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“He’s still dead. And you. Penelope. I just wanted to do good. Instead I make the wrong choices.”
There weren’t words to comfort her. And in so many ways I could sympathize with her. It didn’t matter a person’s age. At some point we all still felt like failures.
I certainly did. With my family. My marriage. Pretty much everything but work, I’d flopped.
I rubbed her back and kissed her forehead. She sought my cheek with her lips with stilted movements.
As much as I didn’t want her touch to affect me, it did.
But I wouldn’t let her make another wrong choice.
I pressed her head to my chest and held her.
She fought me, squirming in my hold.
I was stronger, but that didn’t stop her from trying to escape my grasp. She was a wild cat, scratching and clawing. And I imagined her doing the same to try to save that boy. She wouldn’t have simply watched him drown. It wasn’t in her nature. And she shouldn’t still carry this horrendous fear. It wasn’t right. It wasn’t right for JoJo.
“I’m going to teach you to swim.”
The declaration was out before I could think it over.
She stilled.
Her eyes were red-rimmed and devastated. “I can’t. I can’t get in the water.”
“I won’t let anything happen to you.” A promise. It was a promise I had no business making to her, especially considering I wasn’t sure I wanted anything to do with JoJo.
But I was a man of my word.
“No. I’m not—”
“Yes,” I said firmly.
“You can’t tell me what to do.”
“I just did, sweetheart.”
She sank her nails into my neck as she searched my face. “I’m too scared.”
“Then it’s only fair. Because you scare the hell out of me.”
“Wh-what?”
I couldn’t stand the sight of her tearstained face. I wanted her happy. Dammit. What did I care?
“You heard me. And Barn?” I grasped her jaw and forced her to look at me. “Even if you were an Olympic swimmer, you probably couldn’t have saved him.”
CHAPTERSEVENTEEN
JOJO
“Finally.”
I stirred.
Penelope barreled into the study and sat on the arm of the sofa, her grin illuminating her entire face.
Kane moved from where he was stretched out beside me, though he didn’t remove his arm from around my middle.
