I was just about to the point I could hold my own weight if Jesse’s hold loosened when the screen door screeched open.

“Jesse?” Lily’s voice was small and unsure. “What’s going on?”

“Lily, I need you to do me a huge favor,” he said, setting me down onto the steps. “Grab one of those blankets up there and come hang out with Rowen for a few minutes, will you?”

I didn’t want him to leave me, but he’d given me just enough of a boost to know I could manage without him. He’d talked me back from the cliff, and I could keep backing away from it on my own.

Lily walked down the steps and sat beside me after handing a blanket to Jesse. Her face was full of concern when she looked at me. “Is everything all right?”

I wiped my eyes and tried on a smile for her as Jesse wrapped the blanket tightly around me. “It’s all right,” I assured her.

Jesse grabbed my face in his hands, kissed my forehead, then bounded up the stairs. “It’s about to be all right.”

The tone of his voice put me on high alert. “Jesse?” I called after him as he stormed through the screen door. “What are you doing?”

“Putting a piece of shit in his place,” he said, his voice murderous. “Lily, keep Rowen out here.”

Oh, crap. I tried standing up, but Lily clamped her hands down on my shoulders and kept me where I was. For a sweet, little thing, she had some serious strength. She shook her head when I looked at her with exasperation. “I don’t know what’s going on, but let Jesse take care of it. He usually knows what’s best.”

“And that ‘usually’ part is supposed to reassure me?”

Lily wrapped an arm around me and looked like she was about to say something else when the sound of a familiar voice caught both of our attentions.

“Get out,” Jesse demanded, his voice so loud it sounded like he was just a few feet away, not back in the kitchen. A few seconds of silence passed. “Get out of our f**king house!”

I heard a few Jesses called out from Neil and Rose before the sound of a serious brawl came through the open kitchen window.

I tried shooting up in my seat again. Lily caught me and pulled me back down. “Lily!” I said frantically. “Let me go. I’m not going to let Jesse get hurt over me when I could go break this up.”

The sounds of glass breaking and things clattering to the floor, interlaced with the sounds of punches being thrown and followed by loud grunts, came next.

It sounded like everyone was shouting in the kitchen. Even Mom and the two youngest girls.

“Trust me. You don’t have to worry about Jesse in a fight,” she said, wincing when a particularly loud shattering sound came from the window. “I’d worry about the other guy.”

I could never find one scrap of worry for the other guy. Not in this lifetime.

The clattering and shattering came to a sudden stop right before the back door off the kitchen busted open. Jesse had Pierce by the hair and arm, dragged him down the steps, and down the driveway. Neil and Rose charged out the door right after, followed by Mom and the girls. All Pierce could do was stumble along and try to stay upright. His suit was rumpled, his dress shirt stained with food and blood, and he’d be sporting a couple of black eyes for the next few weeks.

Other than enraged, Jesse didn’t look like he’d just been in a fist fight. As they passed us, Jesse stopped and lifted Pierce’s head so he looked my direction. “I want you to look her in the eyes. And I want you to apologize.”

Pierce was scared. Frightened. Like he was the one who’d been thrown to the ground and hovered over. “I’m sorry.”

I didn’t say anything. I forced myself to look at him so I’d remember him that way: scared, beaten, and repentant.

“I want you to swear that you will never, ever come anywhere around her again,” Jesse seethed. “Ever! Because if you thought the beating you took tonight was bad, just you come within a state of her again and I’ll show you bad.”

When Pierce stalled, Jesse drove a fist into his side. Lily and I covered our mouths. Neil moved closer, lifting his hands. “Easy, son. You’ve taught him a lesson. It doesn’t need to go any further.”

“It’s going to go plenty further if he doesn’t swear he’ll never show his face around Rowen again!” Jesse shouted.

“I swear it,” Pierce said instantly. “I swear I’ll stay away from her. She’ll never see my face again.”

Jesse released him and shoved him down the driveway. “Now get the hell off of our ranch.”

Once Pierce lifted himself from the ground, he fumbled in his pocket for the keys and hurried for the car. Mom broke away from Rose and the girls and marched up to Jesse like she was about to slap him.

That got me off of the steps. Lunging toward Jesse, I pivoted in front of Mom and caught her hand mid-air. Instead, she lifted her other hand and slapped me hard across the cheek. I whimpered, and Jesse pulled me out of reach and threw himself in front of me.

“Rose was wrong. You haven’t changed. And you never will,” Mom said.

The words hit me like another slap to the face.

“Neither will you,” I replied, moving up beside Jesse. His arm pressed out in front of me, blocking my way. I wasn’t sure if it was because he didn’t trust what my mom would do to me or what I’d do to her.

