Page 27 of Chasing Shelter

I waited as she slipped into the bathroom. I tried not to think about her and what she was doing at that very moment, but my ears were too attuned to every sound: the water turning on and off, the paper towel dispenser. Rustling.

The rustling was the worst because I knew it meant Ellie was changing. I was going to hell for thinking about my neighbor changing when she’d just been through something that likely scared the hell out of her.

The door swung open, and Ellie reappeared. I didn’t want to think about how good she looked in my shirt, but it was impossible to deny. Ellie had tied the oversized cotton in a knot at her waist. If you didn’t know, you would’ve thought this was her plan all along.

“Thanks,” she said. “Feels a lot better than my sticky shirt.”

Hell. I was jealous of my own damn shirt in that moment. “No problem.” My voice sounded deeper, a touch raspier. “How do you feel?”

Ellie arched her back, forming the perfect curve as her hand dropped to her ass, rubbing.

Jesus.

“Pretty sure my ass is going to be black and blue for a while, but nothing’s broken.”

My back molars ground together. “Did you get a look at the person who threw the egg?”

Ellie shook her head, the blond and red strands amid the brown catching the light. “No. They were all kind of a blur.”

“Has anyone been giving you trouble since you got to town?” My question was typical, something I’d ask anyone who’d been a victim of this sort of attack. But I knew there was more to it. I wanted to know all Ellie’s secrets, even if I didn’t have the right.

She stared at me, unblinking. “Come on, Trace. My dad didn’t exactly get me on the most popular list.”

It wasn’t the first time I’d heard her say my name, but something about how she said it now made it feel intimate, like a little secret that only the two of us shared. But I stalled on the second part of the sentence. “Have people been hassling you?”

Ellie rocked slightly from the heels of her feet to her tiptoes. “You know what he did. Helped the wealthy get wealthier by the shadiest of means. Helped the powerful escape punishment for the crimes they committed.Killedpeople who got in his way.”

“Yeah,hedid that. You had nothing to do with it.”

She looked at me like I was a moron. “I’m guilty by association. Fruit of the poisonous tree. I don’t blame them. I was raised in his home and benefitted from his misdeeds.”

“You were achild.”

Ellie shrugged, her gaze dropping to the floor. “People think I lived a charmed existence. They don’t know that I was basically in prison for twenty-six years.”

Everything in me stilled as my temper flared. Not at Ellie but at the possibilities of what she’d lived through. I struggled to get the words out without yelling. “What the fuck does that mean, Ellie?”

8

ELLIE

The words slipped outwithout my permission. A brutal truth I didn’t want anyone to know, especially Trace.

“You cursed, Chief. And it was the big one. Do you need to go to the bathroom and clean your mouth out with soap?” I was hoping for a laugh. Would’ve settled for a lip twitch. I got neither.

“Ellie…” His voice held the barest hint of a growl.

A shiver tracked through me, but it wasn’t one of dread. If I were smart, maybe it would’ve been. Instead, my stupid nipples pebbled against the thin lace of my bra. “Nothing. It means nothing.”

Those dark green eyes pinned me to the spot. “Saying you lived in prison isn’t nothing.”

I rocked forward on my toes. “Everyone has their stuff.”

Trace didn’t move his gaze from me. “They do. But I’m not talking to everyone. I’m talking to you.”

I had no doubt that every suspect who went up against this man crumbled in seconds. It was like he saw just a fraction more than the rest of the world and could put together pieces the rest of us missed.

“People have made their displeasure with me known, that’s all.And some around here think Linc and I have done enough to your family and should leave. They don’t tell Linc that because he can be scary, but they don’t mind telling me. I guess I need to work on that mad-dog look.”

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