Page 13 of Wilde Abandon
And that meant if Fox was helping his mother, someone needed to watch his back.Melody wouldn’t let anyone, especially his mother, ever hurt him again.
Chapter three
Melodywokeupearlyand headed to the Wilde Wind Ranch to get answers to the questions that nagged at her through the end of her shift last night and into her dreams.It was the first thing she’d thought about when her eyes opened this morning.
Why didn’t Dad tell me he’d kept in touch with Fox?
What really happened the day my father found him?
She knew Fox had been seriously injured, but her father had been vague with the details because he didn’t want to scare her even more than she had been for her friend.
Thoughts about whether he was hurt or hungry, sad or lonely, afraid and hiding used to tie her in knots all the time, especially after he left.Now, she wanted to know everything that happened from the last time she’d seen him until now.But she didn’t want to ask him about that traumatic event that changed everything for him.She didn’t want to make him relive it.
Someone else knew what happened that day.And her father wasn’t going to give her a watered-down version again.She wanted the truth.Everything, including what Fox meant about her father keeping in touch with him all these years.
She parked at the house and walked in the front door.Her mom and dad were in the kitchen, standing close together.Mom loved music.It was always playing in the house and car, usually to her mom singing along.Today, it was old-school Bill Withers’ “Lovely Day.”
Neither of her parents was singing.Their stares were filled with guilt and trepidation, so she dove right in.
“Why didn’t you tell me you knew where Fox was all this time and that you kept in touch with him?”
Her dad leaned on his forearms on the counter and met her gaze straight on.“I owe you an apology.”
“I don’t want anI’m sorry.I want an answer.”
“You were devastated when Fox left town.”
“Of course I was.”She’d stayed in her room for days, wouldn’t speak to anyone, cried a river of tears, barely ate, and didn’t participate in school until her teacher told her if she didn’t, they’d hold her back for another year.“Fox hated me for what I did.I didn’t get to apologize.I didn’t know what happened to him.I never saw him again.”
“We tried to protect you.”Her mom’s eyes filled with the apology Melody didn’t want.“You were so young.We thought it best not to tell you all the terrible things that happened to him, but focus on the fact that he was going to live somewhere better.After he left, you grieved, but you didn’t ask any more questions.”
“Because I thought you didn’t know anything more once he left.Every day I wondered if he was okay.”
Her father rubbed at the back of his neck.“We should have told you everything long before now.We just didn’t want you to hurt for him.”
“Hurt for him?Since the moment I knew he was being hurt to this very day, I ached for him.It never stops.It is a part of me.That boy…he was mine.”The pain throbbed anew.“You always told us it was our responsibility to take care of those who can’t take care of themselves.”
One side of her dad’s mouth kicked back in a half grin.“I was mostly talking about the horses and cattle on the ranch when I was trying to get you kids to do your chores, but your heart is so big you knew I meant to take care of those who are vulnerable.”
“He was my best friend.He needed me.And I didn’t help.Not in the way he needed me to.”
“You couldn’t stop what his mother and father were doing to him.You needed help.And when it mattered most, you did the right thing,” her father praised.
“You never told me what happened when you got to his house.All you’d ever say was that Fox had been taken to the hospital.You never said why.I heard the gossip around town, but could never be sure what was true, assumed, or flat-out false.”Her parents had only placated her with benign statements that he was going to be okay and that he was going to be placed with someone who would take care of him.Not exactly a lot of specifics in those inadequate assurances.“I want to know everything now.”
Her mom frowned.“He told your father not to tell you.Maybe it’s best if you ask Fox.”
She shook her head.“I won’t make him relive that.”She turned her gaze to her dad.“Please.I’m not a little girl anymore.I don’t need you to protect me from this hard truth.I want to know, so I can be the friend Fox needs me to be.”
Her dad let out a heavy breath.“I found him in the barn.He’d been there for hours.Probably all night.He was nearly frozen to death, barely conscious.He was so terrified his father would kill him.”
“Fox told me last night that I saved his life.Is that true?”
Her mom and dad shared a look that spoke volumes between them.
Her dad met her gaze and gave it to her straight.“If I hadn’t gone there to find him, and his parents left him out there even an hour longer, he’d be dead.He had major organ damage from the beating he’d taken.A lacerated spleen and liver.”
“He was bleeding internally?”