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I’ve been at Aunt Ida Sue’s for a month and a half now, and each day not seeing Titan has been painful. There was a part of me that thought he would follow me here. Chase me down and tear up the annulment papers and tell me he wanted to try staying married. It was crazy, but the thought—the hope—was there and it hurt when he didn’t show. Then two weeks ago, I got the papers in the mail. An announcement that I had been “annulled.” The papers didn’t come from Titan; they came from a law firm in California instead. When I told Hope, her whispered “Thank God” was like a punch to the gut. I haven’t talked to her since. I was about to tell her how much I really liked Titan and how I thought we could have been good together. Her snide remark stopped me from sharing my views. Her comment of: “You really have screwed up in the past, Faith. Your ex was proof of that, but getting married to Titan? God, Faith, that tops them all,” pretty much ended all conversations. I did remind her that I didn’t lie to my husband and convince him we were married when we weren’t—right before I hung up and proceeded ignoring her attempts to call back.
I’m so sick of being viewed as Faith the Screw-up by my sisters. Neither one of them have great track records, but they conveniently forget that. Hope is all happy and she and Aden are so in love they stink of it now, but it wasn’t exactly a great start between the two of them and I’m kind of tired of Hope being a bitch about it all.
“Are you hearing me, Faith Lucas?”
I let out a deep, frustrated breath. I didn’t hear her, mostly because I was blocking her out and being depressed. Which is apparently something my aunt doesn’t like. I really need to find a place of my own. When Ida Sue offered me Petal’s old room for free it seemed like the perfect answer.
Boy, was I wrong.
“Don’t you breathe like that to me, young lady. You might not be from my loins, but you’re my blood.”
“Ida Sue—”
“And I reckon being from my blood means I can slap the stupid right out of you since my brother can’t. That means I’ll be slapping you for a damn long time, because your brand of stupid seems to taking over. So you might want to prepare.”
“I told you the problem is all fixed now,” I all but growl.
“Bull hockey. Is that fine piece of Godiva chocolate sitting here beside my Faith, making me—her—smile?”
“What?” I ask, confused. “Of course not.”
“Then it most certainly is not fixed.”
“But… He’s getting married. He had plans. He was just drunk when we got married, Ida Sue,” I tell her, whispering the words and ignoring the pain they cause.
“Big deal. Hell, Hope’s man didn’t know who he was when she grabbed him. That didn’t stop her. Men are like making meatloaf, Faith.”
“Making meatloaf?” I question—almost afraid to ask. With my aunt you never know what she will say next.
“Exactly that. They have all the ingredients buried in there. But it’s not finished. You got to use your hands to squish them up and make them look like you want and add the little small things that give them flavor,” she says and I blink. What she says actually makes sense. Not that any of it matters, because it’s all finished now. So I just don’t say anything. “Of course you have to make sure that when you’re finished with them they’re not the kind of man that actually lets their meat loaf. That’s unacceptable. There’s too many vitamins and herbs that can fix a limp dick these days. Why, when it comes to Jansen, I—”
“Annnnnd we’re done. The day I hear about Jansen and his meatloaf is the day I need to be put away in a padded cell.”
“I do like meatloaf,” he says, coming around the corner of the house. “Is that what’s for supper tonight, lovey?” he asks Ida Sue. He walks over to her rocking chair and leans down to give her a soft kiss.
“God I hope not,” Ida Sue grins. “But I am hoping for some meat on that old kitchen table.”
“Oh Lord, just shoot me now and put me out of my misery,” I whine, scared they’re going to start talking about sex—which they usually do.
“Quit being so over dramatic, Faith. What you need to be doing is going upstairs, packing your bag and loading your ass up and going to California to tell that fine-ass man to not give up on you.”
“It’s too late.”
“It ain’t over until another woman is sleeping in your man’s bed and has him all twisted up in her. Which means you got time, so you need to get hopping. I need that cinnamon swirl back in my life.”
