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No one’s ever asked me that.
“I don’t know where to start.”
“At the beginning.”
I shrug. “I guess maybe the story starts when my mom met my dad. She’d just landed herself in Hollywood with nothing to her name and no connections, and he was already a star, starting to branch out from acting into directing and producing. He got her jobs and then got her pregnant—three times in total—and then he lost interest. In her, in us.”
“Shane…”
I shrug again. “Tale as old as time.”
“Yeah, but it still sucks. For her. And for you.”
“I was a baby. The part that actually sucked was losing Quinn and Tuck’s dad. He died when Quinn was just a baby. I was almost six.”
She flinches.
“He was great. I loved the shit out of him. After that we were on our own for a while, and then my mom met Hanna’s dad. He was a bronc rider. A total swashbuckler. I was a teenager by then, and I worshipped him. I probably internalized his perspective on manhood a bit too hard.” I shake my head ruefully.
“I like your swashbuckling streak,” she says, her lips curving in that secret smile that drives me nuts.
“Yeah? Well, I’ll let it come out to play more.”
Her lashes sweep down, almost demure, and I want to grab her and kiss her, but this story is halfway out and I’m not quitting now.
“My granddad hated him, though. Hated when I spent time with him. When he disappeared?—”
“Disappeared?!”
“He left town. He’d sworn he could leave the circuit, but there was no way. He loved it too much. He took off without a note and—broke a bunch of hearts. Hanna’s and my mom’s mostly.”
“And yours,” she says. Her eyes are soft, and I have to look away.
“I was okay,” I say, shrugging. “The part that sucked is that after he left, my grandfather really doubled down on how all the men in my mom’s life were deadbeats. My bio dad first and foremost. And then—then my mom died in a car accident.”
I’m staring at my drink, still not looking at her. I can’t.
“How old were you?” Her voice is gentle.
“Sixteen. It destroyed my grandfather, and he and I—we went opposite ways. He got quiet and mean, and I threw myself into acting and dating. Or maybe you couldn’t call it dating. More like stud farming.”
She snorts at that, which is good because the story was getting too dark.
“There was a pregnancy scare—didn’t turn out to be anything, but she was really late and she got scared. She came over, crying—my grandfather overheard and blew up. Got up in my face and told me I was just like my dad.”
Ivy winces.
“Yeah. I started counting the days till I could get out. I leaned even more into all the ways my granddad thought I was like my dad, and I started planning—often very loudly and publicly—to go live with him in LA. Ninety percent, I wanted that life. Ten percent—okay, twenty if I’m being honest—I loved that it pissed off my grandfather.”
“I totally get that,” she says. “He hurt you.”
“So I went to LA thinking—ah, I don’t know what I was thinking. I mean, you can’t ask a guy who’s never shown any interest in being a dad to be a dad. I showed up on his doorstep with a suitcase. It was a huge fucking mansion of a house. He could have put me up in ten different rooms of that house. Instead, he found me a hotel room that night and a place to live the next day.”
“Shane—” She looks like she’s going to cry.
I wave a hand. “I know. I’m sure I need therapy.”
She snorts at that. “I think that’s probably an understatement?”
