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I nod at him.
He smiles. “Eat every bite.”
He downs all six of his plus the cinnamon twists before I get through my second. But it is good. Something about the crunchy shell scratching my throat a bit as it goes down puts me in a better mood.
I unwrap my third taco. “It feels weird, us being here.”
“How so?” Brock takes the last sip of his drink, the straw making gurgling sounds.
“I mean, the two of us without Dave. You know. Huey, Dewey, and Louie.”
“You went to a different college than Dave and I did,” he says. “The whole duck thing kind of dissipated after that. And it should have dissipated a lot sooner.” He rolls his eyes.
I swallow my bite of taco. “I know. But when things were serious, the three of us always stuck together, just like the awesome foursome does.”
“Who the hell came up with that name, anyway?”
I take a sip of drink. “They probably came up with it themselves.” Gina, Angie, Sage, and Bree are the youngest of the Steels, and the most fabulous, to hear them tell it.
“Actually…” Brock fiddles with his phone. “Rory came up with the Three Rake-a-teers, and I’m betting…”
His phone dings.
“Yup. Just as I suspected. The Pike sisters strike again.”
“What are you talking about?”
“Rory says Maddie came up with the awesome foursome. I wonder if the four of them know that Maddie always feels like a fifth wheel with them.”
“She’s not a member of the family.”
“No, but she’s their same age, and they all still go to college together.”
“I don’t get that,” I say. “That feeling of not belonging.”
“That’s because you never cared whether you belonged or not.”
I can’t help a chuckle. “That’s the truth, for sure. But it’s more than that, Brock.”
“What do you mean?”
I look away and scrunch the wrapper from my taco into a ball. “I can’t believe I’m about to tell you this.”
He smiles. “You’re going to have to tell me now, after that lead in.”
“I stopped caring so I wouldn’t have to compete with Gina.”
“Why would you have to compete with Gina?”
“Come on. You know why. She’s beautiful, brilliant, talented. She’s everything I’m not.”
“She’s got a few inches on you in height, but that’s about it, Ave. You’re just as beautiful, brilliant, and talented as she is.”
“I can’t paint.”
“So what? Gina can’t make the fluffiest croissants on the planet.”
I finish up my final taco. “That’s right. She can’t. See? I’m not competing with her.”
He rolls his eyes. “I’ll never understand women. I’m getting a refill.” He rises and heads toward the soda fountain.
I shrug. He doesn’t get it. That’s okay, though. I know what I mean.
He returns to the table with his refilled cup. “You ready?”
“Yeah.” I grab the tray and head to the wastebasket.
You ready?
Not in the slightest. But I want to see this woman. This grandmother. I want to know the secrets she still hides.
Because I’m fucking done with secrets.
Chapter Thirty-Two
Brendan
By ten, the game is over and the bar has settled down to its normal Monday-night atmosphere.
“Let’s go,” Dad says. “You and I still need to talk.”
I pop the cap off a Fat Tire and hand it to a customer. “All right. Where’s Johnny?”
“In the can.” He gestures at Johnny, who’s walking toward the bar, wiping his hands on his jeans. “There he is.”
“Fine.” I move toward the staircase to my apartment.
Dad is right behind me. I unlock the door and enter.
“You want anything? A sandwich?”
Dad takes a seat at my small table. “No. Sit down, Brendan.”
I grab a bottle of water from my fridge and sit next to my father. “So…Lauren Wingdam?”
“Yeah. I’ve got an address.”
“Did you give it to Pat Lamone?”
“I did. She’s his mother. His birth mother, that is.”
“She’s his only mother now,” I say. “His adoptive parents were killed in a car accident.”
“That’s a damned shame.”
“It is. But Pat Lamone is no saint, Dad.”
“Neither am I. Neither are you.”
He’s not wrong. “But Lamone’s bad news. I was talking to Brock—”
“Brock Steel?”
“Yeah.”
“Let’s keep the Steels on a need-to-know basis, Brendan.”
“They’ve been getting the same cryptic messages. The Steels aren’t our enemies, Dad.”
“Did I say they are?”
“No, but…Pat Lamone isn’t a good guy. I’m sorry he lost his parents and all, but he tried to destroy the Pike sisters back in high school. And…he drugged Diana Steel.”
Dad raises his eyebrows. “You got proof of that?”
“Brock does.”
“Are they filing charges?”
“They can’t. Statute of limitations.”
“You mean they only just found out?”
I nod.
“The Steels have their hands in everything. Damn.”
“This isn’t the Steels’ fault. And Pat—”
I stop. As much as I hate keeping things from my father, I can’t tell him that Lauren Wingdam is Wendy Madigan’s daughter, and that Wendy Madigan is Ryan Steel’s birth mother. I promised Ava I’d keep it all in confidence.
“Pat what?”
“Nothing. Just don’t let him fool you.”
“You have to get up pretty early to fool me, Brendan.”
