Chapter 15
The evening settled around us, surprising for such an odd turn of events.
When Junie insisted again that the pig could sleep in her room, I shut that down gently but firmly. Daisy backed me up, and the pig ended up in a dog kennel with a soft blanket and a heat lamp from the barn.
Junie sat on the floor to feed Piggie from the bottle, the piglet’s snout making wet snuffling sounds as she drank.
Daisy sat beside her, hair falling over her shoulder, a soft smile tugging at her lips. She played with Junie’s hair absently, looking like the most natural thing in the world.
“You know, my mom died,” Junie said as she brushed a hand over Piggie’s face. “And Dizzy’s mom died when she was little too.”
Daisy’s hand stilled, but she didn’t interrupt.
Junie tipped the bottle a little higher. “That doesn’t mean you don’t have a family.” She glanced up at Daisy, then down at the piglet. “We can be your family.”
The words hit me low and hard.
Daisy leaned down and kissed the top of Junie’s head, tears glistening in her eyes.
I leaned back against the doorframe, arms crossed over my chest. Between helping my sister rebuild her life and stepping into caring for Junie, I’d spent the last year holding everyone together with sheer stubbornness.
I wasn’t the flashy forward. Never had been. I was the defenseman—the one who held the line, took the hit, and made sure everyone else stayed standing.
Protecting my sister. Junie. Daisy. Hell, this whole chaotic little world.
That part I understood.
But how did I protect people from the pain that didn’t come with an opponent I could see?
Their grief wasn’t something you blocked or absorbed—it was something you lived with. I couldn’t take it from them or carry it for them, no matter how badly I wanted to. And that hurt me, too.
Together, the three of us got Piggie settled for the night, then it was Junie’s turn for bed.
Daisy helped her through bath time, then lay in her bed next to her, making up stories better than any children’s book I’d ever read.
Their soft laughter drifted down the hall to where I sat in the living room.
I soaked it in, already dreading the day the house would be silent once more.
The living room was quiet, bathed in the soft glow from the TV. Rowdy was curled up in front of it, chin resting on his front paws, eyes half-lidded.
Daisy tiptoed down the hall after changing for bed, barefoot and sleepy, her hair tousled from lying beside Junie. The cushions dipped when she sank onto the couch, and for the first time all day, everything felt still.
“Baseball, huh?” She gestured toward the TV, where I had the volume turned down on the game. “I played softball as a kid.”
I glanced her way, surprised. She’d never said much about her childhood aside from her brief mention in court. “Shortstop?”
“Yeah.” She nodded, then looked over at me. “How’d you guess?”
“Impulsive. Optimistic to a fault. A little reckless, right?”
Her lips curved. “That’s right. Guess you were listening, hm?”
If she only knew how many times I’d replayed that night in my head—her nervous chatter, the way her laugh hit me harder than a slapshot. I’d told myself it was nothing, timing gone sideways. But I’d never stopped hearing her laughter in the back of my mind.
Daisy tucked her legs under her, turning toward me. Even in the dim light, her eyes caught the flicker from the TV, crystalline and curious.
“I don’t get you, Ty Hudson. Are you this nice all the time?”
My mustache twitched as I tried not to smile. “You say that like it’s a bad thing.”
“No,” she said, shaking her head. A loose wave of hair slid forward, brushing her cheek. “It’s just a lot. You’re the animal rescue, hockey coach, foster dad superhero. Doesn’t it get exhausting being that good?”
I shifted toward her, one arm resting along the back of the couch. The movement drew her in too—close enough that her knee brushed against my thigh. The touch was nothing, but it still sent a low hum through my chest.
When her hair fell forward again, I reached up and brushed it back. My fingers grazed her skin, warm and soft, and she inhaled—barely audible, but enough to wreck my focus.
“I like those things,” I said, forcing the words out. My hand lingered, thumb tracing a faint arc against her temple before I dropped it. “I like taking care of the people I love.”
She held my gaze, the dim light catching in her eyes. “But who takes care of you, Ty?”
There was a double edge to it—like she was talking about more than responsibility, like maybe she saw the cracks I kept hidden from everyone else. She didn’t move away, and I didn’t want her to.
I managed a rough exhale, leaning back just enough to keep from reaching for her again. “I’m okay.”
“So, I see you have yet to stop saying it’s okay when it’s not.”
A rough chuckle left me. “This is the reason we said questions you’d never ask on a first date. You’re not supposed to know these things.”
“You better believe I’m not drinking that chocolate milk in the fridge either, now that I know it’s full of backwash.”
