44. Hailey
FORTY-FOUR
I’d heard that it only takes one event to reform the entire shape of your life.
One moment to construct a different mold.
One second to reconfigure the truth of what you knew.
I trembled in the aftermath of it, my mind trying to process the catastrophic incident from earlier this afternoon.
My spirit screamed with the horror of what I had brought to this town.
With what I had caused.
With what I had done.
“Would you stop it?” Cody rumbled.
“No, I won’t stop it.” I could barely speak around the rawness of my throat.
“While I appreciate your fretting, darlin’, I can promise you it isn’t necessary.”
I inhaled a shaky breath.
I couldn’t calm down.
Couldn’t soothe the dread.
Couldn’t assuage the fear that he could have been killed.
He could have been killed.
Because of me.
Because of me.
“I think it’s very necessary.” I choked out the words as I tried to help Cody from the front seat of my Durango. It wasn’t like I could support the weight of the man, but God, I was going to try.
Cody eased out onto his feet, sporting a grin like this wasn’t a big deal and he hadn’t spent the last six hours in the ER being treated and observed. “I barely got a scratch.”
Disbelief left me on a shaky exhale as I tried to hold onto his wrist that didn’t have any bandages on it.
“Barely a scratch? You have stitches in four different places, bruised ribs, a cracked collarbone, and a severe burn on your arm.”
Shattered glass had been imbedded all over his body, impaling him like darts as he’d been sent rocketing back like an arrow. The explosion had burned him, his hair singed, and it’d scorched his forearm and hand that had been closest to the truck, and they said it was likely he’d suffer some permanent hearing damage.
It’d been his saving grace, though—the fact that he hadn’t been inside the truck when the explosive had gone off. I had to believe Pruitt knew I was supposed to have been attending a meeting this evening. That he somehow knew that I wouldn’t be leaving with Cody that evening.
But how?
Grief crawled around in my chest, slithering like a snake, the sensation sticky and gross.
Tears pricked behind my eyes.
I fought to hold them back.
“And they shot me full of something that made me feel just fine.” Cody tossed another grin at me as we ambled up the walkway and onto the porch.
He’d left the hospital against medical advice since they’d wanted him to stay overnight for observation. But he’d refused, insisting that he needed to be home with me and Maddie and Lolly, which only made me worry more.
I stayed right at his side, hands fumbling as I tried to keep him steady, even though he was standing just fine.
But what if he hadn’t been?
Sorrow bound, clotting off oxygen. I wheezed around it.
“If I went tumbling onto my ass right now, Hailey, I’d be taking you down with me,” he teased. “I wouldn’t stand so close if I were you.”
“Liar,” I muttered under my breath.
We crossed the porch, our footsteps thudding on the wooden planks.
We stopped in front of the door, and I tipped my face up to him.
“Liar,” I whispered again.
Confusion pinched his brow.
“You would absolutely be standing right here, holding me up, if the tables were turned.”
Understanding dawned, and his smirk softened, his smile going so tender that I ached. “Of course, I would, darlin’.”
“Then don’t ask me not to stand by you.”
I turned and unlocked the door.
It was close to midnight, and it was silent inside.
Maddie had gone to sleep hours ago, having no clue there’d been any issue, while Lolly had texted me incessantly until about ten when I’d finally convinced her Cody was okay.
If only I could convince myself of the same thing.
Cody had demanded that I not call his family. He wanted to be the one to do it. To be able to go to them and tell them he was okay without them running to the ER terrified.
I’d tried to argue and tell him they would want to know—that they deserved to know—because they loved him.
Loved him fiercely.
But he’d asked this one thing of me so I had to respect it.
We kept our footsteps quieted as we stepped inside, and I deadbolted the lock behind us.
Anguish fisted my spirit.
The truth of what this had come to. That reshaping. The reforming.
A conflict of what I wanted and what I had to do.
This was exactly what Pruitt wanted, though, wasn’t it?
He wanted me terrified. He wanted me bent to his will. And he didn’t care what it cost to force me into that position.
Cody’s boots scudded on the floor as we trudged across the great room, my thoughts so heavy that I could barely see.
I realized my breaths were heaving from my lungs in short gasps by the time we made it into my room, agony claiming my existence.
I dropped my attention to the floor in an attempt to gather myself.
To hold it back.
To rein in the spiraling.
The door clicked shut behind us, and I turned to Cody who stood facing me.
The bathroom light was on, and it shed enough light on him that I could plainly see he was battered.
His hair black from the smoke and the fire, his jaw red from the burn.
His shirt was tattered and torn and filthy with soot.
A bandage covered his left forearm and ran down to the back of his hand, and there were little bandages covering the spots where he had gotten stitches.
Agony swept through me. Wave after wave.
How could I have let this happen? How could I have been so selfish that I’d invited him into my life? Knowing the danger?
“Shortcake.” He murmured it through the ghosts that played through the room.
