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I didn’t want to go at first, but as we sat in the salon chairs with footbaths massaging our feet, I realized how badly I’d needed the break. It was hard leaving Arielle for any length of time, but it also felt good to leave the house for a little while and gossip with my best friend. I didn’t know how Kate took care of five kids; just one was making me feel like I was losing my mind. I forgot everything, from appointments to the last time I’d brushed my hair.
I cried when Kate left on Sunday, but I knew she was anxious to get back to the kiddos. Shane had already left on his deployment, and while her neighbor was rad about keeping so many kids, Kate was ready to be home. She didn’t like being without them, and for the first time, I completely understood it.
Sometimes I wonder if that weekend was God’s way of preparing me for what happened after that. A reprieve of sorts so that, when the time came, I would be rested and strong.
Chapter 13
Abraham
I was in love. Flat-out do-anything-say-anything-kill-for-and-die-for love. And the object of my affection was a little girl that weighed less than ten pounds.
I’m not sure how it happened, but from the moment I’d held her in the hospital, it was like something clicked. I loved Katie and Shane’s kids. I’d loved them since the minute they were born, and I’d do anything for them, but Arielle was different.
What I felt for her was stronger than all that. It made me change. I waited for any mention of her, made sure I ran into whoever had visited her and Ani that day just so I could hear whatever story they wanted to tell. I had a hard time falling asleep at night, wondering if Ani had gotten her to sleep all right or if she was pulling an all-nighter that I was missing. And anytime I was in the same room with her, I couldn’t stop my gaze from landing on her over and over again no matter who was holding her, just to make sure she was okay.
I had a thousand pictures of her on my phone already.
I hadn’t wanted any of this. I’d fought it right from the beginning.
When I’d left the hospital that day, I drove around for hours trying to get my head on straight—but nothing seemed to help. She’d worked her way under my skin just by being alive, and that scared the shit out of me.
I didn’t want kids. The thought of being a parent made my skin crawl as I remembered my biological mother. She was, well, beautiful. In every single way.
A lot of kids I’d met in the system had really shitty parents, parents even worse than Ani’s, but my mom had never been anything but perfect. She was single when Alex and I were born, but she’d worked her ass off at job after job to make sure we had what we needed. When we were really little, she’d had a job at a daycare center so she could take us with her, and once we went to school, she’d joined a cleaning company.
But then shit had started happening, things I didn’t fully understand at five years old, and by the time Alex and I hit our seventh birthday, she was dead.
And I’d known that I never wanted to have kids of my own.
I clenched my hands around the steering wheel of my truck and pulled into the garage of my town house. There was no reason to relive all that shit. It was what it was. I still didn’t want to have kids, but that decision didn’t change my feelings on Arielle in the slightest.
Those two truths were a contradiction I would never understand.
I climbed out of my truck and closed the garage door behind me, taking my boots off at the door to my kitchen. I was filthy.
I’d spent the day overseeing some cutting we were doing, and I was covered in mud and leaves. I’d even found some little branches in my hair on the drive home. I needed a shower before I did anything else.
Twenty minutes later, I was leisurely drying off when my phone started ringing where I’d thrown it on the bed.
“Hello?” I answered in surprise.
“Hey, bud. I need you to come on up to the house.” My dad’s voice was raspy.
“What’s going on?” I asked, practically diving for my dresser where I had a shit ton of clothes folded on top. Something bad had happened, I knew it by his tone, the pauses between the words, even the way he was breathing.
“We’ll talk about it when you get here,” he said firmly. “I want you to go pick up the girls first, then come straight here.”
