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My body hefted with a humorless laugh, my heartrate picking up again. We’d drilled into the heart of my anxieties in no time at all. How had she known? It was like she had a magnifying glass and knew how to aim it at the darkest corners of my soul.
“No I can’t. It’s hard to explain. But I…I’m obligated to do this.”
“Obligated?”
“Yes. I work as hard as I do, I aim as high as I do, I do all the things I do because of Jordan and Kaylee.” My voice cracked, and I dragged my hands down my face again. Fucking Jessa last night had shifted something, and I wasn’t sure if I liked it yet. I stared at the ceiling for a moment, letting the words echo inside me first. “They can’t be here to live life, so I’ve gotta do it for them. I owe them. I have to succeed for them.”
Jessa pressed up onto an arm so she could look down at me. I’d never seen her so tender, so soft, so cracked open. Something huge quivered between us. Something I wasn’t sure I was ready to accept.
“Why do you say youowethem?”
“Because I didn’t save them.”
Devastation trickled down her face. “Damian, you couldn’t have.”
“I could have done more. I could have called more people. I could have hounded the detectives, the police officers. I could have fucking canvassed the country until I found them myself.” I pinched my eyes shut, the familiar waves of regret and pain swimming far closer to the surface this morning. Fuck. We needed to turn this around, and it was too early to drink an entire fifth of whiskey, which was my normal coping mechanism when the thoughts got too loud.
“Coulda, woulda, shoulda,” she said softly. “You were a kid yourself when your parents passed, and then you were just another teen in the foster system. There wasn’t anything you could do.”
“I wasn’t just a kid the entire time, though. Axel and I were Fairchilds by the time we lost contact with Kaylee and Jordan, but I was still the head of the Haynes family. It fell on my shoulders as the oldest brother. I was seventeen, eighteen when Kaylee started showing all those concerning signs. I could have done so much more.”
“And now you carry the weight of the world for them,” she said sadly, tears swimming in her eyes. “When are you gonna put it down?”
I soaked in her pretty face, the tiny lines by her eyes, the sadness reflecting from me onto her. I shook my head, swiping my thumb across a spilt tear on her cheek. “I can’t, Jessa. It will all be in vain if I don’t fucking accomplish something in this sad and stupid world. That’s why I built the algorithm the way I did, to funnel money from the world’s 1 percent into the poorest, most forgotten communities. It’s why I raise all this money for kids and education. It’s why we started the charity. It’s why we do it all. There’s no reason other than supporting the most vulnerable, the most forgotten. So no, I can’t put it down.”
Her throat bobbed, and she studied something unknowable on my chest, nibbling on her bottom lip. When she met my gaze, the sheen of tears was still there. “Have you ever thought that maybe the greatest way to repay them would be to just…be happy?”
I shook my head, but she hurried to add more.
“What I mean is, all the good that you do is valuable. It means something. But what if the real reason we’re here, the best way you could honor them, would be to just love your family and eat each other’s cooking and say it was good?”
Now I had the tears in my eyes. I pinched the bridge of my nose and shook my head. This was too deep. Too much. And I’d reached my limit of fucking thinking.
“Nope, time’s up. That concludesmytherapy session.” I had to switch gears,now. “If you aren’t careful, yours is next.”
She laughed. “I’ve got a few skeletons in my own closet, don’t worry. You aren’t the only one.”
“Can I end this conversation with the promise of breakfast?” My heart was still pounding, but I was determined not to fall into my mental sinkhole like I did most mornings. Not when Jessa was here. She was too bright of a light to ignore. And all things considered, she’d been the only person who had successfully navigated me inandout of those treacherous conversational waters, other than Axel or Trace. “I’m thinking a full spread. Opulent everything. Diamond encrusted water glasses. Gold shavings on the toast. Because for once, I’m remembering to feedyou, instead of the other way around.”
She laughed into her hand, that familiar tenderness shining in her eyes. “Wow. This is a momentous occasion. I think that’ll shut me up, yes.”
“Excellent. Mission accomplished,” I teased as I pressed a kiss to her lips. She giggled through the kiss. When we broke apart, I added, “I see how much you worry about me. How much you care. I know I can be an asshole most of the time. I’m trying to be better.”
She froze, watching me with an unreadable look. “You…you’ve noticed that I worry?”
“I see everything, Jessa. Even when I don’t want to. I’m a fucking owl, I just hide it.”
She licked her lips, the aimless patterns over my chest starting up again. “It’s how I treat my family. My found family.” Her words sank into me for a moment. “Blood doesn’t always care,” she whispered. “But your found family will.”
I scooped up her hand, pressing her knuckles to my lips. This time, we both had tears in our eyes. I knew a thing or two about found families. That included Trace and the rest of the Fairchilds. But for her, it was more important. Because she’d been let down by her blood family.
Something big and aching existed between her and her mother, more than just the drugs. “That ‘blood is thicker than water’ quote is bullshit anyway,” I told her, swiping my thumb back and forth over her knuckles.
“What do you mean?”
“I prefer a different version I’ve read:The blood of the covenant is thicker than the water of the womb.”
She nodded, understanding washing over her face. “Ain’t that the truth?” Her gaze drifted off, something fierce churning inside her. “The water of the womb betrayed me, Damian. There’s no covenant with that woman.” She glanced at me. “Does that make me a horrible person, to say that about my own mom?”
