29. Bailey
BAILEY
I don’t mean to hear it.
The nap wasn’t going to work. I lay down. I tried. But I couldn’t sit still, so I decided that I needed coffee.
I’m walking down the hall, barefoot, coffee mug in hand, still trying to shake the morning haze, when Wes’s voice cuts through the door. “Killing him won’t be off the table.”
Killing who?
Then Huck, steady, too casual. “Better to ask forgiveness than permission, right?”
I freeze.
The mug nearly slips out of my fingers, my heart slamming so hard I can’t think straight. I ease closer, pressing my shoulder against the frame, listening.
“He deserves worse, to be honest,” Sean says. “That’s why I like him for prison. Killing the bastard is too easy. Too clean.”
“Not the way I’ll do it.” Huck laughs. “Davy’s got a world of hurt coming to him.”
My stomach lurches, bile burning the back of my throat. I shove the door open so fast it cracks against the wall. The three of them look up, caught like boys who’ve been plotting mischief, except this isn’t mischief.
This is murder.
“No.” My voice is louder than I mean it to be, sharp enough to make even Huck blink. “Absolutely not. You do not kill David. Do you understand me?”
Sean straightens, expression tightening but calm, as always. Wesley’s mouth opens like he wants to argue, his brows already drawn in. Huck just sits back in his chair, arms crossed, watching me like he expects a storm.
I step into the room, setting the mug down hard on the table so it rattles. “He is their father. My kids deserve to have their father. I don’t care what he’s done to me—you don’t get to take him away from them. Period.”
The silence that follows is sharp enough to cut diamonds.
Wesley speaks first, his voice tight. “Bailey, hurting their mother qualifies as being a bad father.”
I roll my eyes. “That’s not the same thing?—”
“Yes, it is.” His words snap out. “On top of that, Maeve thinks he shoved Eli down the stairs. That cast on Eli’s arm? That wasn’t an accident. He broke his own son’s arm.”
The words slam into me. I stumble back a step, gripping the edge of a table. My lungs lock, the air thick and hot, like I can’t pull any of it in.
“No.” My voice cracks. “No, he wouldn’t—he never?—”
“Why wouldn’t he?” Wesley presses, sharp, relentless. “If he’s capable of hurting you?—”
“That’s different!” The shout rips out of me before I can stop it.
My hands tremble, fists clenched at my sides.
“That was between him and me. He was always a good father to them. Always. He never even spanked them when they were little. He used to say spanking was for bedrooms, not children. He would never do something violent to them. He’s an asshole, sure, but he’s still their father. ”
The silence after that is worse.
Sean’s eyes darken, flicking toward Wesley, then back to me. Huck’s jaw flexes, like he’s holding back words. They’re having a secret conversation I’m not privy to, and I don’t like it.
I shake my head hard, desperate, the memory of David rocking Eli to sleep, braiding Maeve’s hair on a movie set, telling me once he wanted to give them a childhood better than his or mine. I cling to those memories when things get bad with him. I always have.
“He didn’t push Eli,” I whisper, shaking. “Maeve’s confused. She’s angry, she just got her first period, her hormones are all over the place—she’s not a reliable witness.”
Wesley’s face twists, disbelief plain. “You really think she’d make that up?”
“She’s a child,” I argue. “She’s hurting, and she’s upset for Eli. She’s looking for someone to blame.”
Huck leans forward, voice steady but edged. “Bailey, you can’t ignore this.”
“I’m not ignoring anything…” I squeeze my eyes shut. My chest heaves like I’m drowning. I can’t reconcile it. I can’t make the man who read them bedtime stories into the same man who would shove his son down a staircase. It’s not possible. “I need space. I need to think.”
“Bailey,” Sean says, stepping toward me.
“No.” I shake my head, backing up fast, my pulse thundering. “I have an appointment. I need to go. Don’t follow me.”
Wesley curses under his breath. Huck mutters something sharp and low. Sean just stands there, his gaze burning into me.
“I mean it,” I tell them, and then I turn and walk out.
The walls feel like they’re closing in as I storm down the hall. My purse is on the hook by the door. I grab it, but the strap slips through my shaking hands twice before I manage to get it over my shoulder. My keys bite into my palm, sharp and cold.
Behind me, their voices follow.
“Bailey—” Wesley’s tone is sharp, pleading.
“You shouldn’t be alone right now,” Sean calls, steadier but heavy with command.
“Stay put,” Huck growls. “You’re not walking out like this.”
Panic urges me to obey. To let them handle things. Let them take over. Let them fuck me until the panic fades.
But this crosses a fucking line.
