Kiss Me That Way: A Cottonbloom Novel (13 page)

“Why not me?” she said softly. “Someone has to stand up for these girls. Like you stood up for me.”

Jesus, that night.
That fateful night had come back around. But he wasn’t the same boy he’d been then. He’d cut every tie to Cottonbloom, or tried to at any rate. Even his brother and sister had learned not to rely on him for anything more than making a monthly phone call and cutting a check.

Yet Monroe had taken on more and more until she was so tightly bound to Cottonbloom she couldn’t move. Her mother, the girls, Tally and Regan, her clients. And him.

She slipped by him and slid behind the wheel, starting the SUV. Cade did the same and backed up so she could pull out first. Kayla lived in a lower-middle-class neighborhood miles from the river. Yellow pollen and grime streaked the white vinyl siding, but the porch was swept and a swing hung from the rafters, swaying slightly in the breeze along with a set of seashell wind chimes made by young hands.

Cade followed them inside. Monroe disappeared into the back of the house with Kayla, and he wandered into the kitchen. Riffling through the freezer, he pulled out a pack of frozen peas and covered his sore hand.

The house was neat, the kitchen spotless, and knickknacks and pictures of a pretty woman and a girl at various ages covered every flat surface of the small den. No sign of a father. Could have been a bad divorce or could be he’d never been around.

He picked up the closest picture. Kayla, minus her two front teeth, sat on the bank of the river with an old-fashioned cane fishing pole, her gap-toothed grin infectious. His conscience twinged, and an old protectiveness reared. The murmur of voices came from one of the back rooms.

He retreated to the porch swing, the chains creaking under his weight. His hand had stopped throbbing, and he removed the bag of peas to do the exercises Monroe had taught him. He didn’t know how much time passed before the front door opened.

“She’s asleep and going to feel terrible tomorrow between the slap and the hangover.” Monroe’s step was hesitant.

“Come sit. We’ll wait for her mama.” He scooched down the swing.

She joined him, tucking her legs to the side, and massaged his hand absently, as if she couldn’t help but give comfort to those around her even if she was the one hurt.

He shifted on the bench and tilted her face to his. “You sure your jaw is okay?”

“It hardly hurts now.” Her voice thickened, and she sounded close to tears of her own. “From a couple of things she said just now, I don’t think this is the first time he’s knocked her around. I don’t know what to do.”

He tugged his hand free and wrapped his arm around her shoulders, pulling her into his side. She didn’t fight him, notching her forehead into his neck and snaking her arm around his chest.

“You’ve done what you can, sweetheart.” As hard as he worked and as much as he sacrificed, Tally and Sawyer never had what their friends had. His best times were doing something foolish like buying Sawyer new baseball cleats or spending money they didn’t have to get Tally the brand of jeans everyone else was wearing. The looks on their faces had made the battle worth it. “It’ll never feel like enough, but trust me, you’re making a difference.”

“Teaching them how to fend off a physical attack is one thing. How can I make them understand they deserve more than to be called names and pushed around?” She sounded more than physically tired. She sounded close to giving up.

Working two jobs, taking extra shifts, then hunting and trapping at night had left him in a constant state of exhaustion, but he’d done what he’d had to do, day in and day out, ignoring the creeping desolation. He searched for the right words and came up empty. “I don’t have the answers, but you have to keep trying, right?”

“I feel like a hamster on a wheel. Working, working, working, and getting nowhere. Kayla was one of the first girls to join the group three years ago. Three years, Cade, and nothing I’ve done has changed the path of her life. Nothing.”

“That’s not true. She called you, didn’t she? What if she hadn’t had that lifeline? Would she have come out of that bathroom and gone home with that punk? Maybe things would have escalated even further. She knew she could count on you.”

“I guess.” Doubt riddled her voice. She pulled from under his arm and leaned forward, her elbows on her knees. “I need to get a counselor in on a regular basis.”

“How much does one cost?”

“More than I can afford at the moment.” A bitter note flavored her words, but determination swept it aside. “This fund-raiser is important. I could have a counselor in place by July.”

Cade wanted to write a check and hand her the key to the next phase of her program. She’d never accept it from him. Not even to help her girls. It would make her too dependent on him.

