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I scanned it again. Where the fuck was she?
The back.
Employee’s parked in the back.
I took off around the side of the building, heading for the employee parking lot. My knees nearly buckled when I saw Rae leaning against her car, her shoulders shaking. Her forearms rested on the top, her head pressed against them.
Slowly, I approached her, trying to make my footsteps loud enough for her to hear me. It didn’t seem like it mattered.
I gently put my hand on her back, and she jolted back. Her head snapped up, her eyes damp and red. The second she realized it was just me, the tears started again.
“Sorry,” she rasped, wiping roughly at her cheek. “What are you doing out here? Where’s Emma?” She looked down, as if she was expecting to see her standing there.
“She’s still inside,” I said softly.
“You left her alone?” Her eyes widened. “Eli—”
“Cora’s looking after her.” The sound of her mother’s name made her lip curl.
“And you trust her?” she spat, her tone accusatory.
“Rae,” I breathed. “What’s going on?”
“Nothing.” Her throat bobbed as she swallowed. I lifted my brows expectantly and folded my arms across my chest as I leaned against the car.
“Reagan.”
She huffed out a breath as she turned and leaned back. She stared at the dark street for a long moment, but I just stared at her. Waiting.
Her upturned nose twitched as she inhaled sharply. Slowly, she dropped her head forward.
“I just wanted to stay at Lily’s for the weekend,” she mumbled. “I feel like I’m in fucking high school again.” She took the clip out of her hair and ran her hand through the silky strands. “I’m an adult. I shouldn’t have to ask permission to do that.”
I chewed my lip. I didn’t know what the right thing to say was.
“That fight felt like it was about a lot more than just staying at Lily’s,” I said slowly. She slid her eyes to me.
“She wants me to get a job,” she muttered. “A real one.” My brows lifted.
“You’re working here. Isn’t this a real job?”
She let out a humorless laugh. “I’m working here because I don’t have a choice. She told me I have to, or I’d have to find somewhere else to stay.” She shook her head, her hand still in her hair. “I should’ve just gone straight to Lil’s when I got into town. I shouldn’t have even told Mom I was back.”
My heart ached. If she hadn’t come back, she wouldn’t have been at the diner. I wouldn’t have been able to see her. Emma wouldn’t have seen her.
“Would you have told me you were back?” I murmured. She blinked at me.
“Yeah. Of course.” She said it too briskly to be the truth. I chewed my lip as I watched her. Finally, she scrubbed her hand over her face and turned toward me. “I just need to go, Eli. I can’t deal with her anymore. If I have to spend one more second with her, I’m going to lose it.”
“Wait.” I held my hand up, my eyes closing as I tried to play through every scenario in my head of how I could fix this.
It wasn’t like it was a secret that Cora and Rae were always fighting about something. Water and oil got along better than they did. But this felt different somehow. It felt bigger, like they were finally at their breaking point. After this, I knew there would be no going back.
And what would happen when Cora was old? Reagan would regret all the years she hadn’t spent with her mother. And Cora would hate herself for not being better to her only remaining daughter.
But if Reagan was ready to end things and walk away, there was nothing I could do or say to change her mind. I knew that.
Selfishly, I didn’t want her to leave. I didn’t know why. I just knew that I wasn’t ready for her to go. Not that we were all that close, or that I’d see her that much while she was in town. But if she left, a part of me knew she’d never come back and I wasn’t ready for it.
