I couldn’t stop shaking, couldn’t fight the tears that started flooding my eyes. I couldn’t change the person I’d always been.
I was the girl who felt everything, and in that moment, my whole world began to crumble.
I held Talon against me and cried into her shirt as she kept speaking her random words. My eyes shut tight as I sobbed against the beautiful soul.
This was where I had felt it for the first time.
What it felt like to be happy.
What it felt like to be loved.
What it felt like to be part of something bigger than myself.
And now, I was being forced to leave.
A hand fell against my lower back, and I curved into Graham’s touch. He stood behind me, tall like the oak trees in the forest, and lowered his lips against my ear. As the words danced from his mouth and into my spirit, I remembered exactly why he was the man I chose to love fully. When he spoke, his words forever marked my soul as his. “If you need to fall, fall into me.”
Jane came back the following day, as if she had a right to stop by whenever she pleased. I hated the fact that I didn’t know what she had up her sleeve. I hated the unease I felt about the idea of her being back in town.
I knew she was capable of anything, but my biggest fear was that she’d try to take Talon away from me. If I knew anything about Jane, it was that she was intelligent—and sneaky. One never really knew what she was up to, and that made my skin crawl.
“Is she here?” Jane asked, stepping into the foyer of the house. Her eyes darted around the space, and I rolled my eyes in response.
“She’s not.”
“Good.” She nodded.
“She’s taking Talon for a walk.”
“What?!” Jane exclaimed, shocked. “I told you I didn’t want her around my child.”
“And I told you that you didn’t have a say in the matter. What exactly are you doing back here, Jane? What do you want?”
There was a moment where her eyes locked with mine. She looked nothing like her sister. There was no light in her eyes, only her dark irises that didn’t contain much heart within them, but her voice contained more gentleness than I’d ever witnessed before. “I want my family back,” she whispered. “I want you and Talon in my life.”
I couldn’t believe the nerve of her—to think she could just walk back into our lives as if she hadn’t taken a year-long vacation.
“That’s not happening,” I told her.
She tightened her fists. “Yes, it is. I know I made a mistake leaving, but I want to make it right. I want to be here for the rest of her years. I deserve that right.”
“You deserve nothing. Nothing. I was hoping we wouldn’t have to go to court, but if that’s the way it’s going to be, that’s the way it’s going to be. I’m not afraid to fight for my daughter.”
“Don’t do this, Graham. You really don’t want to,” she warned, but I didn’t care. “I’m a lawyer.”
“I’ll fight you.”
“I’ll win,” she told me. “And I’ll take her from you. I’ll take her away from this place if it means Lucy won’t be anywhere near her.”
“Why do you hate her so much?” I blurted out. “She’s the best person I’ve ever met.”
“Then you need to meet more people.”
My chest was on fire at the idea of this monster taking my child from me. “You cannot come back and just decide you’re ready to be a mother. That’s not how it works, and I would never in my life let you do that. You have no right to her, Jane. You are nothing to that child. You mean nothing to her. You’re merely a human who abandoned a child because of your own selfish needs. You are not equipped to take my child away from me, even if you are a lawyer.”
“I can do it,” she said confidently, but I noticed the vein popping out of her head from her anger building. “I won’t stand around and see my daughter be transformed into the person Lucy is.” Her words made my skin crawl. I hated the way she spoke as if Lucy was the monster in our lives. As if Lucy hadn’t saved me from myself. As if Lucy was anything less than a miracle.
“And who are you to say who Talon can and cannot be around?” I asked, my chest aching as my heart beat rapidly.