“I don’t want them to end up like me.” Her voice was so soft, it took a few heartbeats for the message to register.

“What are you talking about? You’re successful, smart, gorgeous, kindhearted. You’re a saint compared to most people.”

“I’m so not a saint.” She began rocking them in a jerky forward and back rhythm. “You want to hear something insane? In a way, I’m envious of Kayla. Her ability to love with blind devotion. I think there’s something seriously wrong with me.”

Her confession was important. Not only because of the content but also because she was telling
him
. “Why do you think there’s something wrong with you?” He kept his voice at a whisper.

“Because I can’t…” She leaned her head back, her neck pillowed over his arm, her gaze directed into the darkness of the rafters. “I saw what love did to my mother. She believed whatever a man told her—good or bad. Whether it’s that she’s beautiful or worthless. And men say whatever they need in order to get what they want.”

A darkness skated on the edge of her words. A darkness he recognized. He was the last person who should be lecturing her on love. “That’s not love, Monroe.”

“Well, it’s all I know.” Only the clinking of the seashell wind chimes broke the expectant silence. “Why did you come tonight? Not that I’m not grateful. I am. But why?” Other questions hung unsaid but understood.
What do you want from me? Are you using me?

He swallowed. The games he’d played with women in the past seemed an immature pastime. He had been a user the last few years. Looking back made him feel like Flat Stanley—a cardboard cutout moving through life. The irony was almost laughable. Almost.

“When you hung up on me…” He took a deep breath. Was he seriously putting himself out there?

“You were mad.”

“A little,” he admitted. “But more than that, I was concerned. No, more than concerned. Terrified. I’ve spent years not worrying about anyone else but myself.”

“That’s not true. What about Tally and Sawyer?”

“After I left Cottonbloom, I wasn’t around for them. Not like I should have been. I told myself they were better off without me. Told myself they didn’t need me anymore. But being back…” He shook his head, not sure what to say. Like a tree transplanted from a desert to fertile ground, his roots were inching deeper and deeper by the day. Roots he’d hacked off years ago.

“The thought of you hurt, hurts me.” The confession ripped from his chest, leaving his heart exposed and beating too fast. His name falling from her lips acted like a salve and the arm she wrapped tight around his chest a bandage. He dropped his face into her hair, soft and smelling of summer.

“I was scared tonight.” Her voice trembled.

“It’s all right to be scared. Bravery is about doing something even though it scares you.” Once the words were out, he wondered if he hadn’t directed them at himself as much as her. A reminder. He’d been brave once. He’d done things that terrified him because his family had needed him to.

The day he’d walked into the pharmacy and slipped the cough medicine into his pocket or the night he’d taken refuge in a gulley when it was clear he wouldn’t make it home before a tornado-spawning storm caught him. Attending parent-teacher conferences even though he was still a kid himself, and a dropout at that. Walking into the food bank to accept charity for the first time. All terrifying.

Even though he’d built a company, become successful, he hadn’t done anything truly brave since he’d left this place. Maybe that’s what he’d been trying to recapture by climbing hand over hand up a sheer face of rock or jumping out of a plane, but like he knew every bend in the river, he knew none of his crazy exploits were true bravery.

Headlights blinded him like the flash of a camera. An older-model sedan pulled into the driveway. He’d been so caught up in Monroe, he hadn’t even heard the car approach. He stood at the top of the porch stairs. A fortyish-year-old woman climbed out. He recognized her as a faded version from the photos in the den.

“Stacy.” Monroe joined him. “Kayla is fine, but something happened tonight.”

The woman quick-stepped to them, her gray factory uniform wrinkled and grease stained. “Ohmigod, was she in an accident?”

“Nothing like that. She called me from the Tavern.”

“What was she doing there?” The shock in Stacy’s voice was real and heartbreaking.

Monroe led the woman inside, glancing over her shoulder at him, the message clear. He was free to go.

*   *   *

Monroe rubbed her hands down her face and leaned against the old-fashioned wood paneling in the hallway. After Monroe imparted the events of the evening and her concerns about Dylan, Stacy sat on the edge of Kayla’s bed and tucked her in like a child, brushing her hair back from her face.

