Page 133 of Our Daughter's Bones
They were worshipped. Maybe that was it. Maybe power did corrupt. Even their jerseys were sold for thousands of dollars in auctions.
It was then she noticed David’s jersey.
Number nine.
Out of curiosity, she searched for Nathaniel Jones’s jersey. It was partially obscured. But it was unmistakably number six.
This couldn’t have been a coincidence. They picked these numbers on purpose.
We were a team.
Nathaniel Jones had meant it literally. It had slipped out—in his arrogance and temper—and he didn’t even realize it.
Her heart pounded like a jackhammer. She found the boy with jersey number one.
His face was younger, of course—he was a scrawny version of his current self.
Her blood ran cold. “Nick, ‘916’ is not a date in the new club’s name. It stands for jersey numbers. Look who’s number one.”
Nick peered at the screen, then his eyes opened wide. “Samuel Perez.”
Seventy-Four
1997
There was something visceral about thunderstorms. Summers and winters were stagnant. But storms were when nature danced, hunted, sang, and cried.
Mackenzie never saw them as an inconvenience. She saw them as nature being its most natural.
She sat on the porch steps, hugging her knees. Branches writhed under the wind. The weak ones flew away, lifeless. The starless sky stretched endlessly, its blackness merciless and cold. She waited for a miracle to pluck her out of this life and thrust her into normalcy.
“Where’s your mother?” her father griped from behind.
“Sleeping.” She turned. “You can hang out with me if you want to.”
His eyes tapered, but she held her innocent smile. Inwardly, she prayed that Robert would listen to her and not find Melody, only to hit her.
He grunted and sat next to her on the step. She caught a whiff of alcohol. She waited for him to start drinking. Instead, he laced his fingers and rested his elbows on his knees. His fingers shook, the corners of his mouth twitched, and she knew that he was craving a taste. But for some reason, he was resisting it.
She watched her father. He watched the storm.
Briefly, he closed his eyes, like he was cherishing the wind playing with his hair and swishing up his arms. And she saw the father she always wanted. He was still in there. There was something to be salvaged.
“Do you like storms?”
“Yes.” He took a sniff. “They have a smell.”
Mackenzie took a deep breath. “I just smell rain.”
“I smellthunder.”
She chuckled. “Thunder only has a sound, Daddy.”
“That’s where creativity comes in, Micky. Trying to find something no one else notices.”
“Doesn’t that mean it’s not there?”
He smiled. It cracked her heart open. She hadn’t seen him smile in months.
