Page 64 of Darkness of Mine


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I let the dress slip from my fingers and hold out a hand. “Shall we?”

For one, soul-tearing moment Freya hesitates, then she places her hand in mine, letting me support her as she sits down on a cushion, folding her legs to one side.

I round the table and sit cross-legged opposite her.

Warmth hits my hand as I wave it over the first plate. “This isjjin-mandu, steamed dumpling.” I take care with the pronunciation. I gained most of my knowledge about my heritage from myHalmoniand I was twelve last time I saw her.“I didgogiandyachae, meat and vegetable.” I indicate each one as I speak then point to the other plate topped with deep fried dumplings. “And this istuigim-mandu.

Freya licks her lips, making them glisten. “It smells incredible.”

“Just wait till you taste it.”

She laughs under her breath. “I feel like you’re using my love of food to keep me in place long enough to hear you out.”

“Is it working?”

Freya cuts me a look. “Depends how good a cook you are.”

My answer is to serve her up a plate. We make an unspoken agreement not to talk about anything serious while we eat. Mostly she asks me about the food, and I talk her through the cooking process and the different side dishes.

“Did you cook with your mom a lot?”

I shake my head. “Only ever at Lunar New Year. She’d makemanduto go in this soup calledtteokguk. It’s supposed to bring good luck.” I don’t tell her I’m secretly hoping it will work now even though it never did back then.

When I’ve had enough, I dab my napkin over my lips and lean back on my hands, watching Freya delicately use her chopsticks.

I reach into my pocket and pull out her badge, placing it on the table beside her plate. I was an idiot to take it away from her.

Freya’s chopsticks still, suspended mid-air, as she stares at the badge.

“This is what I should have done when we first brought you home,” I say. “I should have sat you down and told you how every shred of light in me disappeared when I read your note.”

“River…”

“I’m not saying that to make you feel bad,” I add on a rush. “I’m just trying to explain why I went a little overboard.”

“A little?”

The air huffs out of me and I scrape my nails against the wooden floor. “My only thought, for the last two months, has been getting you back. Keeping you here. Everything else went to the wayside. I’m supposed to be leading the SCU and all I’ve done is use every resource available to me to track you down.” I shake my head, a grimace tugging at my face. “And when I found you, I just kept thinking that if you ran once, you could do it again. I have nightmares of you going off to find Zach by yourself or trading your life for Harley’s.”

“I wouldn’t do that,” she denies.

“You did before.” I meet her stubborn gaze. I remember all too well finding her anklet on her bed after she slipped out the window to rescue Oz from her sister. The same sister who also shot Jude and is currently living under our roof because I didn’t have the heart to send her back to the psych hospital when Freya asked me to let her stay. I don’t know how to make it clear to this woman that there is nothing I won’t do for her.

Freya puts her chopsticks down. She nods to herself and the bitter, resigned look in her eyes has me panicking. “Right. I ran one too many times so now I’m being punished.”

My spine jerks straight, her words sending a jolt of dismay through me. “No. I wasn’t trying to punish you, Freya, I was trying to keep you safe. I went too far, I know that, but I swear I didn’t mean too. I wasn’t trying to hurt you. I wouldneverintentionally hurt you.”

I drag my palm over my face, my throat thick and aching with the knowledge of what I did. “I was scared, Freya.”

I close my eyes before coming to a decision. I never talk about my past but if that’s what I need to do to keep Freya then there’s no question. I’m only two words in before I realize Iwantto share this with her. Freya may have run from us, but she’s told us more about her childhood than anyone and if that’s not trust I don’t know what trust is.

“After my parents got arrested, social services tracked down my halmoni.”

Freya doesn’t move, but I feel her eyes on me.

I took my jacket off a while ago and now I roll my sleeves up before I start to stack the plates, needing something to do with my hands as I tell this story.

“She was loving, caring, everything a grandmother should be. She got a confused, angry kid raised by con-artists and thieves and taught him the difference between right and wrong. After the upbringing I’d had she was my conscience. Six months after I turned up on her doorstep, I watched her get driven away in an ambulance. Heart attack.”