Chapter Six
Six
Elsie
Don’t look at him. Do not look at him. He caught you already, and he was unhappy about it. Don’t do it again.
Sure, he was gorgeous, but he was also terrifying.
“Here,” Calvin said while handing me a plate with a small portion of the breakfast casserole, a slice of bacon, and some berries.
“Thank you,” I replied, taking it, although I didn’t have an appetite. I knew I had to eat, but I didn’t want to.
He was leaving me here with these strangers.
Halo, Winslet, Cressida, and Noa all seemed very nice, but I didn’t know them.
I had just met them yesterday. I needed Calvin.
Asking him to stay this morning had been wrong.
I knew he had to get back to LA and that his career depended on it.
But in the light of day, facing the horror of my situation, I had cracked and begged him not to go.
He’d already postponed things to get me to safety.
I should be thankful for that, and I was, but I’d woken up twice with nightmares about my parents.
What they’d gone through. I had ended up crying in the shower, curled up under the water, at three this morning.
Trying to hold it together while I watched Calvin leave today was going to be hard.
A chime went off, and Hawkins jumped out of his seat. “Daddy!” he called out, appearing thrilled.
His father was scarier than Forge, although somewhat friendlier. But the kid sure seemed to be excited about him.
“No, baby, that’s probably Oz and Winslet,” Halo told him. “Or Than and Montana,” she said with a shrug. “Daddy is at Linc’s.”
The little boy’s shoulders sagged, as if he was deflated. “I wanna go to Winc’s too.”
Forge leaned closer to him. “Remember what I said. You sit and eat like a big boy, and I bet you just might get to go.”
That had the little boy scrambling back into his chair. He wasn’t so scary when he interacted with Hawkins. In fact, it was rather heartwarming.
“Sorry we’re late,” Winslet said as she walked into the room, looking from Halo to the two of us. “The alarm didn’t go off.”
“Sure that’s what happened,” Forge drawled.
Oz stepped into the kitchen behind his wife, and his eyes narrowed on his brother. Winslet grabbed his arm and shook her head slightly, as if to stop him from reacting to Forge’s comment.
“You’re right on time,” Halo assured them. “We are just making our plates.”
Oz nodded his head toward the table for Winslet to go sit down. She started to frown at him, but whatever look he gave her made her cheeks flush, so she walked over toward the table.
“Flight time still the same?” Oz asked Calvin after watching his wife until she was seated.
“Yeah,” Calvin replied.
Oz nodded his head, then walked around us toward the food.
“I hope you both slept okay,” Halo said.
“We did,” Calvin told her, although I hadn’t slept much. Not that he knew that. He hadn’t asked me about my night. He’d been too focused on making me comfortable with his leaving. “I don’t think I woke up once.”
Halo smiled at him, but her eyes shadowed concern as she looked at me. I managed a smile as I took the plate in my hands and walked over to the table, being sure to sit at the other end as Forge.
Calvin gave me a slight frown as he sat down beside me. Did he not notice that Forge wasn’t thrilled we were here? I thought he was making it pretty obvious.
“You taking Halo and Hawkins today?” Oz said as he put food on his plate.
He didn’t need to look at his brother for Forge to know who the question had been directed at.
“Yeah,” Forge replied.
“Stay here when you bring them back. We have a run to make tonight, and Linc wants you, Gathe, and Than at the house.”
Forge didn’t appear happy about that as he scowled at his food, but he nodded.
“Bane going too?” Forge asked.
“No, he’s preparing to head out tomorrow. Santa Anita, remember? San Felipe Stakes is this weekend.”
I didn’t know much about horse racing, but I knew that Stakes had to do with races.
“Winslet and I are staying here while they’re gone,” Oz added.
“What horses does he have racing?” Calvin asked before taking a bite of bacon.
“Just one. Slingshot,” he replied, then shot a smile in Halo’s direction. She was beaming.
“My little underdog got a Triple Crown nomination and qualifies,” she said with pride in her voice.
Calvin turned his head to look down the table at her. “Slingshot is yours?” he asked.
She nodded. “Yep. He sure is.”
“Are you going too?”
“I wouldn’t miss it.”
“That’s awesome. You must be excited. Did you buy him, or how did you get him?”
Calvin was very curious and always asked a lot of questions. Halo didn’t seem to mind though. She seemed pleased he was interested.
“He was a gift from Bane. The first horse I ever got to name,” she explained.
“You called him an underdog,” Calvin pressed.
She laughed softly. “Yes, well, he proved them all wrong. He was an end-of-the-summer baby. All thoroughbreds, no matter when they are born, turn one on January 1. If a horse is born on December 31, it turns one the next day. Since thoroughbreds race according to their age, trainers want them born in January or as close to it as you can get.”
“That’s interesting,” Calvin replied. “I’ve bet on some races for fun. When we went to the Kentucky Derby two years ago, I made a few bets. But I don’t know anything about it.”
“Who’d you put money on?” Forge asked, leveling Calvin with his gaze.
Calvin smirked. “I’m not stupid. There was a Hughes horse racing.”
A small grin tugged at Forge’s mouth as he leaned back in his chair and took a drink from his mug.
“Smart,” Oz replied.
“I wace too!” Hawkins announced, and Forge reached over and ruffled the boy’s platinum-blond hair. “Yeah, buddy, you do,” he agreed.
“You’re not eating much,” Calvin said to me, leaning close to my ear.
