“She was?” The phone was ripped from my hand.
“Mac, stop pestering him. He has a job to do, you know,” she said, flashing a wink at me. At least she was more herself this morning.
I could hear Mac’s tone but not his words. He clearly wasn’t happy.
“Look, we just need to stay low for a little while until the police catch up with her.” She paused to listen. “Yes, there were some more incidents. Enough to have the Otter suggesting everyone run for the hills.” She eyed me like I’d done something completely horrible, like killing a butterfly. “No, I’m going to stay low for a while along with Brady. Don’t worry. Honest, we’ve got a NavySEALlooking out for us.” Mac must have said something sarcastic, because her lips twitched. “Ha. Good one. Hug Georgie for me. We’ll talk later. Love you, Squirter.”
She winced at the nickname, hung up, and handed me back my phone.
“Sorry. I just don’t want them to worry,” she said.
It wasn’t my place to get involved, but I couldn’t help saying, “Mac’s going to be upset and hurt when he finds out.”
“You promised to never speak of it. Remember, I’ve got the goods now. I’m sure I’ll be able to dig up that cadet calendar without too much effort.”
I chuckled. It didn’t bother me, but I was fine with letting her think it did if it made her feel better about yesterday.
???
By the time we made it down the stairs, checked out, picked up a rental, and got out of Tallahassee, it was midmorning. While I drove toward Thomasville, Dani took calls, responded to emails, and commented on social media posts. She hadn’t stopped since she’d woken up.
She had to be tired and hungry after yesterday, but you’d never know it. She was acting almost as if nothing had happened. As if it had been a bad dream I’d lived through alone. Reality ripped at my guts.
I hadn’t protected her.
That one thought was a harsh bellow in my brain that had been on repeat since yesterday.
It wouldn’t happen again.
We were a few miles outside of Thomasville when I took a turnoff I knew like the back of my hand. Nothing but the green of farmland and a wave of wild trees surrounded us. It felt almost like nothing had changed until we drove over a newly repaved road instead of the potholes and cracks I’d known from childhood. Proof it had been too long since I’d been back.
I hadn’t texted or called ahead, and I was regretting that choice a little. I didn’t want Dani to be caught in the middle of an argument that had done nothing but gotten worse the longer I stayed in the military—stayed with the SEAL team which had become my home when my childhood one had abandoned me.
My chest grew heavy at the thought of my military life being taken away as well. The team I’d embedded myself in was gone, and my commander wasn’t sure I belonged on any team anymore. I could feel it in his eyes when he’d agreed with the therapist and put me on leave. Between Mac and Tristan, I’d had the truth handed to me more times than I cared to acknowledge since I’d seen Dr. Inez: I had some things to work out.
When I stopped at the gates to put in the security code, Dani looked up. Her family’s home in Wilmington had gates with a huge W emblazoned on it for Whittaker. It also had a paved drive leading up to a home that looked like a mini-me of The White House. The gates here also had scrollwork along the top, these announcing Wellsley Place.
When the wrought iron swung open, we drove over a stone driveway toward a house on an estate worked by enslaved people in a time the family regretted and abhorred. The inhumanity of it was a wound we couldn’t heal with a mere apology. Our family’s philanthropic efforts could never undo the wrong, regardless of the effort. There was no pride in knowing we’d been one of the first families to free the enslaved people on our land. Only a sick feeling of shame that was rightfully ours to shoulder for eternity. It was something that shadowed the land with its tall trees lining the driveway and the manicured gardens which hid the crops beyond them. A tint that wouldn’t quite ever fade.
The scent of lemon was already invading the vents as Dani took it all in with a look of surprise. When we turned the corner in the long driveway, the manor house finally came into view, and her eyes grew wider. The brick, black, and white facade was classic Georgian architecture built by predecessors who’d survived for decades on a wealth which had come with them from England.
“Is this really where you grew up?” Dani asked.
I could only nod.
“You lived here?” she repeated, as if she wasn’t sure I’d understood her question.
“Live might not be the right word,” I told her. “But, yes, it’s my family’s home.”
“Well, thanks for nothing, because now I’m terrified of being sick in your family’s eighteenth-century museum.”
“You’re not going to be sick, but if it makes you feel better, I once puked all the way down the stairs, causing Carson to call both a carpet cleaner and a tapestry repair expert.”
I had returned my eyes to the house, but I could still feel hers on me, trying to read the secrets I’d kept for so long it felt like they belonged to someone who wasn’t even me. As if the person who’d grown up in this house, running through the fields and hunting in the hills, was a completely separate individual. Someone whose story I knew but could no longer feel.
“Who’s Carson?” she asked.
“My uncle.”
