Chapter 9
The room they put me in is supposed to feel safe.
It has one narrow window set too high to look out of without standing on the chair beneath it, a heavy deadbolt on the door, and walls painted a flat beige that probably looked neutral and clean when somebody picked it out but now only make the space feel temporary.
There’s a small couch shoved against one wall, a television mounted in the corner, and a scarred wooden table with two mismatched chairs tucked beneath it.
A basket of toys sits near the couch, and a folded blanket that smells faintly like detergent rests on the arm.
It is, by every practical measure, a decent room.
Secure. Quiet. Hidden enough that my father was willing to put his daughter and granddaughter in it while he figured out how to move us again.
None of that changes the fact that I feel like I am waiting to be transferred from one cage to another.
Lexi sits cross-legged on the floor in front of the coffee table, completely absorbed in lining up crayons by color while an old cartoon plays quietly on the television.
Every now and then she hums to herself, something tuneless and soft, and the sound keeps me from coming apart more than once.
Her bunny is tucked beneath one arm, looking worn from being dragged everywhere.
She stops long enough to color a lopsided sun on a piece of paper, then glances up at me like she wants to make sure I’m still here before going right back to it.
I force a smile for her and get one in return.
That little expression is bright and trusting and undeserved, because I’m the reason we’re here.
I’m the reason she has spent the last stretch of her life being shuttled from place to place with whispered instructions and careful routes and people lowering their voices every time they say her name.
She should be worried about scraped knees and bedtime snacks, not whether Mommy looks scared when a door opens.
I sit on the edge of the couch with my hands wrapped around a mug of coffee that went lukewarm half an hour ago and stare at nothing.
My shoulders ache with exhaustion. My eyes burn.
I cannot remember the last time I slept more than a couple hours at a time, and even those hours never feel like rest. My body has forgotten what that is.
I exist in a constant state of bracing, like the world is always one breath away from impact.
I hate that.
I hate all of this.
I hate needing help. I hate being tucked away in my father’s clubhouse like something fragile and inconvenient.
I hate that everyone around me is trying so hard not to act like I’m a problem, which only makes me feel more like one.
More than anything, I hate that Cal has managed to make the world feel so small that even here, with locked doors and armed men between us and the road, I still can’t breathe all the way.
I draw in a slow breath and set the mug on the side table before I end up dropping it.
My father said this room was temporary.
Temporary has become one of those words that means less every time I hear it.
We’ll stay here for a little while, baby.
This is temporary, Raven.
Just until things calm down.
Just until I figure something out.
Just until we know where he’s looking.
Everything is temporary when you’re running from a man who has made it his mission to turn your life into a map of exits.
Lexi holds up her paper. “Mama, look.”
I blink myself back into the room and lean forward. “What’ve you got there?”
“A house.” She points proudly to a crooked square with a triangle roof and smoke curling out of a chimney in thick red lines.
The smoke is red because she likes red best, because she’s three and because it doesn’t occur to her yet that smoke is supposed to look like anything but whatever color she feels like using.
“That’s a beautiful house,” I tell her.
“It has flowers.”
It does. They are giant purple circles with green stems taller than the front door.
“It’s beautiful.”
She beams, satisfied, and goes back to coloring.
My chest tightens in that familiar, painful way it has lately whenever I look at her too long.
Lexi adapts faster than I do. She settles wherever I put her, takes comfort where she can find it, and trusts that as long as I am there, things will be okay.
That trust feels holy and impossible and terrifying.
There are moments when I look at her and wonder how much she remembers, how much she understands, how much she has absorbed without having words for any of it.
Children always know more than adults like to pretend they do.
There’s a knock on the door, two short taps and then one harder one, the rhythm my father has used my whole life. I stiffen anyway. The reaction is instant, ugly, and so deeply ingrained I can’t stop it. By the time I get to the door, my heart is already beating too fast.
I open it to find him standing there in his cut, big and broad and grayer than he used to be, the lines around his eyes cut a little deeper than I remember from before all of this.
Grinder. President of the Louisiana chapter.
