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“Yeah.” He smiled. His phone trilled in his pocket and he quickly fished it out to answer it. He put it to his ear. “Hello?” He paused for a second and then his smile widened. “Great. Yeah, I’ll tell her. Thanks.”
He hung up and put his phone back in his pocket.
“Who was that?”
“The realtor. It’s official. We close in a few weeks.”
“Really?” I blinked, feeling tears blooming in my eyes. “It’s really happening?”
“Yes.”
“Duke.” I launched myself at him. He picked me up and swung me around.
He eventually put me down, but he didn’t release me. He buried his face in the crook of my neck and said, “I’ll make this go away for you, Willa.”
“Make what go away for me?” I cradled the back of his head with one hand, threading my fingers through his brown locks.
“The horror of the last few days.”
I gently tugged on his hair, forcing him to look at me. I brushed my thumb along his cheek, the roughness of his stubble tingling my skin.
“You came for me, Duke,” I said, my eyes earnest. “That’s what I’ll remember first. That’s what I’ll remember if it ever gets dark. You came for me.”
“I’ll always come for you. Always.”
Chapter41
“Sailor,”Doc said, holding out her cell. “It’s your father.”
Sailor glanced at the phone for a moment and then took it and put it to her ear. “Hello? Hi, Dad. I’m—”
She turned and left the living room, heading out back for some measure of privacy. She returned not five minutes later, her eyes desolate as she handed Doc her phone.
“Ready to get out of here?” I asked. I didn’t know the specifics of the conversation she’d had with her father—but I could guess.
She nodded but didn’t meet my gaze.
Sailor, Waverly, and I left the clubhouse in my car—which had been retrieved from the junk yard by Crow.
I knew how Sailor felt. No matter what I did, my mother spared me very little attention. When Waverly came along, I thought at least the new baby would get the love and care she deserved. Nope. Angel ignored us both. Without love and attention from my own mother, I instinctively lavished it on Waverly, not only to care for her, but to receive love back. I saw her first smile, her first laugh. Her first word had been an attempt to same my name. Moments my mother could never appreciate belonged solely to me, and all I had to do was love Waverly. The fact was, my sister filled the gaping hole in my heart that my mother had left behind.
I turned in the opposite direction of the house.
“Where are we going?” Waverly asked.
“We’re stopping at the store,” I explained, looking in my rearview mirror to see Duke and Savage trailing me on their motorcycles. They weren’t going to let me out of their sight for a good long while, if ever again. At the moment, I didn’t mind. I needed to feel safe. Protected. Cared for.
Sailor didn’t appear as though she’d heard me. She was staring out the window, lost in thought.
“Are you a chocolate person, Sailor?” I asked.
“Hmm?” She finally looked at me, meeting my gaze in the rearview mirror. “What did you say?”
“I asked if you were a chocolate person.”
“Yeah.”
“What about ice cream?” I added. “Cookies?”
