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He shook his head. “Never mind. I’m sure it’s nothing.”
If it was nothing, my brother never would have mentioned it. And I had never bothered to listen to all the voice mails on my phone. I’d assumed they were Koz bitching me out about leaving as early as I had, but I’d never confirmed my assumptions. They could have been Harry. I dug my phone out of my pocket and looked at the missed call log. Eight of them, all from the same unfamiliar number. “What did he say in the messages? And how many?”
“Only that he needed someone sober and awake to help him out. Wouldn’t say what it was about. I called his phone this morning, but he didn’t answer.”
I held my phone out to him. “Was it from this number?”
He nodded and raised a brow. “He called you, too, huh?”
“Apparently so.”
“I hope he got the help he needed.”
So did I. And now, I felt like a shitty friend.
Katie’s phone buzzed with a text message. She took a moment to read it, then glanced up at the two of us with surprise making her eyes wide. “He got help. Dad just bailed him out of jail.”
HARRY AND ONEof the team’s coaches were on their way out of the courthouse across the street from the police station Cam and I were heading into. Cam slowed and called out to them.
“So Webs got you all sorted out?”
Harry nodded and ducked his head. With the way Webs was glaring at him, I didn’t blame him. They went on their way, and we went on ours.
Three hours later, Cam and I left the police station with an emergency protective order against Guy, the promise that they’d serve him notice, and a court date in two weeks to have it finalized.
“Doesn’t this seem like a bit much to you?” I asked Cam as we climbed back into his truck to head home.
My brother gave me one of his patented you’ve-got-to-be-shitting-me looks and backed out of his parking spot.
We’d listed Cam, Sara, and the kids on the order, as well as the address for the house, the rink, and even the Moda Center, since they were all places I tended to spend a lot of time. When the officer had asked about a significant other, I’d hesitated for a moment. Cam had cut in and given Levi’s name.
It had been eating me alive ever since.
“Why did you tell them Levi is my significant other?”
“That son of a bitch threatened him, too, didn’t he?”
I supposed that was a fair point, but that didn’t make Levi my significant other. He might want to be, but that didn’t mean he was. After that, I bit my tongue the rest of the way home.
When we got there, Cam gave Sara a copy of the protective order and put another on the fridge. “Be sure you’ve always got that with you,” he said. Then he picked up Connor and stalked off to the backyard with Buster yapping and chasing after them.
Once they were gone, it was only the two of us. Sara went into the kitchen to clean up from Connor’s snack, so I followed to help her out.
“Cassidy’s sleeping?” I asked.
“Mm hmm.” She shoved a couple of plastic bowls into the dishwasher rack with more force than necessary.
She was mad at me. And she had a right to be mad, in all honesty. I’d made her promise to keep a secret from my brother, and it had turned out to be a much bigger, more harmful secret than I’d anticipated. He’d barely said a word to either one of us today. I’d had to fill Sara in on what had gone down at the hospital this morning, before we’d left for the police station.
I took a rag from the sink to wipe down the table. “I’m sorry,” I said. “I should never have asked you to—”
“You had every right to ask me for a favor. Don’t go there, Cadence. You and Chloe and Corinne—you’re always telling me I’m one of your sisters now, right? And that’s something sisters do. They help each other out.”
“But it wasn’t fair of me.”
“Bullshit.” She slammed one of Cassidy’s sippy cups into the rack. “You asked. It was on me whether I should keep your secret or tell him. If he’s pissed at me for keeping your confidence, that’s between the two of us. It’s not anything for you to worry about. Cam and I are going to have to sort this out on our own. Once he’ll listen.”
Only that meant I was between the two of them. Almost literally. They weren’t speaking, and it was all because of my stupidity. How could I possibly do anything but worry?
