Chapter 6
6
Gunn had just drifted into a restless sleep when hard hands shook him awake. “Gunn, wake up, damn it. I need your keys.”
Gunn flipped over and looked at his older brother. Guthrie was there, a wild look on his face. “The hospital? Is Genny okay?”
“It’s not her. I need to get to Aubrey. Someone trashed their house while we were at the hospital. She is talking to the police now. I need to get to her and her sister.”
Gunn was already standing. “Let me change into jeans and shoes. I’m going with you.”
He didn’t like the idea of those women facing this alone. Not if he could be there to help them.
It took him less than two minutes to get dressed. “Let’s roll.”
He drove. Guthrie was too upset, Gunn didn’t even let his brother try. And it was Gunn’s truck. “Tell me what you heard.”
Gunn’s brother cared about Aubrey. Guthrie had had that wild, raw expression in his eyes Gunn had seen in their father’s when their mom had gotten hurt once. The one that said Guthrie’s very world was in danger of crumbling.
“Charlie called. He had stopped by the TSP and heard the call come over dispatch. He recognized her name from interviewing her at the hospital a few hours ago. He wanted to ask if I had any idea who had done this.”
“Do you?” Gunn asked. He was trying to imagine it—someone wanting to hurt those two women made little sense to him at all. “Do you think this ties into what happened today? Have you spoken to the hospital? Is Genny okay?”
“Chad stayed at the hospital with her, after all. She’s still sleeping. Mom and Dad are going to be there first thing in the morning, but Chad isn’t leaving her side. Apparently, he never left the hospital. Gia found him asleep in the hallway next to Genny’s door a few minutes ago and took pity on him.”
“That’s not exactly a surprise,” Gunn said. “He loves her very much.”
“Yes, so he says. How did you know? They haven’t told anyone yet.”
“I caught him practically undressing her on the kitchen island a few days ago. It was… an awkward moment.” And he wasn’t going to think about what he’d seen that man trying to do to his baby sister at all. Ever again. Sometimes, Gunn just played blind where his family was concerned.
It was his only real option.
“Yeouch. Not something I would want to see.”
“No. That it was not.”
They didn’t say much more until Gunn was pulling into the small ranch style house on the same road as George’s much bigger place. It was charming, with flowers lining the front walk. Gunn could just imagine the two sisters planting them together, and enjoying being with each other. They had each other; no one had missed that.
He had his brothers and his sisters and his parents. He knew exactly how blessed he was.
There were flashing lights. The sheriff’s Tahoe was parked in front of the house. Gunn parked half a block up.
“There they are,” Guthrie said. He practically took off the instant he saw the taller sister. She stood next to Clay Addy and Charlie. And George. Their eldest brother was right there. Her sister sat on a small garden bench near the driveway, a blanket wrapped around Ayla’s narrow shoulders.
Gunn was never going to forget how she looked right in that moment. The fear on her beautiful face was etched into his very soul.
Gunn headed right for her. He just didn’t want her to be afraid.
Gunn Hiller just kind of scooped her up after the police were done. Literally. He just scooped her right up. He was very strong, this man. No denying that.
“I’ve got you, Ayla, I promise. I’ll get you to the truck and then grab your crutches.”
Her arms went around his neck and she clung like a great big baby. Like the wimp she always knew she was. She looked over his shoulder, to see his older brother pulling Aubrey close. “What about my sister?”
“Guthrie is going to drive her car back to our ranch. So that she can have it out there. You two are going to stay with us for a few days. Until she’s not hurting so badly. Then we’ll get over here and help get things cleaned up. He wants her to ride with him. Are you okay coming with just me?”
Ayla just nodded. She didn’t want to stay here tonight. Just not tonight. She pressed her head against his neck and cried. “I’m sorry. I’m just being a wimp. But he almost ran us off the road. He was right in front of our house when we pulled in.”
His arm tightened around her. Ayla wanted to just cling, right where she was. “I’m sorry. I wish I had been here.”
