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“You missed a tin cover,” Posey said pointing to the island where the aforementioned lid sat withFlamewritten on it. “Don’t worry though, I love their food.”
I relaxed into my chair. “Perks of being the brother-in-law of the owner and the brother to the sous chef.” That sounded braggadocious. Was I laying it on way too thick? I cleared my throat. “Anyway, with everything that happened today, I wasn’t even sure if I’d be able to pull this off. I thought for sure I was one diaper away from an all-night stay in the hospital, instead of an adult dinner.”
Her gaze softened. “Must be hard jumping into the unknown with both feet.”
“You’d think because I was around for the birth of my siblings and now my nephew, I’d be better at this.” Who was I kidding? I hadn’t done anything for Ireland or my parents except for being moral support and taking on big brother/uncle duty when Ireland needed me or my parents. I’d probably be doing the same for Jackson sooner rather than later, too.
“It’s not the same as having a child,” she said, digging into her dinner with gusto. “Your child depends on you. With your nephew and now your niece, you can give them back when things become too intense. Same for your siblings when you were younger.”
Ain’t that the truth? As it was, the PI Mack recommended for me, had turned up shit. No one in New York or Mexico knew a damn thing about Pedro or Hope. So, we were expanding to Puerto Rico and the Dominican Republic, just to be on the safe side. Hope and Pedro were ghosts with no families to miss them after their deaths. I didn’t know how to feel about the idea of Destiny never knowing her biological family. However, I also understood as my daughter, she’d always have the Banks family.
“True,” I agreed.
“Must have been a shock for your families when you found out about Waverly and Jackson’s daughter,” Posey hedged, cutting into her steak. “I can’t imagine how traumaticthatwas.
I don’t think traumatic was even the word for it. In fact, I don’t think there was a word for how any of us felt. “Confession time. We kind of overreacted. I might have cold cocked my brother because of how he was acting, before any of us knew the truth.” I winced at the memory. It wasn’t a finer moment in my life. I think I transferred some of my anger at Pedro and Hope onto Jackson, and that wasn’t fair to him. “We all thought he left her because she got pregnant.”
“They got pregnant. She did nothing without him,” Posey corrected me.
“Right. You’re right. They’re kids, you know? We were all wrong when we learned what really happened.” Jackson had no clue. Waverly ghosted him because she got scared. I was still scratching my head on that one. We might be a bunch of assholes, but we’d have never turned Waverly away. Nor would Jackson. The kid was so in love with Waverly and his daughter Alandria, it would’ve taken an act of God to separate them.
I was still worried about them. Waverly had gone and cut everyone out of her life because of her pregnancy and over the last few days, I wondered if she’d had ever told Jackson the truth about Alandria. Jackson, the big doof he was, sometimes loved Waverly way too much to be mad at her. Shouldn’t he have been? Shouldn’t he be pissed Waverly jetted out of his life when things got too hard? Would she do it again if they had issues?
“Fear makes you do stupid things,” Posey said with a little lift of her shoulder. “Fear can make you hide from your life.”
“Lying can break people, though. For some, trust, once broken, can never be repaired,” I said, my confession sitting on the tip of my tongue, burning a hole where the words sat. I swallowed them down, not ready to give her everything. Not really sure I should or could, to be honest.
“Trust is one of those things you either know how to cultivate or you allow it to burn like a wildfire, destroying everything in its path when it’s misused,” she replied.
“Sounds like you speak from experience.” As much as Posey appeared to be the happy, live, laugh, love-type, there were shadows there, too. Like she’d seen shit that would probably throw another, weaker, person into a psych ward for a grippy socks vacation. “Enough about me. How about we talk about you? Who is Posey Roberts?”
She chuckled softly. “A lady of mystery.”
Fuck.
She’d crawled under my skin like an invasive parasite I never wanted to get rid of. I wanted to know everything about her, including what made her tick. What turned her on? What made Posey want to help children? I was almost sure I knew the answer, but I yearned for the day she trusted me enough to tell me. I craved the moment she didn’t see me as some guy who fucked a girl and got her pregnant.
Especially when I hadn’t.
I should tell her the truth right now and put both of us out of misery so we could move forward together as a couple.
Would it ruin everything?
Yes, I was putting my fucking cart before my horse, but damn it, theBoomwas an insatiable bitch that needed regular tending or else I’d go insane. I believed I already was half of the time. Nothing in my life had ever compared to this. If someone would have told me five years ago, I’d be sitting across from the one woman who could tie me in knots. I’d have laughed. I never saw myself as the “tied down-type.”
“Can I solve your puzzle?” I cocked a brow, tipping my beer to my lips. The line was pure cheese, and I’d layered it on super thick.
“Maybe. Someday.” Posey wiped her mouth and pushed her plate back. “That was excellent. My compliments to the chef.”
I smirked. “I’m sure Sasha will approve of your praise.” I cocked my head to the living room. “Leave your plate. I’ll get them later. Let’s move this to the living room, where we can be more comfortable.” I sounded like one of those creepers. I felt slimy. From her expression, she felt it, too. “Fuck. I’m screwing this all up.” She discombobulated me.
Posey was an unattainable obsession. She was sending me all the subtle signals she wasn’t interested, and, like a neanderthal caveman, I ignored them. I’d focused on winning her over with my charm.
“Like I said before, this is highly unusual.” She nibbled on her bottom lip, and I wanted to pull the abused flesh from between her teeth. “Do you ever feel like you’re doing the right-wrong thing?”
I grunted. “All the time. Lately, mostly.”
She nodded. “Same. I wish I could tell you everything about me, but unfortunately, because of my job, there are tons of holes.”
