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The sound of my name brought me back, and I stared down at Grace’s alarmed face on the floor. With a shaking hand, I picked up my phone and met her gaze. “Sorry,” I breathed. “Dropped the—” I blew out a breath and tried to get it together. Get that voice off my skin. “Why would anyone be looking for something at my townhouse?”
“Okay, bigger question right now is, where are you?”
I breathed in deeply and let it go. One thing at a time. “North Carolina,” I said, quickly continuing when her weary eyes widened. “And I know I should have told you, but I already knew what you’d say, and I didn’t want to hear it.”
Grace just blinked, and the silence rang between us. Like I’d broken her.
Just temporarily.
“Faith McMasters!” she exclaimed. “I’m taking the plastic bat Mateo’s already bought for this baby and beating you with it! And then the day he’s out of the womb I’m gonna train him to kick you every time you hold him!”
“And I deserve that,” I said, closing my eyes. “I—have no excuse. I just needed to be—” I let out a long exhale. “Here.”
Grace laughed humorlessly. “What the living hell is wrong with you?” She gestured wildly. “And the hair?”
I saw her husband, Mateo, moving behind her to see me, his dark hair disheveled and scruff darkening his face. “Faith, what’s going on?”
I ran a hand over my face, wishing I’d never turned my phone on... but that wasn’t fair to the people that cared about me. “I just have things to do, okay? I’m fine. Seriously.” I swallowed and smiled a smile I didn’t feel and knew damn well Grace didn’t believe. “I don’t know why anyone would break into my home and that’s terrifying, but I’m okay.”
“You need to come home so we can sort this out and I can protect you,” Mateo said, his tone serious.
“And you need to call Hope,” Grace added.
“Uh, no, you call Hope,” I said. “Please. I’m not jumping on that train right now—wait.” I stood up, narrowing my eyes. “Did you say him? Did you say the baby is—?”
“A boy?” Grace said, wiping her eyes again. “Yes, Auntie Faith, so get your ass home.”
“A boy,” I whispered. To round out their perfect family with Mateo’s little girl, Olivia. My now perpetually empty womb ached with a sadness that I quickly tamped down. “Oh, Grace, that’s amazing.”
I told them I loved them and we managed to hang up with no commitment on my end and my eternal gratitude that he hadn’t brought up the fire again. We’d never have gotten off the phone if I copped to that right now. And Grace would have spontaneously combusted.
The next morning, after a fitful night of pain and my mind on fast forward, I got dressed and headed back to Matthew’s house, trying to focus on what to say, but my brain wouldn’t stop flitting through all the scenarios of what awaited me back in Redemption. Someone broke into my home? Looking for something? I clenched the steering wheel tighter.
Where is it, little chica?
Sweat broke out at my hairline, and I flexed my fingers. I wouldn’t even let myself fall completely asleep last night, afraid of that same visceral slideshow showing up in my nightly adventures.
When my GPS alerted me to turn, I shook those thoughts free and rounded through the same streets as last night. In the light of day, I was more exposed. As I turned onto his street, the back of my neck went hot.
What if he was outside? It was Saturday. I didn’t know what kind of job he had, but he’d been out late the night before. Was he a sleep-in kind of guy? Or one who had coffee on the front porch or liked to—
“What—the—?”
My foot landed hard on the brake, jarring me uncomfortably. My left hand went to my abdomen out of habit, but I couldn’t register the pain shooting through me. The only thing I could comprehend was shock.
An old Chevy Bel Air sat parked across the street, a few houses down from Matthew’s place. One I knew well.
“Tobias?” I whispered with a frown.
Huffing out a breath, I passed the car and U-turned to park behind it, getting out quickly and wincing. Damn, Hope hadn’t wasted any time sending in the troops. But how would she have known in time? It was like a ten-or eleven-hour drive.
The driver’s side door opened, and I steeled my resolve, marching straight toward it.
“Jesus, Tobias, you didn’t have—”
My words stuck in my throat when I reached the door and the man that rose from behind the wheel to glare down at me wasn’t Tobias.
It was Adam.