Monroe leaned against the wall in the hallway, their murmuring drifting out in bits and pieces. Maybe Stacy’s advice would mean more and go further than Monroe’s. After all, she was as screwed up as Kayla in her own way.

Heat whooshed through her body and she pressed her hands against her cheeks. What did Cade think of her now? She had tried to keep things casual, but nothing had ever been casual with him. Her confessions on the swing had sounded crazy even to her own ears. She’d barely ever admitted those things to herself alone in the dark, much less said them aloud.

Stacy emerged from Kayla’s room and Monroe straightened. Stacy’s eyes were red and puffy, and creases bracketed her mouth, giving her a sad, weary look.

“Thanks for getting her home safe, Monroe.” Stacy led them into her small kitchen, pulled a bottle of vodka out of the freezer, and held up two glasses.

Monroe waved her off. Stacy poured a good measure of vodka into one glass and took a sip. A sheen of tears came to her eyes, and her chin wobbled before she said, “I’ll admit when you started that program down at Tally’s gym I thought, ‘A little rich ’Sip wants to sleep better at night.’ But you’ve proven yourself a true friend to my little girl, and I appreciate it. I do.”

“Dylan is trouble.”

“I know. But if I tell her she can’t see him, I worry that will drive her toward him and away from me.” Stacy pulled out a kitchen chair and sat heavily, taking another sip.

Being a mother wasn’t about making cookies and attending recitals; it was this. The hard stuff. Picking up the pieces of broken hearts and helping reassemble them, dealing with insecurities, teaching children how to stand on their own.

“You’ll figure it out. I’m here if you need me.” She squeezed Stacy’s shoulder and backed away but stopped in the kitchen doorway. “Lock up tight after I go, all right?”

“I will.” Stacy killed the rest of the vodka, the empty glass thudding against the table. The corner of her mouth drew up. “I have a shotgun in the closet if necessary.”

Monroe stepped outside and heard the dead bolt flip and the rattle of the chain. Cade’s truck was still parked behind her SUV. She wasn’t even surprised.

The chains on the porch swing squawked as he stood. “How’d things go?”

“As well as can be expected, I suppose.” Kayla was her mama’s burden now, and selfishly Monroe was relieved. She led the way down the porch steps, his footsteps sounding behind her. “You didn’t have to stick around.”

“I’m following you to your house to make sure you’re safe.”

Independence battled with a warm feeling of being taken care of. A new experience. A scary one. Did it make her seem weak? “If on the off chance Dylan shows up, I can handle him.”

He stopped her at the curb between their vehicles. “No doubt, but take pity on me. I’ll be worthless worrying about you if I don’t see you home.”

After a moment’s hesitation, she shrugged and tried not to let the fuzzy feeling in her chest show on her face. “Well, come on then.”

She slipped into her SUV and set off, uncommonly aware of his headlights and the grind of the old truck’s gears behind her. As she got closer to her house, she grew more alert, her hands tightening on the steering wheel. Even though she didn’t expect trouble, it was a relief to see her house deserted and dark, no strange cars parked on the street.

His truck rumbled off behind hers. She walked up to the driver’s side as he got out and gestured around them. “See? No one here.”

“I’ll feel even better if you let me take a look around inside.”

She should insist he leave. Instead, she chucked her head toward the front door. The truth was she wasn’t ready to be alone.

Only the sound of the churning air-conditioning broke the silence of the house. Like a policeman in a movie, he checked all her rooms. Amusement had her biting her lip while she plopped onto her couch.

Cade was a big man, and his dark beard made him appear that much more intimidating. No wonder Dylan had looked like he might wet himself when they’d faced down. He prowled back into the den, a note of aggression flavoring his movements. Yet he wouldn’t hurt her … or any woman for that matter.

An idea flashed, and she moved to the edge of the couch at the surge of energy. Facing a flesh-and-blood man had been different from beating up body bags or flipping fellow martial arts students. There was a line never crossed in the gym that didn’t exist in dark alleys.

“Discover anything?” she asked with fake casualness.

“You don’t hang your towel up, your flip-flop collection might qualify for a world record, and a couple of rabid dust bunnies have taken up residence under your bed.”