Reagan
I sit in my dad’s truck and drum my thumb on the steering wheel along with the music. I dropped Dad off an hour ago, and he sent me on an errand because he hates the idea of me sitting outside a prison by myself. I finished his errand, and now I’m waiting. He can’t fault me for that, can he?
I freeze when I see three tatted-up men walk by where I’m parked. They’re blond and huge. But one of them is holding hands with a girl, a pretty lady with dirty-blond hair. I sit up taller and watch them. They’re friendly with one another, and you can almost see how happy they are to be together. The one holding hands with the girl slaps her on the bottom and runs from her, and she streaks off after him until she can jump on his back. She leans forward and kisses him on the cheek. He puts her down because she’s signing something to him. My heartbeat stutters. This is the family. I’m almost certain of it. They’re Peter Reed’s brothers.
Peter Reed is someone I have wanted to meet for two and a half years. He saved me one night when I really needed saving. He found me huddled in a room in the back of a frat house after the unthinkable happened.
I’m huddled by the wall, still shaking from what happened. He turned out the light when he left, so I sit in the dark with my teeth chattering so hard that my jaw hurts. My panties are still wrapped around my ankle, dangling there like the useless piece of cloth they are. One side is broken from where he ripped them off me, but I can’t make my arms unwrap from around myself long enough to pull them up. Or off. My skirt is hiked up around my waist. He didn’t bother to even pull it down when he was done. He just whispered in my ear about how no one would ever believe me if I told and how I better keep it to myself if I knew what was good for me.
My phone dings beside me, its bright face a beacon in the darkness, and I look down at it. I want to pick it up. It’s probably one of my friends wondering where I’ve gone off to. But I can’t unwrap my arms long enough to reach for it, either. If I unwrap, I’ll fall apart. I can’t fall apart. I just can’t.
The door opens, and a sliver of light tumbles into the room. A young man laughs at someone as he closes the door in a girl’s face. He flips the light on and leans back against the door, cursing playfully. I crawl on my hands toward the shadow in the corner. Maybe he won’t see me. But he does. I can tell when he freezes and curses for real.
My teeth are still chattering, and I can’t draw in a complete breath. He drops down to squat in front of me. “Hey, are you all right?” he asks. He reaches a hand toward me. An animalistic sound leaves my throat. It’s one that scares even me, and he jerks his hand back like I’m a rabid dog and he’s afraid I’ll bite. The guy who just left, he wasn’t afraid of me at all. After a few minutes of really nice kissing, I was ready to stop, but he pushed me down, tore off my panties, held me still, and raped me.
I look into this man’s sky-blue eyes, and they’re so different from the brown ones that hurt me. I open my mouth to speak, but only a squeak comes out. My phone dings again, and I look toward it.
“Do you want me to get it for you?” he asks softly. He reaches for it and then puts it within my reach. I take it, jerking it from his hand as I crouch further into the corner. He pulls back like I scare him. I look down at the screen.
Rachel: Where are you, hussy? I saw you locking lips with the douchebag. Did you leave with him?
I need to reply. But my fingers are shaking too much.
“Do you want me to do it?” the man asks. He gently takes the phone from my grasp with a twisty tug, and I let it go. It’s of no use to me. I’m shaking too badly to use it.
“What do you want me to say?” he asks.
I swallow hard. I screamed when it started, before he covered my mouth with his hand, right before he banged my head on the bathroom countertop, and now my throat hurts. “Help me.” The words are a whisper, and he leans closer because he can’t hear what I’m saying.
“What?” he asks softly.
“Help me,” I say. He looks at my face. He doesn’t look down at my exposed body. He just looks at my face, like I’m not sitting here with my skirt hiked up above my hips, like my shirt’s not torn open. Like I wasn’t just raped. Defiled. Used. I tug at my skirt, and he looks around the room, opens a cabinet, and lays an unfolded towel over me. I start to adjust my clothes beneath it. He looks down and picks up my shoes, which I must have kicked off when I was flailing. He sets them next to my feet. He sees my panties hanging over my ankle, and he reaches for them, lifting my leg gently so he can pull them off my foot. “I need those,” I say. I really, really need them.
He shakes them out and holds them up, as if I was putting them on. “They’re torn,” he says.
