Chapter 25
twenty-five
. . .
Presley
My father and I finished our last loop with the sun shining down on us this morning.
“I think that’s a long enough walk for one day,” I said, as we made our way up the driveway after a two-mile walk. We’d been walking every morning this last week, and he appeared to be almost back to his old self.
“Yeah. I’m going to miss these walks,” he said as he pulled off his jacket. “It’s nice having the sun out again, isn’t it?”
“Yeah, it’s definitely warming up. I think it’s still fairly cold in New York.”
“Are you ready to go back and take the legal world by storm?” he asked as we stopped in front of the barn so he could check on the horses.
That had been the first thing he wanted to do once he was up and moving.
“Sure. I’m looking forward to getting back to my routine.” I ran my hand along Honey’s back.
“And you’ll be back for the opening of Tranquility?” he asked, and I couldn’t help but laugh.
“Yes. And Mom seems quite pleased that we went with her name,” I said.
“She sure is. And she told me about the mural you’re painting. She went into an awfully long, boring description about birds.”
I shook my head. “Yeah. It’s a long story. But I’m glad that she’s excited about it.”
“Well, you heard her at breakfast. She’s agreed to spend more time here now. If I had things my way, we’d live here full time. This is where I feel the most at home.”
I understood that better than he knew.
Better than I wanted to admit to myself.
I had obligations and responsibilities.
People relied on me at the firm.
“You sure do spend an awful lot of time with Cage and Gracie. Is that going to be hard when you leave?” He paused his brushing Honey to look up at me.
“Sure. But we knew it would come to an end. It’s been nice getting to spend time with them, but it always had an expiration date.
No one is going to get hurt this time.” Last night had been emotional.
Both my time with Gracie and my time with Cage.
Something had shifted. Like we all knew the end was looming, so we were holding on tighter. Making every second count.
He nodded. “I’m sure you’ll see them when you come back into town.”
“I don’t really know how it will work, Dad,” I said, my voice cracking on the last word. I was trying desperately to be strong, but I was dying on the inside. I wasn’t ready to say goodbye to them.
To us.
“You can’t be so stoic that you don’t tell someone how you feel. If you don’t know how it will work, why don’t you talk to him about it? You’re leaving tomorrow. It seems like the right time to have the conversation.”
I nodded and blinked several times to keep the tears away.
Once I was home, I would be busy, and I’d forget about how much fun I was having here.
At least, that was what I was desperately counting on.
“I love our new paintings, Presley,” Gracie said as Cage and I settled on a blanket beneath the large tree in the front yard.
She’d wanted to come sit out here so she could pick me a pretty arrangement from the wildflowers growing a few feet away in a little garden Brinkley and Gracie had planted together a few months ago.
It had snowed, and of course, they had all died, but Cage told me that he’d gone and bought a few flower beds and filled them a few days ago after the snow had melted so she’d think they were back in bloom.
This man.
“I love them, too. But yours is my favorite.” I squeezed her little hand.
God, I loved this girl.
It was an unexplainable kind of love.
I missed her when she was at school, or if I went a whole day without seeing her, I couldn’t wait to see her the following day. It was almost an ache that I had when she wasn’t around.
“Yours is my favorite, too,” she said before her eyes grew wide. “Daddy!”
“I’m right here.” He chuckled. “What’s up?”
He was sprawled out on the blanket, looking all rugged and sexy.
We were grateful for the sunshine that was out today, and I knew our time was coming to an end, so I wanted to savor every last bit of time with them.
I’d taken so many pictures of Cage and Gracie and a bunch of the three of us on my phone.
I think a part of me knew how painful it was going to be once I didn’t get to see them every day. And I didn’t know how much contact Cage would want to have once I was gone. I was going to talk to him about it today. Let him know that I wasn’t ready to say goodbye.
“Auntie Brinks got me a watering can. I left it in the house by the front door. Can I go grab it?”
“Yes. And I pulled the hose out so you can fill it up over by your garden.”
