If I Didn't Know Better (The Callaways #9)(4)

Two months ago his life had been completely different. He'd just finished his twelfth year in the Army, and his fourth year as a member of the Army's elite Delta Force. Then an IED blast had sent him to an operating room in a military hospital in Germany. It had taken four hours to stop the internal bleeding and repair shoulder muscles decimated by shrapnel. When he'd woken up, his future had looked a lot different.

Rehabilitating his shoulder was possible, but it would be a long and painful process, and he might never recover full range of motion or the physical strength he needed to do a very challenging and dangerous job. His future with Delta was in jeopardy, and he'd be in denial if he thought otherwise.

He'd never shied away from hard truths, but this was one truth he wished he could look past. He loved the Army. He'd enlisted after high school graduation, and in the military he'd found his family, his skill set. He was good at his job. What the hell else he was good at, he didn't know. But he was going to have to find out.

It wasn't just the potential loss of his career that had sent him reeling, it was also the letter that had arrived two weeks after his surgery. The letter had come from the children's services department in San Francisco. It had been following him around the globe for almost a month before finally reaching his possession.

The news had been shocking.

He had a daughter—an eight-year-old kid named Ashlyn Price. His child was the result of a one-night stand nine years ago with a woman named Justine Price.

Justine had been killed a month earlier in a robbery. Ashlyn had no other living relatives, so she'd been put into foster care until her father could be located—and he was her father.

He'd flown to San Francisco and met a shy, dark-haired, dark-eyed, skinny little girl who mumbled a few words when she absolutely had to, but beyond that she seemed to have no interest in speaking to him. He'd been expecting anger, surprise, or joy at his arrival, but she'd given him no reaction whatsoever.

He'd tried to explain to her that he hadn't known about her until now, but it was difficult to know if anything he'd said had sunk in. Ashlyn had shut down emotionally after her mother's death, and the social worker he'd spoken to in San Francisco had told him to be patient, that Ashlyn needed time to heal and a relationship could take a very long time.

Ashlyn needed to learn to trust him. She also needed to feel safe, and that would require structure, predictability, consistency, and lots of therapy.

He'd accepted his parental responsibility without a second thought. He might not have loved her mother—or even barely remembered her—but he would never walk away from his child. He just had no idea how to be a father.

They'd spent the first two weeks together in a vacation rental in San Francisco. He'd thought about staying in the city and getting an apartment so Ashlyn could go to school with her friends, but the city streets terrified her. The convenience store robbery that had left her mother dead had traumatized her. She visibly shrank when he took her in the car or tried to get her to walk down the street with him. It had become clear to him that he had to make a change.

Since his most recent address had been an Army barracks on the other side of the world, he'd needed somewhere else to go. His good friend Kent Palmer had told him it was time to come home.

At first, Jeremy had resisted the idea. It wasn't like he had a family waiting with open arms to welcome him back or who were dying to get to know his daughter, maybe help take care of her.

No, the only relative he had left in town was a gruff, cold father who still spent most of his days at sea and his nights with a bottle. It had been that way since Jeremy was eleven years old. There was no reason to expect things to be different now.

But he didn't need his father to make things work. What he needed was a safe place for Ashlyn, and the charming coastal town of Angel's Bay couldn't be any safer.

Kent had helped him find a rental house and a good therapist for Ashlyn. Unfortunately, the first visit with the therapist had not gone well. He hoped today would be different.

He parked his car in front of the Redwood Medical Clinic and checked his watch. He had ten minutes until Ashlyn's appointment ended. He got out of the car to get some air. As his feet hit the pavement, he saw Kent pull up in his patrol car, then get out and walk toward him.

At six foot four, Kent was long and lanky with short, dark blond hair and brown eyes. He was dressed in uniform and obviously on duty, but he didn't look particularly stressed out. Jeremy doubted being a cop in Angel's Bay put too much pressure on a man who'd been a soldier for ten years of his life.

"How's it going?" Kent asked with a friendly boyish grin that took Jeremy back to the old days when they'd been two kids getting into trouble.

"Not bad. What are you doing here?"

"Taking a break. I thought I'd see how Ashlyn's session went today."

"We'll see. The first one didn't do anything."

"Did she put up a fight to go back?"

"She doesn't put up a fight to do anything. I wish she would. Anger would be easier to deal with than…nothingness. It's like she wants to be invisible. I talk to her and try to play with her, but I get no response. I've bribed her with toys and candy. Her bedroom looks like the inside of a toy store, but nothing interests her. She spends most of her days lying on her bed, staring at the ceiling. I was actually thinking of painting a picture up there, just to give her something to look at."