Page 81 of Challenge Me

His hands hovered in the air. Mal backed into the wall, then closed her eyes. Her breaths were erratic, and when she began to rock, I swore.

“What the hell are you doing back here?” I asked Clara.

“I just came to—”

“I don’t care. Get out!” I pointed at the doors, refusing to look away from her until she ran through them.

I rushed over to Mal but stopped a few feet away. I crouched where I was, but I didn’t get close enough to touch her.

“Hey, Mal. Can you open your eyes?” She shook her head, continuing to rock, forward and back. “That’s okay. Take your time.”

Remi came up beside me with his arms wrapped around himself. I glanced sidelong at him, noting the way his brow was furrowed and his eyes were locked on Mal.

He turned to me. “I’m sorry, I didn’t . . .”

“It wasn’t you.”

“Whatever I did, I wasn’t trying to freak her out. I . . . Fuck, I’m sorry.”

I took his face and forced him to look at me. “Remi, it wasn’t you. She doesn’t like to be touched when she’s not expecting it.”

“But she screamed.”

“Yeah, I know. It wasn’t because of you. If she wasn’t already overwhelmed, she’d probably be fine. This was Clara’s fault, alright? Not you.”

It didn’t look like he was satisfied, but he nodded. I turned back to Mal and inched closer. Hearing me, she opened her eyes and stared past me.

“I’m sorry I let her touch you,” I said. She already seemed to have calmed herself down quite a bit, so I held out my hand. “She should’ve never gotten close.”

Something rolled across the floor, and she looked down as one of the cars hit her shoe. The other one followed suit, drawing her attention to Remi, who offered her an extremely gentle smile. She looked away from him but bent to pick up the cars.

“Don’t like her,” she murmured.

I breathed a laugh. “Nobody does.”

After another second, she took my hand and let me pull her closer. When she tucked herself against my shoulder, I sighed and wrapped my arms around her. I was still incredibly angry about what had happened, but being able to hold her like this eased some of my fears. It wasn’t as hard as it used to be for her to de-escalate, but this was also a small incident.

I’d been so content this week that I’d barely thought about Clara or her damn articles. It didn’t matter that the touch was meant to be innocent. It was made very clear that my daughter was off limits, so now she’d made a real enemy out of me.

If I had anything to say about it, she wouldn’t get near us again.

Chapter 22

Remi

If hope’s a lie, then let me lie once more,

And build a home from ruins on the floor.

“Don’t you get bored doing that?” I asked.

Mal didn’t look away from her notebook. I leaned back in my seat and let the sun pierce through my eyelids.

She hadn’t said much to me since the incident two days ago. Even though Amir had assured me I’d done nothing wrong, I couldn’t convince myself that was true. Otherwise, all of the progress we’d made wouldn’t have disappeared in an instant.

“Are you hungry?”

She nodded once, so I got to my feet and walked onto the field.