Page 68 of Chasing Shelter

TRACE

I’d watchedEllie from my window for a minute as she struggled to get a goddamnedgoatinto her backyard. For a second, I worried Lolli had slipped me one of herspecialbrownies and I was hallucinating. But after blinking a few times, I knew I wasn’t.

What the hell had Ellie been thinking? Trying to wrangle an animal she likely knew nothing about without any help? She could’ve been seriously hurt. As was evidenced by her hopping, cursing dance.

Ellie froze, her eyes widening at my barked words. I expected her to read me the riot act. To give me absolute hell for being a stick-in-the-mud. What I didn’t expect was for those gorgeous pale green eyes to fill with tears.

“Oh, fuck,” I muttered, moving into Ellie’s space. I pulled her into my arms and held her to me. “Hey, hey. What’s going on?”

“Y-you said the F-word,” she said between sobs.

I just held her tighter against me, wishing I could take back my words, soften my tone. I was such an asshole. “Yeah, I did.”

Ellie kept right on crying as I held her. Each sob was like a knifeto the chest, and I would’ve given anything to fix whatever was wrong. Slowly, her cries lessened, but they didn’t cease altogether.

“Can you tell me what’s going on?” I did everything I could to keep my voice as gentle as possible.

Ellie pulled back, her eyes bloodshot and still pooling with tears. “I can’t even save a goat. How am I supposed to save myself?”

Everything in me tightened, and I battled not to grip Ellie harder. To keep my contact gentle. Instead, I lifted a hand to her face, my thumb tracking under her eye, the same one that had been bruised yet hidden beneath coats of makeup. “Who hurt you?”

My voice was soft, but fury vibrated each word. Because there was more to the story. More to what was going on with her father. Or maybe something else entirely. But I needed to know what it was more than I needed my next breath. Because in that moment, I would’ve given anything to take away Ellie’s pain.

“My ex,” she whispered.

My jaw clenched so tightly pain stabbed through the bone.

“Just once,” she hurried to add. “When I left.”

“He. Hit. You?” The fury vibrated harder this time, my hold on it more tenuous.

Ellie twisted slightly, looking away but not leaving my hold. I wasn’t sure I’d have been able to let her go if she tried.

“I don’t know what it was about. He never—there was no temper before. It was like this whole other side of him came out,” she admitted.

“Tell me you reported it.”

Ellie was quiet, which was my answer.

“El.”

“It wouldn’t have done any good. His family’s connected. It never would’ve made it to court. And even if it had, I couldn’t deal with any more attention.”

I muttered another curse. Apparently, Ellie made me break all the rules. But I understood her thought process. She alreadyhadthe world’s attention, thanks to her father’s crimes. Heaping more on would’ve been more than she could take.

But everything about him walking free made me want to rage. There was no justice in that. And justice was the one thing I needed to count on. That whatever bad in the world happened, the evil would pay for it.

“Did you tell anyone?” I asked, defeat bleeding into my tone.

“No,” Ellie whispered. “I just—I was embarrassed.” Her gaze lifted to mine. “I made so many mistakes, Trace. Let the wrong people rule my life. My dad. Bradley.”

“Don’t say his name,” I spat.

Ellie’s eyes widened a fraction.

“Sorry,” I ground out. “I just—I’m too angry right now. I want to hunt him down and—” I cut myself off, not wanting to admit that the same urge toward violence my father had also ran through my veins.

Instead of being appalled, one corner of Ellie’s mouth kicked up. “Don’t worry, I’ve thought about a little justice myself. Throwing him into alligator-infested waters. Buying a voodoo doll and giving him a permanent limp dick. Keying his precious Maserati.”

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