A Man Worth Keeping. Molly O'Keefe

haven’t talked to her yet, Jared. But I could.”

      She could hear him breathe, could imagine the vein in his forehead pressing against his skin. The ugliness in his soul turned his handsome face into something evil.

      He was not the man she had married. He was not Josie’s father. This man was a monster and she didn’t understand when it had happened. When had he lost control? This all seemed like some absurd nightmare, one of his terrible practical jokes that only he thought was funny.

      “You wouldn’t,” he said. “You’re too weak. Too scared.”

      Once maybe that had been true. But she was Delia Dupuis. And she was her daddy’s girl and tough as nails.

      “Don’t push me, Jared. You’d be surprised what I could do.”

      “I’ve seen what you can do, and I owe you for that.” That night in the cabin she’d nearly split open his skull with a fire poker. When his grip around her throat eased, she’d pulled herself free, prepared to run, but rage and a long list of injuries for which she deserved retribution forced her to turn back to him and kick him solidly, viciously, between the legs.

      He’d passed out from the pain on Chris Groames’s floor and she’d grabbed her sleeping daughter and run.

      She swallowed bile, hating herself and what she’d turned into when backed into a corner.

      “Why haven’t you talked to her, then?” he asked. “With all this proof you’ve got on me.”

      “You want Josie to see what you really are?” she asked, her voice cracking. She was doing the unthinkable, protecting him in order to protect her daughter. “You want her to be called as a witness against you? She’s a little girl, Jared. It would kill her.”

      The line was silent for so long she allowed herself to hope that he was seeing reason.

      “Jared, let us go. We can—”

      “You talk to your cousin and she’s dead,” he growled.

      Ice water like fear chilled her to the bone. Years ago, she would have said Jared, despite his temper, wasn’t capable of real violence. But the last year of their marriage and whatever mess he’d gotten himself mixed up in with the smuggling of drugs and immigrants over the Mexican border had convinced her otherwise.

      He was capable of anything and she had the bruises to prove it.

      “Stop looking for us and I won’t say anything. To anyone. Just leave us alone,” she nearly begged.

      “I’m happy to leave you alone. I’m happy to let you rot wherever you want to. But you’re not taking my girl.”

      “I’m not letting you have her back.”

      “Tell me, does Josie even like you? You left her for six weeks, Delia. That’s a hard thing for a kid to get over. You divorced her father. You’re making her run all over the country. What are you telling her about this little trip of yours?”

      “We’re doing fine,” she lied.

      So many mistakes.

      But she hoped keeping Jared away from Josie was the one good thing she could do as a mother, to make up for the mistakes she’d made. Even if Josie hated her for it.

      “You’re a criminal, Jared. You think I’m going to let her go back to you?”

      “And you think I won’t hunt you to ground like an animal? Josie is mine, Delia. You proved that when you walked away from her.”

      In the end, he was right. She’d left her little girl with a monster. A monster disguised as a devoted father.

      She was suddenly tired, too weak to keep battling. Her adrenaline and nerves bottomed out and she sagged against the wall.

      “Leave us alone,” she breathed.

      “You can’t run forever, you—”

      She disconnected the phone and pressed it hard to her lips until she felt her teeth. Her pulse chugged in her ears and cold sweat ran down her back. She slammed her fist against the wall, wishing it were her husband or Chris Groames.

      How did I get here? she thought, hysterically.

      Her fingers traced the yellow and purple bruises on her neck through the thin cotton of her sweater.

      Two weeks ago she’d gotten back from France. She’d been trying hard to make amends with her daughter, to put aside the guilt she had about her mother. She’d been thinking about planting a garden behind her little house. Her own herbs and some tomatoes for Josie to pick when they were ripe.

      But then the news story about the van of immigrants broke and her life changed.

      This is too much, she thought, too much for me to handle on my own.

      But she didn’t have a choice. Jared made sure of that.

      Her father was dead. Her mother, if she were alive, would be less than useless, having spent her whole life avoiding anything messy or ugly. And this was both.

      Turning to her cousin Samantha was now totally out of the question.

       Josie has me. Me and no one else.

      And I have no one. The realization filled her with a despair so heavy, so all-consuming she couldn’t breathe.

      A rag doll without bone or muscle operating out of sheer habit and will, she turned only to realize the front door stood open, the silhouette of a man outlined in silver light watched her.

      “JUST LEAVE US ALONE.”

      Max heard the snap of a cell phone shutting and the distinctive sound of a fist hitting the wall. He had a sickening sense of déjà vu. How many times had he seen this while on the force? How many times had a woman’s voice, shaking with the same combination of fear and anger, haunted him? Echoed in his head long after the damage was done?

      He turned to duck away, telling himself it was to let Delia have her privacy, but he knew the truth.

      He wanted to pretend he didn’t hear the emotional plea for help in her voice. Because he was a coward.

      But as he stepped back into the night, her voice again cut through the darkness.

      “Who’s there?” she asked. She stepped into the slice of light from the open door, but the light didn’t reach her face and all he could see were her fists pressed against her stomach.

      “Delia, it’s me. Max.” He was careful. Quiet. He kept the door open so he could avoid turning on the overhead lights.

      He didn’t want to reveal what he knew instinctively she would want hidden. Her face, her eyes, the devils that chased her and from which she couldn’t hide.

      “Sorry.” Her voice came out on a soft gust of relief and forced laughter. “You startled me.”

      He did a hell of a lot more than that but he wasn’t about to push the issue.

      “You okay?” he asked.

      “Fine.” She swallowed and opened her hands to reveal the cell phone. When she spoke again her accent was more pronounced. “Just some family problems. You know how it is.”

      He chuckled politely. She was telling half-truths, white lies that were inconsequential, while she hid something big.

      She’s probably having a fight with a boyfriend or her ex or her mother, for all I know, he thought, convincing himself he didn’t need to get involved.

      But then she sighed and her breath caught on a hiccup and something in the way she stood changed. She was cracking, falling apart right in front of him.

      And if she did that they’d both be ruined. He was not the sort of man people should trust—that had been proved time and time again.