We put our supplies away in the kitchen and then venture out to stroll along the shore.
Blake yelps when a frothy wave races across the sand and reaches the tips of her sneakers. The water is painfully cold, and the air isn’t much better.
Good thing I brought a blanket with me, because even in her thick hoodie, Blake’s teeth start chattering.
I wrap the blanket around her and tuck her under my arm. “Do you want to go back?”
“No, this is nice.” There’s a wistful expression on her face, like she’s somewhere far away.
“Tell me what you’re thinking.”
“My mom. She always wanted to see the ocean. There were so many things she said she wanted to do, but it was hard to do them with two small kids and little money, and when we got older, she got sick.” The wind whips her golden hair around her face. “Sometimes at night, I’d sit by her side and think about the life she never lived. An alternate reality in which she never met my dad. Never had us. Where she could live only for herself.”
“You think she regretted it? Getting with your dad?”
“God, no. If I were in her position, I’d be full of regrets, but she had a way of…” Blake sighs. “She ignored people’s faults and saw silver linings.”
“Hmm. You didn’t like that.”
“No, I didn’t.”
I bite on the inside of my cheek. This is why Blake is the way she is, isn’t it? Why she’s quick to slap labels on people—good or bad. She’s rebelling against her mom’s perspective on life.
She looks up at me as we walk on the sand. “Were you close with your mom?”
“I was. When I was kid, it always felt like it was me and her against my dad. We were a team.”
“You’re talking about your biological father?”
“Yeah.” I sniff. “He treated her with resentment, and he was always annoyed with me. I’d do something kids just do sometimes—spill a drink, make a mess, break a toy—and he’d get so angry. I could tell he didn’t like me, even if I didn’t know why. And as I got older, I just started getting sick of being punished over nothing, so I decided I might as well earn it, you know?”
Blake nods. “Yeah, I get it.”
“I’d steal change out of his pocket so that I could buy pizza at the cafeteria at school. Every time he caught me, it was like I’d committed murder. He’d beat my ass raw. By that point, I’d realized what he was scared of all along. He was terrified I was going to end up like my grandpa and ruin his reputation.”
“Your mom’s dad? The guy who was in the mob?”
“That’s the one.”
“That sounds really hard, Nero,” she says in a quiet voice as we pass by a man walking his golden retriever.
I shrug. “It was, but it made me who I am. I have no idea who I’d be without that childhood.”
“Is he still around?”
“Nah. Died two years back. I went to his funeral and all, but by that point, he was a stranger to me. My real dad was my stepdad. I already told you about him.”
Blake gives me a sad smile. “He gave you the love and respect you always deserved.”
I suppose he did. My biological father’s death meant nothing to me, but I won’t ever forget the day I got the call about my stepdad and my mom being killed.
I wish I’d been there that day. Maybe I could have saved them. I’d nightmares for months after, imagining I was in that restaurant with them, my back to the window the gunmen shot through. I’d always wake up just as the bullets hit.
We start walking back to the house, and Blake tugs the blanket tighter around herself. “The day I quit my job, Brett told me my mom helped my dad rob people on the side of the road.” Her throat bobs on a hard swallow. “I told him he was a liar, but I think he was telling the truth.”
I clench my jaw.
I haven’t forgotten about that utter waste of space. Brett will get what’s coming to him. But there’s no rush.
