Page 33 of Broken Bodyguard

“I’ll see you another time, Gracie-bell.” I rubbed her back, unsure what to say to a sad three year old. Her concept of time was tenuous at best. “It won’t be long. I promise.”

Grace pouted, begrudgingly accepting spoonfuls of mashed potato as Maddie fed her. But she never gave up the crossed arms or scowl.

Maddie maneuvered the conversation away from the topic ofwhat came next, for Grace’s sake. We chatted about anything and everything else, until Grace was ready to go back to her coloring books leaving me and Maddie facing each other with empty plates between us.

A moment of silence passed between us.

“Is it wrong to be this sad that I have to go back to real life tomorrow?” Maddie punctuated it with a laugh, but the smile faded fast.

“Not wrong.” I moved into the seat closer to her, where Grace had been sitting. I faced her, pulling her hands into mine. “I don’t want to go back to real life either. But I do want to make sure you’re going to be okay when we do.”

“I’ll be fine at my parents’ house,” she said. “I won’t lie, I’d be a little nervous if I lived on my own right now. But they’ll be with me each night.”

“And then let’s go over the plan again.” We’d been figuring out the specific steps for what came next, as well as contingency plans, when it came to Jericho. She’d done the hardest parts—initiating the separation, hiring the divorce lawyer, waiting the requisite year to formally file. But the longer Jericho dragged his heels, the more gray area he had to do something unhinged. I wanted him excised from her life like a nasty mole.

“Once I’m back in town, I’m filing a report about the car. Then I’m meeting with my lawyer again to talk about going through with the uncontested divorce.” She ticked off her fingers as she spoke. “Then we’ll draft the custodial plan. If Jericho tries anything again, that’s when I file the police report and request an order of protection.”

I nodded as she spoke, encouraging her as she ran down the action plan. Hearing this felt good—but it didn’t entirely appease me.

“And what if he tries to lay a finger on you again?” I asked.

Her throat bobbed, looking at me with hooded eyes. “I call the cops. And then I call you.”

“Good girl.”

The flush in her neck told me she liked that. I smoothed my hand up her arms and then jerked the seat of her stool closer to me in one swift movement. Our knees knocked, but I folded her between my legs, hugging her as close as I could.

“I think I’ll start looking for my own place soon,” Maddie said, nibbling on her bottom lip. “My parents have been nice enough to let us stay with them as I got back on my feet. They want me to save for a downpayment so I can buy my own house, which I’ve been doing. When I’m not paying legal fees that is. But I don’t know…I was thinking I might start looking for an apartment to rent sooner.”

“If that’s what you want,” I smoothed my lips across her forehead, “then that’s what you should do.”

She nodded, but she didn’t look convinced.

“I should do what’s smart,” she finally said.

“Unless you have a different idea?”

She fiddled with the buttons on my flannel button-up. “There’s a lot of things I want that don’t make sense.”

I felt that statement in every cell of my body right now. I wanted Maddie and Grace to be a part of my life, even though I couldn’t offer what they needed most: a homebase. Stability. Permanence. It felt silly to even think about a future with Maddie.

But I also couldn’t imagine a future without her.

“Like what?” I prompted, wondering if she had the same thing on her mind.

She looked away, seeming to wrestle with something. Before she could answer, Grace scampered over, pushing the newest coloring book page up to our level. Maddie’s face lit up as she beheld her daughter’s work, and I admired it too, genuinely impressed with the attempt to color inside the lines.

“You’ve gotten better at this since we’ve been at the cabin,” I told her.

“For you, Toy.” She held it out to me so I could rip the page out—something of our ritual already—which meant that it was officially mine. I had five other pictures just like it behind magnets on the fridge.

“Thank you, monkey.” I dutifully ripped it out and set it aside, handing her the coloring book back. But she wasn’t satisfied until I ceremoniously hung the picture on the fridge. The stool creaked as I slid away from Maddie, leading Grace over to the fridge so she could select the magnet and the best spot for the new picture. Once all that was done, she happily skipped back to her coloring station in the great room.

“Where were we?” I eased back onto the stool, pulling Maddie right back to where she’d been tucked between my legs. She giggled, nuzzling up to me. “I believe you were saying the not-smart things that you want.”

She sighed, shaking her head. “I need to focus on the smart things.”

“Let’s justhearwhat you think is out of reach.”

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