I curled my arms over my chest like it could hold together the pieces that were fracturing apart.
“Don’t call me that.”
It was a plea.
A plea for him to turn and leave.
For him to see that he should run.
He had his whole life out ahead of him, and I’d nearly been the one responsible for cutting it short.
“Now why would I go and do that?” he rumbled in that low voice.
Moisture blurred my eyes, an excruciating burn running up my throat. “Because you need to leave. Let go. I can’t ask you to keep putting yourself on the line like this. You could have?—”
It croaked off.
I couldn’t say it aloud.
Cody took a step forward, and the floor shook beneath my feet. “But I didn’t.”
I blinked against the pain. Against the riot that thrashed at my chest.
“Maybe this is payback, Cody. Punishment for the sin I’m committing. You need to get away from me. Before it’s too late.”
A scowl compressed every line on his handsome face. “What are you talking about?”
I couldn’t contain the tears, and they slipped hot and fast down my face, the guilt I’d been trying to suppress finally breaking free.
“Brooke.” Her name dropped from my tongue like a boulder of regret.
Surprise sent him blinking. “Brooke?”
I squeezed my arms tighter across my chest. “She loved you, Cody. She loved you, and she wanted to be with you. She saw us that day…the day we almost…” I cut off, the words jagged and barbed, sticking to my lips. My breaths cleaved, so harsh they ripped and slayed.
“She saw us.” I whispered it that time. “I promised her I would never do that to her. That you and I were only friends and that was the only thing we were ever going to be. But she was so upset…so upset…”
I gasped it, my arms squeezing so tight like I could keep the mangled mess that was my heart confined within the gaping of my ribs. “She never would have gone into that corral. Never. She was terrified of those horses. I know she…”
I couldn’t fully give it voice. Her death had been ruled an accident. But I knew. I’d always known.
“Fuck, Hailey.” Sorrow rippled from Cody, and he took another step closer. “I can’t believe what you’re saying, but if she did, you’ve got to know that wasn’t your fault. None of this is your fault.”
“It is, Cody. She went running out that night. I…I didn’t stop her. I thought she needed time to cool off, and once she did, she’d understand and forgive me. Forgive me for wanting you because God knows how much I did, and Brooke knew it, too.”
A sob tore out of me. It was the first time I’d ever admitted it aloud. The first time I gave voice to the horrors of what I’d believed.
I’d held it for years. A dirty secret that had haunted. What had driven me to a place I never should have gone.
Massive arms wrapped around me, and Cody pulled me tight against him, his breath a whisper across my hair, as quiet as the words he confessed. “If that was anyone’s fault, then it was mine, darlin’. Mine and mine alone.”
“You told her you loved her. How could you say that and not mean it?” The question was pocked with soggy, gasping tears.
Cody froze, and his arms went rigid. Regret pilfered from his nose. “I didn’t, Hailey. I never told her that. Would never lie about that. If I tell someone I love them, I fucking mean it.”
Sobs kept erupting.
Uncontrolled.
Unchecked.
I wanted to accuse him of being a liar. But once I’d opened the box where I’d stored away the memories, it came flooding back.
Brooke had wanted him to. She’d wanted him to love her.
But he hadn’t. It had been clear.
I’d chalked him up to being a player.
Toying with both of our emotions.
But that wasn’t him.
“It broke my heart, too, when you were with her.” The revelations kept coming, the stress of the day pushing me to my breaking point. I was no longer able to contain what had been brewing for years.
His regret doubled, and those strong arms pulled me tighter, his voice splintered pieces of gravel. “I’m sorry. I’m fuckin’ sorry for hurting you. I couldn’t touch you, Hailey. Couldn’t. Not when you were this sweet, innocent girl my gut warned me I would wreck.”
He inhaled a shattered breath. “Because I wanted you in a way that I knew wasn’t right, and I’d be a bastard to touch you, so I did everything in my power to stay away from you. It was hard, though, every time you came around, shining so damned bright when I was in the middle of this shit that I knew was going to ruin my life.”
He was injured, but he kept drawing me closer, like there was no chance he could get close enough. I clung to him, too, my consciousness spinning. “What shit, Cody?”
Shame filled his sigh, though he didn’t let me go. “My mother was going to lose her house. I couldn’t let that happen. The Wagner Ranch manager at that time heard I was looking to make some extra money and he offered me an opportunity. The guy was crooked, Hailey. Running illegal bets down at the horse track over in Eddings. I didn’t know it when he offered it, but I was hired to shake guys down when they didn’t pay up.”
Alarm blared in the back of my mind.
Cody felt it, and he somehow hauled me closer.
“He was a bad guy, Hailey. Really bad. I didn't realize just how bad until I was in too deep. After he’d already given me enough money to pay off my mother’s debt. After I’d already taken the money and given it to her...”
“What happened?” I almost begged it.
