Chapter 14
CALLIE
PRESENT DAY…
Seven years of active avoidance and it all came down to a gravel parking lot and a question I’d been working really hard to forget.
I bought myself a few seconds when I turned away to look at Cody.
He’d worked his hoodie up around his face and put the string between his teeth.
His eyes cut between the three men, his focus shifting but taking in every single part of them. Smart kid. Smarter than me.
Hawk waited with that same grim determination I’d run from seven years ago.
I locked my arms over my stomach and lifted my chin, finally squaring up to Hawk. I’d faced harder things than this. I’d lived in hell while with Wade and Mom. These men didn’t scare me.
I hid my shaking hands in tightly balled fists.
“Mom?” Cody tugged on my sleeve, instantly ripping my attention away from Hawk’s chiseled jaw and down to his curious expression. “What are we gonna do?”
Now that was an impossible question, and one I could not, under any circumstances answer in front of Hawk.
I could only imagine the look on his face if he found out the shop was all I had.
“We’ll go home soon, Cody.” I swept a hand over his head, pushing his overgrown hair off his forehead and into the hood.
A fire engine rolled into the lot, lights strobing red and white across the gravel. Two deputies climbed out of the cruiser that parked behind it. The noise ratcheted up, and Cody pressed into my leg.
Colt and Diesel remained behind Hawk. Colt kept shooting glances my way, and he crept around to Hawk’s right side to drop to a knee in front of Colt. “Hey. Sorry about your place.” He jabbed his thumb over his shoulder.
“Yeah.” Cody scuffed his toe over the gravel, reminding me he still needed new shoes.
Ugh. One thing after another piled up in the back of my mind until it felt as stuffed as our bags on fill a bag for a buck days at the local thrift store.
Cody hunched his shoulders. “My homework was in there.”
“Aw, man.” Colt grinned a tiny bit. “Any chance your teachers will let it slide this one time?”
Cody shrugged. One side of his mouth tipped up in a smile so like Colt’s I expected him to recognize himself in that instant.
“Probably not. I told her my dog ate my math homework last week. She didn’t believe me cuz we don’t have a dog.
So that night, I chewed on my papers and turned them in all soggy and gross. ”
“Cody.” Exasperation leaked into my voice. I rubbed the throbbing pulse in my temples. “Is that why I have a meeting with your teachers next week?”
He shot a panicked look at me, his eyes going round. Yeah, he definitely hadn’t meant for me to hear that story, but he’d been too intent on trying to impress Colt to realize he’d given himself up.
“It’s fine, buddy.” I patted his shoulder, making sure my face showed zero anger and forcing out a smile. “I dunked mine in an oil pan once because I thought the teacher wouldn’t make me read it out loud to the class.” I chuckled and tapped his shoulder with one finger. “Don’t get any ideas.”
“Don’t have any more oil pans.” Colt deadpanned the sentence without so much as a smirk, pushing to his feet in that slow, rolling motion that I used to adore.
My stomach flipped over and my pulse tried to race. I sank my teeth into my cheek, using the pain to tame my instant reaction.
One of the deputies angled toward me, a notepad and pen in hand. A smile flashed, the eager expression reminding me of a puppy being offered a treat.
Hawk stepped into his path, his low voice carrying but not the words.
They exchanged a few quick sentences. The deputy scribbled in his notebook, nodded several times, and shook Hawk’s hand.
Within seconds, Hawk had not only sent the deputy on his way but had spoken to a firefighter and taken complete control of the situation.
I hated how useful he was to have around.
“Mama.” Cody tugged my sleeve again. “What are we going to do? Why are they staring at us?”
I followed his line of sight to where Colt and Diesel stood shoulder to shoulder. Colt’s hands hung at his sides, and his jaw worked once. He ran a hand through his hair in the exact same way Cody did. I needed not to think about that right now.
“They’re just making sure we’re okay.” Did I tell him they were friends? I crouched in front of him and checked him again for injuries. My hands screamed when I brushed one over the shoulder of his hoodie. “Does your arm hurt?”
He glanced at it and rotated his shoulder and wrist. “Little.”
“We’ll get it looked at.” I’d done everything I could to protect him. But he’d gotten hurt anyway. Fear clawed into my throat and stuck, blocking my airway. I stood and scanned the area for a paramedic. Shouldn’t there be one? Why couldn’t I see it.
“I’m fine.”
“Cody.”
“I’m fine, Mom.”
Mom. My eyes sank closed at the grown up way he addressed me. He’d done it once last week, then gone right back to Mama. I had a feeling those days were over, especially with these three anywhere close by.
Diesel materialized beside me. I’d almost forgotten how good he was at that. He kept his eyes up, his gaze scanning the roof and tracking over to the shop next to me, then the dark stretch of road past the edge of the lot.
My shop.
I hadn’t let myself really look at it. I did now, and wished I hadn’t. Water sprayed over the front in heavy blasts. Smoke and flames billowed from the windows and rolled up the exterior walls.
The heaving in my stomach returned. One second I couldn’t imagine standing here without them.
The next, I wanted them gone so far away I never had to hear a breath of their name.
Having Hawk handle the police gave me a chance to breathe.
There were a few situations where having three dangerous men beside me came in handy.
What would the truth do to Cody?
