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Bullshit, I know exactly what she’s asking.
Only, my mother is the last thing I want to dwell on during our last night in paradise.
This is supposed to be our night, even if I know that’ll only make a clean break harder once we head home.
“I’m just worried about Dad. We know they made a big mistake and it’s probably on life support...but he’s so blind, Chris. He doesn’t see trouble until it smacks him in the face.” She looks down and sighs before meeting my eyes again. “I’m afraid she’s already trying to screw him over, one way or another. I just haven’t figured out why.”
I stare at her, trying to comprehend why she gives a shit.
Our parents’ problems aren’t mine and they shouldn’t be hers either.
Then Delia clears her throat. “I didn’t tell you before, but I think she knows about us. Evie came after me one day—she warned me to stay away from you.”
Fuck, my appetite dies while I’m chewing the most buttery meat I’ve ever tasted.
I reach for my glass, sucking down the last of my wine and refilling it before I answer, needing the fire to calm the heavy ache in my gut.
“I don’t give a solitary shit what she says and neither should you. Ma’s always been a selfish, greedy, train wreck of a human. You’re right to worry if your old man’s got no backbone—that makes him easy pickings if she goes off the rails again.” I bite my tongue because I want to saywhen.“You could do the smart thing. Tell him to break it off now, throw her out, and pray to God he’s got himself an ironclad prenup before it’s too late. I’m the only one who ought to be stuck dealing with her bullshit because we’re blood.”
She shakes her head sadly, staring at her plate.
A waiter stops by to ask how we’re doing, and I wave him off with a few words.
“I can’t,” she says. “Dad thinks he’s in love—and maybe he actually is. That’s what makes this so hard. I haven’t seen him like this since before Mom walked out. Who am I to come along and call him delusional? He’s a grown man. He just... he has to leave her on his own. It’s not my place to push him out of a relationship, however weird or toxic it may be.”
My jaw tightens.
I could say a million things, all of them harsh.
Right now, it’s awfully hard to give a ghost of a shit about what Bruce Burr feels.
If he’d man up, sprout a pair, and leave the tornado bearing down on him alone, then maybe I wouldn’t have to amputate this sweet girl from my life the instant we’re back in California.
It’s going to be hell.
I want to camp out at the Enguard office if I have to, rather than share a wall with her night after night, knowing I can’t just step into her room and—
Fuck.
That house is a certified torture chamber, no matter how big and grand.
If she’s only a room away, I won’t think about anything except the infinite ways I want to keep kissing, touching, and fucking her senseless.
All the special wrongs that are way beyond anything we can condense into one final breathless night here in the city of lights.
“Princess, you all right?” I squeeze her hand again, demanding her eyes.
She gives me her honey-brown gaze so slowly it hurts.
“I’m just trying to figure this out, Chris. I knowyou’vebeen dealing with it for years and I shouldn’t whine. But like, what’s her deal? Was she always like this? Can you tell me anything?”
I stab the last bite of filet into my mouth and chew like a wolf savoring its last bleeding morsel.
Where do I even start?
What the fuck do I say about a woman who’s been spiraling her entire life?
Whokeepsspinning to new lows like a leaf down a canyon after blowing a fortune on her demons and an army of specialists trying to hold them back?
