood the phrasemy ovaries nearly exploded. I’d felt an ache deep inside that had only grown the more he’d interacted with his sister, every moment loaded with a sweet tenderness.
My body’s reaction to him and to Ivy, but especially them together, was surprising and unexpected. Unwelcome, even. It added a layer of admiration to my teenage memories of him. But the bitter truth was, even if there’d been a chance for Gage and me to be something, seeing him with his family and understanding what he’d done to keep them together would keep me from taking a chance with him. I had my own family’s responsibilities to handle. I couldn’t add his to my list.
And yet, here I was.
Doing this job for free. Because it was fucking Monte. How could I not be here?
Ivy waggled a stuffed animal in my direction. The fur was matted and the neck was a bit wobbly, causing the head to tumble forward. “Aw you a fwend of Monte’s?”
Gage looked from me to Ivy and then said softly, “Rory’s helping us look for him.”
Her eyes grew wide. “You aw?”
“Yes. I’m going to do my best to bring him home to you.” My eyes met Gage’s over the top of her head, and I saw tears fill his eyes that he fought back by closing them.
He looked harrowed and exhausted. I knew those feelings well. I’d been living them for almost a year. He pushed the long sleeves of his T-shirt up, revealing the tattoo on his arm. The one I’d wondered about on Saturday. The cursive font wound like vines around a sword, and the words caused my heart to skip several beats.
In a world that loves its villains, be the hero.
They weren’t a Veronica quote I knew, but they felt decidedly Veronica Mars-like. And maybe… maybe that was the moment I fell all over again for Gage. Not for the bright and shiny teenage boy he’d once been, but for a man who’d chosen to be the hero.
I swallowed hard, looking away as waves of emotions flooded me.
After he finished struggling with Ivy’s hair and the two bows that somehow looked askew even though he’d just put them on, he handed her a banana. “Don’t make a mess.” I wondered briefly what kind of mess a banana could make as he turned toward me and said, “Let me just go grab a few things and call River.”
He disappeared down the hall, leaving me with his sister, and that made my gut twist way more than if he’d left me sitting next to Tall Paul and his beefy henchman who got his money back at any price. Paul’s muscle I could handle. A tiny human? Not so much.
I could feel her watching me as I scrolled through the live cam footage along the street outside the Capitol Building.
“What show is that, Wowy?” she asked. The way she said my name with the R’s mixed up snagged at my heart all over again. I glanced up to see the banana was looking decidedly goopy and there was some of it smeared along her cheeks and fingers. How had that happened in mere seconds?
“It’s not a show. It’s video footage from a camera. I’m hoping I’ll see Monte.”
She leaned over so she could see my screen better, and her cheek brushed my sweater, transferring some of the smudged banana guts. “Monte’s on TV?!”
“It’s not TV. It’s like, watching… Never mind. He’s not on there yet, but if I see him, I’ll let you know.”
She sighed and leaned back. I brushed the banana off my sleeve, watching with a sense of dread as she waved it dangerously close to my computer.
“I likeScooby-Doo. Can they find Monte?”
Scooby and the gang had been one of my favorite shows as a kid, and it made my heart soften a bit more, my ovaries clenching in that strange way all over. “I don’t think they’ll be able to come. They have a pretty tight schedule.”
Her little fingers almost touched the screen, and I grabbed her wrist just in time to save it from being streaked with the slime that had now taken over her entire hand. That was… fast… and disgusting.
Gage reappeared behind us, and I caught a hint of soap and clove—a heady scent that had always been his. “Go wash your hands and grab your backpack,” he told his sister.
After she’d slipped off the stool and run off toward the bedroom, he turned back to me. “She didn’t get you all slobbery, did she?”
I shook my head. “I prevented the worst of it.”
“I’ve never met anyone who can go from perfectly clean to utter disaster faster than Ivy.”
My lips twitched as I glanced around the clean apartment and wondered how much work it took to keep it that way with a little terror like her on the loose.
“I drove around most of the night, looking for him on the streets,” he said with a chin nod toward my screen where the steps of the Capitol buzzed with people coming and going. “I know his phone’s last location, but the phone company might be able to send me his history if I asked, right?”
