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If someone had told me a six weeks ago that I’d be aiming to ask Minty to move in with me, I would have laughed.
Hard.
Side-splitting, snorting, hacking-up-a-lung kind of laughing.
I can’t pinpoint the day I fell in love with her with any kind of certainty, but if I had to bet, it would have been at Barrett’s wedding when she knotted that tie around my neck.
Brayleigh loved her.
Hope loved her.
Raiden and my sisters were fully on board, even Ava, not that it would matter if they weren’t.
But it helped.
Would moving in with me strike her as too great a risk or would it finally eradicate her doubts?
Why could she not see me?
I cuddled Brayleigh against my chest as her tears, finally, shuddered to a stop and her body grew limp and heavy in my arms.
Fucking night terrors. The unholy screams. Just thinking about it sent a shiver down my spine.
The first night it happened I found myself in her room ready to fight before my eyes were fully open despite the fact that Hope had warned me. I didn’t even remember her warning at first.
Brayleigh stood in her crib, staring into space and screaming. I scanned the room for intruders, scooped her into my arms, checked the window, checked inside her crib for whatever giant insect had bitten her.
I felt like I’d somehow been transported into that scene in The Lady and The Tramp where I couldn’t find the rat.
Nothing was out of place or out of sorts and still she screamed. She didn’t acknowledge me, just looked past me, though she clung to my shirt. It stopped as suddenly as it started, the only evidence the sniffles and hitches in her breath.
The next morning, she woke as happy as a lark while I’d aged a decade. The doctor assured me night terrors were not uncommon and usually passed on their own.
I rubbed a hand down the side of my face.
They couldn’t pass soon enough. The explosion of adrenalin at the first sound of her screams, no matter how many times it happened, was unavoidable.
And exhausting.
I snickered to myself, remembering when Hope admitted she near pissed herself the first time Brayleigh woke up screaming. It wasn’t funny, but Hope could make anything into a joke.
I didn’t know Hope had planned to confront Minty but based on our earlier conversation, I should have.
“She thinks I’m a dog. That I’m going to lose interest and move on. That she’s temporary,” I admitted.
At first, she laughed, and teased, “You are a dog.”
I hung my head. “I’m really not. I’m honest and straightforward.” I spread my hands wide in supplication. “Was I supposed to pretend interest where there was none? Lead a woman on for a few months until she caught feelings? Become a monk? Those were my options.”
Hope’s big blue eyes scanned my face. “You’ve really never felt a spark of interest other than sex?”
“I really haven’t,” I replied, exasperated. “When I turned thirty, I wanted it. I tried. Remember Judy?”
“I do.” She nodded, her full lips pressed tightly together. “I always wondered why that didn’t work out. She seemed perfect for you.”
“On paper, she was. But there was no drive to be with her. I barely thought about her other than to remind myself when we had plans. Nothing like what Dani and Tracy have with Carlos and Sean, nothing close to how my parents loved each other, and seeing Barrett and Lenny fall? What I had with Judy doesn’t even register on that scale. It was...” I searched for the word, spitting it out like a bad taste. “Clinical.”
“So, what happened?” Hope asked, picking at a loose thread in one of the many holes in her jeans.
