By the time he’d fished it out from the front pocket of my purse, I heard him make a small sound. “Um, Mom? Was it your night to be on for the shelter?”
“No, why?”
We’d developed a rotating system of the first on call about a year ago, and it helped give all of us a well-needed break in case something happened after hours. The shelter held regular hours, and the dogs requiring round-the-clock care were in foster homes, but if we received a call about an emergency, someone had to be the first contact. It was my week off, and as such, I often went hours without looking at my phone while I stayed busy with Gavin and Pops.
He held my phone out. “You have a lot of missed calls. And Auntie Ness used areallybad word in the text right at the top.”
“Yeah, she does that sometimes,” I muttered. At the sight of my home screen, my stomach dropped. Six missed calls and about ten texts, from both Vanessa and my boss, Muriel.
“She swears a lot more than you, doesn’t she?”
“Yeah, but she doesn’t have little ears at home listening to her,” I said, gently tugging on his earlobe, which made him grin. His dimples flashed, and I found myself smiling in return. “Mommy only swears when it’s very, very important.”
“I know,” he sighed. “Like when your tire exploded that one time. Or when you left the coffee machine on and it melted and the whole kitchen smelled like burned plastic for a week.”
I gave him a sidelong look. “Yes, thank you, I remember that.”
He hopped back up onto the bed and peered over my shoulder. “What do they want?”
I scanned the texts, but they were variations ofholy shit,answer your phone, andwhat the fuck are you doing that’s so important. Muriel, the founder of our shelter, was a bit more professional, but her texts became increasingly alarmed too.
My thumb tapped on the first voicemail, but it was just Muriel asking me to call. No information beyond that.
Then another text came in from Ness, and I covered Gavin’s eyes because the f-word was on high display. It included a picture of the shelter and a news article.
Buffalo’s Star QB Taken Into Custody After DUI
My stomach dropped when I scanned the headline, because oh baby, was my mind connecting some of the dots. Then I tapped on the picture Ness sent.
The entire side yard, the one we’d just finished renovating, was completely demolished. The chain-link fence mangled, torn away from the side of the building, and the two benches destroyed, having been dragged underneath a sleek-looking vehicle with a destroyed hood. Popshad finished those benches for me, a gift because he knew that our budget was tight. He’d kept them for three decades, something my grandma had purchased because she liked how they looked by her flowers.
Gone.
My hand rubbed at my aching chest when I thought about those benches.
I thought about how much work we’d put into that area, months and months of saving so we could do it without any extra fundraising efforts, because we tried to save that for things like food and puppy pads and all the things that actually kept our animals alive and healthy.
And in one stupid night, someone who was too rich and too self-centered to think about how his actions might hurt anyone besides himself—he ruined all of it.
My thumb kept scrolling, a mug shot coming into view.
Once the entirety of his face was visible, I dropped the phone onto my lap with a squeak, slapping my hands over my mouth.
The jawline.
The stubble.
The thick hair—a light brown in the unforgiving light of the jail.
And theeyes. Holy shit, his eyes. They were blue. Vivid, bright blue.
My lungs ceased functioning as I struggled to breathe, and for just a moment, I felt the ghost of his mouth over my neck.
I’d let Archer-fucking-Evans stick his hand down my pants.
The revelation failed to settle, and my mind whirred unceasingly. The only thing I could land on was him telling me he never really drank. That he didn’t drink and drive.
How stupid I’d been. He probably said that to ten other girls over the course of a single week. He’d probably said it to someone else that same night, after I’d fled the scene of myinnocent debauchery.