Chapter 7 #2
Her gaze traveled over the wallpaper. “Would you happen to know how to take that stuff down?”
“Yeah, but it’s probably not going to be easy. I’m betting there’s a lot of glue under there. Still, it’s doable. What do you want to do after you get it down?”
“I was thinking something less busy. Paint, probably.” She sighed. “But it’s not a priority. I just think about these things whenever I’m in here.”
“Got anything else you need repaired?”
She laughed softly. “Probably? I don’t know what though. Unless you can look at the drip in the kitchen sink? It’s very minor, but annoying in the middle of the night.”
“I’ll take a look.”
They went into the kitchen and he had the sink pulled apart and figured out in under a minute. “Washer’s old. Needs replaced.”
Paisley smiled and an electric current zapped over him, leaving the hairs on his arms standing. “Well, that’s not so bad.”
“Nope.”
Violet came into the kitchen then. She’d changed from pajamas to shorts and a T-shirt, and her hair was mostly combed. She had a coloring book and a box of crayons.
“Can I color, Mommy?”
“Yes, you may,” Paisley said. Her eyes softened as she looked at her daughter. He could remember when she’d looked at him that way. Long ago.
“Do you want to color, Mr. Ethan?” Violet asked, gazing up at him with golden-green eyes.
Pretty eyes. The color was similar to his own, but that didn’t mean anything.
He found himself wishing it did, though.
He tried to see any hint of Trey in her features, but all he saw was Paisley.
Her little chin, her serious expression, the shape of her lips. Those were Paisley’s for certain.
“Thanks, Miss Violet, but I can’t today. Another time?”
“Sure. I might have this book all colored in, but Mommy will get us another one.”
“Sounds good.”
She went into the living room and sat on the floor, spreading the book onto the worn coffee table in front of her. Then she selected a crayon from her box and started on the page.
“You’re pretty good with kids, you know that?” Paisley said quietly.
He followed her cue and lowered his voice so Violet didn’t hear them. “Never thought about it. I just talk to them like they can think for themselves.”
She grinned. “They can, but some of them will talk your ears off if you give them an opening. Trust me, I have experience.”
He must have looked puzzled because she continued.
“Children’s story hour at the library. You wouldn’t believe what some of them say.
” Her gaze slipped past him to Violet in the other room.
“She’s always been more inwardly focused.
Like me. She loves to play with other kids, but then she also likes her alone time.
Sometimes she tells me she’s done peopling for the day. ”
Ethan couldn’t help but snort a laugh. “That sounds like you all right.”
Her cheeks glowed. “It’s my fault she learned that phrase. I have to admit I find it amusing when she says it the way she does.”
His mind turned back to the original reason he’d found himself on her porch. “She’s a sweet kid. I’m sorry if she has trauma from what you both went through.”
Paisley’s gaze dropped. “Thank you.”
“I can get you a security system, Paisley. Nothing expensive. Just something to give you alerts so you can see who it is before you walk across that floor. The creaking boards from your footsteps are a dead giveaway that someone’s home.
If it’s someone you don’t want to talk to, you’ll know it before you creep to the door to peer out the peephole.
The system will also let you know if anyone suspicious is hanging around, or if anyone breaks in.
I know you have a restraining order, but think of this as another layer of protection. ”
Her mouth dropped open. Closed. “Why would you want to help me? I married your friend. And though I didn’t dump you, you have every reason to think it was me who sent that text and told you I’d moved on. It’s only my word that I didn’t.”
“Trey wasn’t my friend. We were work buddies. I thought I could trust him to do what I asked. I was wrong, and I’m sorry.”
“He fooled us both. I can’t blame you for not seeing what he was when I didn’t either.” Her voice was soft, troubled.
He dragged a breath into his tight chest. “I know you aren’t lying to me about the text. You forget I knew you pretty well, Payz.”
“People change, Ethan.”
Fresh guilt sliced into him. “Know that too. But I can more easily believe he blocked my calls and hid it from you. Then he sent a text to make me go away.”
