Page 79 of Girl Lost
While she waited, he unbuttoned his dress shirt and tossed it in the front seat. The white cotton T-shirt he wore underneath wasn’t fashionable, but it was comfortable.
They set off down the dark street. The sound of ocean waves roared, even from blocks away. Corbin kept a careful distance betweenthem as they walked side by side. He wanted to close that gap, to reach out and touch her, to make sure she was really here. But he held back.
How should he begin? What should he say? He was terrified of saying the wrong thing, but he wanted to be honest. The way she’d been yesterday.
Just as he opened his mouth to speak, Luna broke the silence. “I’m sorry about the commissioner. The way he’s treating you, it’s not right.”
Carlie. The teen’s face flashed in his mind, her bright smile now forever dimmed. “I can see it from his side. His only child was murdered, and I didn’t stop it.”
“It’s the awful part of your job. You can’t blame yourself. He shouldn’t either.”
Couldn’t he? He was supposed to find her. He’d failed. And that wasn’t even the worst of it.
He kicked a rock, and it skittered across the asphalt into the grass. “I’m worried I might lose my job over this. I was already on thin ice, and then the incident with the fire ... I shouldn’t have let you come.”
“I didn’t give you much choice, now did I?” She turned her head toward him. “If you hadn’t agreed, I would’ve been there before you had a warrant. And then...” She looked away. “Then, I don’t know what would’ve happened.”
He thought about how she’d stood there, surrounded by flames, unwilling—or unable—to move. “I think I understand why the fire affected you the way it did. The explosion?”
“I froze. When I saw the flames. I just ... I couldn’t move. And you...” She trailed off, shaking her head.
“Luna, I—”
“No, let me finish.” She cut him off. “You saved me. Again. Just like you did all those years ago when Stryker first brought me to the program.”
Back then Luna, barely fifteen, was all hostility and distrust.Somehow he’d been the one to break through her walls, to show her that not everyone was out to hurt her.
“I didn’t save you,” he said. “You saved yourself. I just ... helped a little.”
Luna didn’t respond.
There was something else, something she wasn’t telling him. A lot, actually. He could see it in the way she avoided his gaze, in the tension in her shoulders. He let the silence linger.
“I froze in there.” She glanced at him, then back down. “That’s the first time it’s ever happened to me.”
He wanted to reach out. Pull her close. Tell her it was okay. But he held back.
They reached the beach and paused at the end of the wooden path to take off their shoes and socks. Corbin rolled up the cuffs of his pants and they left their shoes on the boardwalk. Luna bent and picked up a seashell. Wiped the sand off the ridges and tucked it in her pocket.
The sand was cool and soft beneath his bare feet as they made their way to the water’s edge. The ocean stretched out before them, an inky expanse broken only by the white foam of breaking waves.
To the east, the first hints of light were beginning to peek over the horizon. Sunrise was still an hour away, but already the night was losing its grip. In an hour, the sun would rise, painting the world in gold and pink, and they’d have to prepare for the day. To go undercover. Yeah, he should have tried for more sleep, but walking beside Luna, he couldn’t bring himself to regret it.
This was exactly where he wanted to be.
“So, what’s really on your mind?” The sound of the waves nearly drowned out her words, and he drifted closer.
They continued down the beach, the waves lapping at their feet. Corbin became acutely aware of Luna’s presence beside him. The way the predawn light softened her features. The slight brush of her arm against his as they navigated a piece of driftwood. His skintingled where they’d made contact, and he found himself wanting to close that gap again, but he resisted.
This was it. No more running. “I owe you an explanation. About why I left. Why I couldn’t ... why I thought I couldn’t be a father.”
Luna’s expression remained neutral, but Corbin caught the slight tightening around her eyes. A glimpse of the pain he’d caused her, still raw after all these years.
“I’m listening.”
He licked his dry lips, tasting salt on his tongue. Where to start? How to explain something he barely understood himself?
“It’s about Damien Sullivan. My father.”
