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His expression hardens. “Maybe I should meet your sisters. I bet they’d love to hear how you left me to fend for myself when I needed your help.”
My blood goes cold, but I keep my expression placid. Dell can’t ever find out how badly I want to keep my past a secret from my sisters or he’ll have way too much leverage on me. “Just give me some time. I might have another way to get the money.” And, if I’m lucky, he’ll give up on me and move on. He always did bore easily.
His smile is still gorgeous, even with his sunken cheeks and the dark shadows under his eyes. “That’s my baby girl.”
He turns and walks off into the shadows. He doesn’t ask for my phone number or promise to call me.
If he needs me, he’ll find me again. He knows me as well as I know him, and that sinking feeling in my gut is the thought that he’s right about me. I haven’t changed nearly as much as I’d like to believe I have.
CHAPTER THREE
Jaxon
I’m not a voyeur, but I love people watching.
Ducking lower behind a bush, I hold my breath as a family walks by. They’re arguing about how much farther to go before they turn around. The parents want to keep going, to enjoy nature, to see the views from the summit.
The kids, who appear to be around thirteen and ten, just want to go home so they can skateboard with their friends.
The parents are so determined to have this experience whether or not the kids want it and are clearly getting frustrated.
I listen in like a damn creeper, and I am fascinated.
I’m beyond fascinated.
I never experienced this as a kid. I started working when I was eight, singing in a commercial for breakfast cereal and starring in a kids’ show that was more singing than acting.
I wanted to perform more than anything in the world and my parents worked their asses off to help me get to where I am.
No matter how I feel about them now. I can’t deny they supported me in the beginning.
But I never had a family day out for a hike. And I have no idea if my brothers and my sister did. I never even had the luxury of whining to go home, because every audition and every day of work was my choice.
My parents sacrificed so much for me. Back then, I suspected if they got any hint I wasn’t having fun, they’d pull the plug on the whole thing. I got really good at pretending to be happy. So good, I convinced myself most of the time.
It was my Aunt Lorraine who saw through all my pretenses and insisted I spend summers, or whatever time off I could manage, in Catalpa Creek with her. She’s the reason I’m here now, playing Bigfoot. The general store she owns is finally back in the black thanks to all the Bigfoot souvenirs she’s selling.
The family passes me, and I get up and move on, searching for Bigfoot hunters. I have to give them the occasional sighting or they might get bored. And if they stop looking for me, they’ll stop shopping at my aunt’s store.
Thunder rumbles in the distance, and I head back to the house. Barley hates thunder and I’m not going to leave him to suffer alone if I can help it.
I pick up my pace. After wandering the woods in this costume for months, I’ve gotten good at moving in it and I know the trails well enough not to run into any trees. It feels good to run, even if it is too hot inside this costume.
I rush out of the forest onto my driveway and realize way too late there’s a person standing there. Nothing is stopping my momentum and I barrel right into Honey. She starts to fall back and I’m so off balance, there’s no way I’ll catch her without also falling on top of her.
Thinking fast, I grab her and twist, so I hit the ground on my back and she lands on top of me.
She makes an adorable squeak, and the air leaves me in a loud “oof” as I slam onto the gravel.
It takes me a moment to catch my breath, not just because it was knocked out of me when I fell, but also at the shock of holding this woman in my arms.
In a life where reality has never lived up to the fairy tale, she feels better than I could have imagined. I wish I was touching her skin-to-skin.
“You make a comfy pillow,” she says conversationally.
I let go of her and press my arms against the gravelly ground until I feel the pinch of the stones through my furry sleeves. She is off limits for so many reasons, but chief among them is that the things in life that have always felt the most perfect and real have always burned me the worst.
She lifts her head, confusion clouding her eyes for only a moment before she smiles the fakest smile I’ve ever seen and rolls off me. Her nose ring glints in the sunlight and I notice a small bird tattooed on her right wrist when she lifts her hand to push her hair behind an ear studded with four different piercings.