My chin dropped to my chest, shaking with silent laughter.
The TV lit up, and the announcer called out Ethan Stone’s name.
“Oh, he’s my favorite,” Daisy said, pointing to the screen. “Every time he’s at the plate, it’s like forearm porn.”
I tugged my hat off my head, holding it in my hands instead, because, fuck, I did not like the sound of that. “We had the same agent. I know Ethan.”
She chuckled, then tugged her sleeves down over her hands. “Of course you do.”
“Stone’s been on fire this season,” the announcer said, voice rising with excitement. “If he keeps this up, he’s headed for Hall of Fame status and a household name up there with the greats.”
As if he’d heard them, Stone hit the ball hard down the line, the crack of the bat sharp even through the low volume.
I should’ve been watching it. Instead, I was watching Daisy.
The way her eyes lit up when she leaned forward. How her sleeve hung over her knuckles as she curled her hands together. The quiet little sound she made under her breath.
I’d seen a thousand games like this, but sitting here with her, sharing this small, ordinary slice of my life felt different.
“Get out, get out, get out,” Daisy said, perched on the edge of the couch now, locked in.
The ball clipped the very top of the wall and dropped back into play. She fell back with a groan.
“Damn.” She gestured toward the TV as the announcers confirmed Ethan stopped at second. “That was so close.”
I nodded, still a half-beat behind, my attention slow to catch up.
“Yeah,” I said, finally looking away.
We watched the game together, her quizzing me about which players I knew—a lot of them—and asking for gossip about each one. Unfortunately for her, three years out of the city meant everything I knew was old news, and not as juicy as she hoped.
“So, no one is secretly dating the manager’s daughter?” she asked. “Or maybe a player’s sister? No rivals hooking up in their hotel rooms?”
I turned my hat in my hands and gave her a lopsided grin. “Not that I’m aware of, no.”
“Well, that’s kind of a bummer.”
I laughed, then stood to get myself a drink. “Want anything while I’m up?”
She waved me off, then turned around to watch me go. The longer she stared, the wider her grin spread. I looked away to reach into the fridge, pulling out a Gatorade. When I cracked the lid, she let out a little huff.
“I thought I was about to witness your little act of rebellion.”
“Well, I can’t now that you’re watching me.”
She shook her head, then went back to watching the game. “How was your day?”
“Had a pig dropped in my lap,” I said between sips. “So, weird.”
Her laugh was small but real. “I’m thinking that’s just a regular Tuesday for you,” she said, tilting her head back toward me, eyes glinting.
“Maybe.”
“At this rate, you should start building an ark or something.”
“Junie would be thrilled,” I said, lips twitching. “Two of every kind.”
She grinned, quick and bright. “Right. You, me, a couple of chickens—boom, we could restart the population.”
I choked on my drink, orange liquid drenching my shirt.
“I did not—” she stammered, clapping a hand over her mouth. “That came out so wrong.”
As I lost it to a coughing fit, her face turned scarlet.
“I meant animals! Obviously, the animals, not—”
“Procreation as an emergency survival plan?” I smirked, then grabbed a towel to wipe up the mess I’d made.
“Ty!”
I bit the inside of my cheek to keep from laughing. “What? You’re the one planning on repopulating the world.”
She groaned, hiding her face behind both hands. “I hate you.”
“Pretty sure you started it.”
“I did not start anything!”
But when she dropped her hands, still pink and smiling, something unspoken lingered between us. An image neither of us had asked for, and now I was trying very hard not to think about.
I stared at the TV, but the game was just background noise now. Every cell in my body was aware of her—her warmth lingering in the air, the scent of her shampoo wafting through the dim room, the way her hoodie had slipped to the right just enough to expose the curve of her collarbone.
She sighed, the sound catching halfway between tired and honest, and I looked back at her.
“I went inside Violet’s house today.”
That pulled me straight out of my head. “Yeah?”
She nodded. “I didn’t stay long. I thought I could handle it—just clean something up, maybe sort through boxes—but the second I walked in, it all hit me.” She swallowed. “So I turned around and walked right back out.”
“That’s okay,” I said without hesitation.
“I know. I just…” She sighed, rubbing at her palm like she could scrub the feeling away.
“I hate I couldn’t do it. Every time something gets hard, I bail.
I make jokes, I make plans, I move on to the next thing instead of—” Her voice wobbled, then steadied.
“It’s like my brain sees pain coming and goes, Nope.
Next adventure. Distraction, aisle five. ”