CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Fallon
IWALKED UP THE MCKENZIES’ FRONT PATH TO FIND RON IN THE front yard, deadheading flowers. When he heard my footsteps, he looked up from his work and sent me a smile. “Good to see ya, Fal. How are things?”
“Pretty good,” I lied. My life felt like it was coming apart at the seams. “How about you?”
“Can’t complain, other than these old bones not keepin’ up with all I want to be doing.”
I chuckled. “I don’t know. You look pretty spry to me.”
“Tell Edith that. She’s always on me to take it easy.”
“I’ll make sure to let her know.”
“Girls are inside workin’ on their homework.”
I nodded and glanced through the front windows, getting a peek at Hayden helping Gracie with something while Clem scribbled furiously in a notebook. “How have they been the last few days?”
A look of sadness settled into Ron’s gray eyes. “Well-behaved. Quiet. Always do as they’re asked.”
“But?” I pressed.
“They’re too well-behaved. Turns my stomach. Kids that age should get into mischief now and again.”
I agreed. What these girls needed most after safety was the chance to truly be kids. “We’re gonna work on that.”
“Good,” Ron chuffed. “You go on inside. Edith’s in the kitchen, I think. She made cookies.”
“Double chocolate?” I asked hopefully.
“You know it.”
“She’s too good to me.” I headed for the door, opened it, and called out, “It’s Fallon.”
Edith appeared with a warm smile. “Good to see you.”
“You, too. I heard there might be some double-chocolate cookies on the premises.”
She laughed. “I must’ve had a psychic premonition you were coming. There’s a plate in the living room with the girls. Go on in.”
I knew she was giving me an easy approach, and I squeezed her arm in thanks as I passed, headed for the living room. When I walked in, I found three sets of amber eyes locked on me. The sight of those eyes still knocked me sideways. Because they were all Kye.
Gripping my bag a little tighter, I called on a smile but didn’t force it, knowing they’d see right through me if I did. “I heard there were cookies.”
Gracie let out a soft giggle. “I already had three.”
“Oh, I can totally beat three,” I said, heading deeper into the room. “I can do five at least.”
Clem’s mouth curved as she looked up from her spot on the rug, where she was writing in a notebook. “Chocolate has addictive qualities. There have been studies.”
I lowered myself to the floor and let my bag drop. “Don’t tell me that. I’m already hooked.”
Gracie let out another giggle. “Me, too.”
I turned to Hayden, who watched me carefully. “What about you? Chocolate fan?”
“Who isn’t?” she hedged.
Clem rolled her eyes. “It’s her favorite thing on the planet.”
I grinned. “I happen to be a sugar fiend myself. Strawberry Sour Patch Kids are my number-one favorite. I’m a sucker for gummy bears, too. Gummy candy of any kind, really. But chocolate is my second love. We’ll have to get double-chocolate Oreo shakes from The Pop. They’re amazing.”
A hint of interest flared in Hayden’s eyes at the idea, but she quickly squelched it. “Sure. Are you here to tell us something?”
Right to the point. Smart. Astute. With the proper support, Hayden would soar in this world. “I wanted to update you on what’s going on and what might happen next.”
Hayden instantly straightened from her spot on the couch next to Gracie. “Did Renee get charged?”
I didn’t miss the fact that Hayden hadn’t called her Mom. “She did. She’s out on bail right now as the court decides what’s going to happen. But if you see her around, let me, the McKenzies, or your teachers know, okay?”
Gracie moved closer to Hayden, and the older girl wrapped an arm around her sister. But Clem’s eyes sparked with anger. “We don’t have to go back to her, right?”
“We are working to make sure you don’t. But a judge has to make the final decision. They may ask to talk to you. If you’re comfortable,” I explained.
Clem’s hold on her pencil tightened. “I’ll talk to them. I’ll tell them how awful she is and—”
“Clem,” Hayden said softly. Gracie sniffed.
“It’s true. And I’m not lying about it anymore,” Clem shot back.
Hayden held out a hand. “Okay. But let’s not talk about it now.” Her gaze moved back to me. “What about Les? We don’t have to go with him, do we?”
An image of the grizzled man crouched in front of his bike flashed in my mind. “No. No, you don’t.”
“Because he didn’t want us, right?” Hayden demanded, her voice going hard.
Everything in me hurt at hearing those words. No child deserved to feel unwanted—especially by the people who were supposed to care about them the most. “He knows he’s not equipped to give you the life you deserve.”
Hayden scoffed. “So, we’re going into the system.”
