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“It was just me.” He leaned down and took the knife from her. Puffy, looking considerably cleaner and better fed than on Friday, gave a wheezy sigh and closed her eyes.
“I heard noises before you came in.” She gazed at the damned knife as if she thought he might use it on her. “At ten-thirty-two. Ava packed my alarm clock.”
“You’ve been sitting here for two hours?”
“I think I woke up when Dad left.”
“He’s not here?”
“I think he went to see April.”
It didn’t take much imagination to figure out what Mad Jack and dear old Mom were up to. He strode down the hallway to Jack’s room and pitched the knife on his bed. Let him figure out how it got there.
When he returned, Riley was right where he’d left her, still huddled over her knees. Even the dog had deserted her. “After Dad left, I heard creaking sounds,” she said. “Like somebody was trying to break in, and maybe they had a gun or something.”
“This is an old house. They all creak. How did you get the knife?”
“I sneaked it up to my bedroom before I went to sleep. My—my house at home has security alarms, but I didn’t think there are any alarms here.”
She’d been sitting here armed with a butcher knife for two hours? The idea made him crazy. “Go to sleep,” he said more harshly than he intended. “I’m here now.”
She nodded, but she didn’t move.
“What’s wrong?”
She picked at her fingernail. “Nothing.”
He’d found her with a butcher knife, and he was mad at Blue, and he hated knowing April was getting it on with Mad Jack, so he took it out on the kid. “Say it, Riley. I can’t read your mind.”
“I don’t have anything to say.”
But she didn’t move. Why wouldn’t she get up and go to bed? He had endless patience with the most bumbling rookie, but now he felt himself losing it. “Yes, you do. Spit it out.”
“I don’t want anything,” she said quickly.
“Fine. Then sit there.”
“Okay.” Her head dipped lower, her tangled mass of curly hair hung further over her face, and her defenselessness was a rope dragging him back to the darkest corners of his childhood. His lungs compressed. “You know, don’
t you, that you can’t count on Jack for anything but money. He’s not going to be there for you. If you want something, you’ll have to take care of it because he won’t be around to fight your battles. If you don’t stand up for yourself, the world will roll right over you.”
Misery muffled her quick response. “Okay, I will.”
Friday morning in the kitchen she’d managed to stand up for herself just fine. Unlike him, she’d bent her father to her will, but now, seeing her like this made him crazy. “You’re just saying what you think I want to hear.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. Just tell me what the hell you want!”
Her small shoulders trembled, and the words came out in a rush. “I want you to see if a murderer is hiding in my bedroom!”
He sucked in his breath.
A tear dropped on the leg of her pajamas, right next to a candy heart that said KISS ME STUPID.
He was the biggest shithead who’d ever lived, and he couldn’t do this any longer. He couldn’t steel himself against her just because she was an inconvenience. He sank down on the step next to her. The dog came trotting out from his bedroom and nosed between them.
All his adult life, he’d kept his childhood baggage from dragging him down. Only on the football field did he let that dark cauldron of leftover emotions erupt inside him. But now he’d allowed his anger to spill over onto the person who least deserved it. He’d punished this sensitive, defenseless kid for drawing him back to that place of helplessness. “I’m a jerk,” he said softly. “I shouldn’t have yelled at you.”
