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Ryleigh groaned and rubbed her forehead with her palm. He probably figured she was the type of girl who hung around these brutes and criminals, giving it up to whoever, whenever. It couldn’t be any further from the truth. But then again, he didn’t know that.
“You’ll find a new job, Ry. I know you will,” her dad said, thinking she’d been depressed about losing her job.
Although losing her job sucked some huge monkey balls, the real reason she’d felt unbalanced was she couldn’t stop thinking about a man she would never see again.
She’d asked her cousin about him once, but Devlin had immediately shut her down. He warned her that even though he didn’t know the guy; he knew his friends were all players.
After talking to Devlin, she did what her friends often accused her of; she’d gone milling every single detail of that night over and over in her head. She’d even imagined seeing in his soulful green eyes that he’d been through something so significant, he felt the need to keep his guard up around her.
Ugh. Devlin was probably right about him. But she didn’t get that fuckboy vibe from her mystery man at all. Why couldn’t she just get over him?
Ryleigh’s niece Liv barreled into the kitchen, followed by her mother Jessie.
“Hey, little koala bear. How was it?” Ron asked and wheeled from the table so she could sit on his lap. Because she’d always clung to her grandfather, Ron had nicknamed the six-year-old koala.
Liv beamed and said, “It was so cool, Grandpa. There was a tree house, and I played with a boy.”
Ron arched a brow over Liv’s head and Jessie stroked her daughter’s long blonde hair that matched her own. “Liv made a new friend, didn’t you, sweetheart?”
Jessie eyed Ryleigh for a moment and said, “What’s wrong?”
“I told you this morning, Jess,” their mother said before she joined them at the table.
“You’ll find a new job, Ry. I know you will.”
Ryleigh gave her sister a lackluster smile. “I really need a job soon, sis. I still have some tuition bills left.”
“I wish I could help you with that, Ry.”
“It will be okay, Dad.”
Jessie’s ex Joe was sent to prison after holding Jessie and Liv hostage. With an enormous debt to pay off, Jessie worked two jobs. She did the best she could but often needed help with Liv.
With their father in a wheelchair, their younger sister Billie still in high school and the rest of the family working full time, Ryleigh knew she had to step up and help her sister with Liv so Jessie could go to work.
But by doing so, Ryleigh had missed a lot of classes, which resulted in flunking an entire semester and even dropping out. She already had her doubts about studying Social Work; maybe during this forced break from college she could figure out what to do with her life. Thinking about having no money left for tuition anyway, Ryleigh clonked her forehead on the kitchen table.
Her mother snickered and said, “She’s got that dramatic flair from you, Ron.”
Jessie shoved a white business card over the table and stuck it right under Ryleigh’s nose.
Keenan Mills
Mills Construction Company
Ryleigh tilted her head. “What’s this?”
“You’ve done so much for me—dropping everything to help me out with Liv… maybe this can be my way to help you out for once.”
“You don’t need to—”
Jessie dismissed her objections and said, “I’ve met Keenan at Bree’s house today. He’s her husband Declan’s cousin.”
Jessie wanted to meet up with Bree after finding out they were related. It had actually been Declan and Bree’s sister Caitlin, who got the call as police officers and saved Jessie and Liv from Jessie’s ex.
On that awful day, Caitlin and Jessie discovered their connection. Ryleigh’s uncle Rob had been absent from his family for years on end. Nobody knew where he’d been. Well, now they knew. It devastated Ryleigh’s family when they found out Rob had fathered Bree and her four sisters with another woman.
Ryleigh and her father shared a look before he said, “When we meet our long-lost cousins, you’ll have to help me out with all the names…”
