After being rushed to the hospital despite his objections and dealing with the police for a torturous hour, Hunter finally returned to the Meadow View B&B, having been treated for one cracked rib and a slew of cuts and abrasions. Superficial damage, he thought, nothing that should’ve warranted an ambulance ride and wasted hours.
“I don’t know why you had to fight them tooth and nail,” said Greer, closing their room door once Hunter had sat on the edge of the bed. “The doctors were only trying to help.”
“I look worse than I am,” he said impatiently. “Their words, not mine.”
“You refused to make a police report,” she pointed out.
“Haven’t we done enough damage to that family?” he countered, “to this entire town?”
“I don’t understand where this complete one-eighty is coming from,” she said, nearing him, her arms folded, her sympathy drying up.
“Chester Sand isn’t the problem,” he grumbled.
“From where I’m standing he is.”
“You saw his arms, those scars.”
“So you’re going to excuse his behavior?” she challenged. “How does that help?”
“It doesn’t, but that’s the point,” he shot back. “They can’t be helped, not by us at least. My first instinct was the right one. We need to stay out of it.”
“We’ll we were,” she said, though softly this time. “We were minding our own business and then got ambushed.”
“No, we took Jamie hiking and got what we deserved.”
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” she said. “Wallowing in self-pity is not a good look for you.”
He stared out the window at the darkening sky, the treetops rustling in the breeze, and then met her gaze, asserting, “You don’t get it.”
“No, I don’t,” she agreed. “Not even a little.”
“We shouldn't have gotten involved at all. It was fucking arrogant. We’re not heroes. We can’t just swoop in and turn things upside down.” He shook his head, unable to look at her, and ran his finger along the cut on his lower lip. “This isn’t our world, Greer.”
“You’re wrong about that.”
“Why, because I feel for that little kid? Some people have it shitty. That’s just the way it is. It can’t be fixed.”
“That’s not why you’re upset,” she pointed out. “You’re mad because you think you made things worse.”
“I did,” he said frankly.
“You don’t know that.”
“Look, I didn’t come here to wage war against a family I know nothing about. I came to teach art and have a vacation.”
“And you spent a night in jail thanks to Chester. You should return the favor, file a police report, send him to jail for a day or two. He deserves it.”
“I’m not doing that.”
“You're crazy.”
Offended, he stared at her for a tense moment then challenged, “What did you just say to me?”
She softened, realizing she’d overstepped her bounds, but he was already flying into a rage. He sprang, advancing on her. She shuffled back, suddenly terrified of what he might do next.
“I don’t need any of this!” he yelled, taking hold of her shoulders. “I don’t need you pushing me to open up. I don’t need you manipulating me into getting involved in things that are none of my business or yours.”
“Manipulating you?” she blurted out, appalled, but he was shouting over her.
“I don’t need to save Jamie just because no one saved me!”
She shoved him off, yelling, “You’re a coward!”
“What?” He angled in on her, pointing to the bruise on his face, his cut lip, all the evidence of his bravery. “You don’t have a scratch on you because of me. You hid out in the fucking car!”
“What was I supposed to do? Huh? Not call for help? Throw punches at kids twice my size?”
“All you’re supposed to do is not force me into doing things I wouldn’t do otherwise!”
She let out a frustrated sigh, staring at him in disbelief, then said, “I didn't know you before we got here, did I?”
Hunter was so taken aback that words wouldn’t come. When they did, he found himself saying, “You think this is me, who I am? You think this is all I am, some wounded child who acts before he thinks? That person is dead. I’m so far past being that person that I don’t even think about him anymore.”
“Maybe that’s the problem.”
“No,” he shot back. “It’s not the problem. I’m not the problem.”
“I didn’t say you were the problem,” she objected.
“That’s exactly what you said, what you’ve been saying or implying for the past three days and I’m sick of it.”
Quietly, she said, “If that’s your impression, then I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to make you feel that way.”
He’d run out of steam so he paced away and plowed his fingers through his shaggy hair, but the gesture only made his ribs sting. When he reached the window, he faced her, but didn’t know what else to say.
“I care about you,” she said.
“You can’t fix me. You can’t fix some kid you don’t know.”
She swallowed as though his point had left a bad taste in her mouth.
“I never wanted you to see this side of me,” he told her in a small voice.
Her brows knit together, as she asked, “Where is this relationship going?”
The next thing he knew, he was snorting out a laugh, completely thrown. “Jesus Christ,” he groaned.
