Prodigal Son: A Sexy Single Dad Romance: Book 2 in the Marked Men 2nd Generation Series (The Forever Marked Series)

by Jay Crownover

  It was a bold declaration, but I wanted to put his mind at ease. If I started to slip back into a dark and dangerous place, I knew I needed to ask for help, no matter how hard it seemed. I was much better at listening to my body, mind, the professionals who helped me, and the people who loved me than when I was a teenager. I no longer thought I always knew what was best… just most of the time. I was willing to take advice and put the work in on myself because I understood that I deserved it. I was worth the time and effort it took to build the best version of me.

  My brother grunted a sound that didn’t sound like an agreement and finally climbed to his feet. Apparently, he was done talking about the stability of my unpredictable emotional state because he tactfully changed the subject. He looked down at the fancy, neon motorcycle and quietly told me, “I’m thinking about trying to go pro; about racing for a professional team. I met a guy at the last race who has contacts out in California. I know Mom will flip out if I mention it, but it’s been on my mind a lot lately. I could still crash and it’s still dangerous, but it wouldn’t be as sketchy as street racing.”

  I whistled and pushed off the bench I was leaning against. I wasn’t totally surprised. Zowen had always liked things that went fast and were alarmingly dangerous. He used to race down hills on a BMX bike and speed down mountains on a snowboard when we were growing up. He was always chasing the next thrill, pushing himself to go faster and to take bigger risks. But because we understood each other so well, I had serious doubts it was the allure of a legal race that was tempting him toward the West Coast.

  My eyebrows lifted as he purposely avoided my gaze and moved to put the rest of his tools away. I couldn’t help but tease him when I asked, “Are you sure you’re going to race and not to see Aston Wheeler?”

  My brother’s big body jolted, and his odd eyes finally locked on me. He’d been successful at hiding how he felt about his best friend’s—who also happened to be our cousin’s—girlfriend for a long time. However, I was intimately acquainted with unrequited love, so I knew how Zowen felt even before he was willing to admit it to himself. Ever since Ry’s ex had moved to California to attend college, I’d noticed that my brother was keeping in touch with her. He talked to her more now than when they were at the same high school together. And he confided in me for the first time in his entire academic career that his grades were starting to slip. For Zowen, it meant his marks were just average rather than outstanding, but it was a noticeable change, which meant something major was up with him.

  He grunted and scowled at me. “I probably won’t go anyway. I’d have to take time off school, and Mom and Dad would freak out.”

  I didn’t miss that he purposely avoided answering my question. I lifted up on my toes so I could grab his gloomy face between my hands. I squeezed his cheeks together until he made duck lips and shook his head back and forth in a playful manner.

  “You can’t live your life for Mom and Dad, or for Ry. If you tell them how you feel, about racing and about the girl, they’ll try to understand you. Especially Ry. He and Aston broke up. He’s moved on.”

  I grinned up at him and pointed out, “He’s with Bowe now. They’re happy together. He would want the same thing for you, even if it’s with someone he used to care about. Ry’s not the type of guy who obsesses over what might’ve been.” He couldn’t be, or he’d never be able to move on from the injury that ended his promising football career. And if he responded any other way than with his full support for my brother, I would kick his ass from Texas all the way back to Colorado. I loved my family, but Bowe was my bestie; she was the one who understood me the most and had never changed how she viewed me, even after the tragic incident I barely survived. I wouldn’t stand by and watch her get hurt if my cousin still had any lingering feelings for his former flame. Not that Ry ever showed any indication of being anything but head over heels for Bowe. “If you want to race, go race. If you want the girl named after an expensive car, go get her. Life is too short to do what others want you to do.”

  Zowen pulled free and shook his head, but he gave me a grin in the process. “That’s easy for you to say. You’ve never done what anyone else wants you to do. You’ve always gone your own way.”

  It was true. I definitely carved my own path over the years and made a lot of noise while doing it, but the walk was admittedly a long and lonely one. Refusing to adhere to anyone else’s standards or expectations meant I often left a trail of disappointment behind me. I could never be what others wanted me to be, no matter how hard I tried. If I could, I would’ve transformed myself into the type of girl Hyde wanted to be with all those years ago and saved myself a lot of heartache. For better or worse, I was unrepentantly true to myself, even when it got me into trouble.

  The door to the garage opened just as Zowen was putting the last of his tools away. I thought it would be my mom checking up on us or harassing us to come inside for dinner since both her kids were in the same place at the same time for once. Zowen was home for a long weekend from school, mostly to use the garage and badger Mom to do his mountains of laundry. I’d stopped by to see him since he’d been busy with school almost from the moment I’d moved back to Denver. There hadn’t been a lot of one-on-one time because I was working, so the weekends, when he was home, were really the only time to connect. It was still uncomfortable for me to be around my mom after finding out the part she played in blowing up my young love. I almost let out a sigh of relief when my dad was the one who walked through the door instead of her. He didn’t miss the way my face relaxed when I realized it was him instead of my mother making her way toward us.

