Page 75 of Beyond the Blue Horizon
It was the hardest part.
Letting them go in the end.
Putting my trust in the idea that they were going to blend into society and their tormentors would never be able to uncover where they lived.
Cash kept an eye from afar, but I could never fucking stop worrying about their safety. Wrought with a tumble of all the faces that had come under our care through the years. Hoping to fuck they were okay.
“While they’re here, I can’t slip. Need you to make sure that fucker Pierce Renfry is still clueless in Philadelphia.”
With him digging, it set me even more off kilter.
“I’ll do a full sweep, but I think you’re freaking for no reason. Someone was probably just swinging by to see if your fine establishment is somewhere they’d want to stay. You know, since it’s the most sought-after motel in all of Moonlit Ridge.”
Dude said it like a tease.
I grunted at him.
“Cover is solid, and you know it,” I said.
“Yeah, it’s good, brother. And I know you’ll always keep it that way.”
“Just let me know if anything is out of sorts.”
“Will do.”
He ended the call, and I blew out a sigh to release some of the tension. Trying to erase the dread that sat like a rock in the pit of my stomach. The sense that something had been off with that SUV.
Even though Cash had given me every reason not to worry about it, there was something about it that didn’t sit right.
A feeling that something was off.
Problem was, I wasn’t quite sure where that feeling was coming from.
I turned in the lot, my focus traveling to the outlines of the two cabins that could barely be distinguished between the trees.
Heart tugging like mad as my thoughts moved to Piper.
Wondering if it was her that set me off kilter. If it was the awareness that she was hiding something that set me on edge.
If this thing that made me feel like I was losing my grip was entirely because of the woman who was crawling right under my skin.
Her and that little boy whose smile might be the death of me.
Guilt constricted, sharp claws tearing at the inside of my throat.
My greatest failure screamed from that black hole in the deepest part of me.
The truth that I didn’t know how to love even when I tried.
There was something intrinsically broken inside me.
Maybe I’d inherited it from my parents.
Maybe it was some mutilated part of my DNA.
The only thing I knew for sure was I only fucked things up and made them worse.
Shame clamped down on my chest.
