I moved toward the hall.

“Don’t!” Rhonda cried and I looked to her.

“What?”

“Don’t go to him. Leave him be,” she said.

“Why?” I asked.

“He’s…well, he gets that from his Dad. When Darrin got angry or in his head about somethin’, he needed quiet and he needed time. You need to give my boy quiet and time.”

I studied my sister-in-law, seeing her for the first time in a long, long time with new eyes.

Maybe she didn’t drift, protected every second by Darrin, through life.

Maybe shit penetrated.

She proved this by advising, “Go to Rees. She was in a bad way. Fin won’t want you up there but she needs you.”

Shit penetrated with Rhonda. Definitely.

Good to know.

I nodded and swiftly retraced my steps, went out the door, jogged down the steps and kept jogging as I made my way across the field, through the back gate, up the yard and through the door. I got no greeting from Layla and I’d know why when I got through the house and hit the top of the stairs. There I saw Layla’s body moving agitatedly outside Rees’s closed door, Rees’s sobs could be heard and No was standing in the hallway with the neck of his guitar in his hand, face pale, eyes wide, concern easy to read on his face.

“What’s goin’ on?” he whispered. “She shot in here, slammin’ doors and wailin’ loud. Layla’s freaked.”

One look at his face, I knew No was too.

“Your Dad still at the gym?” I asked.

“Far’s I know since he’s not here,” No answered.

I didn’t know if that was good or bad. What I did know was that Mike had left a while ago so he could be back at any time.

Whatever I was going to do, I needed to do.

“Right, keep Layla away from the door, I’m going in,” I told him.

“What’s goin’ on?” No asked again.

I held his concerned eyes and whispered, “Later, honey, I need to get to your sister.”

No studied me, nodded then bent to grab Layla’s collar.

I knocked twice, called, “Reesee, honey, I’m coming in,” then I went in.

She had her back to her headboard, ass to the bed, a pillow stuffed between her chest and her drawn knees, her arms tight around her calves and her red, wet face was turned away.

“Go away, Dusty,” she said softly, her words hitching audibly as her body did it visibly. “Please just go away.”

God, one look and she was the picture of heartbreak and I knew this because she was so heartbroken, my heart broke just looking at her.

“Honey, what happened?”

“G…g…go away,” she whispered, keeping her head averted, not even trying to brush away the tears streaming down her face.

I sat on the side of the end of her bed, keeping my distance but still close and I encouraged gently, “Honey, talk to me. What happened?”

Her head twisted to me, her face twisted with pain and she hissed, “Fin happened.”

Then she pulled in another broken breath, this one hitched twice and it even sounded painful.

I braced and whispered, “What?”

“He says summer’s comin’,” she spat. “He says he’ll be a senior,” she spat again. “He says he’s gotta worry about that farm and when he’s not, he’s gotta do it up, have fun, last chance he’s gonna get. Next year, it’ll only be him who takes care of the farm, he says. So, he’s gonna do it up and to do it up, he’s gotta be free,” she leaned her whole body toward me, pressing into her feet and finished, “he says.”

Oh God.

“Reesee –” I started on another whisper.

“Millie Chapman,” she bit out and my head jerked at the harshness of her tone and the words.

“What?”

“He’s starting right away, Dusty,” she threw out her hand hopelessly. “He told me. He’s got a date with Millie Chapman,” she leaned in again and concluded, “tomorrow night. The easiest girl in school, everyone knows it because Millie tells them. And he asked her out when he was with me.”

My body went still and my mind went blank.

Rees unfortunately wasn’t done sharing, however.

“I’m fifteen but I know what this is. I knew Fin’s reputation. I’m not an idiot,” she snapped. “Kids talk. Bunches. Especially about guys like Fin. He never took it very far with me and really, honestly, right now, honest to God, I don’t get what he was doin’ with me. I can’t figure it out. Because I know what he wants. Everyone knows what Finley Holliday is out to get when he’s with a girl because he gets it. But not with me. And the only thing I can reckon is that when Dad let us car date, Fin told me they had a talk. He never said much about what they talked about but I’m guessin’ Dad laid it out and Fin knew he’d never get to go there so he did his time with me so I wouldn’t think he was a total dick or…probably, you wouldn’t ‘cause he likes you… and then when he was done doin’ his time, he got rid of me.”

