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Jealousy darts through me, no matter how absurd.
“Don’t think you’d hurt them one bit,” I growl. I try to be gentle—this is a heavy thing for her—but I can’t. “You’re the talk of the whole town right now, you know.”
“I am?” She blinks at me.
“Well, yeah.” I turn things over through a few more bites, rewinding my brain to earlier in the day, remembering fragments of conversation. “When I was picking up groceries earlier, I overheard a few parents talking in the store. Their kids are fucking in love with you, Lilah. They think you hung the moon.” I smile. “Grant said Nell talked about nothing else from the second he picked her up. She said you tell the best stories, and you’re really smart and real pretty. She already wants to grow her hair out long like yours.”
Delilah sputters on her next bite, snagging her napkin.
“Oh, my,” she strains out, red-faced. “Well, at least I made a good first impression, right?”
I watch her fondly, giving her a minute to collect herself.
“You really don’t know what to do with compliments, do you, woman?”
“No. So stop it.” Inhaling sharply, she balls up her napkin, giving me a warning look that tells me it could be sailing my way soon if I step out of line. Then she abruptly changes the subject. “Did I ever tell you why my hair’s so long? It’s this silly little thing...”
“Tell me the little things. I’m greedy as hell when it comes to you.”
That earns me an unguarded look, surprised and wide-eyed. “Okay. But only if you tell me a little thing after.”
Damn, she’s good.
“Deal,” I throw back.
“I didn’t cut my hair from high school until I met my mom again,” she tells me immediately. “That’s why I still wear it long. At first it was just carelessness, no one noticing I was getting a little shaggy as they passed me around from family to family, nobody wanting to make my hair their responsibility.” She shrugs again and catches a fine strand of black hair, drawing it over her shoulder to stroke down its length. “Somewhere in this mess, I still have the same hair I had when I was with my mother. That was the best day of my life.” A soft smile flits across her face as she twirls that lock around her finger. “It’s still there. The same hair she brushed with her hands when she hugged me so hard it almost left me sore. Same hair she hadn’t touched since I was a baby.”
Damn, this girl.
I reach across the island to catch that lock of hair, coiling it in my fingers. “You love her to death, don’t you?”
“Yeah. During the bad times, Mom was all I had, even if she was just a distant memory. A fantasy, even. I loved her my whole life without knowing her, even when I thought she abandoned me. It’s like the connection just stayed.” She shakes her head, then wrinkles her nose in a cute little scrunch when I tickle the tip with her hair. “I should call her. Tell her all about Redhaven. She’d like you, I think.” Grinning, she bats my hand away, reclaiming her hair. “Mostly because your mouth is as bad as mine.”
“So she’s got a fondness for sarcasm, huh? I’m sure we’d get along fine.”
“She gave birth to a shit-talker, didn’t she?”
“That must’ve hurt,” I say slowly, well aware I’m taking my life into my hands. “Squeezing out a chubby little cactus.”
“Lucas!” Yep, there it is.
That balled-up napkin boinks off my face while she scowls at me, her lips still curling up at the corners as she laughs.
“I’m not a freaking cactus—okay, maybe I am. Hmph.”
Picking up her fork, she aims it at me before savagely hacking off a few asparagus tips.
“Your turn, mister. Little thing. Now.”
“You want a dirty secret? Fine.” I think for a moment. “I’ve seen every Disney movie ever made.”
The skeptical look she gives me is enough to make me grin.
“...you? Disney?”
“Look, Grant’s off raising little Nell by himself. Most of the time his parents take her when he’s got to work, but sometimes they can’t, so that girl’s grown up half in the police dispatch office with all of us as her babysitters.” I blow out an exasperated sigh, even though I love that kid like she was my own. “If we don’t distract her, she will abso-goddamn-lutely hop on one of the dispatch computers and raise hell. Don’t know how she breaks past the access restrictions. She’s sharp as a whip, that’s for sure. So there’s an entire collection of DVDs in the back room at the station, and since I hang out there when there’s no patrols scheduled on my shift, I’ve seen 'em all. Pretty sure Henri isn’t far behind me, though.”
Delilah laughs, her eyes glittering. “I bet it’s not as good as my collection.”
