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“Abby? She’s here?” My voice cracks and I have to clear my throat in order to not sound like a pathetic loser. I think about Abby, her skin, her smile, the way she felt beneath me, and my pulse kicks up a notch.
“Well, she’s here, but her and Kate are out shopping right now, so they’re not here.”
Blessedly, Dax looks back at the mountain of stuff. He either doesn’t notice the flush of heat on my neck under the tattoos, or doesn’t care. Either way, I’m glad he keeps quiet.
“So,” I grumble, pretending my mind isn’t filled with thoughts of Abby and the faint beachy scent that always seemed to surround her. Will she smell the same? “What’s the plan here?”
When Dax found out I was heading to New York for a few days, he called to see if I would help out with getting the nursery ready for their impending arrival. He didn’t mention Abby in any of our conversations. Not once.
Dax reaches into a brown plastic bag with a familiar orange logo on the side and hands me a paintbrush. “Now,” he raises an eyebrow, “we do whatever my wife says.”
“Fuck, seriously, Dax?” I stare at the brush and spot three cans of paint stacked next to a horrific primary-colored nightmare of plastic and buttons and various baby implements, and cringe. Thrusting the brush back at him, I blurt out, “I don’t paint. You’re loaded. Hire someone to do this shit.”
Dax, towering over my modest five-foot-ten-inch frame, curls up the corner of his lip and growls. “Listen.” A thick finger stabs into my sternum, and I have to grind my teeth together so I don’t take a swing at a man who could quite easily pound me into the ground without breaking a sweat. “Kate doesn’t want strangers in the house poking around while she’s pregnant, and I happen to agree with her. You said you would help, so shut yer gob and follow me.”
He spins on his heel and picks up all three cans of paint in one big hand, stalking down the wide hall of their huge but well lived-in home. “Adam will be here after lunch!” Dax calls out over his shoulder. “Don’t tell him he’ll be painting or the lazy bastard won’t turn up!”
Fuck me. Painting, a pregnant Kate, a bitchy Dax Davies, Adam’s teasing, and Abby fucking Kessler. This is going to be a train wreck.
Two hours later, I’m covered in gray, cream, and turquoise paint, drips and splatters all over my clothes and skin. Adam, the lazy prick, finally arrived about twenty minutes ago, just in time for cleanup.
“Dax! Where’s the remote for your stereo?”
Dax, as big and scary as he is, has recently developed a bizarre penchant for 80s British Pop. New Order’s “Blue Monday” is currently blaring from the house-wide stereo system.
“Adam, don’t fucking touch my music!”
I roll my eyes as they bicker like an old married couple. It’s entertaining on my best days, but today? Not so much. It’s irritating as fuck.
“So, what’s your story?” Adam asks as he bangs the top down on one of the paint cans with a huge rubber hammer.
“What do you mean?”
While Adam works, I snatch a wet rag off the floor and scrub at a stubborn blotch of paint on the back of my hand. Frustrated when it won’t come off, I rub harder, desperate to rid myself off the gray drip that bisects one of my tattoos—the small, barren branches that represent my nonexistent family tree.
The memory of being in total darkness with warm wet splotches all over my skin creeps in, unwelcome and grisly. I shudder, tossing the rag to the ground once the paint is gone, the spot now replaced with an angry red welt.
“What do I mean?” Adam asks, giving me an incredulous look. “I mean, why are you in New Jersey? Besides acting as menial labor for that tosser over there.” He gestures toward Dax, who scowls in return.
I hesitate telling them why I was passing through New York, not in the mood for another lecture about my “risky behaviors” at the moment. If the two of them knew I was planning on jumping a flight to the Bahamas to do a famous free dive at Dean’s Blue Hole and then scuba dive in the underwater caves, they would badger me until I changed my mind. Which I won’t.
Instead, I save my sanity by being vague. “Nothing specific.” I shrug.
Adam shoots me an odd expression. “You flew across the entirety of the United States for nothing specific?”
“Fuck off, Reynolds.”
Adam opens his mouth to give me hell when the front door to the house slams shut and a loud female voice barking in a British accent travels down the hall.
“Dax! We need help bringing stuff inside!”
“Christ,” Dax grumbles. He wipes his hands on paint-splattered athletic shorts and walks over to Adam and me. “The girls are back. C’mon and help me bring in the mountain of useless baby shite they bought.”
My heart stutters and I trip on my own feet. I’m about to come face to face with Abby for the first time in years and I’m not sure how to act, what to say, or what to expect. I’m not even sure how I feel about seeing her again, especially after the way things were left so long ago.
Adam shouts from the front room. “Evans! Get your useless arse out here!”
The insult jolts me out of my own head. “Coming!” I pray I don’t sound as nervous as I feel.