“I need them,” I say again. A tear rolls down my cheek, and his face softens. He finds the scraps of fabric where the man who hurt me ripped them at the hip, and he ties a knot in them. He holds them up, like I’m two and need his help getting dressed. I put my feet in them and stand up, unsteady on my legs. He reaches out to support me. My hands are shaking so badly that I can’t pull them up. He helps me. He hisses in a breath when he pulls them past the blood on my inner thighs. He lifts his gaze, looking into my face as he pulls them over my hips, and then he tugs my skirt down to cover them. I lower the towel, and he closes my shirt with gentle fingers. He bends over and picks up my phone where I dropped it.
“Can I call someone for you?” he asks.
I nod. But I can’t think of who. I can’t call my parents. I wasn’t supposed to be at this party. I was supposed to be in my dorm room studying.
“Call Rachel,” I say. I lean against the counter, feeling like I can’t hold myself up anymore.
He scrolls through my contacts until he finds her name. He calls, and I can hear the faint ring through the phone. “Hello, Rachel?” he asks.
“Who are you and why do you have that hussy’s phone?” I hear Rachel ask.
He looks at me. “Do you want to talk to her?” he asks me over the phone.
I shake my head.
He closes his eyes and says, “My name is Peter Reed, and I’m here with your friend…” He stops and looks at me, his eyebrows scrunching together. “What’s your name?”
“Reagan,” I whisper.
“I’m sorry,” he says. And he really looks like he is. “I can’t hear you.” His tone is soft and much more sympathetic than I deserve.
“Reagan,” I bark. I groan inwardly at the way I said that. It was a spurt. But he heard me. That’s what matters.
“I’m here with your friend, Reagan. She needs you.”
“Where?” I hear Rachel say.
“J-just tell her the party. M-master bathroom, I think.” I look around.
“Do you want me to just go find her?” he asks, looking at me over the phone.
My gut clenches. “Don’t leave me,” I whisper. My jaw quivers, and I hate it. But this man makes me feel safe.
He reaches out and very gently lays his hand on the side of my head. I jerk back, and he immediately realizes that touching me was a mistake. “I won’t leave. I promise,” he says. He turns back to the phone. “We’re in the back bedroom, in the bathroom. She’s hurt.” He looks at my face while he says it. Not at my abused body. His eyes stare into mine. “She’s strong,” he says. “But I think she needs you.” He looks down at the phone. “I think she hung up on me.”
I nod. “Thank you,” I say.
“I’m going to stay with you,” he says to assure me. “I’m not leaving. I promise.”
I nod and lean against the counter, crossing my arms beneath my breasts.
“I’m going with you so I can be sure you go to the hospital,” he says.
I shake my head. “That’s not necessary.”
He looks into my eyes. “A rape kit is necessary.”
Oh, I’m going to the hospital. I need to be tested for STDs. And get a morning-after pill. And do all the things I never thought I’d have to think about, much less do. “I know. I’ll go.
”
“I’ll go with you.”
I shake my head. He’s already seen enough of my shame.
“I can’t walk away and leave you like this.”
There’s a quick knock on the door, and he calls out, “Who’s there?”
“It’s Rachel,” says a muffled voice. My soul cries out for her. I nod, and he opens the door. She rushes in and stops short. Her face contorts, but she bites it back quickly when she sees a tear roll down my face. “What happened?” she croons. She wraps her arms around me and pulls me in tight. I sob into her shoulder as she holds me. I look up at him through the curtain of her hair and see that he’s blinking furiously. He sniffles and straightens his spine when he sees me looking at him.
“She needs to go to the hospital,” he says quietly.
“I’ll take her.” She looks around. “How can we get her out of here without everyone seeing her?” she asks.
He pulls his hoodie over his head and walks over to me. He bunches it up like he wants to put it over my head, but he asks for permission to do it with his eyes. I nod, and he drops it over me, and his scent wraps around me. It’s like citrus and woodsy outdoor smells combined. It wraps me up and holds me close, still warm from his body. I tug it down around my hips. Rachel wets a corner of the towel he gave me earlier and wipes beneath my eyes. “You have scratches on your face,” she says. Then she sees my neck. “Did he choke you?” she gasps. But she quickly recovers. I cover my neck with my hand. That’s not the worst he did.
