Page 28 of Reckoning

Tate sighed. “We’ll talk every night. It will be okay. You’ll see.”

She leaned her head against his shoulder, weary from the emotion and the pain as her father came down the sidewalk on the run.

“Briar, sweetheart! What happened?” Roger cried.

“I turned my ankle in the park. Tate was on his way home from work and saw me sitting on the grass. I couldn’t get up.”

“Lead the way, sir,” Tate said. “I’ll get her in the house for you.”

“You’ve been crying. Why didn’t you call me?” Roger said as they started back up the sidewalk toward the house.

“I accidentally left my phone in my room, and I was already crying when I left the house, and you know why. The tears now are because I hurt. Thankfully, I am always on Tate’s radar, or I would still be sitting there.”

Roger blinked. “What do you mean by—?”

Tate interrupted. “She means…I was at work, getting ready to clock out, when I had a vision of her in the park. I saw her sitting on the ground, crying. I knew she was hurt, and yes, she is always on my radar.”

Roger didn’t want to hear this. He didn’t want to believe that this boy could see into their lives. Into anyone’s lives.

They were halfway up the steps when Mariah opened the front door, swaying slightly from too much wine.

“What on earth is going on?” she cried.

“Briar hurt her ankle,” Roger said.

“Did he do it?” Mariah shrieked, pointing at Tate.

Tate looked her straight in the face. “No, ma’am. You’re the one handy with fists.” Then he turned his back on her. “Mr. Lowe, where do you want me to take Briar?”

Mariah went from red-faced and angry to ashen, and the look on Tate’s face had startled her enough that she backed up out of the way.

“Take me to my room, please,” Briar said. “It’s up the stairs and the last door on the right.”

“I’ll get an ice pack,” Roger said, as he pushed past Mariah and hurried into the kitchen.

Tate shifted Briar in his arms again to get a firmer grip, and then started up the stairs, well aware that the footsteps behind him belonged to the woman who nearly killed his mother.

Briar was already dreading the moment when Tate would be gone, and the swinging motion of her rapidly swelling ankle was excruciating. Despite her resolve to be stoic, fresh tears began to fall.

“It hurts so much,” she whispered.

Tate grimaced. “I’m so sorry, honey. We’re almost there,” he said, and two steps later, they reached the second floor.

He’d never been inside this house because he’d never been welcome, but he knew where her bedroom window was and hurried to the last room at the end of the hall. The door was ajar. Her cell phone was lying at the foot of the bed where she’d left it, and when Tate stopped at the bed and eased her down, she groaned with relief.

“Oh my God…thank you,” she said.

“Just let me get your shoes off before that ankle swells any further,” he said, and slipped the shoes off her feet, grabbed an extra pillow from the other side of the bed, and slid it under her foot lengthwise to elevate the leg.

“You need to leave. We’ve got this,” Mariah said, and reached toward Tate, intent on grabbing his arm and pulling him back, when he suddenly turned to face her.

“Do not ever put your hand on me. Understood?”

He hadn’t even pretended to hit her, but she felt the blows of his words like gut punches. Her stomach knotted. She wanted to defend herself. This was her house. That was her daughter on the bed, but Tate Bandy wasn’t a little boy anymore, standing in the park accusing her of assaulting his mother. He was towering over her, and the history between them was forever etched in their life paths.

Briar reached for Tate’s hand and clasped it, and the moment she did, his rage faded.

Mariah backed up, an unwelcome presence in her own home. The stress of the moment and the amount of wine she’d already consumed was making her head spin. She staggered over to a chair and sat down just as Roger came running into the room with an ice pack and a bottle of over-the-counter painkillers.