NINE

“Can’t I just—”

“No,” Slade says, getting a blanket and some warm clothes and handing them to me. “No, you can’t have a shower. If you warm up too quickly, you’ll make yourself seriously sick. You have to do it slowly. You were colder than you thought.”

I shiver, and I can see the faint tinge of blue in my hands. He’s right, I’m colder than I think. My head is aching, my body hurts, and right now the only thing I want to do is go and sit in my shower for hours, but I know he’s right, I know I can’t. So, I take the blanket, not wanting to move from the spot on the sofa that he put me, because my entire body aches.

“Get changed, I won’t look. I’m going to make some tea.”

He turns and walks into the kitchen. I watch him go, slowly shuffling out of my clothes with a wince, and putting on the warm track pants he gave me as well as the shirt.  My clothes are slightly damp and they were making me colder than I realized. Pulling on the dry clothes makes me feel warmer straight away. Slade comes back from the kitchen with a cup of tea in his hand. He takes a seat beside me and hands it over.

“Thank you,” I say in a whispered voice as I take it and my body shudders with happiness as warmth radiates through my hands and up my arms.

“Drink it real slow,” he orders. “Don’t put your body into shock.”

I nod and take a sip of the tea, closing my eyes and loving how it feels sliding down my throat.

“What were you thinkin’ goin’ into the woods alone so close to dark?” Slade asks me in a scratchy, low tone.

I’m sure I look sheepish, because I feel sheepish. I should know better than to go into the woods alone, especially when I know absolutely nothing about what’s out there. It’s so clear now, but I was just so frustrated earlier and I just needed something to take my mind off everything. That nearly caused me more than I was willing to give.

“I know it was stupid,” I tell him, glancing at my cup instead of the piercing brown eyes that are fixated on my face. “I just needed to clear my head and before I knew it I had walked further than I thought, and then I twisted my ankle ...”

I trail off and glance down at my ankle. Slade put ice on it as soon as he put me down on the sofa, but he didn’t let me hold it on too long because my body was already so freezing. It’s swollen, and aching still, but the painkillers he gave me have set in and it isn’t throbbing like it was.

“You need to get that looked at in the morning,” he tells me.

“Do you think it’s broken?”

He shakes his head. “No, it’s not broken. You would be in agony if it were broken. I think you’ve just sprained it, but you want to check for ligament damage, maybe even a fracture.”

I put my head in my hands. “I just started my new job, this week is the worst of my life, what am I going to say to them if I can’t walk around and do the job they hired me to do?”

“I’m sure they’ll understand, it’s not your fault. They can’t get angry at you for it,” he murmurs, reaching down and placing his big, warm hands around my ankle. He lifts it up and I have to hold back the gasp of air as he gently rolls it from side to side, looking at it. “Now,” he continues, still holding my ankle in his hands. “We’re going to finish talking about why you were in those woods.”

“Can we not?” I murmur. “I told you already that I just needed to clear my head.”

“Why?” he demands.

“Why are you so bossy?” I mutter, pushing my bottom lip out further than I’d like to admit. I quickly pull it back in and stop the sulking.

“Tone down the snippy comments and just answer me.”

I exhale. “I just don’t feel like I’m fitting in here. I’m having a good time, don’t get me wrong, but things just keep going wrong.”

“Like?” he prompts.

“Like my boss being a dick, my neighbor being a dick, for a start ...”

He stares at me. “I’m not being a dick to you. If I recall, it’s been you coming over and throwing your weight around, running your mouth off ...”

“That’s because ... that’s because ...” I trail off.

“I’m not the only one being a pain in the ass.”

I open my mouth, close it, think on it, and then say, “I was new here, I had no idea, you saw I was alone and honestly talking to you or getting help from you was like talking to a damned brick wall. You would barely say two words to me.”

“I didn’t know you,” he mutters, placing my ankle down. “I still don’t. And you barely gave me five minutes to even try and talk before you started running that mouth off and shutting me down.”

