Path of Destruction (Broken Heartland, #2)(19)

Hayden swallowed hard.

How the hell does he know?

He hadn’t told Ella Jane about his dad and the crap he’d gotten him into. So how Mr. Mason knew was beyond him.

What would Pops say in this situation?

“I see where Ella Jane gets her imagination, sir,” was all he managed before getting in his Jeep and pulling out of the driveway.





After hashing out the details of his punishment on the first day of school, Cooper had made it through the rest of the week by keeping his head down. There was the occasional * trying to prove his badassery by moo-ing or making some dumb comment about hicks going back where they belonged. Since he was pretty sure two altercations during the first week of school would result in the revocation of the deal he’d made with Vice Principal Gleeson, he kept his reactions to surly stares and jaw flexing.

By Friday, the restraint had added up. By the time school ended, he needed a stiff drink. But he only had beer in his cooler back at his loft, so it would have to do. Cooper ordered his brothers a pizza, waited until it arrived, and drove out to the pier.

Afterwards, he would go check on Ella Jane and find out what had made her ditch on the first day, whose ass needed kicking, and what happened between her and Prescott. But for now, he just wanted to get away—away from a wrecked farm, away from a school he didn’t belong in or give a shit about, away from those rich bastards and their bullshit—and breathe.

The sun was setting as he walked out onto the pier. It was quiet besides the crack and hiss of his can opening. Staring out onto the even surface of water that shone like glass, he took a deep swallow of beer and wondered why the universe worked the way it did.

He tossed a small rock and watched the ringed ripple dance outward as he polished off the first can. Every summer had been the same. Working, racing, hanging out with Kyle and sometimes Ellie May. But this one had been different. Kyle had kept a girl a secret—one he’d been trying to find the night of the storm. EJ had been spending her time with City Boy and he’d been barely keeping his head above water trying to juggle his jealously, his friendship, and his family issues.

Secrets, he realized as he sat there. Secrets had been all around him. He’d been hiding a pretty big one from his best friend, keeping his true feelings from Ella Jane and Kyle both. His parents had been keeping secrets from him and his brothers.

Secrets ruined everything. They started out small. Then they grew and festered, smothering and ruining.

Ironically enough, the last thing he’d said to his best friend had been the truth. The truth about the way he’d felt about Ella Jane in that moment. The real question was how did he feel about her now? He lifted his fourth beer to his lips, knowing he wouldn’t find the answer in the buzz, but that it would help him to think less.

When your parents were about to lose everything, the girl you loved was a semi-mute mess in love with someone else, and your best friend was dead, thinking was the enemy. Coop didn’t want to think anymore—didn’t want to feel.

The presence of someone behind him made his shoulders stiffen. Turning, he half-expected to see Kyle’s ghost behind him. They’d spent so much time over the years fishing off this same pier, he could practically feel him—could practically hear his voice.

“You’re going to look out for her when I’m gone, right? You’re the only one I actually trust.”

Ella Jane walked towards him, her body trembling with barely contained sobs. Facing the water, he took another drink before speaking to her. They didn’t call it liquid courage for nothing. She must have been feeling it too. She grabbed a beer from his six-pack, cracked it open, and downed half of it before he had a chance to tell her to slow down. He couldn’t say much. He liked the numb feeling the alcohol delivered. Even if it was only temporary. He’d let her have her beer or two if it meant she’d get a moment of peace from the turmoil of their reality.

“Hell of a first week, Ellie May.”

“P-please don’t call me that anymore.” Her voice was shakier than her legs had been when she collapsed beside him and took another drink.

“Want to talk about it?”

Or why, after two weeks of radio silence, you speak to Pretty Boy instead of me?

“No,” she whispered, surprising him by leaning on his side.

“Okay.” Wrapping his arms around her, he finished his beer. “Okay, Ellie—Ella Jane.” He gave her a squeeze, freeing the sobs she’d been holding back. “It’s going to be okay.”

He didn’t think about kissing her or how his feelings for her had seamlessly shifted him back into the big brother role he’d hoped to escape. All he thought of was that, right now, in that moment, she needed to be held.

He would hold her, stroke her hair, and soothe her until she ran out of tears—no matter how long that took.





For Kyle’s funeral, the director had requested pictures, trophies, memorabilia her brother had collected and any other mementos of significance. It had filled two tables and a five-tier bookshelf. After the funeral, all of that had gone into a curio cabinet at the bottom of the stairs.

Every morning, Ella Jane came downstairs to her parents’ hushed voices and a dozen pictures of her dead brother.

She lived in a tomb that now housed a shrine.

At the dinner table each night, her parents forced a conversation while EJ stared at the ghost smiling at her from the empty chair. At bedtime, her mother’s sobs could be heard through the walls. Her dad slept on the couch. Ella Jane lay awake and stared at the ceiling, at the walls, and sometimes at the photo albums that contained pictures of a life she couldn’t remember. When she was three, for Halloween, she’d apparently been Robin to Kyle’s Batman. When she was five she’d been the Tinker Bell to his Peter Pan.