I spin around, clutching the keys tighter. “I said I need space. I can’t breathe with you all crowding me, arguing, planning a goddamned murder—” My throat burns. “I need to think. Alone .”
Sean steps out into the hall, closing the distance until he’s only a step away. His voice drops lower, calm but immovable. “Then let one of us drive you.”
“No.” I shake my head hard. “This meeting—it’s mine. You can’t come, and I can’t take you. I need to be alone, anyway. I’ll be fine.”
“You won’t,” Wesley snaps, moving up behind him, eyes blazing. “Not with him out there. Not with what’s happened.”
“Trust me to know what I can handle.”
The silence is suffocating. Sean studies me with eyes that never waver. Wesley looks like he’s about to combust. Huck leans against the doorway, massive and unmoving.
Finally, Sean exhales slow. “At least let me check the car. He hired a bomber, Bailey. Even with my people out there, it’s smart to let me check your car.”
I hesitate. The memory of Huck bleeding on the marble floor and my couch flashes through me. The bomb tucked under my stairs. My stomach churns.
“Fine,” I whisper.
The garage smells faintly of motor oil and lemon cleaner, the big space too bright under the fluorescents. My SUV waits in the corner, sleek and safe-looking, but my chest tightens anyway.
There could be a bomb. In my car. Or on it, I guess. Why is my life more dramatic than the roles I’m offered?
Sean moves ahead of me, crouching by the wheel wells, running his hands along the undercarriage, checking seals at the doors. Every motion is deliberate, steady, like nothing else exists.
I stand near the workbench, clutching my keys until they leave half-moons in my skin.
“You know,” he says quietly, still bent low, “we only want you and the kids safe. That’s it. We’re not trying to pick a fight with you.”
The words slip under my ribs.
“I know.” My throat feels raw. “But you have to follow my lead. I know David better than you. I can’t believe he’d hurt Eli.”
Sean straightens slowly, wiping his hands down his thighs. His eyes lock on mine.
I keep talking, too desperate to stop. “You don’t know him like I do. You don’t. And I—” My breath hitches. “I just can’t believe he’d do that.”
He steps closer, cupping the back of my neck, pressing his forehead against mine. His voice is low, rough. “I trust you, Bailey. Whatever you say goes. We’ll follow your lead.”
When he presses his lips to mine, it drags me out of the panic spiraling in my head, makes me remember what it feels like to breathe. I hold on to his shirt like he’s the only thing keeping me standing.
When he pulls back, his eyes burn into mine. “We are always here for you.”
“Thank you,” I whisper. I slide into the driver’s seat, start the car, and watch the garage door lift. Late afternoon sunlight cuts across the hood, bright and harsh.
I don’t tell him where I’m going. I don’t tell any of them. It’s better that they don’t know. They’re sneaky, and they’d follow me if they knew.
The hum of the tires on the highway is the only sound in the car at first. I turn the radio on, flip through stations, then turn it off again. The silence feels heavier, but I can’t stand someone else’s voice in my ears right now. Not when my head is already so loud.
My throat aches like I’m still arguing, because somewhere in my head, I am.
I grip the wheel tighter, forcing my knuckles white. If I believe what Wesley said, then I have to accept that the man who rocked my baby to sleep could also shove him down a flight of stairs. And I can’t. I can’t make those two people exist in the same body.
But a question whispers into existence. If he could do what he did to me, if he could call me names, leave bruises, cut me, strip me down until I was small and silent, then what’s stopping him from doing it to them?
I shake my head hard, blinking back tears. The road blurs for a second before snapping clear again. I breathe out slow, forcing myself to count to four.
In. Out. Again.
This isn’t helping. I can’t show up to the meeting like this—red-eyed, cracked open, half-mad with fear. This is the biggest meeting of my career, the kind that could change everything for me. For us.
I focus on the windshield, on the miles ahead. The sky stretches wide, pale blue bleeding toward gold where the sun starts to climb. The landscape blurs past—palm trees, low buildings, billboards shouting things I don’t bother reading. I anchor myself in the details.
Brake lights three cars up. A truck hauling lumber. I can’t help but think of Final Destination when I see the ends of the logs looking back at me. A green sedan drifting between lanes. Normal things, ordinary things, reminders that the world is still turning no matter how torn up mine feels.
I whisper out loud just to hear the sound. “He wouldn’t hurt them.” My voice is thin, breaking. “Not them.”
But saying it doesn’t make it true.
I blink hard, forcing my eyes back to the road. The GPS voice cuts in, telling me to stay on the freeway for another forty miles. I nod, even though it can’t see me. Forty miles. That’s time. Maybe by then I’ll know what to believe.