She would have liked that, too. She felt safe with this man. Safer than she had any guy before, that was for sure.
Probably the whole minister thing or something.
He had parked half a block from their house. She held herself together while he went back for her crutches and said something to his brothers and her sister. When he climbed back in, she was shaking a bit.
He noticed. Next thing she knew, he was reaching in the backseat, grabbing a zippered sweatshirt. “Here, honey, cover up. I’ll turn the heat on.”
The scent of man surrounded her as she slipped his shirt over her head. “I’m good. I think I’m just shaky. It’s been a crazy night.”
“And the only thing you ate was that little bag of chips at the hospital?”
Ayla nodded. “I usually eat dinner with my sister, after the library. We like to eat together when we can.”
“We do, too. Genny insists on it. And she makes us take turns cooking. She says it’s good for Calvin to have dinner with his family every night.”
“I have no doubt it is. I think it’s cool you all live together like that. I bet you had a lot of adventures as kids, didn’t you?” She used to dream about a life like that. When she was in the assisted living home, and all alone. “It must have been nice.”
“We did. My brothers and I did, mostly. And some with Gia. She’s only three and and half years younger than Grady and me. And she had adventures with the girls and Chantal.”
“There are not quite seven years between me and Aubrey. We didn’t really get to have very many adventures. We weren’t always kept together, you know. Especially… after I was eleven. They put me in a nursing home for a while. After… ”
“Honey, what happened to you? If you don’t mind me asking.”
She usually didn’t tell people. But maybe it was the dark, and what had happened tonight, and his sweatshirt covering her and making her feel safe for once. “A foster father got angry at me. I was stopping him from getting what he wanted. I bit him. And he grabbed me and threw me down the basement stairs and locked me in. I broke my back. It’s not the fall, you know. It’s the landing that gets you.”
“I’m sorry. You didn’t deserve that.”
“He went to jail. Aubrey got me help. She broke the basement door to get to me. She… was what he wanted in the first place, you know. I wasn’t going to let him hurt my sister like that. I just wasn’t. So I attacked him. After he hurt me… he ran away. I stopped him from hurting my sister. He didn’t get to hurt my sister that day. I was in a wheelchair for several months, in the nursing home where the state put me. Then, when I could walk again when I was twelve, I went to a special needs foster home. There were a few other places after that, then back into the nursing home when no one else wanted me. Aubrey sprung me from that joint the instant she was old enough to have guardianship. We got lucky—the judge was nice that day. We got to be together after that. And now… here we are.” She was quiet for just a moment. She was okay with her story. She’d had years to come to terms with what had happened. And Aubrey had made certain she had therapy to help her deal with the trauma.
The state had paid for it—they were liable for what had happened in the first place. Aubrey had begged their social worker not to send them to that foster home three days before. Begged.
And had been laughed at in the face by the evil social worker who just hadn’t cared. Aubrey had threatened to call the newspapers and report everything that had happened. Make a big old stink no one would have wanted. There was nothing Aubrey wouldn’t do to protect the people she loved. No denying that.
“My sister is my hero, you know. And… I think your brother has a thing for her.”
“Yes, I can understand why. I think he’s in love with her, actually. She put herself right in front of Genny tonight. I’ll never forget seeing that. She didn’t have to do that.”
“It doesn’t surprise me at all. She felt really guilty for what happened to me. They didn’t know I’d come home from school yet that day, and she was telling him to get his hands off of her. Fighting him. He was going to hurt her, force her. I’m sure you know what I mean. She was seventeen. I went a bit… feral at him. She has always taken care of me, even before. Now, she goes a bit bonkers overprotective of the people she loves. But she has me to take care of her now. Me, and Genny, and Chan, and Greer and Hala and Gia, too.”
“I’m glad they have you, too, honey. I think the world might just be a darker place if you weren’t in it.”
“I think, Reverend Hiller, that if I ever fall for a guy someday—I hope he’s a lot like you. I think I like the way you see the world, too.”