“Yeah, well, I didn’t want to throw you to the sharks all alone. This might be a business deal, but that doesn’t mean I can’t treat you humanely in the process.”
Boone stopped in the middle of tugging on his second boot, the skin between his eyes creasing. He was going to say something—I could feel it—then the moment passed before it had a chance to take root.
Standing, he cleared his throat and headed to the door. “Rip the bandage off?” He opened the door and waited.
“Rip that sucker off.”
I lifted off the bed and crossed the room toward him. When I passed by, I felt like I was passing through an energy field. Like the electricity in the air was especially concentrated around him. That wasn’t something new when it came to Boone, but it was something I’d hoped would have been decommissioned after all of this time. After all of the baggage that came with the story of us.
When I stepped into the hall, I almost felt my walls lifting back into place. My body armor fit snugly around me, secured so there were no weak spots a sharp thing could penetrate. It came naturally. I’d learned long ago that the only way to survive in this family was to protect myself, invisible walls and armor included.
“Let me do the talking when it comes to us,” I whispered to Boone, who’d shouldered up beside me and wasn’t scanning the area like he was just waiting for some family member to pop out of one of those dozen doors and fire off one belittling comment after another.
His head shook. “Yeah, when I followed that advice from you last time, your parents called the cops, thinking I was some half-naked miscreant in your bedroom, about to defile their daughter. Instead of believing the ‘alleged’ miscreant was dear daughter’s boyfriend who she’d just been defiling.” He gave me a nudge with his elbow, his grin as wicked as they came. “For the second time that morning.”
“You weren’t so eager to divulge what we’d been up to that morning either, so why don’t you turn that tsk-tsk tone on yourself for a change?” I scooted away from him, giving myself some space.
We were almost down the stairs and heading into the breakfast dining room—because the Abbott family had been eating their breakfasts in a separate room than their dinners for five generations—when Boone’s forehead creased. “It’s too quiet down here. Are you sure they weren’t going out to breakfast or something?”
Now that I was paying attention, I realized I didn’t hear anything either, which was unusual. Usually my dad’s booming Southern voice could be heard from a few rooms back, or my mom trying to get my dad’s attention by firing off question after question about whose dinner invite they should accept for the weekend, and Avalee and Charlotte could almost always be heard bickering about something. This morning though, when I knew at least a dozen extra bodies were living under this roof, I couldn’t make out the sound of a spoon scraping against a bowl.
“No, I’m not sure. Since Charlotte was the bearer of the breakfast news, this could be some kind of booby trap.” I craned my neck to look into the living room to see if anyone was in there. Like the rest of the house, it was empty.
“Or maybe Reverend Martin finally got it right and Armageddon arrived and took away all of the bad eggs,” Boone said, checking the kitchen to find it just as empty.
The thought made me laugh. “Free at last. Thank God Almighty, and Armageddon, I’m free at last.”
Boone and I were both still laughing as we rounded into the silent dining room. The breakfast dining room. Our laughs cut off mid-note.
“I don’t know about bad eggs, but if they’re not cold already from waiting on you two, they’re about to be.”
Boone cleared his throat while I slid a bit in his direction. There was a cold front directly ahead, whereas he’d always given off a warmth that bordered on sunshine.
The room had been silent before. It somehow became even more so.
At the head of the long table was my dad, untouched by age and unsoftened by experience, if his expression could be trusted. Where I was used to seeing three of the two dozen chairs staggered around the table filled, this morning, every one save for one was filled. Some faces I recognized; most I didn’t.
All clearly knew who I was though. Just as clearly as they knew who Boone was. No, that wasn’t the right way to put it . . . more likely, they knew of Boone.
Not the version I’d grown up knowing or even the one he truly was.
“Daddy,” I said at last, trying on a smile because the situation warranted it. Seeing one’s dad for the first time in over two years generally did . . . right? “I’m sorry I missed you last night. It’s good to see you again.”