“Let’s get you two inside.” Jace’s voice was rough when it fell on my ear.
He didn’t try to pry her from my arms—I wouldn’t have let him if he’d tried. He just helped me to stand with Bailey still wrapped around my neck.
The man lifted me from the ground with the arm he had around my waist, his other hand set protectively on Bailey’s back.
“She’s fine, Faith,” he murmured, his voice as thick as the sun I could feel burning against my skin, my hair sopping wet, my body suddenly feeling overwhelmed by the pressure of the muggy air.
My knees shook, threatened to give.
“She’s fine.”
The problem was that I wasn’t.
I wasn’t sure I was ever gonna be.
“You have her. You have her,” he quietly encouraged. He guided me up the rickety porch steps at the back of the house.
Steps that needed replacin’, too. Everything falling apart around me.
Everything.
And I had no idea how we were goin’ to survive. How we were going to make it past all of this.
Tears streaked down my face, and I dropped my head as I let him lead us back through the still gaping door.
Numbly, I moved through the massive kitchen, the one room that had already been fully renovated. My feet shuffled down the hall toward the front of the house.
All the while, Bailey continued to cling to me, probably feeling a little of her own fear, too.
The child was smart enough to realize she’d disobeyed; though, I knew she hadn’t realized what she’d done would elicit the reaction it had.
Too young and innocent to realize the danger she’d put herself in.
Too young to understand the threat and danger that loomed like the darkest shadow over our home.
I couldn’t make it any farther than the antique sofa that rested in the middle of the main living space. I sank onto it, still holding her, breathing her in.
My limbs began to shake. Trembles jerking through my muscles, a stutter at my very soul.
Bailey rested her cheek on my hammering heart. As if she were trying to soothe it.
Jace dropped to his knees in front of us.
I didn’t want to look at him.
Didn’t want to see the judgment on his face when he saw what a mess I was.
When he realized I didn’t know how to handle all of this on my own.
Those copper eyes stared back. Somehow hard and tender at the same time.
He set his hand on my bare knee. A jolt of hot energy blasted through my body. I squeezed my eyes against it.
“She’s safe,” he murmured. “She’s safe.”
“I safe, Mommy,” Bailey whispered, so quietly. Her little fingers fumbled over my chin like an apology.
Images flashed.
The pictures of Joseph that I’d demanded of Mack.
Demanding that he show me, because I’d refused to believe what had happened to him was real until I saw it with my own eyes.
My mind flashed with the warning of those notes.
The doll floatin’ in the tub.
All the questions.
All the fear.
And I didn’t know if I would ever truly feel safe again.
Eleven
Jace
The shrill sound of the drill digging through wood echoed through the kitchen. My hand was cinched tight where I held the power tool, teeth gritted, my shoulder turned as I bore down.
All I could feel was the sticky apprehension that clawed at the walls.
Clawed at my insides.
The drill hit, burrowing out the spot, and I set the drill aside and began to install the hardware high up toward the top of the door where it’d be out of reach of curious fingers.
I’d already taken the same care on the other two doors that led outside.
Unease rumbled through my consciousness.
No one was getting inside here.
Not on my watch.
Problem was, I’d never get the chance to erase what was at the heart of it.
What dimmed those chocolate eyes to a murky, black desperation.
What marked her in scars that would never heal.
I did this.
Guilt screamed through my mind, and my shoulders tensed when I heard the floorboards squeak behind me.
I finished securing the last screw into place and then bolted the lock at the top, making sure it worked, metal screeching against metal as I slid it home.
I could feel Faith watching as I did. Her presence crawling across the floor and climbing my legs.
Sinking in.
The way she always had.
Carefully, I shifted a fraction, enough so I could peer back at her.
She’d come to a stop in the kitchen entryway. Wearing fitted jeans and a long-sleeved tee. Her hair dry and tied back into a ponytail.
A goddamned vision.
Angelic.
Beauty.
Filling me with the kind of awe that made me want to drop to my knees and sing.
Or maybe confess all my sins.
She looked between me and the new lock that had been installed. Sorrowful gratitude moved through her expression.
I gave an uncomfortable shrug.
“No one’s getting in or out of here without you knowing,” I promised.