Gathering my stuff, I wait a few minutes for a break in the rain. I don’t even have an umbrella to shield us, so we just have to face the storm. Sometimes life is poetic like that. I fear the time is coming when I’m going to have to face my own personal storm, and this one is going to make the tornado look like a cakewalk.
I open the door of the trailer, finding Jon pulling up in Slade’s SUV. Forgetting about the rain, I rush out to meet him. “Is Catrine alright?” I ask right as he opens his door.
“She’s fine,” he says, motioning with his hand. “Get in. Get in.”
Finn and I rush into the back seat, where a new car seat has been installed. My heart immediately melts. Slade bought his own car seat for his car. I’ve been transferring mine whenever we needed to. God, that man is the best. I don’t deserve him. And for the life of me, I can’t figure out why he keeps putting up with me. No one ever has before.
“Slade sent me to pick you up,” Jon says, starting the car. “He was worried about you driving in the rain.”
Of course he was.
He doesn’t call me all day but sends a chaperone for me. Was he worried I wouldn’t come home if he didn’t? “What about my car?” I ask.
“He’ll send someone to come get it.”
“He shouldn’t have sent you,” I say. “What if Catrine goes into labor?”
“She practically kicked me out of the house when he called. I think I’m getting on her nerves.”
Laughing, I say, “I’ll come see her soon.” He smiles at me in the rearview mirror. “Pull over, please. I want to hop in the front seat. I hate sitting back here. Feels like you’re my chauffeur or something.”
He pulls to the side, and I quickly make the transfer to the front seat, shivering from the rain. He points at a button for me to turn on the heated seats, and we start moving again.
“Don’t you get sick of Slade making you do this kind of thing?” I ask. “What’s your job title, anyway?”
Jon looks over at me, grinning. I can’t believe I ever thought of him as a goon. He’s more like a teddy bear. “Vice president.”
“You’re VP of Slade’s company, but you drive me around?”
“Yep,” he says. “There are certain things that Slade only trusts me to handle. Those things include you and Finn.” Lightly, he touches my arm. “You think he’d trust anyone to drive you? Could you imagine his reaction if he ever saw you in a taxi? The man would lose his shit. I’m the same way about Catrine. Slade and I understand each other.”
“But Slade could do those things himself. He could’ve come and gotten me today.”
Jon raises an eyebrow. “Would you have gotten in the car with him as easily as you did with me, or would you have argued with him about it?”
My smile is all the answer he needs. I look back over my shoulder, seeing Finn’s little head resting to the side, a sign he’s fallen asleep. “How long have you and Slade known each other?” I ask, realizing it’s my chance to pick Jon’s brain. Catrine said Jon is the only person who really knows Slade.
“Since we were teenagers. He’s like my brother.”
I angle my legs to the side, facing him in the car.
“Oh no!” he says. “I recognize that posture. That’s the girl talk pose. You’re settling in for a long talk.”
I just raise my eyebrows at him, and in a sing-song voice, I say, “So tell me. How’d you meet?”
He chuckles. “It’s a long story.”
“It’s a long drive.” It’s actually not that long, about an hour from the ranch to the city, but long enough to pry.
He glances out the side window of the car like he’s traveling back in time to that moment. “Did Catrine ever tell you about my baby brother?”
“No.”
He looks back at Finn through the rearview mirror. “He died when he was six.”
“Jon,” I say, instinctively reaching for his hand. He squeezes mine, not letting go. “I’m sorry. We don’t have to talk about this.”
“You asked how I met Slade,” he says. “Do you know the Natchez Trace Parkway Bridge?
“Isn’t that out toward Franklin?” I ask. I actually heard about the bridge on the news a few months back. It’s long been known for suicides, so much so that they’ve recently installed two emergency phones there that are linked to 911 and the crisis hotline.
“Kind of,” he says. “When I was sixteen, I was babysitting my little brother. My mom and dad were at some parents’ night for my high school. We were watching movies and eating trash Mom wouldn’t normally let us eat. Typical brother stuff.”
“Sweet.”
He tightens his hold on my hand. “We were laughing, and I don’t know what happened. He just started choking. One minute, he was fine, and the next, he couldn’t breathe.”
“Oh God.” I know that fear well. Anyone who lives with a small child knows it.
“I tried to help him. Call 911, but it was too late.”
“Jon, that was a horrible accident. I’m sure you did everything you could.”
“I’m okay,” he says, patting my hand. “It’s taken a long time and a lot of love from my parents, Catrine, and Slade.”
“Slade?”
He glances over at me, holding my eyes. “I met Slade at the top of that bridge.”
He doesn’t say it, but I know why he was there.
“What was Slade doing there?” I ask, although I already know. I can’t imagine Slade on that bridge. He’s such a big guy, strong, stubborn, and fills up a room like no man I’ve ever met. I know what drove him there. We might have grown up in different worlds, but we both had crappy childhoods. I don’t know if he was serious about his intentions that night. But I know his pain.
“Good question,” he says, giving me a sad smile. “He never told me why he was there that night. We’ve never discussed it. I’m sure if I asked, he’d tell me he was just passing by and saw me.”
I look down. I’d just assumed Jon knew about Slade’s mother. I’m the only person Slade’s ever talked to about all that, and I’m keeping so much from him.
“How’d he convince you not to do it?” I ask quietly.
Grinning, he shakes his head. “You have to remember, we were teenage boys.”
“So what did he say?”
“It’s what he didn’t say,” Jon says. “He didn’t ask why I was there. He didn’t ask what was wrong. He didn’t tell me it couldn’t be that bad or how much I’d be missed. All the things you think you’d say. Slade didn’t do any of that. Instead, he walked up, like seeing me on the ledge was absolutely normal, and asked me for directions.”
“You’re kidding?” I say with a half chuckle.
Jon laughs. “Nope. That was his big ice breaker.”
“What did you say?” I ask.
“I don’t even remember,” he says. “But we spent the rest of the night sitting in the middle of that bridge, just talking about my brother, about nothing, about everything.” He looks over at me. “I owe him my life—literally,” he says.