I frown. “I wasn’t that bad, was I?”

He raises his brows.

“OK, well, maybe I was, but you have to admit you’re a difficult person to talk to, also,” I say.

“Never said I wasn’t. I don’t like people a great deal.”

“Funny,” I say under my breath. “You had heaps of people around for that party. You seemed fairly social then.”

His jaw ticks. “We’re getting off track again.”

“No,” I say sipping my tea again. “I think we’re ironing out the issues and moving on from all this bullshit.”

His eyes lighten just a little, and it makes his whole face seem less harsh. He’d be a dangerous kind of perfect if he smiled. He has an edge, but if he softened it just a little. “Hmmm,” he murmurs, low in his throat.

“Maybe we should start again, with you being less of a dick and me being less of a pain in the ass. What do you think?”

He stares at me.

So, I take matters into my own hands, extending one forward and saying, “Hi, I’m Rachel. I moved here from the city so that means I’m not really a country and girl and I’m still getting used to living out of town like this. I am currently single, because men suck, and I love meeting new friends. I’m currently working as a trainee legal assistant. Oh, and I’m scared of bugs. Like deathly scared.”

Slade’s lip twitches, and those brown eyes hold mine. Then he reaches over, taking my hand. Relief floods me, because he could have left me hanging and made me even more angry at him, but instead he’s playing along. I’m glad, because I don’t want to dislike Slade. I think under his tough exterior, he’s a man that’s lived quite a hard life.

“Slade,” he rasps, voice low and deep, and oh so sexy. “I’ve lived here most of my life. Got a kid to take care of. I hate cities. I like bugs. I don’t like people very much but I do have a very annoying neighbor who won’t seem to get out of my way, no matter what I do.”

I can’t help it, I burst out laughing. Loud, happy laughter. Slade studies me, and he smiles, just a little. It’s so small you’d miss it if you weren’t watching his face, but I am watching it. I’m watching every movement, every expression, trying to understand what he hides behind those eyes. And I know one thing is for sure, I’m right, he would be gorgeous if he smiled.

It’s a shame he doesn’t.

~*~*~*~

“Your best friend is the girl that was all over the news a couple years back,” he says, brows raised, impressed look on his face.

“That’s her. She and her partner Noah were taken by that crazy serial killer and dumped in the woods for his twisted game. It was terrifying, I honestly don’t know how she is so happy now. She doesn’t seem to struggle at all, she and Noah have really picked themselves up.”

Slade nods, sipping his beer. I’m still drinking tea. We’re both sitting on my sofa. I’ve finally had a shower, and Slade strapped my ankle for me, and then we both sat down and got to talking, and surprisingly, we haven’t stopped. Slade isn’t a big talker, but he responds to all my questions and listens to my stories. I can see he’s interested, and it’s nice to have someone just listen.

“Saw that story all over the news for a long time,” Slade murmurs. “It wouldn’t have been a nice thing to endure. Seems there’s more and more of it these days, you’ve surely heard about Marlie by now.”

I nod. “I actually met her and recognized her. Poor girl, she must struggle to live anywhere after that book was released. She wouldn’t have an escape.”

“I’ve had a few good conversations with her. She’s a good woman. Strong. Stronger than most. But she’s got a shadow behind her eyes. Not like your friend Lara. Marlie still carries her demons with her.”

“That’s probably because she’s never been able to let them go, you know? I mean, that book was massive. Hell, everyone read it. Imagine living with that on your back, when all you want to do is shake off the past and move on.”

Slade nods. “I thought she wrote it, but she told me her mother wrote it. She didn’t say much more, but I’m getting the impression she didn’t agree with it.”

I exhale and sip my tea again. “Well, they’re both stronger than me, I can tell you. I wouldn’t be so strong about something like that.”

