Page 9 of Little Bird
Blonde hair that has enough curl to be unruly. Wide eyes the color of warm whiskey in the glow of the parking lot’s lights. Broad cheek bones. Full lips. The glint of anger and rebellion in her eyes.
She’s nothing like the girl I last saw, and the thought hits me like a punch to the gut. This isn’t a kid; she’s a young woman, fleshed out and sure of herself and angry as all get out. I let my eyes slide down her body and take in a trim waist and legs long enough to give a man thoughts he should never have. Curves that could kill you if you thought about them too long. Glowing eyes and lush lips and sex practically bleeding out of her pores.
But beyond that, like a ghost under the siren, is the whisper of the little girl, and I would have seen it earlier if I hadn’t been so enraged at the idea that someone was taking advantage of her.
And the fact that she’s changed so much drives all the affection I felt for her right out of my body.
This isn’t my Taryn. She’s grown up, become a young woman, and my brain immediately categorizes her as one more girl who was one thing and changed when I wasn’t looking. A lie waiting to be discovered. A trick lying in wait to ensnare me. My heart breaks in two at this, because it feels like the ultimate betrayal from the girl who symbolized such happiness, and the fire in my veins turns suddenly to ice.
“Taryn?” I whisper.
“Gunner.”
It’s not a question but a statement, and so full of relief and longing that for a moment—for just a moment—I see the little girl again, rather than the heat of her cheeks. Those bee-stung lips. Curves that could make a man cry.
And in that second, I let the ice melt.
“Get in the truck, Little Bird,” I say quietly.
Because I might not recognize her anymore, and she might have grown up without bothering to warn me, but I made a promise to this girl four years ago. If she ever needed me, I’d come for her.
She needs me now.
And I’m not going to let her down.
Taryn
I can’t stop staring at my stepfather.
Wait.
Ex-stepfather? Former stepfather? Does someone stay your stepfather if your mother leaves him first thing in the morning without telling anyone beforehand, and then gets a quickie divorce back to the city?
Because if he is my stepfather still, I probably shouldn’t be following the curve of his jaw like it’s some sort of path to the holy land. Or noticing how his lower lip is slightly fuller than his top lip, the line of his nose straight and stern. He looks older than he did when I last saw him, the lines around his eyes slightly deeper and his skin more weathered. When he turned to me in the parking lot, his eyes weren’t as bright as they used to be. They were quiet, distant, and sort of sad.
Like the last four years have been harder on him than he wants to admit.
I want to reach out and touch him, just to be sure he’s real. Maybe tell him that whatever it is, it’s okay. There’ll be light at the end of the tunnel. But his behavior hasn’t exactly been inviting.
When we left the station, I directed him right to Stella’s house, hoping she’d be there waiting for me, ready to laugh about the adventure we just had. When we pulled into the large driveway, though, I found her windows dark, and when I used the route we always took when we came home past curfew, up the tree and through the window she leaves eternally unlocked, I found her rooms deserted. No sign of the shoes she always kicks off in random directions. No light on in the bathroom of her suite.
No scent of my friend in her room.
I’d frowned, wondering what the fuck she was up to, but then decided that she might have gone to Arden’s instead of coming home. It made sense; Arden’s house was technically closer to the diner and might have been safer, considering her less-public connection to the mob. Maybe the professor, whose name I’d already forgotten, had taken them both there and dropped them off. Maybe they were sitting in Arden’s closet whispering to each other and waiting for me to contact them.
Though I didn’t have time for that. Gunner was waiting in the driveway, and I didn’t want to take time for anything more than dashing around the room, grabbing clothes and toiletries and swearing to Stella’s ghost that I’d repay her when I could. I couldn’t risk going to my own house to get things—with my luck, my mother and Johnny would be waiting in my room when I got there—and I needed something to wear in Hawke’s Wood.
If Gunner agreed to take me.
I’d paused at that, thinking. He’d been all in when I called and asked him to come save me, and I’d thought for certain he was still the man who’d spent four years acting like I was his own child. I’d been sure he was on my side and wanted me with him.
But from the moment he saw me in the parking lot, I’d started thinking otherwise.
I’d put that aside and gone back to gathering clothes, intent on getting out of the Fontenot house and back into Gunner’s truck.
After all, at least he wasn’t part of the mafia.
That I knew of.
