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Digging my teeth into the inside of my lip, I let my gaze settle on Fin’s furrowed brow.
“I’ve not—“ I blow out a heavy breath and grip Fin’s calloused hands harder than I need to. “I’m not—”
“Is your dad cool?” Fin’s jaw clenches when I cut myself off, his eyes sharpening. “Like he’s good to you, yeah?”
“Fuck,” I breathe out on a humorless chuckle that does nothing to ease Fin’s rising blood pressure I can see, thanks to the thick veins popping in his neck. “He’s cool, Fin. I just …”
God, why is this feel so hard to admit?
Shaking my head, I meet Fin’s gaze when he tugs me closer and wraps those massive arms around me. “Tell me.”
“Jesus.” I roll my eyes and bury my face into his delicious smelling chest because it’s the only thing that’s helping me focus right now. “I’ve not come home with anyone.” I gulp down the shame, the guilt. “In, like, a long time, Fin.”
His frame physically relaxes under my touch. “Thank fuck,” Fin breathes into my hair and squeezes me so tight I think my ribcage might collapse.
But it’s the best damn hug I’ve had in my life.
“Not since …” I sigh into the warm fabric of Fin’s shirt and hook my arms around his waist with what feels like a thousand pound anvil sitting on my chest.
“Not since fuckface.” I feel Fin’s nod at the same time I hear the storm door creak open and heavy boots hit the wooden slats of the porch. “I’m piecing it together.” His lips press to the top of my head in the gentlest gesture I don’t feel deserving of, which only makes me squeeze him tighter and that pressure holding in my heart a little looser. “You don’t have to say a word.”
“Ahem.”
Like a shotgun blast into the night, the clearing of my father’s throat echoes around my ear drums and has me shooting back from the warmth I don’t think I’ve ever felt until him and a rush of a different kind of guilt washing over my now heated skin.
“Cedar,” JaxonAtlasJones growls into the early morning dew like I am every bit the teenager I feel and takes another menacing step closer to the edge of the porch. “In the house.”
“What?” I scoff. “No ‘princess’this time?“ I say because mouthing off to the brute of a father I was blessed with has totally always got me what I wanted.
Not that I know what the fuck that is this wonderfully intense too-early morning.
“Get your ass in this house.Now.“ His voice booms off of the surrounding trees and sends some creature in the distance scurrying away to safety and my defiant hands to my hips.
“Cedar, listen to him.” I swing my gaze at Fin, who’s focused solely on the porch where my dad stands with his arms crossed over his puffed chest and his feet holding his stance wide.
“You both are ridiculous.” Scoffing, I shove Fin’s shoulder as I stomp across the lawn and up the few stairs to stand in front of the man that has saved my life more times than even he knows.If only he knew the truth.
The snort is almost inaudible from between his pinched lips, my dad’s shoulders only giving a slight bounce in the dim light where, up close, I catch sight of his bruised brow and the heavy bags under his eyes that flick to me for only a moment before returning to Fin’s position in the driveway. “Go grab some sleep, princess.”
Growling, I shake my head and flip both of them my middle fingers as I sidestep my overprotective father and slam my way into the house.
The fresh scent of brewing coffee smacks me at the same time the exhaustion does, and even though there’s a part of me that would love to just stay up with a warm mug of life, my feet don’t take me past the couch where I collapse.
I try to listen for yelling. I strain my ears for thudding fists or the kick of Fin’s engine as he speeds away from all the crazy that comes with me and my baggage.
But the peaceful silence, with only a mild timbre of deep voices in the distance, lulls me into the dark abyss of sleep before I’m ready to let it claim me.
Sunlightfiltersthroughmyeyelids, the sound of a door creaking open and then closing in the distance bringing me closer to awareness until I’m shooting up and my chest is heaving with a panicked race of my heart.
“What happened?” It’s immediate, slurred with sleep as I whip my head around with stiff muscles and a grimace at the ache built up from the weird angle I passed out in. “What time is it?”
My head pounds as my eyes finally adjust to the wickedly bright light and the sight of my father in the recliner, his forearms propped on his knees, filters into my brain and has my stomach dropping. “What did you do to him?”
“Who?” It’s gruff, almost hoarse sounding.
“Fin,” I snap and swing my legs over the side of the couch to push to my aching feet and beeline straight for the window, where I yank back the curtains and find the driveway empty. “What did you do, Jax?”
“Princess,” my dad nearly whispers, his sight trained on the floor and his roughened hands scraping against themselves with just the right amount of noise to have my mouth going dry.
