7. Nell
CHAPTER 7
Nell
I t was like watching two lions battling for territory. Daddy and Law are not fond of each other, and when I asked Law to leave and come back for breakfast around seven, my dad preened like a peacock. Proud that he was getting his way.
Law was pissed. He didn’t want to leave, and as I hear the doorbell ring right as the clock turns to seven, I’m not sure he left at all.
In my rush to grab my jacket from the back of my desk chair, I run into the doorframe and nearly trip over my feet as I slam against the opposite wall.
“Nell!” My dad calls up as I hear two sets of rushing feet up the stairs.
“I’m fine,” I tell them both. Law pushes his way past Daddy and runs his hands along my body. “I’m fine, Law,” I repeat.
“What happened?” he asks as he turns me around to inspect my backside.
“Just tripped over my feet.” Rotating my shoulder, I know there’s going to be a bruise. “Hurt my shoulder on the jamb, though.”
Dad shakes his head, laughing, and walks away. Law scowls as he lifts my shirt sleeve up. “It’s already bruising.” I look down to see the colors starting to change.
“I bruise easy.” I shrug him off. His concern doesn’t dissipate, though. Law wraps his arm around my waist and guides me downstairs until we’re in the kitchen where the breakfast I spent the past hour making is on the table waiting to be eaten.
Dad puts the coffee pot in front of himself as he sits, while Law holds my chair out for me and takes the seat next to me, dragging his own chair closer to mine. I try to hide my delighted smile, but I fail.
“How can you say soulmate when you barely know her? Neither of you is grown enough to even know what love is.” Dad crosses his arms in triumph like he’s won an argument nobody else was privy to.
“Daddy,” I scold him. “You promised.” I made him swear he’d give Law a chance before he started in on him.
“No. He’s sneaking in and out of my house in the middle of the night. I deserve to know what his intentions are here.” I can see his anger growing by the minute. He’s been up all night stewing about this.
“Barely know her.” Law’s words are quiet but filled with so much emotion. “I know she loves you so much that it terrifies her every time you leave that you won’t come back. That’s why she takes such good care of an empty home and makes sure you have everything you could need on the road.
“I know that she has so much strength but guards her heart. I know that Nell needs someone to love and take care of her when nobody else can. I knew that the moment I set sights on her, she was mine. Nothing and nobody will stop me from keeping her to myself for the rest of my life. There isn’t a thing I won’t do for her.”
I’m speechless.
I didn’t tell him my biggest fears, but he somehow guessed anyways.
“Yeah, and when you aren’t here? You going to college? Travelling? What’s Nell supposed to do while you’re gone?” Dad counters, but I see grudging respect enter his eyes.
“I’m not going anywhere she isn’t.” Law lifts his chin in challenge, but something feels off. While he answered the questions, he also avoided a couple.
“Have you not applied to colleges? What are you going to do with your life?”
“I’m going to be part of the Edmonton Police Department.”
“Are we done now?” I ask, gazing between the two and their glare-off.
“For now,” Dad reluctantly concedes.
Eating breakfast in tense silence makes me want to go to school earlier than usual to get away from it all. By the time eight o’clock rolls around, Law is grabbing my bag, and I’m sighing with relief as he closes my door in his car.
“Tell me about your mom.” I blink rapidly. I hadn’t expected that, but something’s on Law’s mind.
“She was in an accident when I was little; she couldn’t work. Soon, drinking became easier than living with her pain and the failure she often felt.” I hate talking about her when she was like that.
“That’s how she died?” He looks at me as we stop at a red light. “Her liver failed?”
“It was a combination of liver failure and alcohol poisoning. She literally drank herself to death. Daddy moved us here a few months later. I hate what her addiction did to our lives.”
We’re both quiet again until we arrive at school. After carrying my bag to my locker and holding my books for my first class, Law kisses me on my cheek and says he’ll see me later before taking off to chase Dallas down.
Pushing the entire weird morning to the back of my mind, I prepare for a long, boring math class. I have zero interest in anything Mr. Richards is teaching, but I scribble notes until the bell rings an hour and a half later.
With a free period, I head to my locker to put my books away and grab a snack. I intend on going to the library for some quiet reading of Nora Roberts’ new novel. As I take the short way, down the back hallway and past the construction class, I see Dallas in the corner near the parking lot doors huddled up with someone else.
I’m not sure what shocks and upsets me more, the fact that Law is seemingly buying drugs from Dallas or that when Dallas sees me and yells, “Get out of here, Smelly Trucker,” Law looks up and says nothing.
Not as tears run down my cheeks.
Not as I turn and rush away.
Not as I wonder if I’ve lost yet another person I love to addiction.
It’s because of Dallas that I was bullied into Law’s arms, and now, I’m torn right back out, left to question everything I thought I knew about the wonderful boy.