A growl starts low in Peter’s belly, but I can hear it. He’s angry for me. “Thank you,” I whisper to him as she leads me to the door, her hand holding tightly to mine.
“Can I come with you?” he asks.
Rachel looks at me for confirmation, but I shake my head.
“Can I at least check on you later?” he asks. “How can I find you again?”
“We need to go,” Rachel says.
He follows us down the hallway and through the noisy kitchen and the even noisier living room. He shields my body with the width of his and opens the door for us so we can walk in front of him. Rachel’s hand is in mine, but I feel the need to reach for his, because he represents strength for me. “Thank you, Peter Reed,” I whisper.
“You’re welcome,” he whispers back. He opens the car door for me, and I gingerly sit down. I’m sore so I hiss. He stiffens. “Are you sure I can’t go?”
I nod. I lay my head back and close my eyes. And let Rachel drive me to the hospital.
A shriek jerks me from my memories. I watch as a blond man walks out of the front of the jail, and the girl who was with the three men launches herself at Peter Reed. I know it’s him. I haven’t seen him since that night, but I am completely sure that my savior just walked out of the prison.
A knock sounds on the passenger window, and I jump. I look over at my dad, who makes a face at me through the glass. I unlock the door, and he gets in. He looks at the scene in front of us. “Are you happy now?” he asks.
My dad’s an attorney, and he took over Pete’s legal needs when I found out where he was. I went looking for him a few weeks after the attack. I asked around campus until I finally found someone who knew one of his brothers. Pete was in jail for a foolish mistake. So, I asked my dad to help him. He’s been working to have him freed ever since.
My dad’s well known in this town for his work with the youth detention program, and he does a lot of pro bono work for people who can’t afford representation. Dad found out that Pete had legal counsel that someone else set up for him, so he asked to assist in the case. Pete still had to go to jail, but he got a much lighter sentence because of Dad’s help. Pete doesn’t deserve to be in jail. He deserves to be given a medal of honor.
I look at Dad and smile. “Yes, I’m happy now. Did you get to ask him about coming to the farm?” I ask it very shyly because my dad reads me like I’m a book.
He nods.
“And?” My insides are flipping around, and my heart is racing.
“He’s coming.”
I lay a hand on my chest and force myself to take a deep breath.
“What do you hope to get out of seeing this boy?” Dad asks.
“I just want to thank him, Dad.”
Dad grins and rolls his eyes. “I was thinking you might want to have his babies.”
I snort. “Not yet.”
I’ll see Pete tomorrow. I can’t wait.
“Hey, kid,” he says softly. “He’s been in jail two years. He may be a little harder than that boy you met that night so long ago.”
Dad talks about it like it happened years ago. But it happens again and again in my head, every single night.
“He still saved me, Dad,” I say quietly.
Finally Finding Faith
Book 4 in The Reed Brothers Series
Daniel
Bells over the door jingle as I step into the tattoo shop. The big red flashing sign said Reeds’, and they appear to be open. I brush snow from my hair and blow warm breath into my cupped hands. It’s fucking freezing outside. It’s officially midnight, which makes it December thirty-first in New York City. Of course, it’s cold. One day until New Year’s Day, and I have twenty-four hours to cram in a lifetime of memories. Because by the stroke midnight, the last second of 2013, I have to be done with my list. I pull the piece of paper from my pocket and scan down it really quickly.
1.Get a tattoo
2.Ride a horse-drawn carriage in the snow
3.See a Broadway play
4.Buy hot chestnuts from a street vendor
5.Eat a one-pound burger at Rocko’s
6.Drink hot chocolate on a bench in the park
7.Fix my watch
I look around the shop. There’s a bunch of interesting art on the wall, and a little pixie of a woman approaches me. She’s dressed in a retro style, and her hair is all curled up and pinned like she’s a sixties model. Her nametag says Friday. It fits her. “What can I do for you?” she asks, and she blows out a slow breath. She looks tired and I immediately wonder what happened to her to put that look in her eye. But I don’t dare ask.
“Did you leave Wednesday and Thursday at home?” I blurt out.
