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“Calm him down and bring him back in here. We have more to talk to him about,” she murmured. “But take your time. Isa’s fine.”
She looked at the girl that still had no care in the world that any of us were in the room. She was in her own little world and didn’t look like she could be bothered at all by the happenings that were going on around her.
“Go,” my dad said.Chapter 8Why does the nutritional value on a box of Cheeze-Its give you the serving size of 15 crackers? Bitch, you damn well know I’m gonna eat half the box.
-Phoebe’s secret thoughts
Phoebe
I found him outside, arms crossed, leaning against his bike as he stared up at the sky.
There were bats outside, feeding on the insects.
It wasn’t a surprise to see him so fascinated, since I knew that birds had a calming effect on him.
“I don’t even have a car seat,” Bayou said, eyes wide and full of something that I wouldn’t quite say was fear, but was definitely very, very close to it. “I don’t even have a goddamn truck.”
I laughed then. I couldn’t help myself. “Bayou, honey? Everything you thought you knew is out the window. The only thing left is what is right in front of you—and that is a little girl that needs you for her survival. It sounds like she’s had a pretty shitty go of it for the first three years of her life. Don’t you think you’re better than what she would’ve had with Ilsa?”
Bayou looked haunted. “I’m not really sure. It’s taken a lot to get me to where I am right now. But I’m far from normal. I’m abrupt, brash, and say what I mean. I have an obsession with goddamn birds that sometimes borders on unhealthy. I still have trouble with crowds, and even though I look like I’m a really good, functioning member of society, I’m not. I’m broken.”
“You’re not broken,” I said. “You’re perfect. And you’re going to do fine. That little girl won’t care that you like birds. That little girl only cares that you do your best, and at the end of the day, love her.”
“I don’t have the capacity for love,” he said.
“Yes. You do.”
He looked like he was about to deny my every word, then I did what I did best. I stirred shit up.
Reaching for his face, I pulled him down until his face was only an inch from mine, then I squeezed his cheeks together, almost forcing him to look at me.
The hairs of his beard tickled my chin, but I held on anyway, even though having him this close was nearly distracting.
My body was doing things that my mind knew certain parts—i.e., my vagina—shouldn’t be doing in this particular situation.
Did that stop me from wanting to bring his mouth just a little bit closer?
No.
Did that stop me from inhaling his scent and wishing that the situation that I found myself in was different? Again, another no.
“You do,” I said again. “You are a good man, and from what I’ve been able to tell, you love your cousin. You love your adopted sister, even though she has a psycho switch that turns on when she’s anywhere in the vicinity of me or my sister. You also love your club members—from what I’ve been able to tell based on the club parties I’ve attended. You do have it in you. And Isa is new. She doesn’t know what to expect any more than you do. It’s going to be a learning experience all the way around.”
His hands fisted, and that was when I realized that they were on my hips, though now he wasn’t cupping my hips as much as pressing both fists into my flesh.
Though he wasn’t touching me, I was sure, on purpose since I still had hold of his face, the act made something in my brain short circuit.
If I was willing to admit it, I’d had a crush on the man whose face I had in my hands for a very long time now. Years. I’d compared every single man that I’d ever dated to Bayou.
I’d only had a couple encounters with the man, but it was enough to illicit a life-long change in me. One that was so fused with my soul that I hadn’t slept with a single man my entire adult life. Why would I when every time a man started to go down that particular path with me, I compared him to Bayou?
Though, he was Benson to me, then.
However, Bayou had changed. He was no longer that man that he used to be. He was different, more self-assured. More confident in who he was now, and who he would be in the future.
Then again, I was no longer the girl he used to know. I didn’t get to be the girl that hid in the corner while life moved along around her. I had to be an adult, and do adult-like things like go to work, go grocery shopping, pay bills, and generally do things that interested me about as much as I liked plucking my chin hairs.
