She was quiet for a few moments. “I need to do this for myself and for Molly. I don’t want to run anymore, Cam. And I know I can never really put this behind me. What happened . . . well, it will always be a part of me, but it won’t be me. Not anymore.”
This wasn’t what I wanted her to do and I didn’t think she truly needed to. What she didn’t realize was that she’d already begun to make peace with everything, but I wouldn’t stop her. “You know what I think?”
“I’m awesome?” Her grin was cheeky.
“Besides that.”
“What?”
“I think you’ve already made it that far, Avery. I think you have accepted it will be part of you, but it’s not you. You just haven’t realized that, but if you want to do this, then you’ll do this and I’ll be there with you.”
“You want to go with—”
She squealed as I shifted, rolling her onto her back. I hovered over her. “You’re not doing this by yourself. Hell to the motherfucking no. I’m going with you. And you’re not talking me out of it. When do you want to do this?”
Staring at me for a long moment, she smiled. “Got any plans this weekend?”
“Jesus.”
Shortcake placed the tips of her fingers against my cheek. “I need to do this.”
I dropped a kiss to the tip of her nose. “I don’t think you do, sweetheart, but if you think you do, then that’s what matters.”
“You really want to come with me?” she whispered.
“That’s a stupid question, Avery. And yes, there is such a thing as stupid questions. That was one of them. Of course I’m going to be there with you.”
Her lips spread into a wide, beautiful smile. “I love you.”
“I know.”
“Cocky.”
“Confident.” I kissed her softly. “I love you, sweetheart.”
She started to wrap her arms around me, but I moved away, climbing over the side of the bed. “Hey!” She frowned. “Get back here.”
“Nope. We got stuff to do.” I took her hands, hauling her off the bed. “And if you start feeling me up, we aren’t going to get anything done.”
The look on her face was bemused. “What are we doing?”
I bent, picking her up over my shoulder, and then pivoted toward the door. “We got some tickets to book.”
Twenty-Eight
Texas was ungodly hot. Like the circles of hell kind of hot. Even in the shaded interior of the rental car with cool air blasting from the vents, the heat seeped in from every tiny crack.
I couldn’t believe that I was actually in Texas.
My gaze drifted from the marble fountain to the monstrous-sized house. Avery hadn’t been joking when she said her parents were rich. They were like the 1 percent. Hell, maybe even the half of a percent.
Leaning back in the driver’s seat, I blew out a long breath. “Fuck.”
Shortcake was inside that place, with a mom that made Anthony Bates mommy look stable and loving. And I was out here, waiting in the car, half tempted to dive into the fountain.
She’d been in there for at least ten minutes and she hadn’t wanted me to go inside with her. Probably because she knew I’d lose my shit with a quickness. When she had opened up to me that day, she really hadn’t gone into a lot about her parents with the exception of how they had responded to what had happened to her, but over the last couple of weeks she’d told me about them.