WANTED (The Runaways Series Book #2)

Chapter 4

Caleb

I lost my mother, survived my father, survived my brothers, but didn’t wanna have to survive her.

I didn’t wanna have to think about the next twenty-four hours of my life, and how sometime before sunrise I’d have to see her again. I didn’t wanna see her again, ‘cause learning how to hate somebody you’ve spent five years falling in love with was a hell of a lot easier from far away.

Georgia hadn’t said a word to me since we’d left Hailey at the police station, just kept her eyes glued to the road like she hadn’t walked into the middle of an ugly fight.

Dean got it right the first time with her, he found a good woman, a faithful woman, a woman who knew when to talk and when to let the quiet do the talking.

Twenty-four hours ago I thought I’d found the same thing--the kinda girl worth keeping, maybe even the kinda girl worth giving a ring to. Good thing I didn’t, ‘cause handing over my heart to somebody who didn’t want it would’ve been crazy and stupid.

But maybe that's what I'd always been.

It took everything I had back in the parking lot to hold my shit together in front of Hailey. She’d stepped between me and that truck the same way she’d stepped between me and her father the night he buried bullets into the both of us.

I knew who she was that night. I knew what she stood for. She would’ve stood by me even if it cost her everything. That was the girl I’d pushed myself through prison to get back to.

But even after all the bullshit she’d said to me tonight, I swore I saw the old her for a split second when she tried to stop me from putting my hand through a headlight.  Maybe somewhere underneath whatever Sawyer did to her, the girl I wanted to believe in was still there.

Or maybe she wasn’t—‘cause that girl wouldn’t have screwed around with someone else.

Liam, Cillian, and Marcus were probably splitting their sides up in heaven over this. If they were still around, I’d never hear the end of it. They tried to get me to listen, but I never listened, and the most I had to show for it was a broken hand and a dumbstruck heart.

Georgia pulled into the ER parking lot, switched off the car engine, and sat staring at the steering wheel trying to figure out what to say. She always knew what to say. She always knew how to fix things whenever me and Hailey couldn’t figure ourselves out.

But tonight she was searching for answers, and if she had to look, there probably weren’t any.

            “I don’t know what happened and I’m not gonna make you tell me, but I’m not lettin’ you out of this car until you deal with it, Caleb. You’re not my son, you’re not my grandson, but you’re the closest damn thing I’ve got, and I won’t think any less of you if you’re a little less than the man you want to be right now.”

I didn’t even get halfway through trying to thank her before the hard ache pulling at my throat nearly choked me into doing the one thing I’d didn’t want to do.

I clamped my mouth shut when the jagged pieces Hailey’d made in me threatened to tear their way out. Maybe this was why she left. Maybe she hated that I’d gone soft so many times that she couldn’t see the man in me anymore.  

But she’d made me soft.

She made me think breaking down didn’t always make you weak. But it had, enough for her to leave me over it. So I wasn’t gonna fall apart anymore. Not in front of anybody. Not even Georgia.

I pulled open the car door with a broken hand and the pain blindsided me so bad I nearly fell out of the truck. Georgia yelled at me to stop but I kept walking towards the red and white emergency lights without her. I needed time without her.