hung her lightweight jacket on a wall hook and looked around. Even May in Colorado could be cool. Everything was as it should be—loud and relaxed. Women talking, kids laughing, the TV on in the background, the dog running around in circles after its own tail. Late afternoon tended to be a boisterous time around here.
“Bree Cheese!”
Bree smiled at the sound of the two small voices calling her name from the table and chairs over in the corner. It was one of her favorite sounds in the entire world.
Sam and Eva, seven and five years old respectively, were the two children of Marilyn Ellis. They’d lived here for four months with their mom.
Marilyn had been Bree’s best computer student to date. Even though the woman hadn’t graduated from high school, nor gone to college, she picked up the computer classes Bree taught with the ease of a natural.
And had also become one of Bree’s good friends to the point that she was even going to be a bridesmaid in her wedding. Little Eva was going to be the flower girl.
“You guys should let Miss Bree get in the door before you start screaming your heads off for her,” Marilyn admonished softly. Marilyn did everything softly. In the four months Bree had known her, she had never once heard the other woman raise her voice.
Bree didn’t know everything about Marilyn’s situation before she arrived in Risk Peak, but she knew her husband had put her in the hospital and was now awaiting trial. Marilyn and the kids had been some of the first residents at New Journeys. And when they’d opened the new facility, Marilyn had agreed to take a full-time job as the building facilitator and sort of den mom.
She excelled at it.
“Of course I want to see these two as soon as I come in the door.” Bree pulled the kids in for a hug. “Who wouldn’t want a squad of rug rats chanting their name first thing?”
And it was true. To see how Eva and Sam were blossoming made it worth any possible crazy name the kids might call her. Including Bree Cheese, which had been the compromise between them calling her Bree the way she had wanted, and Miss Daniels, the way Marilyn wanted.
“Schoolwork, you two. Got to make sure you’re ready for next week’s camping trip.” Marilyn pointed back to the table. The kids moaned and tromped forward like they were headed to the guillotine.
Bree laughed at their dramatics, delighting in it. Just a few months ago they would’ve never acted that way. “Their teacher must be pretty mean.”
Marilyn gave a small smile. She was their teacher since she’d decided to teach them at home for the rest of this school year rather than add the trauma of a new school to an already traumatic year. “They’re so excited about the camping, I can hardly get an hour’s worth of work out of them.”
“Understandable.” Bree smiled once more.
“Everything okay here while we were gone?” Cassandra asked.
“Nothing of particular interest. That pipe in the hall bath is still leaking a little.”
“And no word about Jared?” Bree asked softly.
Marilyn flinched at the sound of her estranged husband’s name before smoothing her features. “Nothing either way.”
Jared’s lawyer was trying to get him out on bail, something Marilyn definitely didn’t want happening.
“Okay, good.” Bree nodded. “Keep us posted.”
“I will. Although finding out details isn’t easy. Ironically, because of privacy issues.” Marilyn sighed softly and looked over at Eva and Sam. “The kids are sad that Chandler is gone.”
Bree met Cassandra’s eyes and then looked at Marilyn, all of them giving resigned nods. Chandler’s mother, Angel, had been here three weeks. Two days ago, she’d decided to move back in with her boyfriend, despite the violent situation that had originally caused her to leave in the first place.
Angel said her boyfriend had changed. Had made promises.
Bree didn’t know which was harder: seeing the hope in the other woman’s eyes or knowing that the chances her boyfriend had changed after multiple years of abuse were pretty nonexistent.
And poor Chandler was caught in the middle of it all.
It wasn’t the first time someone from New Journeys had decided to return to a less than optimal situation. It had taken both Bree and Cassandra quite a bit of time to come to grips with the fact that not everyone could make the permanent break from their abusive situations. For some, the unknown was harder to deal with than the pain.
But it still sometimes broke Bree’s heart.
All they could do was provide what they could: a safe place and a new set of skills so that these women could support themselves, get back up on their feet and move on with their lives.
People like Marilyn were a prime example of why places like New Journeys was needed. She had made a huge difference in her own life once she had just a little help. But it was also needed for people like Angel who found the steps so much more difficult to take.
Bree and Cassandra grabbed cups of coffee, and they all came back into the family room to chat about all the daily things that needed tending to here. Half the building still hadn’t been renovated yet. New Journeys had quite a bit of private funding thanks to the Matarazzo family, who worked with some law enforcement group named Omega Sector in Colorado Springs, but renovating everything at once would have been too much to handle on multiple levels.
They currently had sixteen residents in the building, about three-quarters of its current capacity, and roughly one-third of what the building would be able to house once all the renovations were finished.
New Journeys had gone out of their way to make themselves particularly welcoming to women with children, so over half of the residents now had children with them—babies up through middle-school age.
Which explained the noise level in the room right now. None of the three women paid much attention to it. Cassandra and Marilyn were used to it since they had their own kids, and Bree just loved the chaos of it all.
But when the room fell almost completely silent a few moments later she sadly knew what had happened. A man had walked into the room. Bree forced herself not to tense or turn around to see who it was. How she reacted would influence how everyone else reacted.
Cassandra winked at her—able to see who was in the doorway—and a half smile pulled at Bree’s face as she heard giggles a few moments later. She knew exactly what man had walked into the room.
Hers.
Tanner kept his stance neutral, his posture relaxed as he made his way into the silent room. Susan, one of the residents here, knew him and had let him in the side kitchen door when he’d knocked.
Nobody got into New Journeys who wasn’t invited. Every door had double reinforced locks and a security code. Nobody could just wander in from the streets and enter the building.
