No One to Trust - Iris Johansen [45]
He shook his head. “I have to practice. I forget.…” He frowned. “It seems like a long time since we left Tomaco, doesn’t it?”
She nodded. “A lot of things have happened.” She headed for the shower. “I’ll be out in ten minutes and you can show me that keyboard.”
“Okay.” His reply was abstracted. “If it’s a scary game, why do you play it?”
“It only seems scary.”
“Then let me come and watch.”
Good heavens, he was being stubborn. Or maybe it wasn’t stubbornness, she thought suddenly. “Are you worried about me, Barry?”
“You shouldn’t do stuff that could hurt you.”
“And you’re trying to protect me?”
“I just want to go with you.”
She strode across the room and cupped his face in her hands. “Nothing is going to happen to me, love. There’s no monster that could hurt me in that barn. There’s only me and Judd and a haystack.”
“You had a cut on your arm yesterday.”
She hadn’t thought he’d noticed. “It was a scratch. You get scratches all the time.”
His eyes were glittering with unshed tears. “But I don’t want you to get them. Ever.”
She hugged him close. “I can’t promise you I won’t be hurt, just like you can’t promise me you won’t fall off that corral fence you were climbing this morning.” She paused, searching for words. “We try to take care of ourselves, but things happen. Then we have to get up and dust ourselves off and try again. Otherwise we’d never know what it is to get to the top of the fence. Didn’t it make you feel good when you did that?”
He nodded. “I could see clear to the mountains.”
“I didn’t stop you from climbing that fence, did I?”
“No.”
“Because I didn’t want you to be scared of it.”
A sudden smile illuminated his face. “You wanted me to look under the bed.”
She smiled in return. “You’ve got it. And you didn’t find any monsters ready to knock you off that fence, did you? Well, I have fences of my own to climb, and I can’t be scared or I’ll never get to the top.”
He was silent a moment. “You stood by the fence while I climbed it. Maybe I could go along in case you needed help.”
“Maybe.” She laughed. “I’m pretty good at climbing fences these days, but I can always use a little help.” She gently pushed him away from her. “We’ll see, Barry. Now go and find Dominic. I have to shower.”
He ran toward the door and looked over his shoulder with an impish grin. “Yes, you do.” He wrinkled his nose. “Phew.”
She was still smiling as she turned on the shower. He was changing, growing more independent and responsible every day. Galen’s influence? Possibly. Or maybe it was the result of the events of the last few weeks. She was just lucky that they had not made him timid as she’d first been afraid they would. Fear could be a terrible thing.
But you told me I had to face scary stuff, and most of the time that made it go away.
Her smile faded. Easy words to say, not easy words to live by. Yet she believed those words or she wouldn’t have spoken them.
I have fences of my own to climb, and I can’t be scared or I’ll never get to the top.
She was scared. Chavez had damaged her confidence and ripped and scarred her.
Time hadn’t healed her yet.
It had already been six years. How much longer would she have to wait for some miraculous transformation to take place? It wasn’t her nature to sit back and take no action once she realized a problem existed.
She closed her eyes and let the warm water pour over her. She didn’t want to take action. Not this time.
Not this way.
Galen was sitting on the couch in the living room, reading, when she came into the room. He glanced up from his book. “I thought you’d gone to bed. Something wrong?”
“Yes. Can we go out on the porch?”
“Sure.” He rose to his feet. “The kid okay?”
“Barry’s fine.” She moved toward the front door. The moon was shining, but it was better than the bright lights in here. What a coward she was being, she thought in disgust. It wasn’t as if—
“What do you want?” Galen said from behind her.
“You’re a problem-solver.” She moistened her lips. “I have a problem.”
“So?”