19. Shiloh
CHAPTER NINETEEN
SHILOH
By the time I get back to Blackwood House, everyone is angry. This is not particularly unusual, not since Reva has joined us. Reva is…feisty, and not afraid to show it.
The difference is volume.
The kitchen windows are open, which means I hear Her Feistiness before I reach the back door.
“I told you not to come.”
Her voice cuts clean through the humid afternoon. Sharp. Shaking. The kind of anger that would rather draw blood than admit fear, even though that’s the root of it.
I pause on the back step with two shopping bags in one hand and a garment bag hooked over my shoulder.
I glance down at the bags consideringly. I could interrupt, maybe use what’s in the bags as a distraction. It could work. Probably wouldn’t, but I could try. These are only a small taste of my morning’s labors. I had everything else delivered as I purchased it, so it should be here already.
Cal Boudreaux answers Reva, low enough that I can’t quite make out the words.
Reva can, though. She laughs, and it is a mean little sound.
“Do not even. Don’t stand there and act like this is reasonable.”
I shrug, then push the door open and step inside.
The kitchen is a war room pretending to be domestic.
Reva stands near the island, arms folded tight over her chest, cheeks flushed, eyes bright.
Cal is across from her in jeans and a dark button-down, travel-worn and still somehow steady.
He has the look of a man who has spent a lifetime refusing to flinch in front of a frightened child.
Nash stands by the stove, one hand braced on the counter, expression carved from stone. Ever is near the hall door with his phone in his hand, watching silently. Sonny is nowhere to be seen, which means someone with sense got her out of the blast zone.
Good for Sonny.
Cal is the first one to look over at me. He glances at the bags, then back at Reva. He clocks everything in three seconds and says nothing. I like him a little for that, even though I don’t like that he is here, on principle. My girl doesn’t want him here; therefore I don’t want him here.
Reva turns on me. “Did you know?”
I set the bags down beside the door. “About which disaster, darling Yank? The day has been…ambitious.”
Her lips tighten. “Not in a mood, Shiloh.”
Fair enough.
I lift both hands. “I knew he landed. I did not know he would beat us to the house.”
“He shouldn’t have landed at all.”
Cal’s mouth tightens. “You knew I was coming. I told you I was.”
“I knew you were threatening to come. I told you not to.”
“You stopped answering your phone, so I couldn’t tell you I was ignoring that.”
Reva’s eyes pinch. “I was busy getting dragged through the French Quarter and assaulted by a palm reader.”
Nash looks toward Ever.
Ever says, “Figuratively. Relax.”
I file that away. Sounds like a story.
Cal takes one step toward Reva. She takes one back.
It is small. It hurts anyway.
I see it hit him. He covers it quickly, but not fast enough for me to miss.
The old man loves her. That much is obvious.
He loves her with the exhausted discipline of someone who has spent fifteen years checking locks, making backup plans, and lying to himself that survival was the same thing as peace.
Unfortunately for him, Reva has started noticing the difference.
“I needed to see you,” Cal says.
“You saw me. Congratulations. Now you can leave.”
“Kid—”
“No.” Her voice cracks on that single word, then hardens around it. “Don’t ‘kid’ me.”
Cal stops. Nash shifts his weight, ready to intervene. Ever slants a side-eye at me, which is annoying because it means he expects me to be useful.
I can be useful. Occasionally. When I want to be. I’m not sure I want to be right now, though—
“Shiloh,” Ever hisses.
Fucking fine. I lift the bags and bang them against my thighs.
“Reva,” I say, jerking my head toward the hall, “come upstairs with me.”
She turns her glare on me. “Why?”
“Because you’re two minutes away from throwing something heavy at a man who looks like he’d let you, and apparently I’m the chosen whipping boy.”
Cal’s expression changes. “You don’t need to get in the middle of our—”
“That’s our business,” she interrupts curtly. “Not yours or anyone else’s. Cal’s leaving.”
“Reva, take the timeout. Shiloh has something to show you,” Ever says.
“I don’t need a break,” Reva says.
“No, but I do. I have been awake since before dawn, committed several acts of retail violence on your behalf, and I would like applause before this family argument resumes.”
Her brows draw together. “Retail violence?”
I shake the bags. “Come see.”
“I’m not in the mood.”
“You are never in the mood for being taken care of. Somehow, it keeps happening anyway.”
