29. Cody

TWENTY-NINE

The faintest glimmer of morning pushed at the window, streams of glitter and dust that played through the room nudging me from sleep. I inhaled, filling my nostrils with the scent of strawberries and cream, and I couldn't help but smile when I realized my nose was burrowed in Hailey's hair.

I tightened my hold on her where she was already tucked into the well of my arms, the way she'd been the entire night, her head rested on my chest.

Her spirit all around as her breaths remained even and long as she slept.

Peace.

I wondered how I could feel even a flicker of it when I knew I was nothing but a monster for taking her. It wasn't like my circumstances had miraculously changed, although it felt like everything was different.

A cosmic shift taking place somewhere in my consciousness.

Got the sense my being no longer fully belonged to me.

It'd been fractured.

Fragmented.

Those jagged pieces given to someone else.

I eased back enough that I could gaze at her precious face. Long, full lashes shadowed her cheeks, and her eyes twitched beneath her pale, delicate lids like she was long lost to a dream. Those plush, full lips were softly pursed, like my name still rested there.

Fuck me, she was pretty. Pretty in a way that shifted orbits because her beauty was so big and deep there was no fucking chance it wouldn't seep all the way out.

Shine like the sun.

A gravity that compelled.

It stole my goddamned breath every time I looked at her.

Punched me in the gut.

Twisted me up in some kind of elaborate origami until I became something else.

Hers.

My chest tightened with the force of it.

This awareness…this need.

This purpose.

Leave it to Karma that it'd be Hailey Wagner who'd confound me this way. Knock me clean from my foundation. Make me turn on every oath I'd ever made.

I was an idiot for thinking I could touch her and this wouldn't end badly, but it didn't fucking matter.

She was worth it.

Before I allowed myself to get consumed by another bolt of lust, I carefully eased out from under her and settled her onto her pillow, doing my best not to disturb her since there was no question she was spent.

I crept around her bed, trying to keep my footsteps quieted, though there wasn't a chance my weight wouldn't make the floor creak.

I glanced back at her as I pulled on my sweats where they were in a ball on her floor. The woman was so gorgeous where she lay lost to the abyss of sleep with the kiss of gold skittering across her flesh.

My damned heart clutched.

Thrashed in my chest.

Blowing out the strain, I tugged my shirt over my head then slipped to her door. Carefully, I cracked it open and peered out.

A stilled silence echoed back.

Thank fuck.

I slinked out, just as cautiously, and I clicked the door shut behind me before I started to tiptoe across the floor toward the couch where I'd left the blanket tossed aside last night.

"And just where do you think you're sneaking off to?" I nearly hit the roof with the voice that suddenly broke the silence.

A shout got free, aggression whipping a stir into my bloodstream, and I whirled toward my right.

My hand smacked down over my heart like it was going to keep it from jumping out when my fumbled brain finally came to the comprehension that it was only Lolly.

The old woman let loose a knowing grin. Her lips were already painted red, and she wore a satin floral robe as she sipped from a mug where she sat at the small round table under the window that overlooked the front.

"Someone's jumpy," she said, so damned sly.

"Yeah, that's because you nearly scared the pants off me," I grumbled.

Sure, I was relieved it wasn't an intruder I was going to have to take down first thing in the morning, though that relief wasn't lasting long with the way she was watching me.

My pulse thundered, and I scraped a shaking hand through my hair that had likely dried sticking up all over the place since Hailey had been tugging at it last night.

I dug around in my brain for an excuse. It wasn't like I hadn't been caught sneaking out of a woman's door or window a time or two in the past, and I always managed to come out unscathed.

But I didn't think I'd ever felt as exposed as right then. Like I'd been caught doing something illicit all while feeling like holding Hailey was exactly what I'd been created to do.

Lolly's eyes gleamed. "I'm surprised you're wearing them."

Agitation lit me up, and I shifted from foot to foot. "I was just…"

I swept a flustered hand back at Hailey's door.

"Oh, I doubt it was just. It sounded like a whole lot of something to me."

A penciled-in brow arched toward the ceiling as she sent me a challenge, daring me to deny it.

Well, shit, this woman wasn't about to tiptoe. She was just laying it out.

Blowing out a sigh, I shook my head like it could break up the disorder and changed paths. I headed into the kitchen where she'd been hiding out.

The woman was stealthier than a panther.