Her right eyebrow arches and she looks down her nose at me. I immediately wish I could take it back. But then she starts to laugh. And it’s not a little laugh. It’s a great big belly laugh. She shakes a finger at me and motions for me to follow her. She sits across from me at a table and says, “I assume you’re here for a tattoo?”
I look around the shop. “Actually, I thought this was a brothel. Am I in the wrong place?” I move to get up, but my stupid prosthetic leg won’t let me play around the way I want to. It clanks against the table and I grimace.
“You okay?” she says quietly. Her eyes don’t drop to my leg. She looks me in the face. Most people at least glance at my leg before they jerk their eyes back up to meet mine.
“Fine,” I bite out.
“Well, we can’t help you out if you were looking for a brothel,” she says. She looks toward the men who are doing tats. They’re all big and blond and a little bit intimidating. And they don’t seem to like my brand of humor as much as she does. She drops her voice to a whisper. “The last time I tried sell my body in here, the boys didn’t like it.” She laughs. The men scowl even more, and I wonder if I should leave.
I glance down at my watch. I don’t know why I still look at it. It hasn’t worked since the blast in Afghanistan that took all my friends, my leg, and my sanity. I still wear it like I expect it to start up any second now. But that’s not going to happen. My life is over. Or at least it will be at midnight tomorrow tonight. I glance at the clock on the wall. Twenty-three hours and fifty-two minutes from now, I’ll get to finish what fate started. I’ll get to right the wrong.
Friday waves a hand in my face and jerks me from my thoughts. “Hello-o,” she sings.
“Sorry,” I murmur. I heave in a sigh. It’s so easy to get sucked into the
memories. The screaming. The hurting. The chaos. I look into her beautiful face. “I’d like to get a tattoo,” I say. “A clock, maybe. One stuck on midnight. With fireworks shooting off around it.” Fireworks. Bombs. It’s all the same thing.
She nods. “We can do that.” She starts to draw on a piece of paper. After a few minutes, she turns it to face me. It’s pretty fucking perfect, actually. “Like this?” she asks.
I nod. I can barely speak. By the time on the watch, I’ll be gone. “It’s perfect,” I croak out. I look down at my watch. It’s what I do when I’m nervous. I don’t expect to see the time change.
Friday calls over her shoulder and one of the men responds. He’s cleaning his table, and he motions me forward. She shows him the drawing and he nods, chewing his pierced lip thoughtfully. “I can do it,” he says. “This is the last one, though, for tonight.” He grins at me. “I have a hot woman waiting in my bed at home.”
“Gee,” Friday chirps. “So do I.” She grins at me.
One of the men, the biggest one, shoves her playfully in the shoulder. “You’re every man’s fantasy, Friday,” he says as he sticks out his hand toward me. “Paul,” he says. He talks to Friday again. “Cut it out, or the man’s going to get all excited, thinking he has a chance in hell of joining you.” He narrows his eyes and leans toward me. “Not going to happen,” he says quietly. “I’ve tried for years.” He motions for me to sit down. “Where do you want it?” Paul asks while the one whose nametag says Pete washes his hands.
I lift the edge of my sleeve. My upper arm is one of the few places on my body that’s not scarred up from the burns. “Here?” I say.
“You might want to take that off so it won’t be in the way,” Pete says. He motions to my shirt.
I was afraid of that, but this is my last day on earth. Who cares what my chest looks like? I reach behind me and pull my shirt over my head the way men do, and I hear Friday gasp as she sees my naked chest. It looks a lot worse than it actually is.
“Sorry,” Friday murmurs when Paul shoots her a glance. She sits down across from me, and her eyes finally land on the thin length of titanium that comes from my shoe. “What happened?” she asks quietly.
Pete transfers the design onto my arm and starts to ink the tattoo into my skin. It doesn’t hurt nearly enough. I heave in a sigh. “There was an explosion,” I say.
“Was it awful?” she breathes. She lays her chin in her hand and props her elbow on a table.
I nod. “It was pretty terrible. Every one of my men died.” I lift my pant leg. “I lost my leg and was burned pretty badly. But I lived.”
“The universe must have better things in store for you,” she says.
Paul snorts. “Friday, please,” he warns.