She looks at Cal when I say that. A mistake on my part, maybe. His face softens. Hers closes harder.
I move before she can say something that will be difficult to walk back from.
“Upstairs,” I say. “Five minutes. Then you can come back and eviscerate everyone in the order of your choosing.”
Ever steps aside from the hall. Nash says nothing, which is possibly the greatest miracle this house has ever seen.
Reva hesitates long enough that I expect her to refuse. Then she jerks her chin toward the stairs.
“Fine.”
I gesture grandly. “After you.”
She walks past me without appreciating the flourish.
Women are cruel.
I follow her through the hall and up the stairs, carrying the evidence of my morning.
Behind us, the kitchen stays quiet. That worries me more than shouting would.
Men like Nash and Cal do not need raised voices to cause damage.
They can do it with silence, posture, and the kind of control that makes everyone else in the room feel twelve years old.
Reva’s shoulders stay rigid all the way to her room.
At the door, she stops and looks back. “I just want you to be aware that I’m aware this is a distraction. So it’s not a very good distraction.”
“Good. I’d hate to insult your intelligence while manipulating you.”
“That is not as charming as you think it is.”
“Shot to the heart.”
Lips twitching, she opens the door and steps inside.
Her room still looks temporary. Bed made too neatly. Dresser mostly empty. A pair of shoes near the chair. Homer asleep in the middle of the bed like a little orange king, one paw over his face.
Reva looks at him. “He fell in the shower this morning.”
“I heard.”
“He chose to stay.”
“Can’t say that I blame him.”
She slants a look at me. “Cretin.”
I decide not to touch that one, mostly because I enjoy living.
I cross to the closet and set down the bags. “Close your eyes.”
“I’m not closing my eyes.”
“Pretend to be whimsical for twenty seconds.”
Her expression is completely serious. “I am not that good an actress.”
I open the closet door myself.
Reva goes still.
The closet was empty this morning except for her sad little duffel and a few random articles of clothing. It’s not empty now.
I didn’t have much time, so it’s not perfect, but it’s better than nothing.
Jeans in a few cuts and washes. Soft shirts hung by color.
Tank tops. Sweaters light enough for Louisiana air-conditioning.
A black jacket with clean lines. Leggings that have never seen the floor of a carriage house.
Pajamas. Socks. Underwear and bras still boxed because even I have limits, though I did choose them with impeccable taste.
Boots. Sneakers. A pair of sandals. A few dresses because I love a sundress and I’m optimistic.
Reva says nothing for the longest moment.
For once, neither do I.
She steps past me into the closet and reaches for the sleeve of a dark green sweater. Her fingers move over the fabric with a tentativeness that makes my throat tighten. Then she touches the edge of a folded T-shirt, the row of jeans, the strap of the jacket.
She looks back at me, her eyes glossed over.
Damn it. I’m not built for this.
Give me a woman furious, flirting, insulting me, threatening castration with a cheese knife. I can work with that. Give me Reva silently trying not to cry because someone bought her socks, and I become dangerously close to sniffles myself.
I lean against the doorframe. “Before you accuse me of dressing you like my personal paper doll, I want the record to show I avoided sequins.”
She doesn’t laugh. Her hand stays on the sweater.
“Reva.”
“No.”
I go quiet.
She blinks hard, then looks at me. “Don’t make it a joke.”
That stops me. Not because she says it harshly. She doesn’t. Her voice is soft, which is worse. I let the joke die where it stands.
“All right,” I say.
She looks back at the clothes. “You did this?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“When Sonny was dragging you through the Quarter.”
“And everyone knew?”
“Nash and Ever were part of it.” I step into the closet, careful to leave space between us. “We noticed you packed light.”
“I came here to kill a man, Shiloh. I didn’t exactly plan outfits.”
“I know.”
“I had a duffel bag.”
“I know.”
“And you all just decided to…” She gestures at the closet, but her hand wavers before she drops it. “What? Fix it?”
“No.”
She looks at me then, eyes wet and suspicious.
I keep it simple because anything prettier will make her retreat.
“We just wanted you to have what you need.”
Her mouth twists. “That’s all?”
“Yes.”
“You bought me an entire closet full of clothes, Shiloh. I just needed…some jeans. A few T-shirts.”