  He gave me a hard look out of icy blue eyes, but didn’t berate me for still being upset and standoffish toward my mom, even though it’d been years. The only reason he ratted her out was because there had been a Christmas not long after the incident where I was really struggling. I’d just switched my medication and wasn’t adjusted fully, so I was depressed and caught up in my feelings when everything around me was lit up bright and cheery. I was thinking about all the holidays my father had to miss with his family when he was younger and enlisted, which led me to wonder how Hyde was doing now that he was in the military, so far away and removed from his loved ones. His family was just as close-knit as mine. I felt bad he’d left his family, and I blamed myself and my actions for sending him running, not just from me, but his whole life in Denver.

  My dad panicked, worried I was going to spiral again, and in his desperation to pull me out of the dreary and dangerous thoughts, he let me know part of the reason Hyde left was because my mom begged him to. He hadn’t pushed me once to reconcile after spilling the beans about the conversation he overheard the night I was in the hospital. Initially, I was angry at him, too, for keeping something so big from me for so long. I wanted to run away from both my parents and never see them again. I was convinced they were conspiring against me and trying to ruin my life, so I had to leave, and didn’t plan to look back. Eventually, with the right meds and even more therapy, I realized the only person who was responsible for Hyde slipping away in the middle of the night, like some kind of criminal, was Hyde. I understood my parents were just trying to protect me. It was easier for me to forgive my father because he only kept an important piece of information from me. My mom was a different story. She actively interfered in my life, which I’d always hated more than anything. Even if it was for my own good.

  “I thought I saw your car out front. I didn’t know you were coming by.” My dad wrapped me in a one-armed hug that felt more like coming home than when I signed a lease for a loft in LoDo. Even though he was starting to go gray at the temples, had a few wrinkles on his forehead and around his bright blue eyes, and had lost a little of the impressive muscle definition from his time as a soldier, my dad was still the most handsome man in the world to me. His strength and careful way of observing everyone and everything around him was always my biggest comfort. He was a security blanket and guard dog all wrapped up in one. The
safest place I’d ever been was inside one of his hugs, even when I was mad at him.

  I wrapped my arms around his trim waist and hugged him back. “I was helping Zowen with his bike.”

  Zowen snorted and narrowed his eyes as he sarcastically taunted, “Helping? She doesn’t know a socket wrench from a screwdriver.”

  My dad chuckled as I kicked out a foot and caught Zowen in the shin. I snapped back the same way I’d done since we were kids, “Fine. I came to see Zowen because I was bored and had no one else to hang out with now that Bowe moved back to Austin.”

  My dad dropped a kiss on the crown of my head and gave me a squeeze. “Since you’re here, how about you stay for dinner? That would make your mom really happy.”

  I stiffened automatically but didn’t outright refuse the way I would in the past. I knew my dad felt bad for being the one who let the truth out, thus causing the rift between my mom and me, so he’d been on a mission ever since to bring us all back together as a family. There was a good chance I would’ve let my fury at her deception overtake everything forever if my cousins, Ry and Daire, hadn’t nearly died in a horrifying traffic accident recently. Watching my aunt and uncle fall apart, barely able to function, while my parents held them together was a stark reminder that family was forever, no matter their faults, and forgiveness was much more powerful than anger would ever be. I took it as a sign of maturity and mental stability that I was willing to see the other side of the coin, rather than focusing on all the hurt I still carried from her choice to try and save me from myself.

  If only she hadn’t had to sacrifice Hyde in the process.

  My brother caught my eye and mouthed the word ‘stay.’ He was as eager as my father was for all the broken fences in our family to mend.

  I heaved a heavy sigh and reluctantly agreed to stay for dinner. My dad’s smile was worth the uneasy hour or so I knew was bound to follow.

  As we were making our way from the large, detached garage through the backyard, my dad tugged on my elbow and pulled me to a stop, while Zowen went ahead into the house where we’d grown up.

  I thought he was going to warn me to play nice with my mom because we both had big personalities and were stubborn as hell, so when we clashed it wasn’t fun for anyone in the vicinity. I was taken aback when he, instead, told me in an eerily similar way to Zowen, “I don’t want you to be blindsided if your mom seems extra worried about you tonight. I met with Zeb Fuller the other day to work on one of the buildings we’re renovating, and he mentioned his son is moving back to town. Your mom knows, so she’s likely to be more concerned about your well-being than normal. It’s just the way she is.”

