Page 105 of Echoes of You

My lips twitched. “I butt dial people all the time. It’s a real bad habit.”

Lawson glared at all of us. “You’re riding behind the cage, and I don’t even care.”

Roan shrugged. “Just as long as you cleaned up the vomit from the last drunk you had back there.”

Holt wrinkled his nose. “Gross.” He glanced at me. “But worth it.”

My brothers were the best.

* * *

Lawson pulledto a stop in front of the trailer that looked exactly as it had the last time I’d been here, just a little worse for wear. It’d been years. Maddie had moved out the second she turned eighteen, renting a tiny studio apartment over one of the shops in town. The place hadn’t even had a true kitchen, but it was a million times better than this sty.

Lawson glanced at me. “You sure you’ll be able to keep yourself in check?”

“I need to look him in the eyes. See if he’s lying.”

“That’s not exactly an answer,” Lawson said.

It wasn’t. Because I wasn’t sure I’d be able to keep myself from shooting Jimmy Byrne where he stood for what he’d done to Maddie. It was something I’d happily go to prison for.

Holt leaned forward and squeezed my shoulder, hard. “Nash has this. He knows getting into it with Jimmy will only hurt a case against him.”

I did know. And that might be the one thing that could restrain me. A quick death would be too merciful for Maddie’s dad. He deserved to rot behind bars for the rest of his days.

I stared up at the house. “I can do it.”

Lawson nodded and opened his door to exit the SUV.

I pulled out my phone and hit Roan’s contact. He hit accept on the first ring and sent me his version of a grin, which looked more like a grimace. I looked back at him. “Mute yourself.”

He nodded and tapped a button on his phone.

I climbed out of the vehicle and followed Lawson up the walk toward the trailer. My throat tightened as I took in the series of cement steps. Stairs that Jimmy had thrown his daughter down without a care in the world.

“Hold it together,” Lawson warned.

I nodded, too afraid that he’d know my hold on my control was tenuous at best if I spoke.

We climbed those damn steps, and Lawson rapped on the door. The aluminum screen door smacked against the wooden one with each contact.

Only silence greeted us.

Lawson knocked again.

“Keep your pants on, would ya?” a gritty, feminine voice called from inside.

A few seconds later, Betsy Byrne hauled open the door. The woman couldn’t look less like Maddie if she’d tried. Dark hair bleached to within an inch of its life, smeared makeup, and a haggard complexion.

“Do you know what time it is?” She blinked a few times, and then rage filled her expression. “My crybaby of a daughter calls the police because I had words with her in a bar?”

I stiffened. Maddie hadn’t said anything about a run-in with her mom last night.

Lawson kept his expression carefully blank. He’d always been a master at it. “That’s not why we’re here. You were at Dockside last night?”

Betsy straightened her spine. “It’s still a free country, ain’t it? I don’t have a restraining order against me, do I? But then again, seems like you give ‘em out for hurt feelings these days.”

The anger pulsed again. Blinding fury at a woman who should’ve cared for her daughter but instead sided with her asshole of a husband. “Attempted murder is a little different than hurt feelings, Betsy.”

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