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“Ash, don’t.” Audrey strokes his arm. “Tessa is right. We need to go to the police. There’s nothing we can do on our own.”
“And if they do nothing? If it’s too late? If there’s no fucking evidence they can use? We let this guy walk?”
“We’re not the law,” Zane says, his voice silencing us all. “Nothing we do now will undo what he did. Unless he has children in the house.” He glances at me, his gaze sharpening. “If he has kids in there, if he has hurt them, then…”
>
“Then we’ll either see him behind bars or take him out ourselves,” Tyler says, and no matter how his words chill me to the bone, I nod.
No other kid should have to go through what Zane did.
***
We pick the kids up and tell Megan and Erin what happened. They’ll go with Zane and Dakota to the police station tomorrow. Unfortunately, I can’t skip another day from work, but I plan to go back home as early as possible. My boyfriend and my kids need me—and yeah, I know I’m not their mother, but I feel like I am.
I can try to be more like a mother to them, at least. Take care of them, love them as they deserve to be loved. Not be absent all the time.
Mason will have to understand.
On the way home, Miles is talking excitedly about a videogame he likes, and Teo is engrossed in a comic I don’t recognize, probably filched from Megan and Rafe’s apartment.
Dylan will return it. I have to explain to Teo that he can’t just “borrow” things he likes from our friends’ homes.
I gaze at Dylan’s profile as he drives. “You knew that neighbor didn’t like Kenneth,” I say, because it’s been on my mind since then. “How?”
He grins. “I can read women.”
“You can?”
“Yeah. Like right now. I know you want to jump my bones.”
“Really?” I glance back at the kids, but they don’t seem to be paying us any attention.
“It’s that gleam in your eyes. You can’t get enough of me, admit it.”
“I admit it,” I whisper.
His grin widens as he parks the car outside the building and kills the engine. “I used to have to hunt for compliments. You’re making it too easy.”
“I don’t want it to be difficult.” I give him a smile. “We have enough of that outside home.”
And to demonstrate, I grab both kids in a hug the moment we exit the car, even though Miles struggles and mumbles under his breath.
“You guys,” I tell them. “You don’t know how much I love you. Now go on, run inside.”
Dylan is grinning at me as he wraps an arm around my shoulders and guides me into the building. “What brought this on?”
“Just thinking I don’t show you all how much I care for you.”
“Wanna show me again tonight, when we’re alone?” He waggles his brows, making me laugh.
The kids are waiting in front of the apartment door, and I pull out the keys and unlock it. The moment the door is open, they run inside, whisper-yelling something to one another.
I arch a brow at Dylan, who shrugs.
Hm.
“Do you think maybe Megan gave them too much chocolate? That looked like sugar rush to me.”