I sat still and staring at her.

“And now I’m never dating again,” she declared dramatically, leaned in and hissed, “ever.”

I stood up just as the door opened and Mike walked in.

“What’s goin’ on?” he asked.

I looked to him but I didn’t see anything.

Not one thing.

Then I stormed out, past Mike, into the hall, past Layla and No, down the stairs, the hall, the living room and out the backdoor.

Then I ran. I did not jog. I fucking ran.

So by the time I hit the backdoor of the farm, I was winded but it did nothing to make me even one iota less pissed.

Rhonda was still in the kitchen and the second I entered it, she asked “Dusty, how’s Rees?”

I ignored her and marched down the hall, up the stairs and straight to Fin’s room.

I pounded the side of my fist on his door once then opened it and walked right in.

Fin was in much the same position as Rees, ass to the bed, back to the headboard, knees cocked but his elbows were to them, his head bent, his hands wrapped around the back of his neck.

But the instant I walked in, his head snapped up and he growled, “No way, no fuckin’ way. Get out.”

“You’re still seventeen, Finley Holliday. I’m still your elder. I’m your aunt and you’re going to fucking listen to me.”

He knifed out of bed, leaned toward me and roared, “Get out!”

“No!” I shouted back. “My nephew is not gonna grow up to be that asshole. No way. Not on my watch. You don’t play with hearts like that, Finley Holliday,” I threw an arm out toward the wall that faced Mike’s development. “You don’t ever play with hearts like that. She’s heartbroken, Fin, un-fucking-done.” I jerked a finger at him. “You did that to her. She’s way too fucking young to be dicked around by a master. You knew you were going to pull this shit with her, you should have never gone there.”

“Get out, Aunt Dusty,” Fin growled, his face stone cold.

I ignored him and kept ranting.

“Asking another girl out while you’ve been seeing one for months and doing it before you got up the courage to break up with Reesee?” I hurled at him. “Spending every second you can with her? When you’re apart, connecting through your cells every other second? Then you just scrape her off. What the hell?”

“Get out!” he thundered.

I crossed my arms on my chest and shot back. “No. For all men in the world, Fin, you explain to me right now how you can be such a dick.”

Fin crossed his arms on his chest too and snapped his mouth shut.

“Answer me, Fin,” I demanded.

“She’ll get over me,” he clipped.

“Yeah? You sure of that? If you are, you have not been paying attention. Because the earth stands still for her when you walk into a room. She’s fifteen but she’s Reesee. She looks at you and she knows straight down into her soul what she sees. And you cannot tell me that you, my brother’s son, didn’t look into her eyes as she was looking in yours and see what everyone saw. You cannot tell me you didn’t see what she was giving to you. So now you’re gonna tell me why you’re perfectly okay with throwing away that kind of beauty.”

“Shut up and get the fuck out,” Fin growled.

“No. You made a decision, you bear the consequences. You played your plays and any play you play affects a variety of people. I care about her. You broke her heart. Which means you broke my heart. And these are your consequences.” I leaned toward him. “So explain it to me.”

“Get the fuck out,” Fin bit off.

“Explain it to me,” I repeated.

“Get the fuck out!” Fin thundered.

“Explain it to me!” I yelled.

“I had to let her go!” Fin roared then I watched in horrified fascination as he turned, stalked to the wall and punched his fist right through.

“Fin –” I whispered, dropping my arms and starting toward him but halting dead when he turned back to me and his face held more pain then Rees’s.

A lot more.

Agony.

Suddenly I was finding it hard to breathe.

“Fin, honey,” I whispered.

“She’s too good for this ‘Burg,” he told me. “That school in Chicago accepted her and she said she wasn’t gonna go because she didn’t want to be that far away from me. What the fuck was I supposed to do, Aunt Dusty? Let her make a fucked up decision about her future for me? She could write bestselling novels or report for some newspaper or, I don’t know, all sorts of shit. All sorts of shit she,” he leaned toward me again, his hands in fists at his side, “cannot do if her ass is rotting on a fucking farm!”

Oh my God.

“Honey –” I started gently but Fin cut me off.