“You are a pain in my ass, Fee.”
“And you are still hung up on Darius.” She doesn’t say it like it’s a question.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Oh please,” she growls. “Don’t bother. If you want to lie to yourself, go ahead. But don’t bother lying to me. You still suck at it.”
“I’m a wonderful liar.”
“Not something to strive for, cousin.”
I giggle and lean back in the couch cushions. “ I don’t know what to do, Fee. He’s still hurting.”
“Of course he is. He’s not a psycho.” She sighs and I hear the question in her breath.
“I don’t know what happened. He never explained any of it to me. Just disappeared.”
“Well, I’d say that’s the first thing that you should do is talk about what the hell happened. Then maybe that will give you an idea where this is going.”
“I suppose.” But I don’t want to ask. What if he tells me that he fell in love with her and he just didn’t care about me anymore.
That my mother, who was a second mother to him, didn’t matter enough to show up for.
“How do you think the plans look?” I ask her, pushing all the niggling doubts down in the back of my mind. That’s for another day.
“I think they look good. I mean, it’s only a wall being knocked down but I do like the way he’s looking at built-shelves along that long wall. That’s a lot of extra space for both of us. We could split it right down the middle.”
“Yeah.” But I’m not thinking about the plans. I’m thinking about the excitement in Darius’s eyes. He looked so good. Like a man on a mission.
“Don’t let him in your heart without getting an explanation for what happened, Harp. You deserve the truth after all these years. I know that he’s why you took off.”
I don’t answer and she groans. “Fine. But don’t say I didn’t warn you.” She whispers something and I groan.
“Could you two stop it for five minutes so that we can finish this conversation?”
Monroe’s dark voice chuckles in the background and I groan. “I’ll talk to you tomorrow. Please try and leave your better half home alone.”
“Love you too, Harp,” he mutters into the phone and there’s a breathy whimper and the phone hangs up.
“Ugh. I need better family members. That’s just wrong.” I know damn well what they were doing and I wish to hell I could wipe all those thoughts out of my head.
And I get my wish. My doorbell rings and I stomp over and throw it open, gasping.
“What are you doing here?”
CHAPTER 6
Darius
This is probably a huge mistake. I knew it as soon as I pulled up outside.
“What are you doing here?” Her pretty lips fall open and my mind goes to dirty, dirty places that it shouldn’t ever think of with her standing in front of me. My dick is so hard in my jeans that it’s a miracle she can’t see it.
“I kinda wanted to clear the air between us, angel. I know you must have questions.”
She frowns and leans on the doorjamb but doesn’t let me pass. Her slim arms cross over her delicate breasts and my whole body tenses. Like a dog with a bone he’s hiding.
“Why?”
