To be honest, I’d never thought anyone would find us here. But I was sure that if they did, it would have been a lot more action-packed than the last ten minutes had been. What a letdown.

Rhys helped the kid stand, and started leading him over to the front door. He was holding Matthew’s hands behind his back like a cop without cuffs would do, and the action made Matthew cry even harder.

“Wait! Matthew, does Juarez know we’re here in California?”

“No. He calls me every Wednesday. When he called me last week, I’d still only been following your uncle.” He tried rubbing his wet cheeks against his shoulder, and looked between Kira and me. “I’m sorry,” he cried.

“We know,” I answered for us. Kira was still standing there with a guarded but sad look on her face. “We’ll tell the police exactly what you told us, I promise.”

He nodded, then let Rhys lead him outside.

“Do you think he was the only one doing everything?” Kira asked.

“I don’t know. Let’s hope so.”

Kira’s face clearly said she didn’t agree. “We need to be a lot more alert from now on.”

“I know, we will.” I sighed heavily and clapped once. “Well! You ready to spend Monday night in a police station giving statements?”

Kira groaned and rolled her eyes, and I laughed at the look. “I’ll go change my shirt so I don’t smell like smoothies. Meet you outside?”

“Last one out has to call Dad to tell him!” I called over my shoulder as I ran toward my room.

I heard Kira’s mumbled curse, and laughed louder as I stripped off my shirt and ran to my closet to grab the first one I touched. The worst part of this entire night would be telling Dad and Uncle Mason that one of Juarez’s boys had found us . . . and I sure as hell didn’t want to be the one stuck having to make that phone call.

16

December 4

Liam

I LOOKED UP at the sound of my office door opening, and my body immediately tensed when I saw the expression on Eli’s face. He looked like he was nervous about talking to me, and while I still wasn’t worried about my job, I was worried that he’d have news from one of his nieces.

“Hey,” I said cautiously. “What’s up?”

He sighed as he sat in the chair opposite me. “I just wanted to see how you’re doing.”

“I’m fine, why?”

Eli’s face went blank. “Well, that’s some bullshit.”

“I don’t know what you want, Eli. I’ve landed more accounts and finished more jobs in the last month alone than I normally do in a quarter. I’m fine.”

“Yeah, your work is fine. It’s great. But you never leave. You never leave the office and you never talk to anyone. So from what I’m gathering, Kennedy still hasn’t called you, and as your friend, not your boss, I want to know how you’re doing.”

I sat back in my chair and folded my arms across my chest. “I don’t know,” I finally admitted. “I don’t know how I am. She calls, but she hasn’t made a decision, so I don’t talk to her. I can’t until she knows. Because talking to her will only give me hope, and right now my chances aren’t looking that great.”

“Well I don’t know about that. From what I saw when the girls showed up with Rhys for Thanksgiving, Kennedy’s pretty miserable herself.”

My eyebrows rose. “He came with the girls?”

“I wouldn’t go reading anything into that. It was very much a we-don’t-know-what-to-do-with-him situation since he’s still staying at their place.”

“Still doesn’t change the fact that he’s there, which means she’s probably no closer to making a decision.”

“Maybe not,” Eli mumbled. “If you want my suggestion, I would go talk to her.”

“I can’t do that, Eli. I told her I was stepping back, and I need to stick with that.”

He tilted his head to the side and looked at me like he thought I was making a mistake, but didn’t say anything else as he stood and began walking out until he got to the door. “My other suggestion is for you to take the rest of the day off, you need this weekend away from the office, and the weekend is starting right now for you.” Eli stepped out of my office, but popped his head back in. “And by ‘suggestion,’ I mean that’s an order from your extremely stern boss.”

I smiled and huffed, but listened to what he said. Gathering up my stuff, I drove home, changed, and grabbed my board to head out to the beach. I usually only surfed in the early mornings, but since I wasn’t able to distract myself with work at the moment, I needed to do something to clear my head.

I’d only been out there for about thirty minutes when I caught sight of a man not far up the beach, standing up, watching me. Instead of paddling back out, I hung my head and walked over to him.

“Is this the day for people to give me lectures? Should I go see Brian after this?” I asked sarcastically, and dropped down next to where my dad was standing.

Once he was sitting down next to me, he asked, “What other lecture?”

“It wasn’t really. Eli just wanted to know how I was doing with the Kennedy situation, and told me he thinks I should go talk to her. And then he ordered me to leave early for the weekend . . . so I came here. Speaking of, how did you know I was here?”

Dad shrugged. “Saw your car. I had to run an errand since your mom’s and my anniversary is coming up, and saw your car on my way out and back. Decided I’d stop to see why you were here—but I figured it had something to do with Kennedy.”

I sat there for a couple minutes trying to figure out if I wanted to ask him what I’d been thinking for the past couple weeks. Dad just sat there waiting for me to begin. “When it was you . . . what did you do? And would you do it again?”

“With your mom and Chase?”

“Yeah.”

Dad exhaled slowly and leaned back so he was holding himself up on his elbows. “Well. When I found out she was pregnant I asked her to leave, and that was it for us for a long time. I knew you weren’t mine, and it didn’t take more than a minute to figure out who your dad was. I’d known how Chase felt, and I saw how your mom looked at him. While Chase waited for your mom to decide between the two of us—before she knew she was pregnant, and after—he did what you’re doing. He stepped back. And if he were here, I have no doubt he would tell you how big a mistake that was.”

“Mistake?” I blurted out. “Why?”

“Because your mom ended up taking a long time to decide. Even after Chase found out that we had broken up, she still told him she couldn’t be with him, and didn’t tell him that she was pregnant for months.”

“Months,” I echoed, my voice dead even though I was fucking terrified that Kennedy would draw this out for the same amount of time.

“Months,” Dad repeated. “By the time your mom was ready to tell him, and ready to give him a chance, they didn’t have very long before he died. He missed a lot of time with her because he stepped back. If he would have pushed it more, or been around instead of hiding from her, I have no doubt your mom would have broken down sooner.”