Whispers of a Broken Halo by Abbi Glines

She looked nervous and unsure. It was as if she was battling shoving me out the door or covering Cullen’s mouth.

I shouldn’t have said it in front of the kid. I hadn’t thought before speaking. Shit. He hadn’t needed to hear something bad about the woman he trusted and loved. But how did I backtrack and fix this?

“You’re right. I got confused. I think I dreamed that.” I replied, hoping that was enough so he would forget about it.

Cullen frowned at me. It had been a poor cover-up, but he was four.

Did he have to think it over so hard? Let it go, kid.

“You didn’t dream it,” he said to me. “We found Mama with that pole, beating up a Jeep. Aunt Bryn told me to lie back in my car seat and close my eyes, but I didn’t.” He looked at his aunt and lowered his head. “I’m sorry I looked, but I was scared Mama would hurt you with that pole.”

“It’s okay,” she assured him, then reached down and ran a hand over his head. “Go on and wash the berries,” she added, but she didn’t look at me.

She shifted her gaze down at the kitchen towel she was wringing in her hands. I waited for her to elaborate. To explain why I’d found her with a pole in her hand and not Tory. Asking Cullen to say more felt wrong. He shouldn’t have known the truth or witnessed it. But him being in the backseat made sense. Where else would he have been? I knew now that there was no way Bryn would have left him home alone to come bash my Jeep. Maybe once, I would have believed that about her, but not now. I had seen too much into their life in my brief stay here.

“You gonna say anything?” I asked her when the silence continued.

She sighed and finally lifted her eyes to meet mine. “What?” she snapped.

“Oh, I don’t know. Maybe explain why you took the blame for it, lost your job,” I began and decided to leave out, Started working at a strip club . I had already said too much in front of the kid.

Bryn leveled her gaze on me, and it suddenly looked more like a glare. She was angry with me, as if I should understand. As if this were my fault.

“I did what I had to do,” she replied.

How the hell was this my fault? She had let me believe she had bashed my Jeep. I’d had every right to be pissed off about it. I should have filed charges that night. I shouldn’t have let my insurance pay for it. And she’d given two thousand dollars for it.

“You lost your job and your last paycheck. How was that the thing to do? Look at what you ended up doing because of it.” I stopped myself and glanced at the kid.

He was watching me. This wasn’t the place for this conversation. He didn’t need to hear it. But he had seen what had happened that night.

I looked back at her, and with a softer voice, I asked, “What if I had pressed charges? He needs you .”

I saw something in Bryn’s eyes before she looked back down at the towel in her hands. “Thanks for forgiving me,” she said finally but didn’t look back up at me, but at Cullen. “Let’s get those berries dried. We have waffles to make.”

Cullen handed her the fruit he had washed, and she went to work, putting them on the towel she had spread out on the counter. She wasn’t going to say any more in front of Cullen. As much as I wanted to talk about this, I didn’t press because she was right. He had heard too much already.

Without saying any more, I opened the door and left the apartment.

I didn’t walk away from the door yet. Instead, I stood there and took a deep breath to calm myself, but it didn’t work. My chest felt as if someone had a fist inside, twisting everything. Why was I reacting like this? Because I had believed a lie? Did this matter? Should it? Every-fucking-thing about Bryn Wallace was screwed up. Her entire world was full of baggage I didn’t want to deal with. Shit I had left behind a long time ago in my own life.

I studied the place, my surroundings, and made sure nothing was sketchy before making my way down to the street. I heard the bolt click into place in the door as I walked away and wondered if she had seen me still standing out here.

I wasn’t her hero, and I didn’t want her to think I was going to be. I’d do what needed to be done to make sure the kid was safe from whatever shit his mama had left behind, and then that was it.

Getting in my Jeep, I turned and headed up the main street toward my house. I needed a shower and some food, but first, I was going to get Saul and Drake. It wasn’t that I was nervous around dealers or addicts. I had lived with one most of my life. My mother had been an addict, and dealers had come and gone in our home, wherever it was at the time.

Saul knew the area better than me because he had dealt with his mother’s addictions. He could find the people I needed to see. Drake was just another body. Numbers were always safer. The more of us, the better. I wanted this handled, and I wanted to get on with my life.





Chapter Twenty

Bryn

An hour after lunch, Cullen fell asleep on the sofa, watching television. He had wanted to go to the park today, but I had been waiting to hear from Rio that it was safe. I didn’t like having to keep Cullen inside all day, but I had no other choice.

Rio had said he was going to handle things this morning. Maybe he hadn’t planned on updating me. I was just supposed to trust he had done it. However, I had Cullen’s safety to worry about, and I needed to know for sure. I thought about calling Henley and checking to see if she had heard anything. In the end, I decided to just wait. If I didn’t hear from him by tomorrow, I would call Henley. Right now, we would stay inside, locked up safely.