Page 51 of Hideaway Whirlwind
Goldie eyes me as I twist my wet hair up into a towel. “Layla set him straight. He knows not to come near you again.”
“What? That’s not what I want,” I blurt, saying out loud for the first time what I can no longer stuff deep down inside. “And I barely know Layla. That wasn’t her conversation to have with him.”
Goldie straightens, dropping her arms. “He’s her brother-in-law.”
“And he’s my—” My what?My Elliott. Mine.“Crap.” I rub my eyes. Since my number one priority is my kids, sickened by the thought of what they might have heard, I tell Goldie, “I’ll talk to him later.”
“You can’t be serious.” Bewildered, she grabs my arm to stop me from walking away. “He attacked you and tried to force—”
I shake her hand off. “No, he didn’t. He was scared and wanted to make sure the baby and I weren’t hurt. He freaked out. We both did.”
“Teagan…You don’t have to make excuses for his abusive behavior.”
“You know Elliott. He’s intense, yes, but he would never purposefully hurt me.” Other than the biting, of course, which I more than welcome. My hand drifts to my neck, missing the scrape of my big, overprotective bear’s teeth.
Goldie’s shoulders slump, and she’s giving me a look—one that says she thinks I can’t or won’t face the truth. But she’s wrong. My eyes are wide open.
“He’s dangerous,” she says, as if pleading with me one last time to see things her way.
“Yeah, well, so am I,” I snap, leaving Goldie with her mouth hanging open.
Davis is walking circles around the living room and kitchen with Rowan while Russell is at the table, putting together another strange jigsaw puzzle with the older kids. It should be Elliott sitting at the table, not Russell. The table itself should be round instead of rectangular, fitting only four or five, not eight. The kitchen should be paneled with dark wood instead of modernized with fresh paint and a massive island that would never fit inside the cabin’s kitchen. It’s all so wrong.
Dustin stands and sprints toward me, nearly knocking me off my feet with the strength of his hug. “I love you, Mommy.”
I grip his arms and pull him back so I can kneel. “I love you, too, baby.”
He cups my face, studying me as if looking for bruises, dried tear tracks streaking his cheeks.
“I’m okay,” I say, pulling him into a rib-crushing hug. “Elliott didn’t do anything to hurt me, I promise.”
Dustin nods, pushing his face into my neck. “I told Papa I’d kill him if he hurt you,” he whispers, trembling, afraid he’s going to get in trouble.
Before I can think of how to respond, Dustin follows up his confession with, “He said that’s alright.”
Oh fuck.
My eyes go straight to Russell, who stands and pushes in his chair.
“Papa said he loves us.” Dustin pulls back, wearing a tremulous smile. “I love him, too.”
Russell releases a heavy exhale with a mix of murder andgrief in his eyes, clenching his ham fists, having heard everything. I know him even less than I do Layla, but IknowElliott, and I see much of his brother in him.
“I’ll talk to Elliott,” Russell says quietly.
“Don’t,” I say, pushing up from the floor and turning Dustin around, hugging my son from behind. “I’ll talk to him. No one else.”
Russell raises a dark gray brow, and he and Davis make brief eye contact. I ask Dustin to sit and work on the puzzle for a few more minutes while I follow Russell and Davis to the front door. Before Russell leaves, I put a hand on his arm to stop him. That feels wrong, too, and I quickly snatch it back.
“Elliott didn’t hurt me. He wouldn’t ever hurt me,” I tell the men in an urgent voice.
Russell tightens his lips, pointedly flicking his gaze to the kids. He doesn’t believe me. Thinks I’m saying it—lying—for the kids’ benefit, just like Goldie.
“He didn’t hurt me,” I insist, keeping direct eye contact.
My irritation rises when Russell and Davis give each other anotherlook, dismissing my comments, before Davis follows Russell outside.
As soon as the men are gone, I sit with the kids, asking seemingly innocent questions to parse out if they heard anything that happened in the bathroom. So far, it only seems to be Dustin who has had any inkling that something was wrong.