A shiver rocked down Cody’s spine. “There was this guy who’d gotten a couple beat downs. Owed a shit ton. Refused to pay. Brent came to me with an extra hundred grand to take care of the problem.”
Horrified disbelief slammed me on a rogue wave. “Oh my God.”
Cody’s throat rolled heavily as he swallowed. “It’s why your father hates me. I went to him for help, and I confessed what was going on. He called a friend at the Feds to take care of Brent and break up the ring he was running. He told me I got a free pass since I’d done the right thing and come to him, but he warned if I ever showed my face anywhere near him or his family again, he was going to see to it that I never had the capacity to make that mistake again.”
He sucked for the air that had gone missing. “It was the day I left, Hailey. When I came to tell you goodbye because I couldn’t leave without doing it. Then I turned my back and buried my head and kept my nose clean for the last six years, always looking over my fucking shoulder for the day those crimes were going to catch up to me. Worried that someone who knew me then was going to come back for me. That, or your father would finally turn me in.”
“Cody.” I whimpered his name. “But you’re here. With me.”
After every warning.
After every danger.
He pulled back, his thumb tracing beneath the hollow of my eye, the gold of his gaze flaming in the muted light.
“Told you that you’re worth it. Whatever the cost, Hailey, you’re worth it. If anyone has Karma coming their way, it’s me, Hailey. It’s me. So drop this bullshit that you’re in any way responsible for this.”
He was wrong, though.
Pruitt was my responsibility. Cody had nearly been killed because of him.
I blinked through the tears that wouldn’t stop falling. “Pruitt isn’t going to stop until I give in.”
“Pruitt can go to hell.”
“This isn’t some drunk guy at a bar throwing fists, Cody.” I begged it. “Pruitt is dangerous, and he won’t let anyone get in the way of what he wants. I should have realized the lengths he would go. I should have run far away, hidden where he could never find us. I never should have come here.”
Cody pulled back and cupped both hands around the sides of my face. “Fuck that, Hailey. You’re right where you belong. With me.”
“I won’t be responsible for you getting hurt any more than you already have been.”
Cody gave me the slightest shake of his head. “It’s too late for me, darlin’.”
He kept staring down at me, both thumbs brushing my cheeks.
Energy thrummed.
Pulsing and compelling.
That connection writhed in the space.
Demanding to be acknowledged.
“It’s too late,” he repeated. “I’m already gone. Already done for. Already yours.”
“Cody.” His name shuddered off my tongue.
Begging him to stop.
To see reason.
His thumbs swept over the moisture that wouldn’t stop falling, voice rough when he murmured, “I’m in love with you, Hailey. So in love with you that there isn’t a piece of me left that doesn’t belong to you.”
My lips parted on a shattered exhalation.
Cody just held me tighter, his nose dropping close to mine. “I’ve made a million mistakes in my life, but standing here, with you? For you? That’s not one of them. Because when you love someone the way I love you? You don’t bail when things get rough. You stand closer to them in their battles. You pick them up when they fall. You carry them when they can’t run. You love them with all you’ve got because they are the very meaning of time. Because you and Maddie are the reason I’m living it. You are the sun setting and the sun rising. Every minute. Every second. Every fucking beat.”
I swayed beneath the power of his words.
Beneath the power of his touch.
His hand slipped down to the side of my neck, his words harsh and sweet. “You got me, Hailey. You’ve got all of me.”
“Cody.” I rasped over his name.
The emotion I’d been trying to hold back burst free.
Got loose of the sacred place I’d tried to keep it shored.
Where guilt had lived.
But it couldn’t thrive there anymore.
“I love you, Cody. I love you so much, and there is a piece of me that always has. I tried not to, to deny it, to ignore what I always felt, but I don’t think there was a way to stop myself from falling in love with you.”
Playfulness kicked up at the edge of his mouth. “Well, I’m pretty impossible not to love.”
I choked over a soggy laugh, and my chest squeezed as I gazed up at his rough, masculine beauty.
At his battered face and his flawless heart.
“You’re right. It’s impossible. It’s impossible not to love you.”
His expression intensified. “You’re it for me.”
I gulped around the love that rushed. “Good because I won’t let you go.”
Because of it, I knew what I had to do. I was terrified of it, but I couldn’t let Pruitt get away with his cruelty. Couldn’t let him continue spreading his wickedness in the world.
He needed to be stopped.
And it was time we were free.
“Now that we got that cleared up.” Mischief played across Cody’s face, sparks flickering like greed in those gold-flecked eyes, right before he crushed his mouth against mine.
This kiss was searing.
A mark.
A brand.
A claiming.
I wanted it.
I wanted him written all over me.
On every inch of my body and in every recess of my heart.
But I was also brutally aware that he had almost died today.
“We can’t,” I urged against the force of his kiss.
Cody pulled back, still holding onto both sides of my face, mouth cocked in that smirk.
“Oh, but we can.”