Page 150 of Collateral Love
Daddy met us on the porch.
He’d been pacing.
His hands shook when he reached for Jared.
“Son,” he said.
Jared froze.
They hadn’t seen each other outside of visiting rooms in over a decade. Plexiglass and metal detectors had a way of thinning out father-son bonds until they were just reports
“I’m good, Pop.” “I’m proud of you, son.” Words with no space for silence.
Now, on that little patch of porch where we used to leave our shoes, they just stared at each other.
Then Daddy pulled him in.
Held him like a man who finally got permission to breathe.
“I failed you,” Daddy whispered.
“No,” Jared said into his shoulder. “The system did.”
“But I’m your father,” Daddy insisted.
“And I’m your son,” Jared replied. “We both survived that bitch. That’s enough for today.”
They went inside together.
Camilla followed, lingering in the doorway. Chanel hugged him one more time, whispering something in his ear that I didn’t catch.
Zayden stayed by my side.
When the door closed, I stood there for a second, staring at the peeling paint.
“You did it,” he said.
“We did it,” I corrected.
He nodded.
Then his phone buzzed.
He checked the screen, jaw tightening just slightly.
“What?” I asked.
“It’s Miller,” he said. “Wants to go over prep for the hearing. They got footage. Witness timelines. The whole alley situation is tightening.”
The alley.
Charles’s blood still lived in the grooves of my mind even though the rain had washed it off the concrete weeks ago.
“You gotta go?” I asked.
“Not right this second,” he said. “But soon.”
I leaned against the porch rail and looked at him.