My father to everyone who matters. He looks like solidity.
Like the kind of man men move aside for.
He also looks like he hasn’t slept much either.
His gaze flicks over my face, probably cataloging the tired I can’t hide, then moves past me to Lexi on the floor. He softens instantly for her. “There’s my best girl.”
Lexi launches up from the carpet with her bunny clutched to her chest and runs the few steps to him. He bends, scoops her up one-handed like she weighs nothing, and kisses the top of her head. She grins and wraps her arms around his neck.
“Papa.”
That word still nearly undoes me every time.
He makes a low sound in his throat and carries her inside, shutting the door behind him with his boot.
I watch him cross to the couch and settle with Lexi on his knee like the room isn’t too small for a man like him, like he isn’t carrying the weight of an entire chapter on his shoulders along with me and the mess I brought home.
“You colorin’ in here?” he asks her.
She nods and holds up the picture. “House.”
He studies it with a seriousness that makes her light up. “That’s real nice, sugar.”
“It has flowers.”
“I can see that.”
Purple circles and red smoke. My father treats the drawing like it belongs in a frame.
He glances at me after a minute. “Can I steal your mama for a second?”
Lexi looks between us, then back at her picture. “Okay.”
He sets her down carefully and waits until she’s back on the floor before tilting his head toward the far end of the room. I follow him to the narrow strip of wall between the window and the television, far enough away that we can talk without Lexi hearing every word if we keep our voices low.
“Everything’s set,” he says.
I hate the way those words make my stomach drop. “For when?”
“Tonight.”
My throat tightens. “Tonight.”
He nods once. “Safer that way. Less traffic, less notice. They’ll move you after dark.”
I look down at my hands because I can’t look at him and keep my expression under control at the same time. My fingers twist together restlessly, nails catching against skin. “How far?”
“Alabama.”
I lift my head. “That’s farther than we talked about.”
“That’s the point.”
“I know the point.” The words come out sharper than I mean them to, but I’m past the place where I can smooth every edge. My father doesn’t react to the tone. He only watches me with that steady patience he’s always had with me, even when I make it difficult.
“This chapter owes us,” he says. “And I trust them.”
I let out a breath that doesn’t help. “I’m so tired of people owing people.”
He doesn’t answer right away. His jaw works once, and for a second I can see the man under the president, the father under the patch, and he looks tired too. Tired and furious in a way he’s trying very hard to keep leashed.
“I know,” he says finally. “But right now owed is useful. Useful is what we need.”
I look away first.
There’s no arguing with the truth of that.
Pride does not keep your child safe. Pride does not get you through the night.
Pride certainly does not erase the fact that if I had reached out sooner, if I had pushed back sooner, if I had told my father what was happening before Cal managed to cut me off from everyone who ever loved me, maybe we wouldn’t be here at all.
Maybe I wouldn’t have waited until the ground was giving way under my feet.
Lexi laughs softly at something on the television, and the sound slices through me.
“I hate this,” I admit, the words rough and low. “I hate being moved around like luggage. I hate that he did this to us. I hate that I let it get this bad.”
My father’s expression hardens at the mention of Cal, though his voice stays even. “You didn’t let him do anything. He did it. That’s on him.”
I laugh once under my breath, and there’s nothing amused in it. “That might make me feel better if I didn’t remember every time I told myself it wasn’t that bad. Every time I thought if I just stayed quiet, or fixed the wrong thing, or stopped pushing back, maybe he’d calm down.”
“Raven.”
I shake my head before he can say anything else. “I know what you’re going to say.”
“Do you?”
I look at him then, really look at him, and for one ugly second I am seventeen again, angry and stubborn and sure I know better than everyone else.
Only there is nothing youthful in the exhaustion dragging at me now.
“You warned me to slow down. I didn’t. You said something about him felt off.
I told you that you were overreacting. He smiled at me and touched my back in all the right places and acted like I hung the moon, and I was stupid enough to think that meant something. ”
My father’s gaze does not waver. “It did mean something. It meant he knew how to lie.”
The brutal simplicity of that hits harder than comfort would have.