Page 17 of Salvation (Rising From the Ashes #3)

Ivy

T he pencil in my hand feels wrong. Foreign. As if I haven’t spent most of my life immersed in the world of art. I’m supposed to be working on a few concepts for the community building, but just like my canvas, my sketchpad has remained blank.

Frustration bubbles under my skin, and a growl rips from my lips as I throw the pencil across the yard.

It flies through the air, coming to a rest in front of a pair of worn cowboy boots.

Wincing, I drag my gaze up a pair of long legs, clad in denim, until I meet Campbell’s gaze.

He quirks a brow, and I shrug sheepishly.

It’s been a couple of weeks since I’ve seen him.

We’ve texted a couple of times; mostly, it’s been him giving me updates on things involving our daughter.

Other than that, we don’t talk, and it’s stupid how sad that makes me.

I’ve spent sixteen years without him. I don’t need him in my life again.

“What did that pencil ever do to you?” His voice washes over me, warming my skin as I stare at the glimmer of humor in his eyes.

It’s a small glimpse of the boy he used to be—the carefree, fun, loving boy—and I can’t stop the smile that tugs at my lips.

For a minute, it’s just us, lost in a moment where the past doesn’t exist and things aren’t so hard, but then Campbell blinks, his gaze shuttering and that glimmer fading away.

The hollowness in his eyes returns, and even though I shouldn’t care, fear claws at my chest. His eyes aren’t just hollow.

They are dead. Lifeless. Like he’s given up on life, or maybe it’s that life has given up on him.

He looks tired, and I can’t help but wonder if anyone else in his life has noticed.

I hope so. I hope he’s getting the help he needs, but it’s also not my business to pry, no matter how the fear weighs on my tongue, begging me to ask.

Instead, I turn away, looking anywhere but at him and ask, “What are you doing here, Campbell?”

Exhaustion leaks into my voice, but unlike Campbell, there’s no one in my life to notice. He has Hayes and his family, and I have no one. It’s better that way, but with the person who used to be that for me standing just a few feet away, the loneliness creeps in.

My fingers find the brick step beneath me, and I dig the tips into the rough texture as I stare out over the backyard, waiting for his answer.

But like with most things with Campbell, it doesn’t come easily.

He walks over to where I’m sitting on the bottom step of the porch and sits down.

There is enough distance between us that we aren’t touching, but it’s small enough that I can’t ignore his presence.

Not that I’ve ever been able to ignore Campbell.

Out of the corner of my eye, I see him lean forward, bracing his elbows on his knees and hanging his head, and only then does he answer.

“I found her.”

My eyes snap to him, unable to prevent myself from looking at him any longer. “What did you say?”

His blue eyes meet mine, swimming with tears. The pain in his expression is tangible, slicing through the air and piercing my skin.

“I found her,” he repeats, his voice a rasp, barely above a whisper. “She lives thirty minutes from here. All this time, and she—”

His words crack, and he shakes his head, unable to get the rest out without breaking down, but he doesn’t need to. I understand. All this time, she had been living within reach.

Pain is often solitary; no one can feel it for us, but Campbell and I share this.

We are living it together, and maybe that’s why I lift my hand and lay it softly against his jaw.

And maybe that’s why he lets me. That’s what I tell myself because it is easier than admitting the truth.

I miss him so much sometimes that I forget how to breathe properly.

I’ve been missing him for years, and I’ll go right on missing him, even though he’s sitting beside me.

Campbell closes his eyes, his nose flaring in a sharp exhale before he opens them back up.

Blue eyes meet mine—a collision of lingering pain and blame.

None of this is either of our faults, but maybe it will always be easier to blame each other.

Except, just for a minute, I don’t want to place blame, so I give myself one minute to revel in the moment before I have to let it melt away.

“Thank you,” I say, my thumb tracing a path along his jaw.

“For what, sunshine?” He asks, the deep rasp of his voice sending chills over my skin.

“For not making me face this alone.”

A funny look flashes through his eyes, there and then gone, and then they soften, looking at me with a tenderness I’ve never had with anyone else.

“Never, Ivy. I would never make you face this alone.”

______________________

The smell of citrus soap and cedar cologne surrounds me, filling my lungs and making me dizzy, but there’s no escaping it—not when I’m sitting in the front seat of Campbell’s truck.

