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Those weren’t new.
Caleb lifted the end of the machine and dragged it backwards until he smacked into me.
"You going to help, or you just going to fucking stand there?" he snarled.
I picked up the panties.Her…panties.Then I looked at the black plastic garbage bag still sitting on the corner of the bed. "I think you can manage."
"What the fuck are you doing?" Nick growled from the doorway behind me.
"Dad wants us to cart this out of here," Caleb grunted, and shoved past, forcing me to lean over the bed.
"And put it where?"
Soft. Worn.
"Garage," Caleb said quietly.
They were small in my hand.
"Ryth Castlemaine," I spoke her name and lifted her panties. "Seems like Dad wants them to stay."
"Tobias," Nick called my name like a warning.
I’d tried to put the sound of their laughter out of my head the other night, tried to find a little sleep, even if it was filled with memories of mom. But I couldn’t sleep…not knowing a woman was downstairs, and when I left yesterday and drove through the city streets trying to find my way to somewhere I didn’t even know existed, I'd come back feeling more caged than ever, like an overwound spring ready to snap. My hands had trembled. Just like I felt now.
When I'd come back home last night, I'd felt it…the change.The sound of her mother in the living room, thefeelof her upstairs. The girl I'd seen outside my bedroom as she scurried toward the bathroom we now shared.
"I want them gone." I fisted her panties and lifted them to my nose. "I'll make sure of it."
"Tobias, no. She's just a kid."
"She's eighteen," I answered as that coiled serpent moved inside me. “A year younger than me.”
The memory of her came back in a rush, how her eyes had widened for a second when I stepped out of my bedroom, almost slamming into her…and how she'd suddenly jerked her gaze to the floor, hiding her face from me.A kid?I'd raked her body with my gaze. Skinny, short. Small breasts under one of Caleb’s old t-shirts.
I didn’t give a shit what excuse dad gave.
I looked around the room, filled with the equipment that had kept my mom alive for a little longer, giving me one more second with her. That girl shouldn’t be here…shouldn’t be anywhere near here, not this room…and not our home.
Burned down house or not, she wasn't staying here. Not if I had anything to do with it.
Kid, my ass…I’d make her desperate to fucking leave.
I threw her panties on the bed, then glanced at the pretty pale green dress hanging at the end of the bed, and strode from the room.
THREE
ryth
“Dad.”I stood up when they brought him out. But he didn’t look at me right away, just glanced my way, then lowered his head as he walked with a limp toward the barrier.
He was hurt, badly. His eye was swollen, his lips bleeding. The sight of that hit me hard. “Jesus.”
He forced a smile as he sat. “It’s okay, Ry.” He nodded at a chair, urging me to do the same.
“Did they do that to you?” I whispered, unable to take my eyes off his face. His poor, beautiful face.
“It’s nothing I can’t handle,” he said as tears welled in my eyes.“Hey.”He leaned closer to the divider. “Look at me.”