Slade’s eyes hold mine as he takes another long pull of his beer. Something shifts in my belly, deep in my belly, and it’s a feeling I’m not familiar with, at all. Lust. It has to be lust. That’s the only thing that makes sense. Considering I don’t even know the man.

“I think people find a strength even they didn’t believe they had when put in positions like that. Not many people think they could do it, but when it comes down to it, they can.”

“Yeah, I guess you’re right. Still, it takes a lot to put your life back together after something like that.”

“Fuckin’ right about that,” Slade agrees.

“What about you? You must find things hard sometimes being a single father?”

Slade’s eyes flash, and he meets my curious gaze. “Ryder isn’t mine.”

I blink.

Then I blink again.

“He’s not?”

He shakes his head. “No. He’s my nephew. My sister’s child.”

Oh.

“Did your sister pass?” I ask carefully.

Something comes across his expression, something dark, angry even. I shiver, because whatever is behind his gaze, whatever caused that look to cross his face, isn’t good. I wonder what could have happened for him to get his nephew full time, but not only that, to look so upset at the mention of his sister.

“No, she’s alive.”

“Oh,” I say, not wanting to push further, but kind of wanting to know what happened.

“Look, it isn’t something I like talking about. But, I will explain some things to you, because you need to be aware. Especially because Ryder likes you, and he’ll want to spend more time with you. I can only allow that if you’re understanding of how much I need him protected.”

This doesn’t sound good. At all.

“OK,” I say, holding his gaze, hopefully showing him that I am on his side and would never do anything to put Ryder in danger.

“My sister isn’t well ... mentally. She has had more than one breakdown, been admitted four times, tried to kill herself three and is beyond manic. She was always off as a child, but it got worse as she got older. It got even worse when she turned to drugs.”

Oh, God.

Having a mental condition is hard enough, but to struggle with drugs on top, dealing with the effects being that much more intense, wouldn’t be easy. It certainly wouldn’t have helped her condition. Not at all.

“She met a man,” Slade continues, after taking a sip of his beer. “He was helping. He helped her get clean, got her on the right medication, and for the first time, she seemed to be making progress.”

I nod, to let him know I’m listening. I don’t want to interrupt him right now, because the fact that he’s even telling me this, when he doesn’t really know me, is a massive thing. He hasn’t even told Steph, and he was sleeping with her for ages.

“She got pregnant with Ryder, and everything went well until she gave birth to him. After a week, something shifted, and she started doing strange things like leaving him to cry until the boy could barely breathe he was so worked up, or sitting him in his bath on his own and walking off. Her boyfriend, John, knew something was off, and tried to talk to her, but she claimed she was fine, just tired.”

God. Poor Ryder. He’s just an innocent little boy.

“It got worse, until even the very sound of Ryder making a sound would send her over the edge. She told John she was having murderous thoughts about throwing him out windows, or shaking him until he stopped crying. John knew she needed help, so he took her and was informed that she had postpartum depression, severe. Probably because of previous issues, it was worse than normal.”

I’ve heard of postpartum depression, not to that extreme, but I do know how much it can affect a person. How much it can change the way they think and feel about their child. I feel for anyone that’s had it, because it is a condition that can’t be helped. Like any mental condition, I guess.

“John called me,” Slade goes on, shaking me out of my thoughts and bringing me back to the story. “He told me what was happening, and that he was getting the help she needed. I told him I’d come and visit the following week, and two days before I was due to arrive, he was in a car accident. He died instantly.”

My heart splits in two. Right there and then. It breaks open. Not only was this woman suffering with her own demons, but the mental complications after having a baby that she probably didn’t understand, and then losing her partner. Awful. Absolutely awful.

“I’m so sorry, that’s terrible,” I tell Slade, feeling terrible for everyone, including poor Ryder.

“I got the next flight I could, and I flew to her. When I arrived, the house was quiet, but I had this feeling ... I don’t know how to explain it ... I just knew something was wrong. I went upstairs, and I won’t go into detail about what I saw, but she was trying to end Ryder’s life.”

