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“I actually do,” Cole said with a satisfied sigh as he closed the window behind him before gesturing for Chloe to move out of his way so that he could grab the baseball bat that Katie liked to keep in the corner and dropped down on the chair that he kept in here for nights like this.
“How?” Katie asked, narrowing her eyes as she considered him.
“I can’t tell you,” Cole said with a sad shake of his head as though not sharing this secret somehow pained him.
Katie watched him for another moment before her gaze flickered to her closet and-
“Fine,” she said, slowly nodding as she sat back and then swallowed hard as she slowly laid down and after one last terrified look in Cole’s direction, Katie closed her eyes as she slowly exhaled.
For several minutes, neither one of them said anything as they waited for Katie’s breaths to even out, and once they did, they quietly made their way into the hallway, where Chloe said, “You don’t have to keep doing this.”
“Then, you’re going to tell your uncle what’s going on?” Cole asked, making her sigh as she made her way to her bedroom.
“He doesn’t need to know,” Chloe said, dropping face-down on her bed with a groan.
“He really does,” Cole said, dropping down on the bed next to her.
“We talked about this,” Chloe said, blindly reaching over to shove him off her bed, only to grumble when he stole her pillow instead.
“He should be here,” Cole said, shifting to get more comfortable.
“It’s fine,” Chloe mumbled against her comforter.
“It’s really not.”
“We don’t need him,” Chloe said, sighing heavily as she tried to find the energy to get off the bed and grab her book.
“You shouldn’t be doing this on your own,” the stubborn teenage boy who refused to let this go said.
“I’m not. My uncle is-”
“Never here,” Cole finished for her.
“We’re fine,” Chloe said, wishing that he’d just drop it as she gave up trying to get up and stole her pillow back so that she could bury her face against it and-
She missed her mom and dad.
God, she missed them so much.
Chloe missed her mom’s smile, the corny jokes her dad used to make over breakfast, the way that her mom burnt the toast every morning, and just how safe she felt when her father was here.
With Uncle Nick…
He was barely here.
When he wasn’t working, he was going out, leaving them on their own, and leaving Katie terrified that something bad was going to happen to him, too. She wasn’t sure how much longer she could do this, Chloe thought as she closed her eyes and slowly exhaled, knowing that she didn’t have a choice.
“We’re fine,” she said again, hoping this time that she believed it.
“No,” Cole said as she felt his hand wrap around hers, “you’re not.”
CHAPTER13
“So, what’s the plan?” Jonathan asked as he dropped down on his bed with a satisfied sigh.
“You mean besides ignore you?” Sebastian asked as he grabbed his iPad off his nightstand and settled in for the night.
“Do you really think that’s a good idea?” Jonathan asked as Sebastian looked for the book that Uncle Jason mentioned in class today.