It’s soaked into the leather, flowing through the air vents, suffocating me in the very best way until I have to hold my breath against it so I don’t do something stupid like shove my nose into the seat and draw in a deep breath to soak it in.

Campbell’s scent was just another thing I spent missing over the years. He always smelled like home. Sometimes, after I left Benton Falls, I’d pass by someone who smelled similar, but it was never the same. Campbell’s smell was always uniquely him: citrus soap, cedar cologne, and home.

My vision begins to fade, and I finally have to let out my breath, rolling down the window to let in fresh air.

It hits me in the face, and I gulp it in, taking deep breaths through my nose even as the wind wreaks havoc in my hair.

I suck it in as if I haven’t had air in days because that’s what it feels like whenever I’m around Campbell.

When I’ve finally purged the smell from my nose, I chance a glance his way, studying him while I have the freedom to do so.

He’s sitting with one arm propped up on the windowsill and the other draped over the steering wheel. A backward ball cap covers his hair, and his beard is a little longer than the scruff he wore on my first day in town. But it’s the dark shadows under his eyes that hold my attention.

“I can feel you staring at me, sunshine.”

Heat blooms across my cheeks, and I pull my attention back to the window, watching the scenery pass by.

“Will you tell me how you found her?” I ask, changing the subject to something safer.

Campbell lets out a long sigh. I itch to turn and look at him, but I resist.

“I tracked down the private investigator. The one your grandma mentioned in those papers. It was pretty easy after that. But, Ivy,” he says, his hand falling on my bare arm to get my attention.

Goosebumps pebble my skin, and I can’t resist the pull to look at him.

My eyes meet ocean blue ones that make you feel like you’re drowning if you stare into them too long.

“I don’t know what we are walking into. The investigator didn’t tell me much, just the name of the family who adopted her. ”

“Do you—” My throat aches, and I try to swallow it away. “Do you think they’ve taken care of her?”

I’m not asking if he thinks she was clothed and fed, and we both know it. I want to know if she is loved. I’ve asked myself that a hundred times since finding out she’s alive. I’ve sat up and wondered about it at night when I should’ve been sleeping because I’m terrified that the answer is no.

“I hope so. I’ve prayed about it.”

I can’t stop the scoff that slips out. I shift, turning away from him to look back out the window, but his hand moves, tugging at my fingers until I look his way.

“What?” he asks, his gaze flicking from the road to meet mine. His lips are tugged down in a frown, showing the dimples at the corners of his mouth, and I try not to notice.

“What do you mean?” I ask, pretending to be oblivious, but Campbell has always been able to see right through me.

He purses his lips and gives me a side eye.

“Don’t play dumb, sunshine. It’s not cute.”

I glare at him, crossing my arms over my chest and shrugging. “I’m just not sure I see the point in praying.”

Campbell’s brows furrow. “What do you mean? You always used to go to church with me.”

“You’re right. I did, and do you know what I did when I was there?

I sat there staring at the wall, wondering about the point.

The people sitting beside me were the same ones who stabbed me in the back when they walked out.

My grandparents are a prime example. I grew up and realized that church was just about the pageantry—a way to make people feel good on Sunday for the bad things they did during the week. ”

I can tell my answer surprises him. His brows are raised, and he keeps looking at me from the corner of his eye.

But my bitterness runs too deep to care.

I know Campbell and his family go to church, and for a long time, I counted them as part of the hypocrites.

Now that I know things weren’t exactly as I thought they were back then, I’m not sure where they fit in my logic, but that still doesn’t change my feelings about church and the people in it either.

A sharp sting tears through the corner of my thumb.

Looking down, I realize that I’d been picking at my cuticles this whole time.

A drop of blood trickles down my thumb. It’s poetic—the way I always seem to bleed around this man.

Just when it’s about to drip onto my jeans, I lift my hand and shove my thumb into my mouth to stave off the bleeding.

“Ivy, that’s not—” Campbell starts, but I cut him off, pulling my thumb out of my mouth.

“No, Campbell,” I say, shaking my head. Curls fall around my face, and I push them back. “Don’t do that. You won’t change my mind.”

A deafening silence fills the truck, but I can feel his eyes on me. After a second, Campbell lets out a long sigh, and I glance his way. He’s staring straight ahead, no longer looking at me.

“Okay, Ivy,” he agrees, resigned.

We spend the rest of the drive just like that, with Campbell staring out the front window and me trying to figure out why the silence makes me sad.