Page 19 of Love Always

“Remember, it had an eight-year rest at Everlast.”

That was the cult Chloe reluctantly joined right after our parents were killed. And the guy who tried to kidnap her again to bring her back was its leader.

“That may be, but there’s no air-bag or side-impact bags.”

“I’m fine. I’ve got a really strong shoulder strap. That’s going to have to do.” I smile at him, suddenly grateful he’s going to be following me back up the highway. I open the car door and grab my backpack from the floor. “Thanks!”

“See you tomorrow?”

Suddenly, that awkwardness manifests again. “Ah, yeah. I’ve invited a friend from school too, Colleen.”

“Great,” he says, “I’ll catch you at The Inn.”

“I work ’til three,” I say which sounds like I’m expecting him to want to know that particular piece of information.

“Good to know.”

He waits until I am all buckled and the engine kicks in. As I pull out, he’s right behind me. This is, I have to admit, comforting. Like we’re a team. We are doing this thing, driving home, and he is going to be there all the way to the end.

It’s only after we’ve been on the road for ten minutes, two pairs of headlights heading north, that I adjust my rearview mirror so I can’t see his car and try to think about nothing. No weird professor, no Kevin, no worries about Cory being taken from me.

But I can’t. The circling snake in my stomach won’t stop.

Twenty minutes later, I make my right along Main Street which faces the sea and pull up a little beyond Weaver’s. Devon and I room together in a three-room apartment above the store. The blacktop makes the elbow turn to the right, I catch his headlights making the left onto the dirt road and toward The Inn and the clinic.

The light outside the doorway to the stairs leading up to the apartment is burned out and as I fumble for my keys, the gritty wash of waves crashing behind me matches the churning in my gut. I grab the mail from the floor on the way up and when I get to the top, I wait to hear Cory, but there is no rush of little feet, no cry of “Momma!”

When Devon opens the door, her hug is almost alarming. Claire and Chloe and Travis are huggers. Not me and Devon.

“I’m fine,” I say, realizing she doesn’t have the full picture on anything that’s going on.

“Who grabbed you? I’m so glad Mateus was there.”

“You remember him now,” I said with a wry smile. Cory is nowhere to be seen.

“He’s in bed,” she said.

“Did he ask for me?”

She shook her head and then holds up a finger. “But he did say I had to read his favorite book, the one about the ‘Pengu-ENs’ because ‘Mommy always reads that to me.’”

I need to see him. The door to his room moans when it’s opened, but he won’t stir. Once, a fire alarm went off, and I carried him sleeping out of the room. His curly head pokes above the sheets and his little fist, with the thumb still slick from sucking, lies curled on his pillow next to his cheek. I lean down to kiss him.

As I close the door, Devon asks, “Did you at least recognize the guy that grabbed you?”

I can’t tell her it was Keven Barr. There’s no way. I’d have to tell her everything and then she’d go to Claire with the information and Claire would make it all her business and get Finn and Bryce involved.

So instead I shake my head and look her in the eye. “No, I don’t. He came out of the restaurant and I think he thought I was someone else.”

“But you got hurt!”

I roll up my sleeve. “Just a road burn.”

“Did you file a police report?”

Again, I shake my head. “Look, it wasn’t that big of a deal. Mateus patched me up and then followed me up the highway so—”

“He followed you? He must have thought this guy was a threat, Laurel.”