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“Maybe,” she whispered.
I squeezed her hand.
“Andra Elizabeth Lang.” Yeah, I’d hounded Konner—and inadvertently, Kimmie—for information on the drive over. “Don’t make me pull over and remind you what we just felt back there. It’ll just take us longer to get home.”
Plus, I was really fucking tempted to sprawl her out on the backseat and take her now before she could let her pretty head get in the way of what we were building.
I watched her full lips twist into a grin.
“It’s Andi to you, Mr. Incredible.”
If I was lucky, it would bewifeto me. But that was for later.
“Tell me,” I pushed, reminding her what we were doing here.
She sighed, heavy with the weight of her troubles. But I was in the business of hauling things away. If she’d open up to me, I’d help carry her load.
“I was raised by a single father too, after my mother passed when I was too young to remember. But my story isn’t quite as pretty as yours. He liked to drink. Couldn’t keep a job, so we had nothing. Sometimes not even a roof over our head.”
That explained her chosen career in real estate.
“The older I got, the meaner he was. There’s not much to tell I guess. With a lot of work and sheer grit, I graduated. He left after the ceremony and I never saw him again.”
Hearing her tell it, struck a different chord in me. Told me all new things about my girl, and what she needed.
“That’s not the end of the story,” I urged.
“No, I suppose it’s not. After he left, I scraped together enough money from my job at Jackal’s to move out of the decrepit trailer he left me and into an apartment in town. Then I landed a position at a real estate firm, Bradley and Associates. I was only an office assistant, but the idea of having my hand in buying and selling homes was… I don’t know…comforting. I felt inspired. So, I took that and ran with it, working my way up to the top.”
This told me everything I needed to know about her. The level of determination she’d mastered. The unstoppable work ethic. The way she strategized her goals, and tackled each of them with the same intensity I’d once used on the field.
“You’ve turned a bad situation around. Just like I did, Andi. The details are different but the gravity is the same.” I pressed a kiss to the top of her head, whispering the rest. “You’re the incredible one.”
She lifted her head, turning in the seat to face me.
“It really doesn’t bother you?”
“What?”
She shrugged a shoulder. “That I have no family except for my Chub Club friends. No one to… I don’t know… share with you? In the future. Like, if we had kids, they wouldn’t have a full set of grandparents.” She clamped her mouth shut and even in the dashboard light, I could see her cheeks going pink. “I mean,ifwe get to the future. I’m not saying—”
“Whoa, girl. Are you making me a daddy already? I was just going to drop you at home with a quick goodnight kiss,” I teased. “Probably just open the truck door and shove you out. But if you’ve got something else in mind…”
“Oh, shut up, you liar.” She smacked my arm, a chuckle rising up from my chest.
“See, we’re getting somewhere now. You knew right away that was bullshit.”
Reaching over, I brushed my thumb over her cheek where she smiled, and watched it fade slowly.
“It really doesn’t bother me,” I said. “Your father would’ve made a shitty grandpa anyway.”
“True,” she said with a sad laugh. “He spent a lot of time telling me how worthless I was. And I spent even more convincing myself it wasn’t true.”
“It’s not true.” My voice shot out harder than I intended, but I wanted her to hear me good. “Andi, it’s not true. And I’ll spend twice as much time proving him wrong.”
Silence hung between us for a heavy moment while I waited for my words to sink in.
A tiny smile curved her lips and she sighed, rushing forward to kiss my cheek while my eyes went back to the road.