“Be right back,” she said, and she took off running. Cage and I both watched her as she hurried inside and then came running back outside, so excited she didn’t even close the front door all the way.
“Slow down, Gracie girl. There’s no rush. We don’t need you falling and getting hurt,” he said, and she looked back at him and smiled as she ran right past us toward her garden.
“You’re so protective. I love it.”
“I think sometimes I feel extra pressure, you know?” he said, and I sat forward to give him my full attention.
“What do you mean?”
“Well, I think when you have two parents, whether they are together or not, you still have someone to share some of that responsibility with. But for me, any time I think about doing anything, I have this voice in the back of my head reminding me that I’m all she has.
I can’t take risks or be selfish because if something happens to me, she doesn’t have a parent.
And it works both ways because I don’t have someone reasoning with me about being too protective.
My instinct is to keep her safe, and that’s what I do. ”
My heart sank at his words.
How could I bring up trying to make this work, trying to find a way to see one another once a month or something like that, when he had a child to think of?
He couldn’t make me his priority, and I would never ask him to, because one of the things I loved about him most now, was how he was as a father.
“You aren’t alone, though. You have your family, and you know, I, um,” I stumbled over my words. “I would love to be part of your life, and Gracie’s life.”
He reached for my hand, and his gaze locked with mine.
“How would that work? I mean, I can’t uproot her life, you know? I’ve got a practice here, and family, and a home.”
But I’m not here.
I wanted to say it, but I couldn’t.
“I know. I get it, Cage. I do. My life is there, and I don’t know anything else. I’ve been working so long toward this goal that I can’t see a different path.” I shook my head and looked away. “I would never ask you to move. I just, I don’t know. I’m not ready for this to be over.”
He leaned forward and used the pad of his thumb to swipe the tear rolling down my cheek away. “I’m not either. But I don’t have a solution. Not a realistic one, at least. I mean, I could come visit once or twice a year. You could come here that often. But what kind of relationship is that?”
I nodded. “Maybe once I establish myself as partner, I can make some demands in a couple of years. I can request to work remotely.”
I was reaching. The partners would never agree to that. I worked sixty-hour weeks. That was the way I’d been able to advance my career. Working long hours, doing whatever it took. And I’d loved it because I had nothing else in my life.
Before now.
“How about we just see how it goes, huh? But I need you to know something,” he said, leaning forward so his mouth was inches from mine.
“I love you. I’ve always loved you, and I always will.
Time may not ever be on our side, but I want you to know that.
I need you to know that. No matter how long we go without talking or seeing one another, you own this.
” He took my hand and pressed it to his heart.
“I love you, too, and I always will,” I said, my voice shaky.
“One day at a time, Raven.”
And just as I was going to lean forward and kiss him, I heard a shriek in the distance.
“Daddy! Maxine got out!” Gracie’s voice was laced with panic, and Cage was up and moving before I processed what was happening.
I pushed to my feet, and my world started to spin as I ran after them.
Cage was moving so fast as his deep voice traveled through the air. “Gracie! Stop!”
She was a good distance ahead of him, but I’d never seen someone run so fast in my life.
He was a blur he was moving so fast. He shouted again and sprinted just as a loud screech had my legs freezing.
The sound of brakes straining and tires skidding.
A blue car spun in the road as I saw Cage dive through the air to reach his daughter. It was like something out of a movie.
This couldn’t be real.
His large body slammed over the hood of the car, a loud bang as he dented the metal. Gracie’s hair flew around them as they disappeared from my line of sight.
There were screams and cries, and I pumped my arms and ran as fast as I could.
No sound left my lips as I saw the driver get out of the car.
His lips were moving, but I couldn’t hear anything.
I moved around to the front of the car to get to the other side, as Cage lay on the ground with Gracie in his arms as she shrieked and cried.
“Call 911!” I shouted to the driver as I hurried over to them.
Tears made it difficult to see.
“Daddy!” Gracie just kept saying his name as he scrambled to sit forward, his hands on her cheeks and her shoulders as if he couldn’t believe she was okay.
