“Look, babe,” Holt says, spreading his hands with the devil’s own grin. “Your dad was an even bigger player than me in his day.”
“I was not a damn player!” I protest.
Holt turns a sly look on me. “How many high school girlfriends did you have?”
My eyes widen. I recoil. “I, uh...can’t remember. Long-ass time ago. Why’s it matter?”
“You mean you lost count.” He smirks. “I didn’t. I was jealous. The answer is sixteen, by the way. The freshmen used to say you’d get a new girl every season.”
Holy crap.
I’m dying.
And Andrea just laughs herself red in the face, a little hyena slumping back in her seat and covering her mouth with one hand, watching me over her fingers. “You’re such a hypocrite, Dad.”
But she’s not saying it with any malice, just giving me a dig, and I accept it with a reluctant grunt.
“Eat your food, Andrea,” I growl.
“’Kay. But you puff up like a porcupine if I even think about a guy, and you were like, sleeping with everyone in high school.”
“Yo!” Oh fuck, people are gonna stare at us if I get any more flustered. Or loud. “No one ever said I slept with all of them, and I don’t need that kind of talk coming out of your mouth. I’m your old man.”
Andrea just sticks her tongue out merrily.
Damn.
She’s got me by the tail and she knows it. She’s enjoying being the one to embarrass her stupid dad for once.
Bah.
I still want to power-kick Holt under the table when he catches my eye and winks.
Whatever. So besides dying of mortification, it ain’t going half bad for a family dinner.
Still doesn’t mean I’m just gonna sweep the past under the rug.
Especially after another half hour or so of giving me shit and tag-teaming me while I bury myself in my burger. Time to say goodnight.
Andrea’s got school tomorrow, and I should probably drop by the radio station tonight. Mario, my right-hand man, can only fill in for so long. He just doesn’t have the same knack for it as me. And Rex Natchez, station owner, said listener numbers have been way down since I got so busy.
I really ain’t sure why people tune in the way they do.
Still, it’s nice to feel like I’m doing something useful, even if it’s just giving folks a good old laugh at the end of a long day.
I’m not laughing, though, when we signal for the check and Holt takes the billfold from the waitress without even letting me look at it. Bastard’s already pulling a pretty nice-looking leather wallet from his pocket, fishing out his metallic credit card.
“Hey,” I growl. “Lemme see what our share is.”
Holt waves before slipping his card into the billfold and passing it back to the waitress. “It’s on me. It’s the least I can do to thank you for humoring me.”
I swear to God, the entire room flashes red.
From the table, to the dim overhead lights, to the sly gleam of my brother’s eyes.
I’m going to fucking kill him.
Thrusting back from the table, and if it hadn’t been a booth I’d probably have knocked both the seat and the table over, I stand.
“No,” I snarl, even if I’m so pissed I can’t even articulate what I’m saying no to just yet.
He stares at me. So does Andrea. Holt looks confused and stricken, while Andrea just looks horrified.
Dad’s embarrassing her again, I guess.
But I can’t hold it in.
I can’t let him pull this.
“I told you,” I bite off, “I don’t want your money. Not one dime. No matter how you want to sneak it in. Fuck you, and fuck Ma’s cash.”
Holt’s face actually crumples. “Blake, it wasn’t about that—”
“I don’t care!” I roar—then make myself drop my voice.
People are staring now.
I am being an asshole, shaming Andrea and myself like this.
I need to get out of here before I fully lose my spaghetti.
“Andrea, come on,” I snap, pulling a couple crisp bills and throwing them on the table. “We’re gone. Your uncle wants to pay, he can finish off his portion.”
Andrea just gives me the most horrified look ever, then thrusts to her feet and sweeps toward the door, practically running, leaving me behind.
Leaving just me and Holt staring at each other, the air practically vibrating between us.
“So,” he asks softly. “How long you gonna hate me?”
It’s slipping. That slick-dick city accent he puts on. The country boy’s coming out the longer he stays in Heart’s Edge.
That just makes me want to punch him in his smug face even more.
“As long as I need to,” I retort.
Then I turn and stomp out before he gets the last word.
Whatever his stories are, I don’t want to hear them.
He says I was a player in high school, and maybe there’s a shred of truth, but Holt’s always been a different kind of player. I got past my teenage sins and grew up.
Holt, he’ll say anything to get what he wants.
I just don’t have to listen.
Andrea’s already in the Jeep by the time I push the swinging door open and leave it slamming closed behind me in a jingle of the overhead bell.
She’s tucked in the passenger seat, scrunching herself in the door like she’s trying to seat herself as far away from the driver’s seat as possible.
And when I crunch through the fresh-fallen snow, she goes stiff—only to turn her face away and glare out the window as I let myself inside and settle behind the wheel.
I sit there for several long, helpless moments, sighing and just staring through the windshield.
Doesn’t help that I can still see Holt inside the diner, just sitting back against the seat with this hangdog look on his face.
I don’t want to see it.
“Listen,” I try. “I’m sorry. Me and Holt...we got bad blood. Bad history.”
“Must be nice,” she snaps, though it’s a sort of sullen mumble, talking more to the window than to me. “Having someone to have history with. Thanks to you, I don’t have anyone. No brothers. No sisters. No uncle. No grandma. No mom.”
Shit.
That one stings like a screaming slap to the face.
Not nearly as much as when she finishes, “All I have is you.”
I close my eyes, curling my hands tight against the wheel, wishing I could squeeze the pain out of me through my hands and soak it into the leather.
Part of me gets it.
She’s sixteen.
She’s mad.
She’s smart as fuck and just as emotional, but she doesn’t have the maturity to know the way she can cut people deep with words. She just knows she’s hurting, and that makes her lash out to hurt someone else, like she can punish me for making everything so messy.
Maybe she should.
I sigh again, opening my eyes and starting the engine.
“Maybe I’m being a little hard on him,” I admit.
She doesn’t answer, won’t even look at me.
“We’ll try again some other time, Violet,” I tell her.
“Don’t call me that,” she mumbles, but it’s softer, less furious.
Fine. That’s something.