I leaned back against the island, chewing at the inside of my cheek, wondering what the hell was protocol in this sort of situation. It wasn't like Hailey was a child, but I also didn't want to come around here showing disrespect.

"I don't think you were supposed to hear that," I settled on.

She took a sip of her coffee. "Probably not, but I think the whole town might have heard."

How was I supposed to respond?

Sorry, Lolly, it couldn't be helped. Not when your granddaughter was blowing my mind.

She laughed at my discomfort, playfulness edging her features as she studied me where I itched. "I'm not here to judge. I've been trying to get my granddaughter to step out and have a little fun myself."

Then her gaze narrowed. "And while I'm all about it, I am not sure fun is really in her makeup, and I feel I may have been pushing her in a direction she isn't ready for, though it's clear you are well-versed in the act."

There was no missing the implication. What she was pushing at.

I was a player, good for a fuck, and Hailey was so much more than that.

Possession bound me at the thought. Regret crushing down because this felt different for the first time in my life. The connection I had with Hailey.

I had no idea how to hang onto it, but God knew, I was going to try.

"I have no intention of hurting your granddaughter."

"No?" Speculation lifted her brow, the woman searching me like she could see right through to my secrets. To every wrong I'd ever committed. To every lie I'd ever told.

"No."

She hesitated, calculating, gauging whether I was being honest or not. Deciding if she could trust me.

She seemed to come to a conclusion, and every bit of the impishness she normally wore vanished.

Her voice dropped lower than the stillness that echoed around us. "She needs a man who isn't going to be afraid of standing for her and her daughter. Someone who's not a coward. Someone who can support her when he finds out?—"

Whatever warning she was giving me cut off when a flurry of energy suddenly banged down the hall.

Maddie came running out, her hair a wild mess of warm blonde ringlets and that little bunny she carried with her everywhere hugged to her chest.

"Good morning, my Lolly and my favorite Mr. Cody! Are you makin' breakfast? I am the hungriest and so is my Princess Verona!"

In unease, I shifted to look back at Lolly, to demand to know what she was talking about.

My hate for that bastard Pruitt had grown so fierce I thought I would choke on it. The truth that this was more than getting rid of a scorned ex.

The fucker was dangerous, but I'd already known that. Had felt it. Knew this was going to be a fight.

The graveness Lolly had been wearing had shifted, and she was smiling wide as she stood from the table.

"How did I know you were going to be hungry so early in the morning?" she asked as Maddie came barreling into the kitchen.

Maddie beamed. "Because you know all the important things about me, Lolly, and you love me with all your whole heart, right?"

My chest tightened in a damned fist.

Caught in the affection that bulged in the room. The devotion that banged against the walls, a gonging that claimed.

Warily, I watched the two of them, unsure where I stood, but somehow knowing I couldn't move.

Lolly ran a tender hand through the little girl's hair. "That's right. With my whole heart. And that heart says we'd better get you fed, hadn't we?"

"And don't forget my Princess Verona!" Maddie held the stuffed bunny out in front of her, flopping it around.

"Never," Lolly told her.

The old lady started to shuffle into the kitchen, but I pushed from the island. "You sit. I'll handle breakfast."

Surprise expanded her eyes, shrewdness lighting her expression, with this knowing as she reached out and curled her hand around my bicep. "Ah, I think that I might have been right about you."

"That he's the strongest, most tallest man with the biggest muscles in the whole wide world?" Maddie piped in from the side.

"That's right, Maddie…" Her gaze twinkled. "He might just be strong enough."

Disquiet gusted.

A sense coming in from the recesses of my mind, from the instincts seeded in my spirit.

It warned things were nastier than imagined.

Hailey had let me peek through the barriers last night, though the details were still vague and distorted to the sordid secrets that thrashed behind the barrier where she kept them concealed.

She'd given me a peek behind the veil last night, but I knew firsthand how depraved those kinds of souls went.

Regret throbbed from the vat of immorality I'd kept inside myself.

My own dirty secret.

Was I any fucking different than that monster who was hunting her now?

Maddie took my hand and looked up at me. "Do you know all the important things about me, too, Mr. Cody?" she asked.

Shit.

I fucking had to be.

Had to prove I was better. Be fucking better.

Because it was my whole heart that clutched as the little girl looked up at me with so much trust it grounded me to the spot.

Made me sure I was purposed to be right there.

I squeezed her tiny hand back. "Not yet, Maddie, but I'm going to do my best to learn every single one of them."