6. AVERY
AVERY
Iris looks up at me from the blanket fort.
She has that same frightened frown on her face that she had when she found me and Carl.
The last forty-eight hours have been hard enough without me talking to her about what she might have seen.
Every time I’ve sat down with her and found a moment to bring it up, she’s looked at me with that sad, scared gaze that makes my stomach turn.
“You really should let Rhett take a look.” Callie nods down at my side as I grasp the back of the dining chair I’m using to hold myself up.
The pain hasn’t subsided even with the aging bruising, and I’ve stopped taking the painkillers regularly like Rhett instructed. They make my head fuzzy, and it panics me to be so hazy when there’s so much happening.
“I’m fine,” I tell her, taking the salad platter she’s got in her hand. I put it down as an excuse to look away from her prying gaze.
Now that the shock of it all is dying down, I don’t have a buffer to keep her from digging deeper.
Maybe I should’ve gone back to DC like Mike suggested when we spoke last night.
Long before he and Dad were partners, they were friends.
He’s like an uncle to me, and he’s right, I could’ve gone back to my parents’ home.
Locked myself and Iris away from the world until I figured out a way of moving forward.
However, as Callie pointed out, I’m certain Carl would’ve found a way of getting to us.
The thought of him finding out where we are terrifies me because as much as he hurt me the other night and others before, he was still holding back.
It’s obvious in every recollection I have of that night, because he could’ve caused more damage.
And that is the one thought that keeps me from going back to DC.
“You’ve got the look, Avery.”
“You keep saying that, and I have no idea what you’re talking about. I’m just…I’m trying to figure out what to do. How to do it. What our life is going to be like. I’m trying to understand why all this is happening now.”
“Sounds familiar.” Callie pauses, focusing on the girls as they disappear back into the fort that Rowan helped them pitch up in the open-plan family room. “I’ve been there. I’ve been right where you are, wondering why shit happened the way it did. Why my dad was gone…”
“This isn’t about my dad. I know why he’s gone.” My heart clenches so tight that it sends a jolt of unbearable pain to the pit of my stomach.
I can’t cry. Not here. Not now. Not in front of Iris. Not ever.
“But it is, because you’re still hurting, and you’re having to get used to missing him. To add to that, you’re trying to protect her from the truth.”
“I think I know what the truth is, but I don’t want to believe it.
” I follow her lead, sinking into one of the dining chairs.
“I don’t want to believe that this is my life right now.
It wasn’t perfect before, but it wasn’t this fucked-up.
I swear to God, Callie, I had no idea what was going on.
” Grabbing my glass of water, I drink what’s left of it.
“I only figured out he was…” I take a deep breath, swallowing the sudden dryness of my mouth.
“I only figured out Carl was…or is? What is it? We’re still married, so I suppose he’s still cheating on me. ”
“Ding, ding, ding, douche face has managed to hit a whole new asshole high.” Callie rolls her eyes with a growl, focusing on me. “You can’t hide from the storm, Avery. You have to ride it out and make it your bitch.”
Rowan walks in from the yard with Caleb following behind him. He’s still listening to his son talk about some problem he’s having with the level he’s playing, and he doesn’t care how trivial it all is. He’s still smiling, still cracking jokes and listening.
“Case in point.” Callie nods his way.
“What are you smiling about, princess?” Rowan asks, pausing in front of her, before he tells Caleb, “Hands. Wash. Now. Use soap.”
“See?”
“See what?” He looks between the two of us.
“I was just telling Avery that she needs to ride the storm.” She grins up at him, her finger raking down his torso to the top of his shorts. “You know…make it her bit—”
“Ah-ah-ah…save the riding for later.” He winks at her, mirroring her grin.
For the slightest tick of a second, I’m jealous of the way he looks at her. No one has ever looked at me like that. As though their world revolves around me…for me…maybe because of me.
Both of their phones ring at the same time.
“Right on time,” Callie chimes almost too happily at the notification that’s popped up.
Rowan laughs, shaking his head as he sits at the head of the table at the exact moment his brother and an older woman walk into the room.
My heart races the minute Rhett greets me with a smile.
