Page 62 of Unleashed
"Stop noticing things about me, Ace."
"Stop being noticeable."
She opens one eye and looks at me. Both of our walls drop in that single second, and I’m thrown back in time, listening to her sing in the truck, my hand on her thigh, probably driving somewhere so I can chase her. Walls gone, and what's underneath is so raw and so real and so goddamn devastating that neither of us can hold it. She closes her eyes. I look back at the road, shaking my head.
We don't say another word for the rest of the drive.
We don't need to. The silence says everything.
And it's the loudest thirty minutes of my life.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
Harper
Song- The Apparition, Sleep Token
We pull up to Sterling Ranch, both not saying a word.
I'm holding my breath as the gates pass and the land opens up around us, endless and golden and achingly familiar. The fences. The paddocks. The big cactus by the round pen, where Ace kissed me for the third time. The dirt track where he taught me to drive his truck when I was fifteen. I nearly rolled it into a ditch, and he laughed so hard he cried.
It's all still here. Like it was waiting.
He pulls up outside a barn, it’s bigger than Jett's, better kept, with a row of stables running off the east side. Horses are moving in the paddock behind it. I can hear them before I see them. The soft thud of hooves. Noises that used to be my whole world.
Ace cuts the engine and sits back, pulling his phone from his pocket. He frowns at the screen.
"So, Hunter is going to be a couple of hours. He's picking Wyatt up from school with Lola, then they're grabbing some food."
A couple of hours. On Sterling Ranch. With Ace.
I twirl my thumb ring and look out at the stables. Something in my chest cracks open so fast I can't seal it back up.
"I-Is Penny still…"
"Yeah, she's doing great. Wyatt loves her."
I nod, fighting a fresh wave of tears. My girl who has been looked after by his little nephew because I couldn't.
"Wyatt is your nephew, right?"
I already know the answer. I've researched this family inside out. I've seen their names on documents, their faces on reports. But I want to hear him talk about them. I want to hear the warmth.
Ace laughs. "Criminal journalist investigating the Sterling family's crimes, specifically Hunter's baby mama's death, doesn't know the name of the son?"
My eyes form slits.
"I was just?—"
He blows out a breath. "Yeah. I get it. And yes, Wyatt is my nephew. Fuckin' great kid. Has a pet goat named Gary that headbutts the shit outta Hunter. They're expecting another one. Kid, that is. Not goat."
He lights up when he talks about his family. His shoulders drop. The tension in his jaw loosens. That guarded wall cracks just enough for me to see the real Ace, the one who loves hard and laughs loud and would burn the world down for the people he cares about.
It makes me smile. Because it means everything I'm doing is worth it. I left to make sure he stayed here with his family. That he became this version of himself.
"Good. Lola is pregnant?" I ask, almost in shock.
He nods. Then turns to me, something shifting behind his eyes. "You sound like you know Lola."
