That offends me a little. “What’s wrong with this place?” I ask, straightening now, too.
“It’s full of bikers, sex, and drugs. It is no place for a child.”
“I grew up here just fine,” I grind out.
Dolores looks me up and down, and then smiles in a way that makes it feel like a lightning bolt rips through me. “Oh, and you’re telling me that you have had no problems in your life? Save it for someone who believes you, girly.”
She turns and walks out, after having her say.
We watch her drive off until the taillights disappear.
“What a bitch,” Reagan snaps.
“Maybe she’s right,” I murmur, as much as I hate admitting it. “Look at how things went for me. Maybe it is best to keep Amber away. I didn’t know Travis wasn’t clean again...”
Reagan frowns. “No, that’s not a good thing. Explains his bad mood.”
Everything inside me is screaming that I should just turn around and go home, to leave him to his life and his problems, but my heart is begging me to stay, to help him fix this, to get his daughter back.
Goddammit.
Reagan nudges me with her elbow. “You doing okay?”
I shrug, but don’t answer. Travis is gone, I have no idea where. For a second I think about chasing him, but I know better. You don’t chase a wild thing when it’s bleeding, you don’t corner it, not unless you want it to hurt.
“Want to go grab that coffee?” she says. “Or maybe something stronger.”
“Yeah, I think I’m going to need it.”
“Me too, girl. Me too.”
Another week comes and goes, with almost no progress. I am starting to think my trip home was all for nothing.
Travis is nowhere to be seen.
He is avoiding me at all costs—how, I don’t know, but he is.
All I know is he’s out on the town every night, stumbling from one neon-lit bar to the next, chugging cheap beer, flirting with strangers, and not letting his body heal at all. I imagine him leaning over bar tops, grinning at bartenders and getting everything he wants.
I have tried to call him, but he refuses to answer.
In fact, I think he might have blocked my number.
It is only making me angrier.
He can’t avoid me forever.
For now, though, I am in desperate need of a distraction, so when Reagan tells me she wants to go sunbake on the beach all day, I jump at the chance.
So, here we lay, the sun searing down on us as if it wants to burn every trace of doubt from my bones. Reagan and I have claimed a patch of sand that is close enough to people, but far enough that they aren’t bothering us, and it feels somewhat private. We lay side by side on our striped towels, knees bent, toes wriggling in the warm sand.
The salt air tastes like home, and I forget just how much I have missed this. The tide laps in a steady rhythm, the air just gusty enough to keep us cool. Reagan, with her wind-tousled dark hair and perfect skin, closes her eyes and tilts her facetoward the sun, soaking up rays for the coming winter. I turn and prop myself on one elbow, about to ask her if she wants to get really, really drunk tonight when a group of guys stops in front of us.
I have already noticed them, of course, because they have been walking up and down like they own every inch of sand between the water and the boardwalk. The one that is already smiling at me is tall, lean, bleach-blonde hair flickering in the sunlight. He has olive skin that contrasts with his ice-blue eyes, which shine beneath dark lashes as he scans us. When he grins, I can’t help but pay attention, because his teeth are so damned perfect and he looks like someone personally carved him out of stone. I push up, so I’m sitting.
“Hey ladies,” he murmurs, eyes traveling over me. Not in a creepy way, but in a way that lets me know very clearly that he is enjoying the view.
Considering it has been a while since I have had a man look at me like that, I’ll take it.