Downfall(62)

“What would that be?” I smoothed a hand down her hair and sighed when I heard Noble rustling around in the living room.

Orley leaned into the touch and whispered, “My heart. I handed it over without question what feels like forever ago. I’m pretty sure it was yours even before you became my own personal hero.” She shook her head slightly. “And I’m starting to get used to the fact I have to share Noble’s heart with you on a regular basis these days.”

If that were the case, then she’d given me the most precious, treasured thing I was ever going to own. It would take an actual act of God for me to put that fragile, cherished gift at risk.

Living in this city prepared me for war, and not just the kind that was fought with violence and weapons. Sometimes battles had to be fought using strategy, not strength. Knowing what Channing was capable of, it was going to take more brains than I’d ever been forced to utilize and every single acquaintance I had.





Orley



“I told you, you can’t leave. That’s exactly what he wants you to do!” It was the first time Solo raised his voice at me, and it was scary. He was intimidating when he wasn’t red-faced and angry. When his temper was unleashed, it was downright terrifying.

I held Noble, who was crying as if the world was ending, tightly to my chest and cast a worried glance over Solo’s shoulder where a crowd was gathered on the steps in front of the Skylark. Erica was watching the dramatic scene between the two of us play out with worried eyes, and Riley was crying almost as hard as Noble because her friend was leaving and she had no idea when she would be back.

Carmen, the very pretty waitress who lived across the hall from Solo, was glaring at me and practically snarling. They all loved Solo and couldn’t believe I packed up everything I could fit in my piece-of-crap car and was ready to hit the road. To them, I was breaking the neighborhood hero’s heart, not doing what had to be done in order to protect my daughter. Everyone was already raw and on edge from Lester’s death, watching me walk away from Solo in such a hurried, careless way wasn’t going to make me any friends in this heated showdown.

I brushed my fingers through Noble’s curls more for my comfort than hers. I met Solo’s dark glare under the brim of his hat and chewed on my lower lip so hard I knew it was going to tear. He couldn’t stop yelling and I couldn’t get my voice above a shaky whisper. “I have to go. I told you, you aren’t in charge of deciding what’s best for me, and you won’t ever be in charge of deciding what I should or shouldn’t do for my daughter.” The words burned on their way out and pushed Solo back a step.

“Stop yelling!” Noble’s wail could probably be heard ten blocks away. “I don’t want to go, Mommy. I don’t want to leave Solo and Riley.”

God, it was such an ugly scene. There was no way it could be missed. We were making a commotion that could be witnessed from miles away. I hated every single second of it, but it had to be done. Taking a steadying breath, I reached around Solo so I could pull open the back door of the beat-up sedan and deposit my daughter into her car seat. She cried and screamed Solo’s name the entire time.

When we ran from Channing in the middle of the night, things had been so rushed and scary, there was no time to process what we were leaving behind. I was pretty sure Noble’s three-year-old perception still didn’t grasp the fact her grandma was gone for good and her grandpa was the reason why. However, now she fully grasped that we were about to leave her favorite person behind, and she was having none of it. The sound of her body-shaking sobs broke my heart, and it took everything I had inside of me to keep from breaking down into a worthless pile of goo right there on the sidewalk in front of the man watching me like he didn’t even know who I was.

“I’ve got to go. One day you’ll understand.” The words felt like they were wrenched out of my chest. They felt clumsy and wrong on my tongue and I hated saying them. Hated everything about this situation.

Solo swore now that Noble was out of earshot. Walking away from him right now ranked right up there as one of the hardest things I’ve had to do, right next to becoming a single mom as a teenager and leaving behind a very affluent lifestyle to start over from scratch.

He must have seen me waver and the indecision in my eyes, because the next thing I knew my face was buried in the center of his chest and my silent tears were soaking into his t-shirt. I felt his hand on the back of my head, and a second later his beloved ballcap, the one which rarely left his head, was slapped down on top of my barely brushed hair. I was a mess, inside and out, and there was little the hat was going to do to cover it up.

Solo squeezed me so tight I couldn’t breathe and I worried my ribs would crack. I hugged him back far more carefully since his side was still a galaxy of ugly bruises.

“Promise me you’ll find a way to get in touch with me when you get where you’re going.” It was a command that was so Solo. Always looking out for me, even when he looked like he could happily murder me with his bare hands.

I nodded, wiped my eyes dry, and gently pushed him away so I could walk to the driver’s door.

“Orley.” I looked up when Erica called my name. Her eyes were kind but very worried behind the lenses of her glasses. “Maybe you should listen to Solo. If he thinks it’s dangerous for you to go, maybe you need to stay here in the city for a little bit.”