“I’m serious,” she stated. “You think you can hide part of yourself from me? That’s what you want? How could you possibly see a future with me?”
“What’s the worst thing that’s ever happened to you?” he challenged.
“What?”
“I’m asking,” he said.
She took a moment to think about it then said, “Probably when Aidan jumped me outside of my apartment last fall. I was really scared. I thought he was going to rape me.”
“Imagine living with that level of fear in your chest every second of your life growing up. Imagine being scared shitless of your own parents, day in and day out for seventeen solid years. Can you fathom how dark that is? Why on earth would you tell anyone about it? If you finally managed to get out of that kind of life and things were finally fucking awesome, why the hell would you ever tell the people closest to you, the people who matter most, the people you’re terrified of losing... why would you tell them about the horrifying things that happened to you? Why would you risk them looking at you differently once they knew?” After a long moment he added, “You wouldn’t.”
He could almost see her mentally placing herself in his shoes. Her mouth twisted into a frown and her eyes darkened. She seemed to wilt before his very eyes and he felt a stab of regret in his chest because of it.
“Sooner or later, Jamie will be fine,” he said in conclusion. “They all will.”
“Like you?”
They stared at each other for a long moment, both of them too emotionally exhausted to further the argument.
Then from out of nowhere fists began pounding on their door and as Greer asked, “Who’s there?” the small voice on the other side yelped in distress.
“Hunter? Greer?”
It was Jamie.
Greer wasted no time throwing the door open and Jamie spilled into the room. His cheeks were wet with tears and he looked as though he’d been kicked around in the dirt.
“What’s wrong?” Greer asked, sitting him down on the bed to get a good look at him. “What happened?”
He began hyperventilating and though he tried to get the words out, they came clipped and shaky. “I can’t go back there.”
Looking on, Hunter felt paralyzed, dark memories suddenly surfacing, but Greer took charge, explaining. “We have to go to the police station.”
“No!” he yelled, jerking his shoulders from her grasp. “They’ll make it worse.”
“Listen to me,” she said calmly, but soon lost the thread of her point. After a moments consideration, she asked, “Do you have any extended family? Anyone I can call?”
Jamie seemed to wrack his brain and the effort helped his sharp breathing to steady. “Aunt Carol,” he said finally. “But she lives on the other side of Lake Tahoe. Dad hates her. I haven’t seen her in forever.”
“Okay,” she said, straightening up and locking eyes with Hunter. “We’ll give Aunt Carol a call, but we can’t do it here. We'll call her from the police station.”
Immediately, Jamie snapped his gaze to Hunter as if terrified to leave these four walls.
Hunter neared him, letting out a rocky breath, and said, “It’s our only option. You can do this.”
As they drove Jamie to the Civic Plaza—Greer holding the steering wheel with a white-knuckle grip, Jamie fidgeting nervously in the passenger’s seat, Hunter cramped in the back and staring out the window as though if he locked his eyes hard enough on the trees, the little shops, the residents strolling happily by, he’d be able to extract himself from his body and melt into the landscape.
Maybe Greer was right. She hadn’t stated outright that he needed to change, but he couldn’t go on like this—hiding, pretending, trying to pass himself off as normal when nothing could be further from the truth.
Greer angled the car along the curb in front of the Civic Plaza and after they climbed out, Jamie clutched his hand and they started up the stone steps.
The lobby was quiet, but the police station had a few attendants. Officer Geffen was behind the front desk as usual—did the man ever take a night off?—and Chief Maguire was in the throes of a smiley conversation with a woman, which seemed more personal than professional. He tucked a lock of her long, dark hair behind her ear as he leaned in for a kiss.
Geffen sighed, registering that Jamie Sand was once again in Hunter’s unauthorized custody.
“He came to us,” said Hunter. “We were in our room at the Meadow View.”
“Hey, E-Love!” said Geffen, glancing over his shoulder at the chief.
Maguire started through the station house and joined him behind the counter, as Greer explained, “Jamie has an aunt named Carol. I know it’s asking a lot, but-”
The chief held his hand up, indicating he understood. “Come this way,” he told them, walking through the station and into his office, as Greer kept at his heels and Hunter brought up the rear with Jamie in tow.
Hunter urged the boy to have a seat in one of the chairs across from the chief’s desk and Greer settled into the other.
As Maguire rounded to the business side of his desk, he lifted the phone to his ear and asked, “What’s her last name?”