He hadn’t considered it at the time because why would he? Trey hadn’t done anything in the short time Ethan was at Eglin to make him think he’d steal Paisley away and then hurt her. It had never occurred to him that Trey was capable of such a thing.
Trey’s deception had succeeded so fucking easily, and Ethan would never get over that. But what had he been supposed to do? Find time between missions to go to Florida and confront a woman who told him she was done with him? What kind of creepy stalker behavior was that?
Still, he wished he had. Maybe both their lives would have turned out differently.
“You must have been so angry when you got that text. And confused.”
He nodded. He’d left town excited for a future with her, and it was in pieces at his feet when he returned.
“I thought we had something, and I wanted to come back from the mission and see where we went together. But you’d moved on, and there was nothing I could do about it. I spent a lot of time asking myself how I got it so wrong. And then I moved on too.”
Or so he’d thought. Until seeing her again knocked the breath out of him and left him questioning everything he thought he knew. Maybe doing this for her, helping her, was the way to finally close the door on that chapter of his life.
She folded her arms around her middle. Protecting herself.
“I was so shocked when I saw you in the Dawg. It was like seeing a ghost come back to life.” She shook her head.
“We aren’t the same people anymore. Even if Trey lied to us both, that time is gone.
So I guess I just wonder why you’d want to help me when all it does is drag up the past for both of us? ”
He chose his words carefully. “Nobody knows about our history but us. But more than that, I know Trey McCann. Not as well as you do, but I know how he was trained, what he’s capable of.
Because I have the same training. So do my guys.
You said he threatened to kill you and you’re scared he’ll come for you, that you’ll have to live in fear for the rest of your life.
I can’t stand by and do nothing, Paisley.
Not when I share some of the responsibility for you ever meeting him in the first place. ”
“You don’t. He was in the bar that day, same as you. If you hadn’t been there, he still could have been. Maybe I’d have gone out with him and still found myself in the same place.”
He closed his eyes for a second. “Maybe you would’ve dated him, but that doesn’t mean you’d have ended up with him. You were upset because you thought I’d dumped you, and he took advantage of your feelings. Let me have my guilt, okay?”
She huffed a breath. “It’s not your fault, but I can’t stop you from feeling what you feel. Even if I disagree.”
“Now that we’ve got that out of the way, let me at least have a look around, see what you might need.
I’ll work up a quote for you. You can make payments if you have to.
Or, hell, cook me some of those Cajun dishes you learned from your mama and don’t worry about the money.
Just let me do this, Payz. For you and Violet. ”
She stared at him, her blue eyes brimming with emotion. Then she sighed, her shoulders slumping. “Fine, give me a quote. I want to know how much it is and then we can talk about how to proceed.”
“Great. You got time now for me to check things out or should I come back later?”
She looked at her smart watch. “I have to take Violet to the Parks’ house before I head to the library, but I don’t have to leave for another thirty minutes.”
“That’s enough time. I’ll need to go into all the rooms, and I’ll need to see the basement and attic. That okay with you?”
“Have at it.”
“Thanks. Need to go out to my truck and get a tape measure, unless you have one handy.”
“I don’t. Sorry.”
“Then I’ll get mine.”
She caught his arm as he turned away, then dropped her hand like he’d burned her. He understood the feeling because his skin stung where she’d touched him.
“Sorry,” she sputtered. “I-I just wanted to say that I appreciate this. So much. I don’t know that I’ll be able to afford it, but the fact you want to help us—it means a lot, Ethan. Thank you.”
“You’re welcome, Payz. And don’t go thinking you know the answer before I tell you the price, okay? We’ll make this work because you and your daughter deserve to live in peace and safety.”
She dropped her gaze to the floor. He didn’t wait for her to say another word. To stop him or place restrictions on him. He went outside to his truck, grabbed his tape measure, and returned to the cute Craftsman bungalow determined to make sure Trey McCann never laid a hand on Paisley again.
Because if he tried, Ethan didn’t think anything on this earth could stop him from making Trey suffer for what he’d done to the woman Ethan had once loved.
The woman he wasn’t sure he’d ever stopped loving.