I should have died with them. “I doubt it,” I say. “I ship out in twenty-four hours,” I inform her. That’s a lie. Well, sort of. But not really. “I’m going to join my team.”
Friday brightens. “Well, that’s something to look forward to.”
Yeah. It’s all I’ve looked forward to for a long, long time.
I want to change the subject, so I think about the list in my pocket. “Do you guys know where I can find a clock shop in town? Someone who can fix a watch?”
The men look at one another and one of them says, “Henry’s?”
“Do you know if they’re open tomorrow?” I ask. “Well, today, I guess.” I have to have the watch fixed by tomorrow night. Midnight. It’s on my list.
“Call him, Paul,” Pete says. He pulls his phone from his pocket and tosses it to Paul. Paul juggles it playfully until Pete makes a noise and then he stops.
“Isn’t it awfully late to call tonight?” I ask. I look from one of them to the other.
“Henry’s wife had a stroke two years ago. They keep odd hours while he takes care of her. He might still be up. If not, Paul will leave a message.” He shrugs. “Worth a shot.”
Paul nods, and I see him smile as someone answers. Paul tells him I have a broken watch. He puts his hand over the mouthpiece and looks at me. “Can you go by there when we’re done here?” he asks. “He’s still up.”
I nod. “Love to.”
Paul talks to him for a minute and hangs up the phone.
“How is she?” Pete asks.
Paul shakes his head. “She’s not doing well, and she’s ready to give up. I think sometimes she just hangs in there for Henry.” He blows out a breath. “I’ll write down the directions for you. It’s right around the corner from here. In the basement of a building.”
He hands me the directions when Pete finishes the tattoo. I look down at my new ink and smile. It’s beautiful. I can cross that one off my list. “You’ll find Faith there,” he says. “In the clock shop.”
“Faith?” I ask. I almost snort. I don’t believe in faith. Not anymore.
“Faith is Henry’s granddaughter. She helps to take care of his wife and works in the clock shop when he’s not there.” He holds up a hand to show she’s about as tall as his shoulder. “Short little redhead. Really fucking adorable. In an I-want-to-bang-the-librarian sort of way.”
“Faith is a girl?” I ask. It’s not some mythical state of being?
Paul nods slowly.
“Oh, okay,” I breathe. I’d rather talk to a girl than talk about faith or hope or God or any of those things I don’t have anymore. I pay my bill and walk toward the front of the store. But as I’m leaving, Friday tugs on my sleeve. I look down and she stands up on tiptoe and kisses my cheek.
“Best of luck to you,” she says quietly.
“Thanks,” I croak. I suddenly have a lump in my throat and I don’t know why.
Pete shrugs into his coat. “I’ll walk with you to Henry’s. You don’t want to be alone in this neighborhood at this time of the night.” He looks over at Paul, who I assume is his brother. They look very similar, but the big one is broad enough to fill a doorway. He doesn’t smile quite as readily as Pete does. “You going to walk Friday home?” Pete asks Paul.
Paul grumbles playfully and wraps Friday up in his beefy arms. “If I have to,” he says. He scrubs a hand across Friday’s hair. She slaps at his wrists until he pulls her back in for a hug. She settles against him and exhales. He looks down his nose at her, like he’s confused. She breathes him in, a smile softening her face. He sets her back from him. “You ready?” he asks.
She nods her head and her cheeks color. “Don’t walk me home hoping I’m going to invite you in,” she chirps playfully.
“One day, Friday, I’m not going to give you a choice about inviting me in.”
She freezes and her breaths fall a little quicker.
Pete bumps my shoulder as he walks by me. “You ready?” he asks. I nod, and stick my hands in my pockets. “See you tomorrow,” he calls over his shoulder.
“Big plans for New Year’s Eve?” I ask as we step out onto the sidewalk. The snow is falling even heavier, and I pull my hood up over my head. I stumble a little in the snow, and Pete slows down. He doesn’t mention my leg. He just adjusts his walk. “Thanks,” I mutter.
“For what?” he asks. He looks into my face.
“Nothing,” I say. Maybe I’m just imagining that he’s adjusting for me. I worry so much about my disability that I think everyone else does too.
“I’m taking my girl to watch the fireworks tomorrow,” he says.
“Tonight,” I correct. I look down at my broken watch.
