Page 81 of Cuffed (Everyday Heroes 1)
?ll save you again in a goddamn heartbeat without thinking twice.
The thought screams in my head, but I stop myself from saying it, from bringing the past into the present. From treating her like the girl she no longer wants to be.
Yet, I remember.
And I wonder.
And I worry.
Just like that fucking case file sitting in my house.
“You saved what?” She grits out the words as she takes another step closer, posture defensive and full of challenge. Sure, she’s angry with me. I’m questioning her, but fuck it, she needs to know I care. Too bad I’m a guy and am not sure how to get that point across without setting off that magnificent and infuriating temper of hers.
“Nothing.”
“I can save myself just fine, Grant Malone. And not just in skydiving. At least in jumping there’s a reserve canopy in case the first one malfunctions. Wouldn’t it be great if life had a backup chute for those moments when you’re falling without anything to catch you?” She shrugs with her hands out to her side.
“And if the backup chute fails?”
“Like I said, life fails all the time. The only way to deal with it is to roll with the punches. Besides, living safely is dangerous. It isn’t good for the soul or the psyche.” She flashes me a huge grin before turning on her heel and saying over her shoulder, “Come on, I’ve gotta close up.”
Standing on the tarmac, I watch her stride toward the office of Blue Skies.
Living safely is dangerous.
Well, shit.
Just as I’m about to walk after her, my phone alerts a text. I groan when I read it and realize I just screwed up royally.
Talking about sex possibilities with Emerson or fulfilling obligations to my family.
I know which one I’d rather choose, and I currently can’t take my eyes off her.
“You don’t have to do this,” Grant says as he pulls down the street I know so well from memory but have lacked the courage to venture back to since I returned to Sunnyville.
I’m not ignorant of the fact that he took the long way through the neighborhood. I am, however, silently relieved not to have to deal with seeing my old house for the first time since I left it twenty years ago.
I risk a glance his way, the anxiety I know visible in my eyes hidden by my sunglasses. “I know.”
I don’t know.
Needing to abate the nerves jittering through me, I slide my clasped hands between my thighs and squeeze my legs together.
Cue the panic.
“My mom is going to be thrilled to have a woman to balance out all the testosterone tonight,” he says and reaches over to squeeze the top of my thigh. He doesn’t remove his hand, though. I appreciate the silent show of support and wonder if he has any idea of the riot of emotions clamoring around inside me.
“It’ll be good to see her,” I murmur, eyes fixed on the houses as we pass.
Sally Glendale’s house is still there and still that awful green color we used to say looked like puke. Then comes Adam Beecham’s house to remind me of the hours we spent on the green transformer box out front playing UNO until the streetlights came on and it was time to go home.
Everything looks the same but so very different from my memories. I bet they’ve all moved out, moved on, and forgotten about the little girl, Emmy Reeves, two streets down who had the unthinkable happen to her.
Did their parents gossip about me for a long time after I left? Did they wonder if I was telling the truth, or did they just think I was making stuff up to get attention from my workaholic mother like little kids often did? Or did they not think of me at all because it was too unpleasant and might ruin the idyllic feeling of their safe neighborhood?
My palms grow sticky as the car slows down. My heart beats faster.
Why did I agree to come?
