Dance Away with Me(95)

Kelly clutched her daughter tighter but didn’t move. He spoke coldly, methodically. “You hardly pay any property taxes on that place of yours. I think the county assessor needs to take a fresh look.”

“Brad!” Kelly exclaimed.

“And the road up here. If the county falls down on the job, it’ll be nearly impossible to get a car through. As for your job—”

“Brad, stop.”

“This doesn’t concern you, Kelly.” He raised his chin. “That woman who died having the baby you’re so attached to—”

“That’s enough!” Kelly said.

“Maybe it’s time somebody other than Freddy Davis took a closer look into the—”

“I gave Ava the condoms!” Kelly cried.

Brad barely seemed to have heard. “What?”

She released her daughter. “I’m the one who gave Ava the condoms.”

He shook his head, confusion replacing his smugness. “You? You’re the one who gave our baby—”

“Yes, me! Because she looks at Connor the same way I used to look at you. Because I don’t want her to end up trapped the way I’ve been!”

“Trapped?” He tried to find his bluster. “You’re hardly trapped.”

“I feel trapped! Kelly do this. Kelly do that. You never ask. You demand. And I’m sick of it. Sick of you!”

“Stop talking like that. Saying things you don’t mean.”

“I mean every word.”

Ava started to cry again. Tess hurried forward. This was a conversation Kelly and Brad needed to have alone. “I’m calling a time-out. Right now.”

“You can’t—”

“Yes, I can.”

“Yes, she can!” Kelly exclaimed.

“I have to talk to Tess!” Ava wailed.

Tess touched Kelly’s shoulder. “You and Ava go to the cabin. Stay there tonight and get some rest.”

“Don’t listen to her,” Brad said. “Everybody has to calm down. We’re going home—”

Ignoring him, Tess nudged Kelly. “Go on.”

Without a glance at her husband, Kelly grabbed her daughter and rushed out.

Brad looked at Tess, bewilderment replacing his anger. “What have you done?”

“Given your family some breathing room.”

Ian came in, Wren on his shoulder, and took in the scene in front of him. “Damn. Why does all the fun happen when I’m gone?”

“Go home,” she told Winchester. “Or sleep in your car. In a tent. I don’t care. But if you take one step toward that cabin tonight, you’ll regret it.”

“Don’t you threaten me!”

“Why not? You’ve made it clear that I have nothing to lose. You, on the other hand, have everything.”

“Winchester, just do whatever the hell she tells you,” Ian said. “She’s had a hard day, and she could be mentally unstable.”

Tess gave Ian a weary smile and reclaimed her baby. Her heart-meltingly beautiful, sound-asleep little squid.

Brad Winchester collapsed on the couch and dropped his forehead into his hand.

Tomorrow, she’d apologize to Ian for abandoning him, but she couldn’t take any more of Winchester or even of Kelly and Ava. She cradled her baby to her breast, climbed the steps to the bedroom, and shut them all away.





Chapter Twenty-One




Ian studied the man slumped on his couch, as unwelcome as a carbon monoxide leak. “Tess is impulsive, but she has good instincts. And the heart of a lion. If she says you need to stay away from the cabin tonight, I suggest you stay away.”

Winchester rubbed his face in his palms. “My Ava . . . She’s the most important thing in the world to me.”

“Jesus, Winchester . . . Tell a therapist, not me.”

“And Kelly . . . I’ve never loved another woman.”

“Seriously. I’m not the one you want to confess your troubles to.”

Winchester’s head finally came up, the thick gray hair he was so vain about hanging lank over his forehead. “Yeah. You’re right. Sorry.”

Ian regarded him with disgust. “Leave or sleep in your car. I don’t care. But stay the fuck away from the cabin.”

Ian gazed toward the stairs, hesitated, and turned away to the geode bedroom.

*

Wren awakened Tess before six after a rotten night’s sleep. Tess changed her diaper, slipped into sweats, and carried her downstairs, where she found Brad Winchester snoring on the couch, an empty bottle of Ian’s scotch lying on the floor next to him. It was more than any mortal woman should have to face.

Ian was either still asleep or out on his morning ramble. She collected Wren’s bottle, bundled her up, and made her way down the trail to the cabin.

Birdcalls whistled through the woods, and the redbud outside the back window showed the tiniest hint of pink. Someday she’d be able to appreciate it all.

She went upstairs and found Ava and Kelly asleep together in the small back bedroom. By now, Kelly would have seen enough of Tess’s things in the cabin to know Tess was no longer living at the schoolhouse.

Careful not to wake them, she returned downstairs to give Wren her bottle. Wren’s eyes were fixated on her. “You are the smartest, bravest, most mathematically gifted little girl in the universe,” she told her.