“There are several possibilities. One is me finding a long-term foster family for you to live with. But there is another possibility.”
“What?” Hayden pressed.
My heart hammered against my ribs as I braced to possibly turn the girls’ world upside down. “We discovered that you have a relative who would like to file for custody. A half-brother. Kyler Blackwood.”
The reaction wasn’t what I’d expected. No gasps or shock. Hayden’s face went stone-cold. Gracie stared down at her lap. And Clem hunched in on herself.
“He won’t take us. Mom said he doesn’t want anything to do with us,” Clem whispered.
Fury like I’d never known blazed through my system. It felt as if someone had replaced my blood with lighter fluid and then lit a match. It took everything I had to beat it back and swallow the rage so the girls didn’t see it.
“That couldn’t be further from the truth,” I said quietly.
Hayden scoffed. “Sure. That’s why he comes around so often.”
I turned to her, trying to let her see my truth. “He didn’t know you existed. If he had, he would’ve been there. Trust me.”
Hayden’s face twisted. “He’d rather be with your perfect family than us. He’s probably just saying he’ll file so people don’t think he’s an asshole.”
“Hayden.” I kept my voice low. “I’ve known Kyler since I was fourteen years old.
I have never, in the past fourteen years, seen him as devastated as when I told him that he had sisters he didn’t know about.
Sisters who needed him. He’s never even met you, and he would already lay down his life for any of you. And that’s a fact.”
Gracie peered around her sister. “I like his drawings,” she said quietly. “The one on the wall outside the gym is really pretty.”
A phantom fist squeezed my heart. This little girl had been taking stock of Kye’s creations, thinking he was a brother who didn’t want to know her. “That will mean a lot to him when I tell him.”
“Can we meet him?” Clem asked hesitantly.
I breathed through the pain. “He’s dying to meet you. But we have to wait until he gets all his approvals.”
Hayden’s face hardened. “What do you want to bet one of them conveniently doesn’t go through? Renee told us she asked him for help when Clem needed to go to a doctor, and he said he didn’t want anything to do with us.”
“He’s giving his everything to make sure he’s approved. And even if he isn’t, he’ll still want to be in your lives—as much as you’ll let him. And I can guarantee that Renee never told him anything about Clementine. Because he would’ve taken her to the doctor himself.”
Disbelief swirled in Hayden’s expression. It was the sort of mistrust built on years of being lied to and manipulated. There wasn’t a damn person in her life who’d proven they had her back. “Maybe we don’t want to go live with him. Maybe we choose the foster system.”
I went quiet. So many worries gnawed at me.
I wanted to give Hayden a choice, to empower her when so much of her agency had been ripped from her.
But I knew the chances of keeping the girls together long-term in the system were damn slim.
And there was also a greater chance of upheaval as time went on—placements could change at the drop of a hat.
Hayden’s face paled. “You don’t think you can keep us together in the system.”
“We always try our hardest—”
“But you don’t know for sure.”
Gracie started to cry and climbed onto Hayden’s lap, holding her tightly as if she thought I would rip her away from her sister right then and there. “Don’t let them take me, Hay Hay! Please, don’t let them take me.”
Hayden wrapped her arms around the little girl. “No one’s taking you. I’ve got you. You’re safe, okay? You’re safe.”
Gracie only cried harder. Clem looked at Hayden. “We have to try,” she whispered.
Hayden sent a furious look in my direction. “Fine. Tell him to file. And when this all falls apart, remember whose idea it was.”
A monster tension headache bordering on a migraine pulsed through my skull.
It was as if the pain started there but radiated through my entire body.
And it wasn’t just physical. The agony living in Hayden, Clem, and Gracie had made a home in me, too.
As it should. Because if I didn’t feel that pain, I wouldn’t fight nearly hard enough.
I flipped on my blinker, making the turn into the DHS parking lot.
I nearly ran into a parked car when I saw the familiar black truck and the man resting against its back bumper.
The battered leather jacket covering a black tee told countless stories, just like the scarred motorcycle boots that adorned his feet.
His broad shoulders and thick thighs spoke of someone people didn’t mess with often.
The scruff on his angular jaw was thicker than the last time I’d seen him, and his nearly black hair looked like he’d been running his hands through it nonstop.
But it was his eyes that stopped me in my tracks.
Those amber eyes were darker than I’d ever seen them. Heavy with the weight of responsibility and the demons all this had kicked up. I would’ve given anything to soothe the war inside him. But I wasn’t sure where to start.