Ethan glares at me and starts waving his hands. I think he’s trying to tell me to stop it. I flip the finger and turn around.
“Make sure it has a pool,” she requests.
“Pool,” I say. “Noted. Anything else?”
“No, as long as it’s big and I can hire someone to clean up for me.”
“Clean up,” I repeat. “We can find something fitting just for you.”
“I want some options. Also, make sure you—”
I hang up the phone before she finishes the sentence.
“Why did you do that?” he asks, disconnecting the phone.
I guess Mrs. Bitch won’t be able to call him back.
I shrug. “We can send her to a retirement home in Alabama where they have a pool and people who clean up after her. At least once she’s there, you’ll know someone will be watching her when she’s old.”
He stares at the phone. “You don’t believe that we’ll fix our differences, do you?”
“Me and you?”
He scoffs. “My mother and me.”
An ache starts in the center of my chest, spreading like wildfire. It has nothing to do with me and a lot to do with Ethan, who still hopes that his mother will accept him one day.
Not only accept him but love him. The woman I just spoke to seemed more interested in a piece of real estate than the well-being of her son. Unlike her son, who only wants the only family he thinks he has to love him.
“I hope you can, but if not, you need to think about her future.”
The disappointed look that passes over his face makes my heart ache. “Family counseling might be the answer,” I add.
He shakes his head and asks, “What do you want to eat?”
And there he goes to push away the pain and the conversation. If I had more energy, we’d hash this subject out until he had a solution. I’m not going to give it to him, but I’m sure he can come up with something.
I sigh. It’s not disappointment. Though, this feels like a setback. He doesn’t want to confront her. How will he find happiness if he’s going to be tied to that woman for the rest of his life?
“Why is life so complicated?”
“That’s not what I asked you,” Ethan growls, like a wounded animal.
It wasn't. However, if I answer, I’m making a commitment I don’t think I want to make. He’s going to expect me to stay for lunch. I’m gathering some courage to run away from here.
“Did I tell you I went to the doctor?” Okay, maybe that’s not the right subject.
“Are you okay?” His concerned gaze matches the tone of his voice.
“I needed to know if I was going to die of cancer, like Mom.”
He grabs onto the back of the leather couch, swallows hard, and asks, “What did they say?”
“I left the room before they drew my blood,” I answer. “What’s the point of knowing if you are going to die of cancer? I’m going to die anyway. My life is a contradiction. One moment I remind myself to take everything one day at a time, and the next, I’m wondering how long I am going to live or if I’ll have a family of my own.”
His voice brightens even when the grimace on his face remains. “Are you afraid that if you have children and you die…?”
I nod.
“They’ll have me,” he answers immediately. “You’ll live a long life, but if not, they have us. Tuck and Nana will look after them too.”
“Mom’s friend was supposed to take care of me and look at what happened.”
“What happened?” he asks.
I raise an eyebrow, confused. Didn’t he listen to the story of my fucked up childhood?
“There has to be something more than her just not doing it,” he responds to my silent question of, what the fuck are you talking about? “If you want, I can get a P.I. to investigate her whereabouts. She might be able to give you an explanation.”
“See, that’s one of the million questions I ask myself. Why was I not enough?”
He shakes his head. “But see, it’s not you. It’s the people around you who aren’t smart enough. They let you go. Just look at me. I loved you so much, but I lived terrified, in denial, and in hiding. It wasn’t you. You were plenty.”
Why does he have to go and say things like that? I love you. I want to take care of you. You were enough for me.
I hate when he says what I want to hear, but it’s also something I can’t handle. There are already too many emotions flooding my brain.
Yet, I want to hear his voice and anything he has to say. This moment and our conversation feel weird and natural.
This is how we used to communicate when we were alone. Well, with a lot more reservations and secrets between us. Now it’s all raw, and there’s pain and hurt between us.
Still, being here with him feels right. It makes me want to take a break from life and offer to be his temporary friend with benefits. That’s more feasible than… Fuck, I should get out of here.
This isn’t the first time I’ve fantasized about a future with him.
But I know how that ends, don’t I?
“Killion, I don’t need you to tell me that I was plenty. Not right now.”
The way he narrows his gaze and his back tenses don’t match the easy way the next word comes out of his mouth. “Why?”
“Because I want to kiss you so bad, I might do it, and we know that as part of my recovery, I can’t have sex.”
He moves his shoulders back. The tightness of his body loosens slightly. “A kiss isn’t sex.”
“With you, I’m pretty sure it’ll become a fuck fest,” I say in a teasing voice, just to keep things light. “I’m so fucking horny. I haven’t had sex in years.”
In case he didn’t hear well, I repeat, “Did you hear? Years.”
“Right, and you have this pact with Tucker that you won’t sleep with anyone until you’re in love.” He sounds disappointed, and I’m guessing it’s not because we can’t have sex but because Tucker and I have something and he’s not a part of it.
“We almost made a pact to marry each other if we didn’t find anyone by the age of eighty.” I wink at him. “You can always sweep me off my feet before I turn seventy-nine.”
He gives me a stop-fucking-with-me look and asks, “What do you want to do?”
“Sand some wood, bang my drums…” Fuck you. Of course, I don’t say the last one out loud.
“I’ll get the helicopter ready.” He brings his phone back to life and starts sliding his fingers across the screen and typing. “We can go to the studio right now.”
“What happened to lunch?”
“I’ll order tacos,” he offers.
Sometimes he’s so fucking perfect. “Thank you.”
“For?” he asks, not moving his attention from his phone.
“Being here for me.”
“You’d do the same,” he answers. When his gaze lifts, he winks at me.
Did he just fucking wink? This man has to stop surprising me—and flirting with me. He doesn’t flirt.
“Are we good?” he asks.
“Better than a few years back,” I respond. It’s not what he asked, but I feel like it needs to be said. “Not as great as we’re going to be tomorrow.”