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“You came over and waited on my stoop because you think I’m lying about Earl getting together with Fred.” Fred barked once, as if she knew we were talking about her, then lay down. I wanted to make sure I had this right. “How do you even know where I live?”
“I have my ways,” he replied vaguely, then pointed at the chunks of concrete driveway.
Oh. I set my hands on my hips. “You think I’m trying to… to trap him? Earl?”
He ran fingers over his beard, suddenly uncomfortable. Was that the reason he came here? It seemed unlikely. Ridiculous, definitely.
“Or do you still think, even after the vet’s office earlier, I was trying to trapyou?” I added.
Now he lookedreallyuncomfortable. I had my answer.
“You did,” I said, shaking my head. “You misinterpreted the messages and you thought I accused you of getting me pregnant on purpose, even though we’ve never met.”
He shook his head. “No. Yes. No.”
“Which is it?”
He sighed, looked at the sky, his boots, then finally at me. “I did. At first. When I got the messages, yes. Definitely. Then I saw you and changed my mind.”
Oh. My shoulders dropped and my anger bled away. Of course. “Right. One look at me and there was no way you’d have taken me to bed. Notme.”
Sure, my master plan was to steer clear of men, especially older ones who might hurt me. Perhaps not physically, but with a toss-aside, one-and-done attitude. I didn’t have a carefree perspective on sex or relationships. It was easier to never get involved than to be hurt. Because if my father never loved or wanted me and my mother loved everyone with the same casual association as she did her own daughter, then I wasn’t worth anything permanent. Or for them to stick around.
Sex didn’t have to mean forever, but it had to meansomething.
What hurt from Daniel’s words wasn’t that I shut myself off from any kind of relationship with a man, but that I wasn’t wanted in the first place. That I wasn’t worthy.
He sighed, ran a hand down his face and for the first time, his growly demeanor slipped. He eyed me with something akin to horror or panic.
Even worse.
“No. Fuck no.” His voice was still deep and rumbly but came out soft. “That’s not it. Shit, I’ve messed this all up. I didn’t mean… Look–”
“Give me Danny’s number,” I snapped. It was one thing to know I had no chance with a guy like him, but to have him say it to my face was another. As I fished in my purse for my cell, I continued, “I’ll call and leave him a message about all this on his cell instead of at the tree service office. You’re not responsible. You never were.”
I wished I knew that Danny had been out of town. He hadn’t answered his door a few weeks ago when I found out Fred was pregnant, and I never got his cell number. We always talked in person. If I had, I’d have never met Daniel and he wouldn’t… be repulsed by me.
I reached my arm out and waved my cell at him until he took it. Using his big thumbs, he jabbed at the screen. “I want to be responsible, Melly. I’ve fucked this all up. I’m putting in my number because I have no idea when Danny will be back.”
Earl returned from his exploring and approached Fred. Again, they circled each other doing the usual dog get-to-know-you sniffs. Then, in a big dog/little dog way and without any foreplay, he mounted Fred and started humping her. Daniel sure as hell was wrong. The size difference didn’t matter. Fred spun around and snapped at him, making Earl jump back.
“Call me if–” Daniel froze, mid-thumb press and looked down because Earl had given up on Fred and moved to Daniel’s leg. “Earl!”
“Still want that paternity test?” I asked, smirking and giving him the mental middle finger.
6
DANIEL
I was an idiot.I couldn’t remember a time when I’d stuck my foot in it any more than I had with Melly Harwood.
Being the oldest of the Pearson brothers, one would think I learned a long time ago not to be such a dumbass. Or that between the five of us, we’d have done every single idiotic thing possible by now.
It seemed, even at forty, that was not the case.
I not only accused Melly Harwood of trapping me with a baby, but then I waited on her doorstep to accuse her of trapping Earl instead.
A big doofus of a dog. Who got tried to get some from a tiny teacup thing and was sleeping off his attempts, on Fred and my leg, in front of my fireplace. I refused to take him back to Sea Bass because I didn’t want to explain why I was such a fucking moron.
