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Still, I slid the box from the table to the sofa in front of me.
Silently, I picked off a slice of pepperoni, watching as the hot, stringy cheese desperately tried to keep its prisoner safe on the slice.
We ate. Both of us. Questions faded in the silence we shared.
Or, so I thought.
“Portia. Your stepmom?” Brantley’s question came again after three slices.
Man, he wasn’t going to let it lie, was he?
I shut the lid of my box and out it back on the table. “Yep.”
“You don’t want to talk about it, do you?”
“I never have to,” I admitted. “Everyone here knows everything about me. That’s what living in a small town does to you.”
“I don’t know,” he said softly. “But I’d like to.”
I cast my gaze over him. Over that dark hair and those full lips and that stubble and those strong shoulders.
Those compellingly bright eyes.
“My mom died when I was five.” I pulled my wine glass onto my lap.
Brantley took a deep breath. “I’m sorry.”
I drained the rest of the wine and looked at the empty glass. Words danced on the end of my tongue, teasing and playing. In the time they’d done that, Brantley had gotten up and returned with the bottle.
He filled my glass. “I didn’t know.”
“Why would you?” I cradled the now-full glass in my hands. “You just moved here.”
“True.”
I looked away from him, sipping slowly, focusing on anything but him. Anything but his gray sweats and white tees and muscles that wanted to distract me from reality.
“When did you meet her? Your stepmom?” Brantley asked, voice soft like silk. “How old were you?”
I didn’t even glance at him when I said, “Thirteen.”
“Really?”
I nodded. Once. “I hated her for three months, then she became my best friend. She’s been my mom ever since.”
“You call her Mom?”
Side-eyeing him, I smiled. “Of course. I was so young when my mom died. Me and Dad were alone for years. Portia came along when I needed her most, and it’s just how we are. She’s my mom, but she’s a different kind of mom. She’ll never replace my mother.”
Brantley tilted his head to the side. “Interesting. I love your perspective on it. It’s very…open and honest.”
I brought my glass to my lips and sipped. “I don’t think it’s my perspective. It’s just how it is.”
“You say it like it’s nothing.”
“On the contrary, it’s everything.” I pulled both legs up onto the sofa and crossed them, Indian-style. The base of my glass rested on my ankles, and I stared into the swirling mass of my wine. “Portia was there when nobody else was. She guided me when I was alone. She was the friend and support I needed when my father was lost. Our relationship isn’t perfect, but she’s the best friend I’ve ever known.”
Brantley nodded slowly. He tipped his beer bottle up, draining what was inside it. Wordlessly, he got up, retreating to the kitchen. I cradled my glass and stared at where he’d left until he appeared again.
He handed me the bottle of wine.
Against my better judgement, I poured.
I set the half-empty bottle back on the table.
He popped the cap of another beer. Settled back. Sipped. Sighed. Breathed easy. “Moving on is hard,” he said quietly, staring into the brown-tinted neck of the Budweiser bottle. “Sometimes it seems impossible. You just made me feel like, one day, my kids will feel some kind of happiness.”
“You think they aren’t happy?”
“I know they aren’t.”
“You’re wrong.”
He hit me with his bright gaze. “You think?”
“I know.” I glanced into my glass before our eyes met again. “Look at them, Brantley. They love you.”
“Sure, they do. But happiness is something else.”
“They’re happy with you. Anyone with a brain cell can see that.”
He stared at me.
Really stared at me.
Moved closer to me, closing the distance between us.
“You’re a great dad,” I said softly, cradling my wine glass. “You have to know that.”
“I do,” he replied. “But I have no choice. I’m a great dad because I have to be. Because without me they have nobody.”
“You don’t believe in yourself enough.” I turned my head and finished what was in my glass. It clinked against the coffee table. “You’re an amazing father because you love them beyond anything I could ever understand.”
He met my eyes. “You know love, Kali. I watched you braid my daughter’s hair earlier.”
“Out of kindness.” I swallowed hard and put my glass down. “You were busy. She wanted her hair braided. It was easy.”
Weird, to be precise.
But easy, sure.
Brantley swigged his barely-touched beer and put it down. His sigh echoed off the walls.
I shouldn’t be here.
I put my glass on the table, closing my barely-touched pizza. I had to go home. His intentions had been good in buying me dinner, but this was wrong. Mostly because I didn’t really want to leave at all.
