She wanted better for her daughter than all that aimless wandering. She wanted her to have dreams and to make plans, and to move through the world with intentional steps that led her toward her goals. To carry herself to the destinations she chose. She didn’t want her to be a brittle, helpless leaf, blown from place to place, propelled only by a need to escape, and never by desire.
Freedom—that was what she wanted for her daughter. Freedom of choice, and freedom from the guilt and shame and repression Abilene had grown up shackled by, and from the oppressive environment that had driven her to such extremes in the name of rebellion.
She glanced down and found muffin crumbs on Mercy’s head. Catching footsteps creaking from the direction of the den, she brushed them away.
“Casey?” She’d left him sleeping upright on the couch and found him in the exact same position when she’d crept through the den this morning.
He strolled in, rubbing his face. “Morning. Again. When did you two ditch me?”
“A few minutes before four, I think. You passed out. So did Mercy.”
“And you?” Casey asked, pulling a bowl from a cabinet. “You get any more sleep?”
“An hour or so.”
“I don’t know how you do it, man. I get less than six and I might as well be drunk.”
Abilene checked him out while he was distracted, fixing himself a bowl of cornflakes. Her libido had begun to return, if tentatively, and she was starting to take note of certain things for the first time in months.
Case in point, she was discovering all over again how much she loved Casey’s arms . . . and probably because that was the most of his skin she ever got to see. He wore button-ups and T-shirts, and while they fit nicely, they didn’t give much away. A fine pair of normal-guy biceps—lean and muscular, but not beefy like his brother’s or her ex’s. His forearms were just as nice, with blond hair and about half as many freckles as he’d had back in the summer. The hair on his head was a bit darker than when they’d met, more strawberry than blond now, but his beard had stayed the same—a brazen shade of red. Where he got that from, she couldn’t guess, nor those bright blue eyes. He looked nothing like his black-haired, hazel-eyed tower of an older brother. And that suited Abilene just fine.
Casey was a nice, normal-sized man, with better things to do, she imagined, than spend his spare time lifting weights.
What those things might be, however, she couldn’t guess. He was awfully cagey about what he’d done for a living before he’d returned to his hometown last August. But she could handle that. She had plenty of secrets of her own she didn’t plan on sharing.
Heck, Casey didn’t even know her real name.
There was something about him, though . . . something that set him apart from all her exes. It was in the way he stood and the way he talked. It was in the easy way he held himself, and in the old Chuck Taylors he wore when he wasn’t in motorcycle boots. He’d be thirty-four on April fifth, more than a decade her senior . . . though he believed she was a couple years older than she was.
He had more than ten years on her, yet in some ways Casey seemed like a teenager. Normally that wasn’t a plus for a woman, but Abilene’s own teenage years had been forfeited. She’d never experienced young love as she should have, never been with a guy and had it be about fun, about exploring like dumb, eager kids. She was always the student, with men. An innocent in need of teaching, or saving, or corrupting. She’d fantasized a thousand times about how sex with Casey would be, and not even in a horny way—not since her hormones had banished her sex drive, at least.
He’d be eager, she bet. Silly, and energetic, and shameless. Up for anything, and every emotion he felt would be right there on his face. She loved his voice, too—not deep like his brother’s, but soft, and sexy when he spoke low, late at night. What would he say, in bed? She swallowed, unable to guess but knowing it’d be brash. His ears and throat and cheeks would be bright pink, like they got when he was embarrassed. No guile, just proof that he wanted her. Lust bloomed at the thought, chased by a different heat—shame. The two were as married inside her as bees and their stingers, a product of the strict breed of Christianity she’d been raised in and formed by. The lust, she knew now, was wholly natural, a force from deep in her body. The shame was all in her head. Though knowing that didn’t keep her from feeling it.
Where Casey was concerned, though, fantasies were all she got. Good as he’d been to her, as both a boss and a friend, she knew it shouldn’t ever be more than that. She knew he’d been to prison, but for what crime, she wasn’t sure and frankly didn’t want to know. For her, it was enough to know that he’d done time. Enough to tell her that letting this crush grow any deeper would just be history repeating itself yet again. For her daughter’s sake, she had to pick with her head the next time she fell hard for somebody.
And though she and Casey weren’t meant to be, she welcomed the what-if daydreams. She’d missed being sexual these past months, and feeling the surge of power that came with it.
She might not be the most obvious sex object, but the whole petite-girl-with-big-eyes thing worked on some guys, and she’d always gotten a rush from seeing that glint in a man’s eye. The power she felt, feeling wanted like that . . .
Sure, she’d been led astray, but never all that unwillingly, she could admit.
“Refill?” Casey asked, tipping the coffeepot to his own mug.
“No, thanks. One’s probably plenty. Hoping I might steal a nap, if Mercy goes down at ten like she has been.”
“Good thinking.” He took a seat across from her, eyeing the baby. “You spill anything on her?”
“Not yet,” she fibbed, spreading butter on the second half of her muffin. You didn’t spill crumbs, she reasoned. You dropped them. No one told you crap like that about motherhood—how you’d accidentally drip oatmeal on your poor baby’s head, or sneeze on her, or otherwise undermine your dignity on an hourly basis.
“What are you up to today?” she asked.
“Meeting my brother and Duncan, before Benji’s opens,” Casey said. Duncan was his co-owner at the bar, her other boss. “To finalize plans.”
She knew what he meant—plans to do with what might happen once her ex was released tomorrow morning. After her shift tonight, Abilene would be hanging up her bar towel until further notice, and Vince would probably be arranging to meet with James, to take the temperature of the situation. She was afraid of the details. As long as Casey or Miah was nearby, she felt safe.
Though what am I really afraid of? she had to wonder. James’s anger, or everyone finding out the truth about me?
False names aside, she’d been two very different girls in her short life. One sweet and lost, one thoroughly ugly. Neither quite what they seemed to be.
If the truth came out, everything was at risk.
Duncan might want to fire her. The Churches might not be so keen to have Abilene staying under their roof. Casey might quit seeing her as a scared young mother in need of protection, and people could start wondering if maybe she shouldn’t be trusted with Mercy.
Because Abilene wasn’t what she appeared to be. She wasn’t even Abilene, technically. She wasn’t twenty-four, and while she might be in danger, she wasn’t a complete victim in any of this.
She wasn’t anywhere near as innocent as she seemed.
• • •
Casey got to Benji’s at eleven and let himself in through the front door.
He and Duncan were having a kitchen installed, its space cannibalized from the former stockroom and an adjoining corner of the bar. It was going to be a boon to the business, and hopefully keep the drinkers from vanishing each night at dinnertime, keep the place relevant once the Eclipse—the massive and controversial resort casino just resuming construction in the foothills—arrived, along with its attendant competition. Casey had waged an epic battle with his new partner over the future menu, and won—they’d be specializing in roadside-style barbecue. Nice and simple, tough to fuck up. Duncan probably wished they could serve kale and quinoa and artisanal mulch or whatever he’d eat if given his snooty druthers, but Casey had stood firm. Ribs, chops, steak. That was the recipe for success, fitting their existing clientele and the vibe of the joint.