I open and close my fist. Look at the clothes. Back at Reva. “Damnit, Reva, we bought you an entire closet because you were living out of a bag in a house full of people who keep telling you to stay.”
She looks away.
“Nash noticed first,” I say. “He didn’t say anything, because Nash was raised by portraits and stick-in-the-muds, but he noticed.
Ever checked your sizes because he is offensively practical.
I shopped because if those two had done it, you would own twelve black shirts, cargo pants, and possibly a lifetime supply of thongs. ”
That almost gets me a smile.
Almost.
“This was on our list,” I say. “Along with security, training, answers, and keeping you from running directly into the nearest death trap.”
“This is sounding like a complicated list.” She snaps those infernal rubber bands on her wrist, but the lines on her forehead are beginning to smooth out a bit.
“You are a complicated woman.”
Her fingers curl around the sleeve of the sweater. “It feels like a big deal, Shiloh.”
“It’s only a big deal if you make it a big deal.”
She turns on me, and the tears are closer now.
“It’s kind of a big fucking deal, Shiloh.”
My mouth closes.
She swallows. “I have spent my whole life being grateful for whatever version of safe I was given. Cal gave me a home, so I didn’t ask why it had so many locked doors. He loved me, so I didn’t ask why he bothered. He protected me, so I didn’t ask what he was protecting me from.”
Her voice shakes, but she keeps going.
“And now I’m here, and all of you are doing the same thing in different clothes. Taking care of me. Moving pieces around. Making decisions. Buying me a closet so I can stay somewhere no one has actually asked me if I want to belong.”
I feel that one under the ribs.
“I’m asking,” I say.
She looks at me.
“If that is what you need, then I am asking. Do you want to belong here?”
Her face crumples for half a second before she saves it.
“I don’t know. Maybe.”
Honest answer. Painful answer.
I nod. “Then we start there.”
Her laugh comes out broken. “With pants?”
“With pants. Underwear. That sweater you are currently strangling. Small foundations, darling.”
She looks down at her hand and loosens her grip on the sweater.
“This is ridiculous,” she says.
“Little bit, yeah.”
“I’m crying over clothes.”
“You are crying because feelings are assholes, and love is inconvenient.”
She wipes under one eye with the heel of her hand. “You did not just say love.”
“I say many reckless things.”
“Shiloh.”
The warning in her voice is fragile enough to step around.
I reach for the garment bag and unzip it. “This one is indulgent.”
“Define indulgent.”
“Unnecessary. Beautiful. Likely to make Nash swallow his tongue. Ever has already swallowed his tongue, so he’ll just walk around with a stiffy.”
She snorts.
I pull out the dress. Black, simple, cut to skim and reveal but with excellent manners. Not for Noir Night. Not for hiding. For Reva, if she ever wants to look in a mirror and see something other than survival.
She touches the fabric. Her lips press together.
“Too much?” I ask.
She shakes her head. “No, it’s…hot.”
“Good. I bullied a woman named Patrice for it.”
“You bullied a saleswoman?”
“Well…I charmed her aggressively.”
“That sounds illegal.”
“It was purely consensual retail, I promise.”
The corner of her mouth moves.
She studies the closet again, and I can see her trying to categorize the gift so it hurts less. Practical. Strategic. Manipulative. Anything except kind.
Kind is harder for her. Kind has hooks, and Reva doesn’t like hooks. She doesn’t understand that she’s had us hooked since the first day we saw her.
A knock sounds against the open bedroom door.
Reva’s spine stiffens, and we turn. Cal stands in the doorway.
He hovers in the doorway rather than entering, perhaps the first smart thing he has done since landing in New Orleans.
His gaze moves from Reva to the closet. He sees the clothes. The boxes. The tags still hanging from some of the sleeves. His expression shifts before he can stop it, and for a moment he looks older than he did downstairs.
“I don’t want to interrupt,” he says.
“You are,” Reva answers.
I glance at her. Her face has already closed. Whatever softness the closet pulled from her is gone, bricked and mortared behind a wall so fast I almost hear a lock sliding into place.
Cal looks at the clothes again, then at me.
“Looks like you’re taking good care of my girl.”
The words are gentle. That makes them worse. Cal realizes his mistake a second too late.
Reva’s fingers fall away from the dress. Her chin lifts.
“I’m not your little girl.”