I gasp. I can’t help it. That’s so terrible.

“I managed to get him off her and call an ambulance, but she completely lost it. I had to put him down, gasping for air, only a tiny baby, and pin my sister to the floor to stop her from getting to him. She was screaming that it was his fault, that if it wasn’t for him John would be alive. She lost it.”

“Oh, God, that’s awful. I’m so sorry you had to experience that.”

“Anyway, she got taken away and put into care, she needed it. Because Ryder’s father had passed, he came into my care. He was tiny, and hungry, and he cried so much, but I figured it out. He was family. She was family. I did what I had to do.”

“That takes a lot, you should be proud of yourself for finding the strength to do that,” I pause, and then ask. “What happened to your sister?”

“She was getting help for a while, and then when she was doing better, they let her out. I would let her come and see Ryder, but there was something missing in her eyes, something that made me uneasy. She wanted him back, but she wasn’t willing to fight for that. She got mixed up in the wrong crowd and got into drugs again. Her mental health went through the roof, she would follow me everywhere, screaming that I stole her child. She had lost it completely.”

“That’s so sad, the poor girl. It couldn’t have been easy to lose so much of yourself.”

Slade nods. “She tried to get Ryder back from me, but she was so wacked out on drugs, no court would take her seriously. She started stalking me, threatening me, even going as far as vandalizing my car and house. It wasn’t safe for Ryder anymore. The court appointed me his guardian, and I moved him here.”

My heart breaks for that beautiful little boy.

“Did you ever hear from her again?”

“Once, a few years ago, when I was in Denver. She saw us on the street, and lost it. She was so bad. So withdrawn and damaged. I barely recognized her. She threw around a few threats, saying she’d find someone to come and get her child back.”

“Do you think she was serious?”

His eyes flash. “I didn’t, but now I’m not so sure. Recently, I’ve had a few random messages on my phone, a few strange things happening, and I have a feeling she’s looking for him. I don’t think she ever truly stopped, but I think for some reason, she’s become desperate. Could be money reasons, could be that she’s clean—though I doubt it. Either way, she’s dangerous. It may not be entirely her fault, but it doesn’t change the facts. Ryder is like my son, I won’t let anyone hurt him.”

It all suddenly makes sense to me now. Why he got so freaked out when Ryder came to breakfast with me that day. He thought something had happened to him, he thought she had come back and gotten him.

“It’s my biggest fuckin’ fear,” he tells me, his voice low. “That she will take him and I won’t know where, and I won’t be able to find him, and somehow she’ll ruin him or worse. She’s not fit to be a mother. If she cleaned up, I’d let her see him, but there is no way I’m letting my boy into that dangerous and dark world.”

“You have every right to protect him. He’s basically your child, and you’re the only thing he has.”

Slade nods.

“I’m sorry I took him to breakfast that day,” I say, holding his gaze. “I honestly didn’t realize. I meant no harm, I promise you that, but I understand now why you freaked out so much. I never meant to cause any panic, so I am truly sorry for that.”

Slade nods. “It’s OK. I shouldn’t have gone off at you. He’s just ...”

“He’s your boy.”

Slade’s eyes flash to mine, and he nods.

“I promise I’ll be more careful.”

“And if you see anything suspicious, or anyone hanging around, tell me, yeah?”

“Of course,” I say quickly. “Ryder is a great kid, I’d never want to see any harm come to him. You’ve done a good job with him.”

Slade stands, and murmurs, “Thanks. And speaking of, I have to go and make sure he’s not burning down my cabin. You good here now?”

I nod, looking up at him, feeling that warmth in my belly again. “Thank you, Slade. For everything you did to help me out tonight.”

He nods, and his eyes scan over me once more. “Goodnight, Rachel.”

“Goodnight.”

I watch him walk out the door, and I smile.

Maybe moving here wasn’t such a bad thing after all.