Neil, Rose, and the girls huddled off to the side, watching the whole scene with confusion and sadness. They didn’t need to know what was going on to realize something was extremely wrong.

By that time, Pierce had crawled inside the car and was blasting the horn.

“Rowen. Get in the car,” Mom demanded, grabbing for my wrist. I swiped it away, and Jesse blocked my mom when she tried again. “You are leaving with us right now, young lady. I don’t want you staying with these people another second longer.”

My blood boiled when I realized my mom wanted to take away the one good thing I had going in my life: that place and those people. “These people?” I said, crossing my arms and glaring at her. “The kind of people who love me? You know, the unconditional kind? Oh, wait. Never mind, you’re not familiar with that kind.” I shook my head and stepped toward her. I wasn’t backing away. I wasn’t running away from her. I was standing up to her at last. “The kind of people who trust me? The kind of people who would actually believe their daughters if they ever told them they were almost molested?” From behind us, I heard Rose gasp. “The kind of people who wouldn’t bring that same man back into their lives years later and expect everything to be all right? Are those the kind of people you’re really so concerned about leaving me with? Because from my point of view, you and your boyfriend are the most concerning people I could ever be around.”

I was venting years of baggage, years of frustration, and it felt freeing in a way I’d only dreamed of.

“You stay here,” Mom replied, her face every shade of pissed, “kiss art school goodbye.”

My dream. The whole reason I’d sucked it up and gone to Willow Springs in the first place. “Bye, mom.”

Her eyes flashed onyx before she spun around and marched toward the car. As she swung the passenger side door open, she said, “Goodbye, Rowen. Have a nice life.”

“I will,” I whispered as they peeled out of the driveway. Mom never looked my way again.

Jesse draped his arms around me and pulled me close. “Rowen, I’m so sorry, baby. I’m so damn sorry you had to go through that.”

I nodded into his shirt, feeling a couple of tears about to leak out. “Are you all right?” I pulled back so I could examine his face. His hair was a little rumpled, but that was the only sign he’d been in a fight.

“He never even landed a punch,” he answered, running his thumbs under my eyes to wipe the tears away. “I’m just fine.”

“Sweetheart,” Rose said, tears streaming down her face as she approached us. “Oh, my sweet, sweet angel. I didn’t know. I never would have let them come if I’d known—”

I shook my head. “I didn’t even know until he walked into the kitchen. I’ll be fine. Really.” No one, least of all Jesse, looked convinced. “If you all don’t mind, I just need a moment.” I walked away. As Jesse started following me, I clarified, “Alone. To sort a few things out.”

Jesse’s forehead lined, and Rose looked like she was fighting her instinct to wrap me in her arms.

“I’m fine,” I said before turning around and heading for the barn. I didn’t want to go back into the house to witness the mess I’d inadvertently been responsible for, so the barn would have to do.

I jogged inside and checked once over my shoulder to make sure no one followed me. Everyone was filing back into the house. Except for Jesse. He camped out on the porch steps, watching me like he was fighting his instinct to come after me. But he did as I asked and stayed.

I wandered down the row of stalls until I found a clean, empty one with a few bales of straw. It looked like the perfect place to “have a moment” and let everything that had just happened catch up with me.

A few of the horses in the nearby stalls whinnied a welcome, but, other than that, the barn was silent. I dropped down on one of the bales and leaned my back into the stall wall. The thought that kept bursting to the forefront of my mind was how hard I’d worked all summer to make myself better, how I’d actually succeeded, and my mom saw nothing but the troubled juvenile delinquent she’d always seen in me. I knew I could never do anything that would impress her, never do anything to earn her unconditional love and respect.

I’d have to learn to accept that, but I wasn’t sure if I could ever make peace with it. Could a person ever truly heal from that kind of a wound? Only time would tell.

The next thing that worked its way to the front of my mind had me lifting my legs up to my chest and curling into an upright ball. It was a thought, or a realization, or a damned epiphany that I didn’t want to have, but I had it nonetheless. No matter how hard I worked to overcome that troubled girl I’d been, she’d always be hiding just below the surface, ready to pop out when something set her free.

That person I’d been for so long was not removable. She was a part of me. Forever. That girl could rise to the surface before I could stop her. She’d push people away before they got too close, hurt them before they could hurt me. I couldn’t allow myself to be the toxic person to Jesse that my mom was to me. I couldn’t poison his life the way she had mine.

I’d made myself into a better person, I knew that, but no matter how hard or long I worked, I couldn’t risk that dark side of me striking out when I least expected it. I loved Jesse too much to put him through the pain or chaos of my life.

Who knows how much time had passed, but the longer I was alone, the darker my thoughts got. The farther down that trail they went. Only when a hesitant body slipped inside the stall did a ray of light cut through my blackness. Cut through, but didn’t remove it.