Itsked.“It’s almost 2009. You need a cellphone,” I scolded gently. “You also need a website.”
Smothering a delighted laugh, Elise shook her head. She looked so happy, for a moment she seemed like a stranger. Or maybe I was the stranger. “I can’t afford all that.”
I arched a brow at her. “If you’re netting thousands of dollars as a high school student. Not only can you afford them, you can’t afford to go without them.” As I gently lectured her, an idea took root. I was pursuing a degree in engineering and a minor in business. My goal was to someday run my own engineering firm. But I knew from my minor how important marketing was to the success of any business.
I also knew how to put together a simple WordPress website. Maybe it was time to repay some of the debts I owed to Elise Cormier. After all, she’d saved my sister from a child predator. She’d cleaned blood of my shirt after my father hit me, and she’d hid both of us while Ava sobered up that night three years ago. If my father had caught us back then, we would have both paid a hefty price.
And then there had been the times before I went to college when she’d stay at the kitchen table with her books out in front of her if our father came home from a bad day in court. He’d have Flora pour him a bourbon and water before she served dinner, and the four of us — Ava, Mom, he, and I — would eat at the dining table in a silence as taut as a tripwire
The way my father had breathed through his nose on those nights, the urge to lash out so great he almost vibrated with it. But something about both Flora and Elise in the kitchen had kept him in check.
Some of the time, anyway.
As far as I was concerned, those rescues were worth a little web design and a new iPhone. The more I thought about it, the more I liked the idea. Christmas was still a week away. I had time to get the homepage of a website designed. And it was definitely enough time to pick up a cell phone. Surprising her, I realized, would be a lot of fun.
But that could wait. It could wait for a time when she wasn’t sitting beside me. For once, not looking at me like I’d just drowned a bag of kittens.
She watched me, her smile softening. “So, I guess it’s working,” she said, eyeing me carefully.
“Working?” I frowned, thinking we were still talking about websites and cell phones.
“Your…insurance,”she said, tilting her head toward the house. The set of her eyes hardened just a little, and I grasped her meaning. The gun. My threats to my father.
“Oh. My insurance. Yes.” I dropped my voice and nodded. “It seems to be. It’s been quiet for a lot longer than I expected.”
Honestly, if I’d thought it would have freed us, I would have threatened to kill him years ago.
Elise’s eyes narrowed. “It seems weird, though.”
I narrowed my eyes in response. “What do you mean?”
She shifted in her seat, angling her knees more toward me and propping her elbow on the back of the swing we shared. Elise looked comfortable, but also intent. It was a look I appreciated.
“I mean, I wouldn’t think it would be something someone could just turn off,” she said before catching her bottom lip between her teeth.
I studied her, saying nothing for a long time. How much could those amber eyes see? How much had she noticed over the years? Probably everything. I’d made a huge mistake in underestimating her, taking her youth too seriously. Elise Cormier probably knew more about my family than I did.
I drew in a long breath before blowing it out. “I think my father went about eighteen months before,” I told her. “It was when my mother was pregnant with Ava, and the nine or so months after she was born.”
She blinked her eyes wide. “Do you remember that?”
Closing my eyes, I tried to think back on that time. I had only been two when Ava was born. My father was always the shadow presence in our house, the one we weren’t to disturb. But the first time I remembered him hitting Mom, Ava had been just learning to crawl. She’d pulled herself up to standing by gripping the tablecloth, and she’d upset the jug of half-and-half, and cream had spilled on my father’s suit pants.
I remembered a crack and my mother’s head sailing back before her body hit the floor beside me.
I pulled away from the memory. “No,” I said. It was true. I didn’t remember the days when he hadn’t hit her. I’d only heard my mother swear on them. She’d always swear that he could change.
“So, a year and a half? That’s the longest?”
I let my eyes meet hers. I could see they were edged in worry. “Yes, but that was before he was properly motivated,” I stressed, letting her hear the edge in my voice. “Fear of a bullet in your face can help a man overcome his nasty habits.”
Her nervous gaze moved between mine. “You sound kind of scary when you say things like that,” Elise said.
Her voice had gone a little breathless, and I found I didn’t like it. I didn’t like her looking afraid of me. The thought made me frown. I halted the gently sway of the swing and searched her eyes. “You know I’m not like him, right?”
I watched surprise skitter across her features. “Cole, I didn’t think that.” She shook her head with conviction. “I’d never think that.”
It was the first indication that Elise Cormier might not actually imagine the worst of me. And, all of a sudden, her good opinion seemed as vital to me as breath.