“Paramedic’s at the engine.” Diesel faced me, his face drawn in to a series of hard lines. “I’ll walk you over. You need to let them check your hands.”
“I’m fine.”
He ducked his head to look straight into my eyes. “Please. Do it for me.”
Fuck.
Cody looked up at Diesel. “You’re really tall.”
Diesel looked down, then crouched on one knee. “Yeah.”
Cody’s eyebrows drew down. He twirled the sodden hoodie string between his thumb and forefinger. “You a good guy or bad guy?”
“Good guy.” Diesel grinned, and it took all the anger out of me in a whoosh. “But you should never trust that. Bad guys will tell you they’re good guys so you trust them. Trust what you see, kid. Trust your gut.”
“My gut’s too hungry to make decisions.” Cody held out the string he’d been chewing. “Want some?”
“I’m good.”
Cody smirked. “Should I believe that?”
Smartass. Just like his father. With a fair bit of my smart mouth thrown in.
Colt inched over again, sidling toward us like we wouldn’t notice. Like if he moved carefully enough I wouldn’t send him away.
“Nice shoes, man. I always wanted shoes that lit up.” He dropped down beside Diesel, the two of them making a kind of barrier between Cody and the burning building.
Cody glanced down. “Yeah. You gotta stomp though. They don’t work if you walk normal.” He demonstrated, stomping twice on the gravel. Blue and red flashed across the ground, mingling with the lights from the emergency vehicles. “See?”
Colt’s throat worked. “Very cool.”
He didn’t look at me. Thank goodness. If he flashed those hooded eyes in my direction, I might end up on my knees begging them to forgive me.
Another deputy cut toward me. Hawk’s firm shoulder brushed mine as he walked past me. “I’ll take care of it.”
“I can talk to a deputy.”
“I know.” Hawk didn’t slow. “You have burns on both hands, a kid who needs to be checked out, and probably a million questions. Let me handle the deputy.”
Damn him for always being right. Except for when he let a stupid rule ruin everything that we had. “Fine.” I motioned for Cody to join me. “Come on, Cody. Let’s get your arm looked at.”
“Only if you do.” He pointed at my hands.
I ignored the throbbing pain in my palms. “Absolutely.”
Colt stood when I moved and fell into step beside us, close enough that he kept up that protective stance.
I ignored that too and walked Cody over to the young paramedic giving us a warm smile from the back of the ambulance. “Thought for a minute I’d have to track you both down.” She patted the floor of the ambulance. “Who’s first?”
Cody slid an arm around my leg and hung on for dear life. Seven going on seventy but he still needed his mother’s reassurance.
I showed her my hands. “I’ll go first.”
“She kicked down a door but got burned cuz she tried to open it using the knob. It wouldn’t budge so she kicked the shit out of it.”
“Cody.”
“What?” He stared up at me, wide-eyed. “You said sometimes a situation calls for a cuss word.”
Heat flamed in my cheeks, but the paramedic laughed and ripped open a pack of bandages. “Your mama sounds pretty badass.”
Cody’s eyes gleamed and he gave me a look so full of awe that I didn’t even try to hide my smile. “See? You’re a total superhero. Like Batman.”
In Cody’s world, there was nothing better than being a superhero. I took the praise with a nod. “Thanks.”
The paramedic cleaned my blistered palms with quick and efficient moves that required me to lock my jaw against the sting. Once she wrapped them in gauze, she turned her attention to Cody.
“So.” She pulled open a drawer. “I have one very important question. Batman, Spiderman, or Wolverine?”
Cody shot to his feet so fast he almost fell out backward.
Colt braced him with a hand in the center of Cody’s back, and our son flashed him a smile as bright as the sun. He whipped around and began discussing the merits of each superhero while the paramedic checked the tiny scratch on his arm from where the door had caught him on our way through.
Once we’d been seen, our wounds addressed, and moved away, Hawk and Diesel joined us.
“We’ve put out the main blaze.” A man in a firefighter uniform stopped in front of me. “We’ll stick around a bit and check for hot spots. You should go on home. Check with us tomorrow and get your insurance adjuster out here to take a look. Might not be a complete loss.”
I nodded, my mind scrambling to keep up with the influx of information.
Hawk took my elbow in a gentle grip. Searing heat swept up my arm, and I pulled away, shaking my head at him. His lips flattened into a thin line. “I’m not going to let you fall over because you’re being stubborn.”
I crossed my arms. “Let’s be careful with who we call stubborn around here.”
He took the verbal hit with barely a blink. “I need an answer, Callie.” His voice dipped, his head swinging closer. “Whose is he?”
I really did not want to do this right now, but I’d run out of options to delay, and lying didn’t help any of us. “He’s Colts.”
Colt froze. Every part of him except his eyes went so still he might have been made from marble. Except his eyes. They shot wide in a mimicry of Cody’s, and he glanced at the boy by my side. His jaw worked several seconds, and his face hardened in a way I’d never seen on him before.
A nervous skitter of fear raced up my spine and twined around my neck. I’d known he wouldn’t be happy about the news, but I had no reference for what he might think about the situation.
“Why didn’t you tell me?” Colt stayed put within arm’s reach, but a sudden invisible distance dropped a chasm between us.
I opened my mouth to answer.
Crack.