“Oh, yeah,” he says. He smiles. “Tonight.” He blows out a steamy breath. Suddenly, he stops and turns, and goes down in to a stairway. “You coming?” he asks, when I stand there looking at him like an idiot. “We’re here,” he explains.
I walk slowly down the stairs. Stairs are hard for me, and if he wasn’t here, I would just hop on one foot down them. That’s much easier than taking them slowly, one at a time. But it’s much less graceful.
We walk through the door and step into a basement full of clocks. There are grand
father clocks and cuckoo clocks and desk clocks. A train rumbles by on a track above my head, and I smile at the noise it makes.
“Kind of awesome, isn’t it?” Pete asks.
It really is, in a ten-year-old most-awesome-thing-ever sort of way.
There’s a long table at the back of the room and an older gentleman is sitting at it, and he has gears and parts spread around him. He’s wearing magnified glasses and has a bright light shining on his workspace. He doesn’t look up, so Pete calls his name. “Henry,” he says loudly.
The man looks over the rims of his glasses at us. “Pete,” he says. He sets his tools to the side and wipes the grease from his hands. “What a nice surprise.” Pete reaches to shake hands with him, but the old man pulls Pete to him and hugs him instead.
“It’s good to see you, Henry,” Pete says. “How’s Nan?”
Henry shakes his head and gets a far-away look in his eye. “She’s still hanging in there,” he says.
Pete squeezes Henry’s shoulder.
“Well, at least she’s home,” Henry says. He looks at me and points to Pete. “This young man and his brothers came and moved our furniture so I could bring my Nan home.”
Pete looks down at his feet and doesn’t say anything.
Henry extends his hand. “I’m Henry,” he says. “Who might you be?”
“Daniel,” I say. “I’m sorry to bother you so late at night, but Pete said you might be able to help with my watch.” I take it from wrist and hold it out to him.
He pulls his glasses down and looks closely at it, flipping it over. “This is old,” he says. “Can’t say I’ve ever worked on one of these.”
It belonged to my grandfather. “Do you think you can fix it?” I ask. He takes it to a nearby table and pops the back off, appraising the gears inside like he knows what he’s look at.
“Maybe,” he grumbles.
Suddenly, there’s a thump from upstairs and the old man startles. He lays my watch down and goes to the stairs. “Do you need some help?” Pete asks.
“Granddad!” a female voice calls from the top of the stairs.
The old man goes up the stairs, and Pete follows him. They both disappear. I shove my hands in my pockets and walk around, looking at all the old clocks. The man must just repair them. He doesn’t have a showroom or a place to display them. The train rumbles by on the track by my head, and I feel a grin tip the corners of my lips.
The door at the top of the stairs opens and light feet skip down them. I see puffy bedroom slippers and striped pajama bottoms, and I’m suddenly staring into the greenest, most beautiful eyes I’ve ever seen.
Faith
I stumble on the bottom step and he reaches out to catch me. He’s a little unsteady on his feet and he hops, but he’s solid and strong. I have a feeling he’d fall before he let me do so, and that’s an odd feeling to have.
“So sorry,” I mutter. I tug my sweater close to my body, wrapping it around myself. I should have gotten dressed instead of coming down in my jammies, but I just don’t have enough energy to do more. I’m working constantly, and when I’m not working, Granddad’s at work and I’m taking care of Nan. I feel like I haven’t slept in days. I probably haven’t. I nearly got the life scared out of me when Nan tried to get out of bed and fell just now. I shouldn’t have fallen asleep. I should have stayed awake to watch her. I knew Granddad was downstairs. He needs a break sometimes, too. He still works during the day as a doorman at an apartment complex. And he fixes clocks in his spare time. And he loves my Nan.
Theirs is a love like nothing I’ve ever seen. Not even my own marriage could compare. When Nan was at the nursing facility, he went there and slept in a chair beside her bed every night, because he said he couldn’t sleep without her, so what good was it for him to sleep at home? I came to stay with them when they brought her home. I don’t know if I’m a help or a hindrance. But I feel better being here, until I do something stupid like fall asleep.
The man coughs into his fist. I must have been wandering. Granddad says I do that a lot. It’s one of the reasons why I’m good at fixing clocks. It’s slow, methodical work and it takes my mind off the rest of the world.
