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“Like what?”
“Soft. Funny. Different, but really sweet.”
He let out a quiet laugh. “You’re going to ruin my tough guy reputation.”
“Your bark is worse than your bite. But the truth is—and Bella can correct me if I’m wrong—you’re always open and friendly.”
“He is,” Bella said loudly, proving she was listening, so they walked into the kitchen to join his sister. “I don’t think he wants to be funny, but it comes off that way to me. I think it’s funny when he tries so hard. I like it. I tell him that too, but it’s still funny.”
He couldn’t help it. The heat filled his chest with pride as his mouth tipped at the corner. The tension he’d walked in carrying—about the call earlier, about people asking questions, about the complications stacking up—eased a notch.
He needed this more than he needed to breathe and neither of the females in this room had any idea of how this interaction was aiding him.
They moved to the table when everything was ready. Bella insisted on serving, her chin high as if she were hosting a gala.
He tried to help a few times, but she’d brushed him aside, saying that she liked doing it.
Once their plates were filled, Marly took a bite and closed her eyes for a second. “Okay. This is awesome.”
Bella looked startled, the worry blocked by praise. That was more like the girl he knew and maybe he wanted her to go back to the carefree one that started the night off. “Really?”
“Really. The meatballs are perfect.”
Colson pointed his fork at Bella. “See? I told you.”
“You also said, and I quote, ‘It’s beef in sauce. It’ll be fine.’”
“That was encouragement,” he argued and dove in for another bite to prove his point.
“That was covered up by annoyance so you could go change,” Bella corrected.
Marly leaned in conspiratorially toward Bella. “We’ll work on him.”
He shook his head, but he couldn’t stop watching the two of them. The easy way Marly fit at the table. The way Bella was animated instead of anxious. The way the air didn’t feel heavy or awkward or strained.
Instead, there was laughter. Teasing. Normality. Just not a normal dinner he’d ever had in his family, but one he’d had at the Conway house.
At one point when Bella got up to get more water, Marly glanced at him across the table, her eyes softer than earlier in the doorway. “You’re doing great,” she said quietly.
“With what?” She tipped her head toward Bella. Something curled tight in his gut and it wasn’t the delicious food. Because Marly was right. He was doing good. And maybe he needed to hear that too. “Yeah,” he said, clearing his throat. “Well.”
For once, he didn’t feel like he was bracing for impact over the next thing that was going to fall into his lap.
Dinner wasn’t stiff. It wasn’t complicated. It wasn’t a disaster waiting to happen.
It was easy. Easier than he’d let himself believe it could be.
And wasn’t that what everyone in this room needed, just in different forms?
24
SO MUCH GROWTH
“You had dinner with Colson and Bella last night?” her mother asked.
She’d texted her mother when she got home last night.
Marly was floating on clouds. Her life felt right even through the frustration of the mayor’s visit.