I dropped my gaze to the plate in front of me. “Not very hungry.”
“Try,” he urged quietly.
He was right. I needed to eat something. Picking up the fork, I stabbed a portion of the casserole and took a bite.
I held on to Calvin as he hugged me. This was it. He was leaving me here for an undetermined amount of time.
I didn’t even have details on my parents’ funeral. There was no contact with the DEA. Their death had been covered on the media by now, but I hadn’t watched any of it. Calvin had just warned me not to watch any news.
I didn’t know how to navigate any of this. What should I do? Wait? I had all these questions for him now that he was leaving. Reasons why I needed him to stay were mounting. But I wouldn’t beg him. I’d already asked. He’d said he couldn’t.
“You’re going to be okay. I can’t call because it’s not safe, but I will be able to contact via email. They have a secure server, where I can send emails to you,” he assured me. “I will be back as soon as I can.”
I nodded, unable to talk passed the lump in my throat.
The fact that I was being cut off from everyone in my life was finally sinking in.
Calvin started to step back, and it would be pathetic if I didn’t release him. Reluctantly, I loosened my hold and let him go. The only person I had left was leaving me.
The sad glint in his eyes as he stared at me only brought me guilt for making this so hard on him.
“Good luck,” I choked out.
“Thanks,” he said and reached out to pinch my chin before turning and walking out the door, following Oz’s retreating form.
I stood there, trying to gather myself, staring at the closing door. Hands touched my shoulders.
“Let’s go out back. Get some fresh air,” Winslet suggested gently.
I knew there were others in the house, but I hadn’t seen them when I walked with Calvin to the front entrance.
Halo, Hawkins, and Forge had left a couple of hours ago.
Ransom and Noa had come to breakfast but left right after to go to the house they were having built.
Kash and Cressida had been at his parents’ house this morning, but Cressida had come back here earlier.
I’d seen her briefly in the great room. It would be easy to isolate myself here due to its sprawling layout and size.
Turning from the door, I nodded my head and followed Winslet back through the entryway, into the great room, and out the French doors.
I’d not been out here yet, and it was as impressive as the rest of the place.
Winslet led me over to a sitting area with plush furniture that looked rather luxurious for outdoors.
There was a firepit lit in the center of it.
The temperature wasn’t cold exactly, but there was a chill in the air.
“Would you like something to drink? Tea, water, soda? I can even open a bottle of wine,” she asked me.
I was tempted to say yes to the wine. I wanted something to dull the pain, hollowness, loneliness that filled me. But I didn’t think drinking this early in the day was a habit I needed to start.
“Water,” I replied, thinking that was the easiest out of the options.
She walked over to a bar area and opened a cabinet that I realized was actually a refrigerator. Reaching inside, she took out two fancy glass bottles of water and brought them over, handing me one.
“Thank you.”
“It’s always stocked. Help yourself. Halo wants you to make yourself at home here. She understands being … alone.” Winslet gave me a sad smile. “But you’re not. It just feels like it.”
Yes, I was. I didn’t say that though. I twisted the top off the water before saying anything.
“I don’t know anything about my parents,” I said, wishing that Calvin had found out where their bodies were at least. Or let me contact the people my father had worked with so I could ask.
“I want to know where they are, if there will be a funeral. I … I realize I can’t attend, but I need to know they will be buried properly.
That their …” I paused as my throat tightened. “That their lives will be remembered.”
Winslet’s brows drew together. “No one has told you anything?” she asked.
I shook my head. “The only contact I had with anyone was when they called to tell me my parents had been murdered and that they were coming to get me and not to leave my hotel room.”
She blew out a heavy breath. “And you left to come here and never saw them?”
I nodded.
Her eyes narrowed slightly, like she was thinking about something, and shifted to the doors leading into the house.
“Oz will know. I’ll make sure he finds out for you.
” She looked back at me. “I’m sorry about your loss.
I lost my mother when I was young, but she wasn’t …
good. I never knew my dad, so I can’t begin to understand how that feels. Were they good parents?”
I swallowed the water. “Yes. I’m an only child. My dad worked a lot and often had to be gone because he was undercover. But Mom and I were very tight. We spent a lot of time together.”
As painful as talking about them was, it also felt right. I wanted them to be remembered. They had been important, and their lives meant something. They’d been my world, except for Calvin.
She seemed unsure about what she should say. Talking to someone you’d just met about her dead parents had to be awkward.
I decided to turn the conversation back to her. “If your mom died when you were young, who raised you?” I asked.
A smile touched her face, and I was relieved that this question wasn’t going to lead to more sadness. “Marley.” She said the name with affection. “My elementary school counselor. She got custody of me and”—there was a pause and a flash of sorrow in her eyes—“my brother.”
Was he dead too? I didn’t want to ask that, but it was obvious mentioning him was difficult for her.
“And she was a good … guardian?”
Winslet nodded her head. “The best. She took in and gave a home to two very damaged kids, and she did the best that she could. Perry, my brother, suffered more by our mother’s abuse than I did. He, uh … he isn’t around.”
I was curious what that meant, but by the way her voice had gotten thick with emotion, I knew not to pry.
That was all she wanted to say about it.
I understood not wanting to talk about things.
Haunting shadows that you didn’t want to resurface.
Until yesterday morning, I hadn’t had any of those.
It hadn’t been a club I’d wanted to join, yet here I was. Its newest member.