“Didn’t mean to fall into you,” I say. Heat creeps up my cheeks.
He’s handsome. Startlingly so. He has brown hair and deep, chocolate brown eyes. His face is shadowed by beard stubble, and he doesn’t smile. Why doesn’t he smile?
He reaches down to adjust his pant leg and I see the length of metal that comes out of his shoe. I look up to his face and he’s watching me carefully. Is that why he doesn’t smile? I stick out my hand, for lack of anything better to do. “I’m Faith,” I say. He takes my hand in his and gives it a gentle squeeze, his eyes meeting mine, and I might even see a little spark in his dark gaze. But it burns out as quickly as it arrived.
“Daniel,” he says. “Everything all right upstairs?” He looks toward the closed doorway.
“Nan tried to get up and fell.” I shake my head. Nan’s head is still solid, but her body won’t cooperate and she just doesn’t fully grasp her limitations yet. “Pete’s upstairs charming her back into bed.” I laugh. That man has a way with people.
“The Reeds,” he says. “They seem pretty nice.”
I roll my eyes. “All five of them in one room can be a little overwhelming.” I had a crush on Pete for a little while, but then he met Reagan, and they are so freaking perfect for one another that I quickly discarded that notion.
“There are five of them?” he asks. He scratches his head. “I think I only met two.”
I start to count on my fingers. “Paul, Matt, Logan, Sam and Pete, in order of age. Sam and Pete are twins, although Sam swears he’s eight minutes older.”
I walk over to where Granddad started on Daniel’s watch. “Is this yours?” I ask, as I pick up my glasses and sit down on the stool. I bend Granddad’s light toward the watch. I look into it, and, although I’ve never worked on one of these, I might be able to fix it.
“It was my grandfather’s.”
I look up at him. “What happened to it?”
He looks everywhere but at me. “There was an explosion. In Afghanistan.”
“Was that where you were injured?” I ask, but my mind is already on the inner workings of the clock.
“Yeah,” he says and he blows out a breath.
“So your watch hasn’t worked since the blast?” I ask. I’m trying to figure out what could be the matter. Because the gears turn when I manually work them.
“Nothing has worked for me since the blast,” he says. His voice is suddenly heavy and I look up.
“What do you mean?”
“The clock,” he goes on to clarify, but I’m pretty sure he just meant life. “It hasn’t worked since.”
“Mm hmm,” I hum. I start to remove the gears and pieces and lay them on the table in front of me.
“Are you sure you should be doing that?” he asks. He walks close to me and pulls up a stool. He’s fidgety, and he makes me a little nervous now that he’s close to me. But Granddad and Pete are right upstairs.
I look up at him. “You do want it fixed, right?” I ask.
He nods. “More than anything.” He heaves a sigh. “I feel like time stood still that day, and it never started back up.”
I nod. But I can’t look at him. He’s telling me more than he wants to, and I’m afraid he’ll stop if he realizes how closely I’m listening. “Did you lose any friends?” I keep working on the watch, removing the parts piece by piece.
“I lost all my men.” His voice gets thick and he coughs to clear his throat. “Everyone. I lost everyone and everything.”
“Where’s your family?” I ask.
I feel the warm breeze of his heavy exhale. “All gone.”
I finally look up. “I’m sorry.”
He nods. He gets up and starts to wander around the shop. An hour later, I’ve put his watch back together and I wind it up. It should work. But it
just doesn’t. And I don’t know why. I heave a sigh.
“What’s wrong?” he asks from directly behind me. I feel the heat of his breath on the back of my neck, and the hair on my arms stands up.
“Nothing,” I say and I start to take it apart again. I look over my shoulder at him. “Are you in a hurry?”
He shrugs and settles down beside me. He picks up a pen and starts to spin it on the tabletop. I look over at him. “Sorry,” he says sheepishly, and he stops the pen from spinning with a slap of his hand. “So, you live here?” he asks. “In New York? All the time?”
I nod. And I keep disassembling his watch. Watches are made on a series of gears, even watches this old. I make sure each one works as I put it back in place. There are no snags. No broken gears. No missing parts. Nothing was jarred loose in the blast. “Yep,” I say quickly.
