She paused. He'd been asking Pierce for 2 years to let him ride. Pierce kept saying no. One day, he just went ahead and rode without asking. She looked at her hands.
He came home with the scar. Pierce didn't yell. Didn't say anything about the bike at all. He just looked at the scar and said, "Now you know what happens when you make decisions without me. " Boon said nothing for a moment. That's not a dirt bike accident.
Ren said, "No," Boon said. "It's not. " They sat with that a while in the bay, the smell of oil and cold metal around them, the radio playing something low. "I want to talk to him," Ren said alone without the audience. She looked at Boon directly, not to forgive him. "Not yet.
To understand him, because if he knows something about Pierce and he's been trying to get it out, that matters. " Boon looked at his daughter, 17 steps ahead of herself and still checking her own motivations while she ran. If he says anything specific about Pierce, Boon said, "Word for word. Don't interpret. Don't summarize. Word for word," she said.
2 days later, she found the moment. After practice, parking lot half empty. Dalton near the side of the gym building, hands in his jacket pockets, looking at his phone without really looking at it. He looked up when Ren came around the corner. You were going to tell me something, she said.
No preamble. He looked at the ground, then at her. I shouldn't be talking to you, he said. You're talking to me right now, she said. You could be anywhere else in this parking lot.
He didn't move. Why is your stepfather interested in my father? She said direct, no buildup. Something shifted in Dalton's expression. She'd named it and he hadn't expected that.
What do you know about him? Dalton said enough to know this isn't actually about me, she said. What does Pierce think my father has? Dalton looked around the lot automatically. The surveillance of someone who'd grown up in a house where being overheard had consequences.
He told me Dalton started stopped. Started again. He said, "Your father was someone who could make trouble for him. That it was important your father understood Mil Haven wasn't the right fit. " He looked at Ren. He didn't tell me why, just that it was important.
But you did what he asked, Ren said. Dalton's jaw tightened. Something moved through his face that wasn't anger at her. Anger at something older and larger than this parking lot. I always do what he asks, he said.