Page 58 of Chasing Shelter

She’d distracted me in every way imaginable. With her kindness. Her raw honesty. By giving me hell.

“Trace?” Leah’s voice cut into my spiraling thoughts.

“Sorry. I, uh, had an incident.”

She arched a brow. “And you went to a bad tourist shop in Hawaii to remedy it?”

I shrugged. “Desperate times called for desperate measures.”

“Daddy!” Keely yelled, running for me.

There was no greater feeling than when she launched herself at me—complete faith that I would catch her. And I always would.

This time, I caught her with anoomphand hauled her into my arms. “Did you grow today?”

She giggled. “No.” Then she pulled back slightly. “I looooove your shirt. Pinkandpuppies!”

I chuckled. “I’m glad you approve.”

“Keely,” Leah said, her voice holding the slightest hint of tightness. “Can you grab your backpack and take it to the SUV? Your dad and I need to talk for a minute.”

A wariness settled into Keely’s eyes as she looked back and forth between us, and I wanted to scream at Leah. I gave Keely a pat as I set her down. “Everything’s fine. We’re just talking schedule stuff.”

Keely’s head dipped as she moved to grab her backpack from just inside the door. “Okay,” she said, but the single word was quiet and sounded defeated.

As she headed for the SUV, I pinned Leah with a hard stare. “Don’t pull that in front of her. It makes her worry.”

Leah bristled. “Because I asked her to give us a moment? That’s learning manners. Sometimes, adults need to talk privately.”

“Yeah, sometimes they do. Buthowyou say it can make a kid who’s been through a lot of upheaval worry. So have a mind to that.”

Leah’s mouth thinned into the hard line I’d memorized over the years. “She doesn’t need to be coddled.”

“She’ssix.”

“Which is why I asked her to wait in the car,” Leah snapped.

This was getting us nowhere. “What did you need to talk about?”

Leah clasped her hands in front of her, her knuckles bleaching white. “I know the occasional emergency will pop up, but I needyouto keepmyschedule in mind. I’ve got a lot going on at work right now, and I can’t leave at the drop of a hat every other day.”

“It wasoneday.”

She pinned me with a stare. “What about last week?”

I’d busted a meth-cooking facility, and the arrests and paperwork had been a nightmare. “Fine. I can have my mom fill in when needed.”

“Nora shouldn’t be your solution,” Leah ground out. “Maybe I should have primary custody. If I knew I’d have Keely for the whole school week, I could plan accordingly.”

My entire body hardened to granite. “You are not taking more time with my daughter away from me. You try, and you’ll have the fight of your life on your hands.”

“Trace—”

“I know I’m far from perfect. But I love that girl with everything I have. Not having her with me half the time is like walking around with half my heart missing. I’m not losing any more.” I had thought we’d done well with our parenting arrangement. It wasn’t typical with Leah taking Keely to all the lessons she was so passionate about our daughter being involved in and me picking her up for horseback riding outings with Arden, despite who had custody that day. But it had seemed to work for us. At least, I’d thought it had.

Leah’s hazel eyes widened as I started talking, her complexion paling. “Okay.”

“Good.” It was all I could say when I wanted to rip into her. But more, I wanted to tear into myself. For messing things up so royally. For not being what Leah needed to stay. For losing my daughter.

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