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“We’re going to my place.” He clicks the key fob to unlock the doors to his truck. “Get in.”
“Uh, why can’t we talk here?” I plan on going back inside to finish things with Wren. This can’t be the end of us.
He marches around to my side of the truck and swings the passenger door open. “Get in.”
Light blue eyes pierce me, and it’s plain to see there’s no room to negotiate. My heart pounds fast against my rib cage. Pop can certainly be a take-no-prisoners kind of man when he needs to be, but never before have I seen this side of him directed at me.
I do as the man commands and hop into the truck. We don’t talk on the short drive to his house, and even once we arrive, he ambles from the truck to his shed without so much as a word to me.
As before, it’s clear to see he expects me to follow him, and while I do, my throat dries and closes in panic. All I want is to have Wren, Pop, and Percy in my life. My family. Yet now, because of Dot and her lies, I feel like I’m wading in quicksand. Nothing is solid or sure, and with my next breath or next move, I could lose everything. Sink into the abyss.
Unable to take the silence anymore, I sidle next to him. “Pop, you’re killing me here. Let me explain.”
He slides his toolbox out from the bottom shelf and stands. “Grab that two-by-four.” With only a quick point in the general direction of the wood, he ambles out of the workshop toward the back of the house.
Quickly, I haul the wood onto my shoulder and awkwardly jog after him. “Uh, I hope you’re enjoying this. If you’re aiming to torture me with silence, it’s working.”
He stops so unexpectedly that I almost smack into him but manage to swerve at the last second.
“You always did try to use humor to cool the waters.” He rocks back on his heels and mashes his lips together as if contemplating how best to drag this out.
“I meant no disrespect. I came into the Grill today intending to explain everything. Apologize?—”
“Do you think it’s funny that a father has to learn his daughter’s with a man that everyone believes is engaged to another woman? And then, not even a blink later, he learns said man got his fiancée knocked up.”
The question must be rhetorical, it has to be, but even still, he stares at me expectantly. Like I can somehow put all his fears and doubts to rest with my response.If only.
“Uh, things aren’t as they seem.” I grit my teeth at the warm rush of a blush creeping onto my face.
“Well, then, how the fuck are they?”
I stumble on my feet, shocked at Pop’s cursing for the second time today. The man doesn’t swear or at least never did in my presence.
He’s got me by the proverbial balls and there’s nothing I can do but take it. I’m at fault here, and he has every right to put me in my place. To expect me to answer to him for this fuckup.
Resigned to his ire and fully deserving of it, my shoulders droop and I remove the two-by-four and stand it up.
Like a garbage truck, I unload the entire messy fiasco that is my relationship with Dot. I spare no detail from my confession of always loving Wren—which isn’t a surprise to him—to winding up with Dot in a stupid attempt to amuse myself.
Fucking idiot.
Even still, I keep it brief. Pop doesn’t have the patience for a long drawn-out story.
When I end on Dot’s latest threat to change the town name, his frown deepens. “Damn, that woman. I’ve heard rumblings of this from some of the city council.”
“You have?” Blood rushes to my head, and suddenly, I’m lightheaded.
My fingers tighten their grasp on the wood and I lean into it, trying to steady my legs.
“Not recently—when your father was alive.” Pop looks out onto his land as if weighing whether or not to say more.
When his eyes meet mine, I’m not sure what he sees, but it’s enough to spur him on. “Your father was a pompous ass, and he got high and mighty with the Winslow name. That rubbed some people the wrong way. You gotta be careful with this threat. I don’t think it would take much convincing from Dot for Bill Malone to jump all over it.”
“Shit.” One of my fists thumps against my thigh in frustration.
This isn’t what I wanted to hear. Yet it’s just as well I know what I’m dealing with. I can’t let the Malones destroy my family legacy.
Pop places a reassuring hand on my shoulder. “Listen, if it comes to that, we’ll fight it. My advice… don’t push Dot on this. Let it lie. Sounds like you two have a lot to quarrel over as it is; just don’t bring this into the fray.”