Blood and dirt and tears smeared together on her face.
“Oh my God. Are you okay?” My voice shook as I squatted down and tried to assess them. His forehead was bleeding badly, and his hands were scraped raw. I tugged off my sweater and wrapped it around Gracie as her little body shook.
The driver hurried over to us as sirens blared in the distance.
“Are you okay?” Cage asked his daughter over and over. “Gracie, are you okay?”
“Daddy, I’m sorry. I didn’t want Maxine to get hurt.” Her little sobs tore my heart to shreds.
Cage pushed to his feet, Gracie tucked protectively to his body, startling me and the driver when he got up.
“I don’t think you should move,” I said.
“Maxine!” Gracie shouted, and I saw the pig tucked in the bushes on the other side of the road.
“Maxine’s fine,” I said. “She’s okay. Tell me what hurts.”
My hands were running down her arms and legs, wiping the blood from her forehead only to realize it wasn’t coming from her. It was coming from her father.
“Nothing is hurting, but my daddy is bleeding,” she wailed. It was the most gut-wrenching sound, and I struggled to stay upright.
“Cage, you’re bleeding badly,” I said as I reached for his face and tried to find where it was coming from. I pressed my hand to his forehead, which was gushing blood now, and urged him to sit on the curb, but he refused.
He wouldn’t let me take Gracie, and I was fairly certain that he was in shock.
The paramedics were there, and they told him they needed to take her, and he still refused.
“She stays with me,” he said, his voice shaky now.
“Cage,” the man said, making it clear that they knew one another. “We need to assess both of you. She will be right here. But you’re bleeding badly, and we need to see where it’s coming from. We’re going to take you both to the hospital, okay? But you need to let her go.”
Cage turned to look at me. “Do not leave her alone. Promise me you’ll stay with her.”
“Of course I will.” My voice wobbled as the man pried Gracie from Cage’s arms, and she shrieked and tried to hold onto him.
I took her hand in mine. “I’m right here, Gracie. I’m right here with you.”
Several paramedics sprang into action. Gracie was placed on a gurney, and a female medic was asking her questions and flashing a light in her eyes as she squeezed my hand and continued to cry for her father, and then she pointed at Maxine, who was still standing in the bushes, shaking.
I looked over to see four paramedics working on Cage, as one was calling something into the radio, but it was all a blur. The driver of the car stood there staring and looking a little shocked as the police officer questioned him.
The officer came over to speak to me as they were loading Gracie into the ambulance, and I cut him off. “You’ll have to talk to us at the hospital. I need you to go get that pig and just shove her inside the house and pull the door closed, please. She’s friendly. Can you do that?”
He nodded. “Of course.”
Gracie and Cage were loaded into two different ambulances, and my heart split in two as I saw the pain in his eyes when he looked over at me.
“You stay with her, Presley. Call my parents.”
I nodded as the tears rolled down my cheeks, and I kept hold of Gracie’s hand and moved inside the ambulance.
I dialed Alana, and when I tried to speak, the words were jumbled as the lump in my throat made it difficult to talk.
“You need to come to the hospital,” was all I was able to get out.
“We’re on our way,” she said. Her voice was even, but I heard the fear.
I ended the call and turned my attention to Gracie, who was looking up at me. Her dark eyes were a mix of sadness and fear.
“Hey, I’m right here. I’m not going anywhere, okay? Daddy’s right behind us.”
She nodded and sniffed as the medic wiped some of the blood from her forehead and searched her head for any injuries.
“You’re going to be okay. It looks like you got away with very few scratches,” she said, patting her on the shoulder.
“Is Daddy mad at me, Presley?” she asked, as more tears slipped down her cheeks.
“Of course not. He’s just so happy you’re okay.”
“But I’m not supposed to go in the street. I was just trying to catch Maxine. I didn’t see the car.”
“I know you didn’t. Everything is going to be okay. I promise.”
And I just hoped like hell that it was true.