“Have you always lived here?” he asks.
“No,” I grunt. “I moved here when my grandmother got sick. Before that, I was in Florida.”
“Do you like it here?” he asks.
I shrug. “One place is as good as another.”
“Why aren’t you married?” he asks.
I look up. “What makes you think I’m not?”
He grins, but it doesn’t quite meet his eyes. “Because any man in his right mind wouldn’t let you out of his sight.”
I jerk my head up. He gets up and starts to wander around again, like he didn’t just say something profound. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” I mumble.
He cups his hand around his ear and leans toward me. He grins. “What was that?” he asks.
“Never mind.” My gaze drops to his lips. He licks his full upper lip, and I have to force myself to look away.
“Something wrong?” he asks. His eyes drop to my mouth and he walks closer to me. Is he thinking about kissing me?
I look down at the watch. I shrug out of my sweater, because it’s suddenly hot in here. “No,” I say.
I look at the parts of his watch, which are scattered all over my table. The door to the upstairs opens and Pete walks down. Half way, he slows down, and looks from me to Daniel and back. “What did I miss?” He grins.
“Shut up,” I grumble.
“Oh,” he breathes. He nods his head and punches my shoulder as he walks by me. I growl at him and he laughs.
“How’s Nan?” I ask. “Still upset?”
“Only that you were worked up over it,” he says. He ruffles my hair with his big bear paw. “Don’t be so hard on yourself,” he says quietly. “Could have happened to anyone.”
I nod, biting my lower lip to keep from sobbing. Nan has gone downhill so fast. She keeps having these mini-strokes that make her weaker and weaker. There’s not much else we can do for her, except wait and make sure she’s comfortable.
“She was talking about some old clock,” Pete says. He picks up a bag of chips I was eating earlier and helps himself.
I smile. Granddad bought her a funny little clock made in Germany when they first got married. But they sold it when times were lean, about thirty years ago. Granddad has been scouring the internet to find another one. “He’ll never find another clock like that, not one that he can afford. They make crappy knock offs, but he doesn’t want crap. He wants the real thing for her. Or nothing.”
“What kind of clock?” Daniel asks.
“It was a German clock, made with a Black Forest design, and when the hour chimed, dancers came out of the clock and slid back and forth along the front.” I shrug my shoulders. “That’s all I remember about it.”
“Is it rare?” Pete asks.
I nod. “And too expensive for Granddad to buy another.” I would buy one today, if I could find one and had enough money. “Nan used to make up love stories about what the people did when they went into the house.” I lift my brows at the men. “Apparently, there was a lot of kissing that went on inside that Black Forest house.”
Nan and Granddad have always had this crazy kind of passion and I sometimes wonder if I’ll ever have that again. Maybe I’m waiting for a love like theirs. I don’t know. I don’t need to elaborate, because Pete’s already grinning.
“Henry was a horn dog,” he sings playfully.
I shake my head, but I secretly don’t want to scold him. “She started to mention it again a few weeks ago. I know he wants to give her one, but it’s just not going to happen.”
Pete’s phone chirps from his pocket and he grins and types something really quickly. He looks up. “Reagan’s going to lock me out if I don’t get home soon.”
I laugh. “You better hurry.”
“She loves me,” he says. And he gets this happy look in his eye. Pete’s settled and happy, and I couldn’t be happier for him. He looks at me. “How much are we talking about with this clock?” he asks.
“Like more than a car,” I say. “Even for a broken one.”
He grimaces.
“Yeah, I know. I thought about buying one too.”
Daniel sticks out his hand. “Thanks for the help finding the shop,” he says to Pete.
“Hey, do you want to come over tomorrow night? You could go to the fireworks with us.”
Daniel shakes his head. “I have somewhere to be at midnight,” he says. “But thank you.”
Pete claps him on the shoulder, and then he hugs me way too tightly and leaves. I can hear him whistling as he goes up the sidewalk.
I snap the back onto Daniel’s watch and look up at him. “It still doesn’t work.”
His mouth flattens into a straight line. “I hoped someone could fix it before it’s too late.”
“Too late for what?” I ask.
“For me,” he says.
“It’s never too late for you, silly,” I tell him.
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