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“Why don’t the three of us meet up for breakfast after I get Everly off to kindergarten?”
“That works.” Tristan bumped fists with his brother, then pulled her next to him. “Let’s get you out of here.”
She looked back as they walked to his car. Her poor apartment. She didn’t have much since she’d walked away from everything she owned with Danny. What little she did have, mostly clothes and shoes, was probably ruined, both from the fire and water. The good news, three of her uniforms were at the cleaners. The biggest loss would be her laptop, but thankfully she stored all her files in the cloud. Such a pain. At least she had her gun and her only credit card in her purse.
“I wish there was an all-night Walmart nearby. I need a pair of shoes.” Along with underwear, a few T-shirts, jeans, and toiletries for a start.
“Hmm” was all he said.
He closed the door after she got in the car. As he walked around the front, he pulled out his phone. Who was he calling? He stopped, talked to someone for a minute, then stuck his phone back in his pocket.
“You okay?” he said when he was seated. “Never mind. That was a ridiculous question.”
“I’m okay.” Truthfully, she was numb. And her feet hurt. She slipped the heels off and sighed. There was no way she was putting them back on. She’d go barefoot until she could get new shoes that were comfortable.
“You’re not okay. Who would be? You know, you can lean on someone else occasionally.”
“You got someone to recommend, Chief?”
“I sure do, Sheriff.” He glanced at her and winked.
She laughed, and dear God, that felt good. It was also a surprise. This was not a night she thought she’d find something to laugh about. Not after losing everything but the clothes on her back. Had Mason torched her apartment? She just didn’t see it, but who else had she pissed off lately?
When Tristan drove past the turn that would take them to his house, she glanced behind her. “Um, that was your turn. Did you forget where you live?”
“Nope.”
“Are we going to talk to Mason?”
“Nope.”
“You’re a real PITA, you know that?”
He laughed, and crazy thing...making him laugh did that funny warm thing to her stomach again.
“Where are we going?”
“Say please.”
“Please. Happy?” What was he up to? That was another thing about him. He kept surprising her. Like telling her to say please just to mess with her. She’d never liked being messed with until him. She might be losing her mind.
“Since you were so sincere with your little please—” he dramatically rolled his eyes, which made her laugh. Again! “—Fanny is meeting us at her shop. You need stuff. She has stuff.”
This man!
“That was really nice of Fanny to open her shop just for me,” Skye said as they both dropped shopping bags on his bed. She even had new shoes, black high-tops for work, pink sneakers, and a pair of sparkly flip-flops. She still couldn’t believe she’d let Tristan and Fanny coerce her into getting pink shoes and flip-flops with crystals on the straps.
“You’ve lived here long enough to know that we take care of our own.”
She had seen many examples of that since she’d moved here, but she’d never felt like that applied to her. Even after a year, she still thought of herself as an outsider. But was that the town’s fault? Other than to do her job and stopping in at the Kitchen on Monday mornings, she’d kept to herself. Maybe it was time to make some changes in her life.
Chapter Twenty-Five
It bothered Tristan that Skye seemed surprised that he would ask Fanny to open her shop and that Fanny would agree without hesitation. She didn’t expect to be taken care of, nor would she ask for help.
The little she’d said about her family gave him the impression they weren’t close, so maybe they weren’t the kind of people who leaned on each other. Then there was Pretty Boy and what he’d done to her. He guessed she had learned the hard way she could only depend on herself. But she had him now.
He glanced down at her new flip-flops and smiled. Refusing to put those sexy shoes back on, she’d walked barefoot into Fanny’s shop. She hadn’t wanted pink sneakers or sparkly flip-flops, but Fanny didn’t believe in plain anything. When Skye had asked for white sneakers, Fanny stated she wouldn’t put boring shoes on anyone. The black high tops that happened to be Skye’s size had been a special order for someone else. Fanny had grudgingly let Skye have them.
