Page 123 of Already At Risk
“Iknow,” Chloe cut me off, adding five extra syllables to the word through her groan. She said it in a way that made me think this was a repeat conversation for her. That maybe Natalie had already had this talk. “Butwhy? You just said you like her. And she says she likes you.”
My lips twitched as I tried to control my reaction to that.
They’d definitely had this conversation before, and while Iknewthat meant that Natalie and I needed to be more careful around Chloe, it also warmed parts of me that I’d recently learned existed.
“Because there are rules about that,” I said, giving her a factual answer. “Since I’m her lawyer.”
Chloe pouted into her pizza for a moment before flashing a look filled with curiosity. “But youdolike her?”
I nodded with a gentle smile. “Of course I do. I like her. I like you. I like your whole family, Chloe.”
She narrowed her eyes at me, perceptive enough to know thatI was avoidingfullyanswering her question, but she dropped the topic.
I got Chloe to bed by nine, and honestly, I wasn’t sure if that was normal for her. But even if it was a little later than usual, it was summer, and Chloe said she didn’t have day camp tomorrow. I wondered how that might work with Natalie’s schedule, especially depending on how long she got stuck at the hospital, but if I needed to take a day off to help, I’d take a day off. Or Chloe might even like to take a little trip to Gardner Law.
I didn’t hear from Natalie for most of the night. I got one response from her around ten, after I’d sent an update that Chloe had gone to bed and all was well. She said that it was still going to be a while, that she was so sorry. I told her not to worry, knowing that she probably was. I was fully prepared to camp out on her living room couch tonight.
But to my surprise, Natalie walked in the door a little after one in the morning, wearing a vacant expression that terrified me more than any tears might. It wiped away all the relief that I felt just from seeing her make it home again.
I stood from where I’d been hunched over paperwork at the kitchen island and took a tentative step toward her. She looked skittish.
“You’re awake,” she said with a dumbfounded look. “I should have told you. I—you could have slept.”
“I know,” I assured her. “But I had some things I had to finish up. And I was waiting…in case you got home.”
Like hell would I have been able to sleep before she made it back to me and Chloe.
Natalie nodded. She stared down at her feet, like she didn’t know how to move them.
“Why don’t you sit down, Natalie?” I offered, using the softest voice I could muster, walking around the island to grab her electric kettle from the corner of the kitchen. Natalie watched me, unmoving, while I filled it up and turned it on. Just like I had the first night I was here after oneof her shifts.
Tonight was different, though.Shewas different, more broken, and I could barely handle seeing it. Especially when I started toward her as the kettle began heating, and she took a step back.
I felt a cracking sensation just behind my sternum.
It took everything in me, but I retreated, moving instead through the kitchen to find the tea packets and a mug.
“I already gave Annabeth her nighttime treats,” I said. “She came looking for them earlier, and I couldn’t say no. She didn’t get more than two, though. I promise.”
Natalie was silent. A glance over my shoulder told me she was processing, her eyes glazed over, her head nodding.
“Thank you,” she whispered after a second. She’d still been holding her bags but slowly lowered them to the ground, plopping them by her feet. She stepped over them, slipped her shoes off, and then quietly padded to the barstools at the island, sliding onto one of them.
She froze, sending me into a panic until I realized she’d spotted the flowers on the counter. Her lips parted as she stared at them, almost like she’d never seen flowers sitting in a vase in her kitchen before, like it was an entirely new concept.
“Chloe wanted to get those for you,” I murmured, trying to focus on making tea but continuing to get sidetracked by Natalie—everything about her. She reached out, brushing her fingertips over the petals of a flower. When her eyes flicked to mine, they were watery.
“Chloe wanted to get these for me?”
I nodded and dunked a tea bag into the steaming mug before handing it to her.
“Chloe wanted to get me flowers?” she repeated.
“Yeah.” My lips stretched in a smile. “She did.”
“She picked out…sunflowers?” she asked, and the corners of my mouth tilted further, my grin growing.
I suspected she knew the answer to that question, but sheseemed desperate for a response. So I just shook my head and said, “No, Sunshine. She didn’t pick them out.”
