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“I love her,” I said without hesitation.
“Then you know what you have to do.”
And I did.
I knew exactly what I needed to do.
35
Annie
I didn’t hear the banging on the front door or the subsequent doorbell. I’d cried myself to sleep the night before, and I hadn’t planned to surface the rest of the day. Jennifer had a photoshoot in the morning and evening. So, I’d expected to have the entire house to myself to wallow. Now that the floodgates had opened, there was nothing left to do.
Until a five-year-old jumped on me in bed and started giggling. “Aunt Annie!”
I peeked out from under the cover to find my niece, Aly. “Aly Cat, what are you doing here?”
“Daddy said that you were sad and we needed to bring you doughnuts.”
I laughed. “That sounds like your dad.”
“I want the chocolate ones!” Aly cried.
She hopped off my bed, and I could see that she was in a full ballet ensemble—tights, leotard, and tutu. Her own mop of red curls pulled up in a bun. This kid lived and breathed ballet.
“With sprinkles?” I asked her.
“Yes! Sprinkles are my favorite.”
“All right. I guess I’ll get up then.”
Aly ran out the door. “Daddy, I got her up, and she wasn’t even mad!”
I snorted as I tugged on black sweats and a red Tech sweatshirt. At least Isaac knew to bribe his kid to wake me up instead of doing it himself. I’d hit him too many times, growing up, for him to attempt it on his own.
“Doughnuts?” I asked cautiously as I stepped into the living room to find Isaac and Peyton standing there.
“Rise and Shine,” he said, indicating our favorite doughnut shop.
“You know a way to a girl’s heart.” I hugged his fiancée. “Hey Peyton. I didn’t know you were in from New York.”
Peyton smiled as I scooped up one of the lone chocolate doughnuts covered with sprinkles left after Aly ate just the chocolate tops off of three others. Crazy kid.
“Last-minute plans,” Peyton said. “It’s good to see you.”
“Aunt Annie,” Aly said. She was skipping and doing dance leaps around my living room. She had more energy in one pinkie than I’d had any other morning of my life. “Daddy said that if you got your shoes on, we could walk to the playground.”
I arched an eyebrow at Isaac. “Bribery?”
“It works.”
Peyton chuckled.
“Let me finish my doughnut,” I told Aly.
“Okay. Are you finished now?”
I took another bite and shook my head.
“What about now? I like going down the slides.”
“I know you do,” I told her with a laugh. Nothing like Aly to raise my terrible, terrible mood.
“You’re finished!” she cheered as I ate the last of the doughnut. “Now, can we go?”
“Patience, Aly.”
She screwed up her face at her dad like she’d heard that word one too many times and knew it didn’t apply to her.
I went back in search of socks and tugged on tennis shoes and a beanie. “All right. Now, we can go if we can stop at J&B on the way for coffee.”
“Done,” Isaac said.
It was brisk for early March. That last haunting cold that clung to Lubbock for dear life. With our luck, it’d still snow one more time before spring officially broke through.
I got Peyton and me both large black coffees. I held the cup tight to warm up my hands as we walked to the next block, where there was a park and playground. Aly ran the rest of the way to the playground and immediately befriended another girl who was there with her mom. The mom tipped her head at us.
“I’m going to watch Aly,” Peyton said pointedly. “Give y’all time to talk.”
Peyton disappeared, her lean dancer legs cutting quick across the space to stand next to the other mom.
“Oh great,” I murmured into my coffee. “Big-brother talk.”
“So…” Isaac said.
“How much did you hear?”
Because there was only one reason he was here this morning. If Peyton was in town, I expected to see him long enough to watch Aly before they disappeared to do grown-up things. Long-distance was hard. Another reason I hadn’t wanted to do it.
“It can’t possibly be as bad as I heard,” Isaac said.
“Oh, it’s probably worse.”
“I was told that Jordan punched Chase, you and Jordan got into a huge argument, the police were called, and then you had a very public breakup.”
I took a fortifying sip of my blistering hot coffee. “Actually, that’s pretty much right.”
“Jesus, Annie.”
“Tell me about it.”
“Jordan’s my boss, or I’d definitely beat him up for you.”
I laughed softly. “You’d lose. I saw how he hit Chase. You’d definitely lose.”
“So, what are you going to do?”
“I really don’t know,” I whispered into my coffee. “I was hoping to not have to think about it.”
“That usually solves everything.”
I snorted. “It’s just…it’s complicated. I’m mad at him. Furious, honestly. He was out of control, and he said some horrible things that I’m ninety-five percent sure he’s going to deeply regret, but it doesn’t change that he said them.”
