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Noticing she’s shivering, I take my hoodie off and slide it down over her hair. “Are you okay?”?
She nods, swallowing roughly. “Can I have a ride back home?”?
I grab her hand and open my passenger door for her.?
Whipping my car around to head back toward Richmond Valley, I repeat my question. “Are you going to answer me? Where is Colton? I need to know he is safe before I leave this shithole.”?
“He’s fine. More than fine. With that chick he met last week. She lives two houses down from the party, so he said he was going to stay there for the night.”?
Is she jealous? She sounds pissed… hurt. Maybe there is more to their relationship, even though Colton has always sworn there wasn’t.?
“Did he know you were leaving?”?
She nods again, way quieter than normal, which is exactly why I know something is off. “Yeah, but I may have lied and told him I had called Lucian to come get me. I just needed a minute to clear my head,” she says with a huff, slumping back into her seat.?
We ride for a few minutes before either of us speaks again. “You hungry?”?
She shakes her head but doesn’t look at me, just keeps her eyes out the window. Her demons seem to be radiating off her and calling out to my own.??
What’s going on in that pretty little mermaid head of yours, Em??
“Wait!” she yells as we exit the outskirts of Highland, turning her whole body as she keeps her eyes on something we just passed.?
Slowly, I pull off the side of the road. “What is it?”?
“Can you turn around, please?” she almost begs.?
I turn my car around. “What are we looking for?” Fully expecting some type of animal hurt on the side of the road.?
“There.” She points to a run-down house. It looks weirdly familiar, but I have no idea why.?
“What is this place?” I ask as we pull into the grassy driveway.?
“It’s the last place my mother was ever happy.” The emotion in her whispered words rips at my soul, and it hits me why I recognized this home. It’s the one in the Polaroid from the first night I met her. The picture of her mom standing in front of this house with a baby in her arms.?
I keep my headlights on the house so she can see. Leaning against the hood of my truck, I watch her as she takes in all the little details of the old, abandoned home. Probably imagining what her mom’s childhood here was like.?
“Who was the baby?” I ask, because I know it couldn’t be her. Emerson’s mom was only around nine or ten years old in the picture.?
“My mom only talked to me about it one time. She told me it was special to her because a few days later, her stepfather left and took her half-sister with him. She never saw Jade again,” Emerson responds, running her fingers across the rotting porch rail. “A week later, she saw her mom doing drugs for the first time. They lost this house not too long after that, and a couple of years later, she started doing drugs offered to her at the hands of her own mother.”?
Fuck, that’s heavy.?
“She was a shitty mom, just like her own. Addicted to pills and heroin. Men in and out of our house, and she was too fucked up to have any clue what they were doing or saying to me.” The thought makes me want to puke my guts up and murder someone simultaneously.?
Emerson tilts her head back, expelling a huff. The cool mountain air was just cold enough to see the breath she blew out.???
“There’re only two positive things that woman ever did for me…” She puts one finger in the air, keeping her face to the sky. “She never forgot my birthday…” Adding another finger and letting it hang in front of her, she adds, “And whoop-de-fucking-doo, she never offered me drugs.” Emerson chuckles sarcastically. “But she also died when I was twelve, so I guess she never really had the time to do the latter.”?
“That’s some fucked-up shit, Em.” I straighten, wanting to go to her, but knowing she probably wants her space.?
“Yeah…at least you have one good parent. I never even knew my real dad,” she says, shaking her head. My heart aches for her… She deserves so much better than what she’s got.?
No kid deserves that shit. Especially not Emerson… not Colton… or Greyson or Ford.?
Or me.?
“I love my mom, but she has some faults too… She keeps letting him come back.” I take a steadying breath, because I’m about to confess something to her I’ve never uttered to a soul.?