Similar and yet so different to Rowan, his hair is a darker shade of blond, and up close, his eyes are a bluer shade of green. Like a tropical ocean.
With his shirtsleeves rolled up his forearms, he’s so obviously more clean-cut than Rowan.
No tattoos. His shirt and slacks don’t have a single crease, and his hair is all deliberately mussed whereas Rowan is tattooed, shaggy-haired, and has the surfer dude vibe down pat with a side of “don’t fuck with me. ”
“Hey, old hag.” Rowan wraps his arm around the woman’s shoulder, and she hits him with her walking stick hard enough that he grimaces a curse.
“Who you calling old bag, asshole?” she spits at him with a side glance before holding out her hand to me. “Jo.”
“Avery, this is Josie. She’s a friend. Helps keep these two mankids in line.” Callie introduces her to me before turning to Jo and telling her, “Avery is a friend from DC. She’s staying with us for a while with her little girl.”
“More babies.” Jo looks around the room, pausing when she finds Iris looking at her. “Hey there, sugar.”
When Iris doesn’t answer, she shakes Rowan’s arm off her shoulders with a pat to his face as she walks past him toward the fort. I don’t know what she says to Iris, but it makes her smile for the first time today.
“How’re you feeling?” Rhett asks, catching Scarlett when she runs at him. “Hey, scoundrel.”
“You wanna join us?” Scarlett nods at the blankets and sheets pitched up in the middle of the seating area. “We’re watching the Care Bears.”
“You are?”
“Yeah, it’s Iris’s favorite, and she’s sad, so maybe it will cheer her up soon.”
“Huh.” He nudges the tip of her nose with his. “Check you out being Little Miss Sunshine.”
“Call me Funshine.” She grins at him with narrowed eyes.
“Okay…”
Clearly, he has no idea that Funshine is the sunshine Care Bear, and it makes me chuckle that he’s trying to work it out as though it’s some important fact she’s shared with him.
“Is that a new thing?” Rhett asks Rowan when Scarlett crawls back into the den. “Call sign…code name, whatever it is you call it.”
“Nope, she’s still a demon.”
“That’s not sunshine or funshine, that’s contained hellfire dying to explode.” Callie hands him a beer from the fridge, pulling out the chair next to Rowan for Jo to sit. “Caleb! Scout! Kids…dinner!” she yells, dropping into her seat, leaving Rhett to sit beside me with Iris on my other side.
She doesn’t eat much, not that I expected her to when I’m struggling myself. The entire time we’re at the table, I’m wondering how exactly I’m meant to make anything “my bitch” when I can barely move without bursting into tears or vomiting my guts out.
How the hell am I going to fix any of this?
Trying to understand how I completely missed what was going on with Carl only makes me feel like more of a fool.
He was never the easy and soft kind of husband or father that I dreamed about.
But to be in politics, you need a thick skin and you need a level of hardness.
I thought that was it; his personality was a byproduct of the world we lived in. As it turns out, I was an idiot.
My rose-tinted glasses are gone now, and all the times he pulled me up on my misgivings and on all my inadequacies are nothing more than a power trip. It wasn’t stress; Carl is nothing but an asshole. And it’s taken me this long to fully realize it.
“Are you still in pain?”
I look up from my plate to find Rhett assessing me. He’s so close that I have this panicked urge to pull back. His stare makes me all too aware of what I look like. The bruises, swelling, scratches, and grazes pulse. Every cut stings the longer he stands watching me.
“I’m fine.” I get up and start for the back doors, trying to gather my wits about me before I break down.
Given I still feel awful about my outburst the other night, I don’t want to lose my slippery grasp on what’s left of my tact.
I’m not quite sure what’s more exhausting—holding my shit together or falling apart.
My head is only now starting to dull from the throb of my sleepless, tearful nights, and yet, it feels as heavy as the prospect of where I’m going from here.
Sitting on one of the seats by the pool, I take a deep breath, reminding myself that I’m not alone and that somehow, I’m going to make sure Carl doesn’t come near us again. That’s the one thing he is one hundred percent right about—Iris is mine.
