Page 19 of May's Bad Boy: Kody
Swallowing the lump in my throat, I pause. The stars blur for a second.
"I watched the system swallow her whole. Watched her cry in secret when the calls wouldn't stop, when the bills kept coming, and she couldn't keep the lights on. I watched the strongest woman I ever knew break into pieces. And there was nothing I could do."
I draw in a shaky breath, the memory raw and sharp.
"I remember sitting outside the hospital one night, the vending machine coffee in my hands going cold, while a debt collector left a voicemail on her phone. She was getting chemo, and they were still calling, still threatening. She looked me in the eyes and said, “Don't ever let them steal your voice.”
Kody reaches over and takes my hand in his. His thumb strokes slowly across my knuckles like he's trying to calm a storm.
"I swore I'd never be that powerless again," I whisper. "Never let someone I care about fall through the cracks the way she did."
He doesn't speak right away. Just sits there, letting my pain live in the space between us without trying to fix it. Then he lifts my hand and presses a kiss to my knuckles.
"When you talk about all this, you make it sound like I'm a hero," I add with a shaky laugh, blinking fast to keep the tears at bay.
"You're more than that," he says, voice steady and thick with something deeper. "You're Mustang Mountain tough."
I laugh, soft and broken. The kind that comes from somewhere deep, like it's been waiting years to be let out. "You make me feel like I’m not broken anymore."
He shifts closer until our knees brush. His fingers trail up, slow and deliberate, cupping my cheek like I'm something fragile and precious all at once. Instinctively, I lean into the touch, my eyes fluttering closed for just a second.
"You were never broken," he says, voice rough now. "But if I help you feel whole again, even a little... then I'm doing something right."
I open my eyes, and the look on his face nearly wrecks me. It's not pity. It's not gratitude.
It's reverence.
Like he sees something in me I'd forgotten was even there.
"Kody," I whisper, my voice catching on the edges of his name.
He leans in, not all at once, but slowly, giving me a chance to change my mind. He knows this isn't just a kiss—it's a decision.
And I make it.
I close the distance.
I reach for him at the same time he leans in. Our lips meet, soft at first, searching. But then something breaks open between us: need, want, relief. The kiss deepens, and I find myself sliding into his lap, knees straddling his thighs, my hands buried in his hair. His arms band around me, holding me like I might disappear.
When he stands with me in his arms, I gasp, clinging to him as he carries me inside. Into our room, into the dark, into something neither of us planned but both of us need.
This isn't pretend.
Not anymore.
CHAPTER 8
KODY
The suit I'm wearing suit doesn't quite fit anymore. The shoulders are too snug, the cuffs a little short. But it's the only one I have, and right now, it has to be enough. I stand just outside the Whitefish, Montana courthouse with Paige beside me, her hand tucked into the crook of my arm. Her chin is lifted, her shoulders squared, but I can feel the tremble in her fingers. Her dress is simple, but elegant. Her hair is pulled back from her face in a way that highlights her strength instead of softening it. She's terrified, but you wouldn't know it unless you knew her.
Inside, Sadie is with Caitlin down the hallway, coloring in a notebook with stars and unicorns on the cover like today isn't the biggest moment of our lives. I envy her innocence. Her world is still filled with magic and bedtime stories, not courtrooms and legal statements that can break hearts.
When the courtroom doors open, we step inside together. The space is too clean, and too sterile, with echoes in every corner. A bailiff ushers us to our table. Paige's hand is still looped in mine, but her grip tightens ever so slightly. I squeeze back.
The Wells family enters with the kind of smugness that comes from money and polished shoes. Her pearls gleam under the fluorescent lights. Her grandfather has that stiff, performative frown he wears for judges. And their lawyer? Cold, calculated, with a suit that probably costs more than my truck and eyes that flick over Paige like she's a problem to be dissected, not a human being.
The judge comes in and sits high at the bench, already flipping through the case file with a practiced hand.
