Page 16 of Sacrifice
He doesn’t want to.
“I believe I was invited by my niece to go to the park. If you don’t want to come, go home.” He shrugs and starts off down the sidewalk.
I watch them walk away, my daughter’s giggles flowing through the air like a pretty song. It warms my heart. But the sight of Crew with her doesn’t.
The closer they get will just cause her to get hurt more in the end. He’s in a prime position to make her life better or destroy her and I can’t control the way it falls.
I force my feet to move and follow them down the sidewalk and into the park. Crew squats down and lets Ever climb off. She makes a beeline to an open swing and pushes off, pumping her little legs as her hair flies behind her. Crew leans against a tree nearby and watches.
I take a deep breath and stand next to him. The corner of his lips twitch as he waits for me to break the ice.
He can wait all day.
I cross my arms over my chest and ignore him.
He chuckles and pushes away from the tree, standing straight. He isn’t as tall as Gage was, but still several inches taller than I am.
“If you don’t wanna be here, I’ll bring her home.” He doesn’t look at me when he speaks, just watches Ever play.
“Of course I want to be here. I can’t understand why you want to be though.”
He lets his teeth graze over his bottom lip. He turns to face me. His eyes are narrowed and I can tell he’s thinking about how to reply.
“It’s time I man up.”
I bite back a laugh. “Really? You just woke up this morning and thought, ‘Ah, I think I’ll take my niece to the park today’?”
“Something like that.”
“We’ve made it without you coming to the park with us for a long time. Feel free to leave.”
He turns to me and I take a step back. I’ve seen this look a few times and I know by the way his eyes have darkened—he’s itching for an argument.
“Why do you act like this, Jules?”
“Like what?”
“Like a bitch.”
“Crew.” I gasp, not used to hearing him talk like that to me.
“Well,” he says, spreading his arms out to his sides, “tell me how else to explain it.”
“Like a mother protecting her child.”
“Protecting her from what?”
“You.”
“Fromme?You’re fucking kidding me, right?”
I shrug and look back to the playground. Ever is now digging in the sandbox with a little girl her age. The sand is wet and getting stuck in her hair. She’s giggling and building a sandcastle; I’ll be picking sand out of the washer for a week.
“You do realize that everything I do is to protect her, right?” His tone demands attention. Without thinking, my eyes are drawn back to him. He’s watching me, his face passive, but his eyes are on fire. “My life would be a lot easier if I just worked and fucked and drank a little.”
I glare at him to cover the touch of hurt his words cause. I know we weigh him down and that’s embarrassing, even though I don’t ask him to help us. “Yeah, well, that’s really worked out for you so far.”
His mouth drops, then clenches. “What I do isn’t for you,Jules.It’s for Gage, for Ever.”