I lie back into the lounger, focusing on the stars ahead. They’re so bright out here; I don’t think I’ve seen this many in years. Something about the clear sky almost makes the burden on my shoulders lighten, until my phone rings, jarring me from the calm.
Kayla’s familiar tone keeps ringing and ringing.
I’ve ignored it enough times to know she must be worried, especially with the headlines that have taken over almost every news station and paper.
A part of me feels guilty that I haven’t called to check on her.
It’s not fair that she’s being tainted by whatever Carl was involved in, and it’s part of the reason I feel almost embarrassed taking her call. So, for now, I let it ring out again.
“I know you’re fine, but in case—”
“Are you this pushy with all your patients?” Ice chills my veins with the pain from my sudden movement to sit and look at Rhett.
“I’m not being pushy, I’m concerned about your well-being…any good doctor would be, and I can promise you, I’m a fucking great doctor.”
The sound of the curse sets my pulse off, racing wildly. Something about it is shocking and severe in contrast to his jovial tone and aloof stance. With his hands in his pockets, he has a coolness about him that’s somewhat contagious.
“Besides,” he sighs, kicking off his shoes and lowering to the edge of the pool.
He goes about stripping his socks and rolling his slacks up before dipping his feet in the water.
“You’re not actually my patient patient.
I’m doing my brother a favor by making sure his wife’s friend is… as fine as she says she is.”
“You should practice in DC—apparently it’s where everyone exchanges favors,” I snap, and he tips his head to the side, looking as though he’s trying to contain his laugh.
“Huh,” Rhett chuckles, looking over his shoulder with a shit-eating grin as he continues mumbling, “Well, I guess he’s going to have to let Pamela go after this.”
“Pamela?”
“Pamela Anderson.”
“That makes so much more sense.” I lie back onto the lounger as he turns to level me with a narrowed stare.
“It’s a thing, you know…”
“Not really. I’m an only child, so sibling things aren’t something I’m all that familiar with.”
“Explains why you’re so stubborn. So adamant on being fine.”
“You don’t get it, do you? You might be a great doctor, but clearly you have no idea what it’s like to lose grasp of your life.
” That’s it, I’m done with the conversation.
Getting up to my internalized stream of curses, I fist my hands, hoping that it helps get a handle on the physical pain at least. “It’s abundantly clear that you don’t understand what it’s like to lose everything from one moment to the next. ”
Rhett turns to look up at me, leveling me with a loaded look that tells me that maybe I’m wrong.
Just as my frustration and anger begin to deflate, he stands, we’re not even that close, but his presence is so palpable that it makes the space between us seem like nothing but a sliver.
I think that’s what scares me about him even though I know I’m safe.
There’s no worry that he’ll hurt me. Still, something about him—beyond his physical height and broad shoulders—hulks over me. It’s inescapable.
Something about this man says he’ll see through all my excuses and fears. It’s like he can see everything, even what I’m desperately trying to hide from everyone around me.
“Suppose I know fuck about anything,” he muses, taking the shortest step toward me.
My already racing heart pounds harder, trying to loosen the vise around my chest. “I know enough to see that you’re avoiding dealing with any of your problems. Take it from a pro, Avery—you can ignore everything that’s happened, but it won’t ignore you. ”
Anxiety overtakes me at the raw truth of his statement, and the tears that have been swimming in my eyes fall, heavy and weary. My stomach turns, and I’m so sick that I have to forcefully steel myself so that I don’t collapse in a heap at his feet.
“What makes you a pro?”
“What makes you think you’ve lost everything?” Rhett counters without breaking the hold of his stare on me.
I’m trapped by its gentleness, even as he assesses me. There’s no judgment or pity, only a searching pull. A tug that urges me closer, taking every ounce of my strength to resist.
“Do you honestly think you have nothing left?” There’s a gruff edge to his question that makes me pull back.
I put as much distance as I can between us as I walk away, resisting the lure to look back with every knotting coil of my stomach, every reverberating thump of my heart.
My insides twist with every step with the knowledge that out of every person in my life right now, Rhett Reynolds could be the most dangerous.