Sledge by Jessie Cooke

Author:Jessie Cooke [Cooke, Jessie]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Redline Publishing
Published: 2018-09-05T22:00:00+00:00

16

Daria had known it would be pointless to seek him out. It was like suddenly she had some kind of twisted need to torture herself. When a man fucks you, leaves, and doesn’t call…it’s pretty self-explanatory why. He was right, too; he’d been honest at the offset that fucking was all it was. Her crazy, romantic head had tried to convince her otherwise. The novel in her head was about two kids that came from different backgrounds. When they were still kids, one hurt the other, but later in life they got a second chance and they ended up living happily ever after. A novel, a story, that’s what it was. This, though, was real life and as much as she hated to admit it, her sister was right…she wasn’t living in it. She kept hurting herself with her own expectations.

“Daria?” She had almost made it back to her car when someone calling her name stopped her in her tracks. She turned toward the voice. It was Asher Bennett.

“Hey, Ash.”

“Hey, what are you doing here?” As Ash got closer she could see the tape across his nose and the bruises underneath his eyes. His lips were swollen and one of his hands was bandaged. He must have been involved in the same fight Sledge was…but that made no sense. The two of them always had each other’s backs.

She reached up and tried to wipe the tear sneaking out of her eye away before he saw it. With a catch in her voice she said, “I just stopped by to set up some research stuff with Wolf.” Ash raised an eyebrow and looked toward Sledge’s trailer.

“Really?”

She sighed. “Okay, sorry. I came by to see Sledge, but he wasn’t interested in company tonight, so I was a little embarrassed to admit that. It looks like you guys had a pretty rough day.”

Ash chuckled. “You could call it that, yeah. You look upset too. You gonna be okay?”

“Yeah, I’ll be fine. Can I ask you a question?”

“Okay.”

“Why are you being so nice to me? I mean, I know Mack hates me and I’m not at the top of Sledge’s list of favorite people…”

“People make mistakes, especially when they’re kids. I’m sure it took a lot for you to offer Sledge an apology, I respect that. Mack does too…Sledge is just like, a brother to her and she’s fiercely protective of the people she cares about.”

“He’s like a brother to you too.”

Ash smiled. “Yeah, but brothers handle things differently than sisters sometimes. Just because I’m protective doesn’t mean I don’t also know when my brother is wrong.”

“Thank you,” Daria said with a smile. “I’m sorry about your…face. Is anything broken?”

He shrugged. “The nose, but I’m so damned good-looking that even if it heals crooked, it’ll just give me character.”

She laughed. “I’m sure it will. You have a good night, Ash.”

“I will,” he said. “On my way to the airport to pick up my old lady. Explaining all of this should be fun.”

Knowing Mackenzie, Daria didn’t envy him.

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