  I blinked at him for a minute before clearing my throat so I could sound self-assured when I spoke, since I wasn’t really feeling that way. Zowen’s worry and my dad’s concern I could deal with in small doses; my mom’s overprotective tendencies tended to be suffocating and overwhelming.

  “I know. I saw Joss the other day, and she told me he was coming home. It’s okay, Dad. I know he’s with someone now and we’re not kids anymore. I’m fine. I can handle being in the same city as him without causing another catastrophe.”

  My dad shook his head slowly and reached out to put his big hands on my shoulders. “He was planning on getting engaged, but he’s not anymore…”

  He trailed off, so I interrupted. “It doesn’t matter. Whatever is going on in Hyde’s life has nothing to do with me.”

  My dad’s expression shifted, and his voice dropped a tone. His icy eyes were even cooler than normal as he told me, “Remy, the reason Hyde’s not making those plans any longer is because the girl he was seeing died a couple months ago. She was killed in a car crash.”

  I sucked in a breath and felt my body go numb. “That’s terrible.” The words escaped on a breathless whisper before I could stifle them.

  My dad squeezed my shoulder and pinned me with his intense gaze. “The girl was pregnant when the accident happened. Hyde’s coming home because he has a newborn baby girl he doesn’t know how to handle. The baby has been in a NICU unit on base in Georgia for the last couple of months. I had no clue the reason Zeb has been so hard to get ahold of and has been handing so many of his projects down to his foremen is because he’s been going back and forth to help Hyde out. Their family has been going through a lot, and I felt like you should hear about it from someone who understands your history with Hyde, rather than be caught unaware if you hear about his child when he returns.”

  “I...” I honestly didn’t know what to say after I started speaking, so I went with the refrain I’d forced myself to repeat lately. “It’s going to be fine. Hearing that hasn’t changed my mind. His life still has nothing to do with me. It sucks he’s going through so much and lost so much, but there’s absolutely nothing I can do to help him.” Even if I wanted to. I was as clueless as he apparently was when it came to babies. And he’d made it pretty clear ages ago that there was no place in his life for me. I gave myself a mental shake and told myself to get it together. I still had to get through dinner. I wasn’t going to let myself get caught up in obsessing over how badly Hyde must be hurting, and how desperate and scared he must be if he was finally returning home when nothing else had managed to bring him back. “Let’s go inside. You have to promise to play referee if Mom starts acting up.”

  He agreed, and his gaze softened slightly, but he didn’t look like he bought my thin veneer of composure one bit. I couldn’t blame him.

  Neither did I.

  Hyde

  THERE WERE MANY times in my life when I’d felt helpless and useless.

  There was the night I left Remy in that hospital bed without a backward glance.

  There was the day my mom broke down in tears when I told her I was going to enlist, and she pleaded with me not to go.

  There were the first few weeks of boot camp when I was overwhelmed and absolutely positive I made the wrong choice.

  There was my first deployment, my first birthday, and the first major holiday away from my family on foreign soil.

  There was a time when my dad suddenly started having chest pains and was rushed to the hospital in the middle of the night. My mom was convinced he was having a heart attack, but I hadn’t heard anything until he was already home and recuperating after having a stent placed due to a blocked artery. He could’ve died, and I would’ve been none the wiser. My mom would have suffered the loss and heartbreak all on her own.

  There was the night the girl I’d been seeing, the daughter of a commanding officer, informed me she was pregnant right when I was on the verge of breaking up with her. While I’d been away for training, she’d taken comfort in the arms of a friend while I was gone. She wasn’t sure if the baby was mine or his, and she was more worried about her family finding out about the pregnancy than about how I would react to being cheated on.

  I couldn’t do anything in any of those situations to make myself or anyone else feel better. I protected no one and didn’t make one single thing better.

  Recently, the biggest moment where I’d felt like I was doomed to keep getting railroaded by life, rather than actively living it to the fullest, was the heart-stopping moment when the higher-ups pulled me away from my assignment to inform me there’d been an accident involving my ex and the unborn baby. When I heard there was a chance to save the baby—that very well might not be mine—but not the mother, I forgot how to breathe. I nearly buckled under the weight of fear and frustration. I knew instantly that I couldn’t make any major medical decisions on behalf of the child until I proved she was mine. I’d never been as helpless as I was at that moment.

  I lost a girl whom I no longer loved but still cared about deeply. I lost a friend and fellow soldier whom I thought I could trust until his betrayal. I nearly lost my baby. She was mine in my heart already, regardless of what any test would reveal.

  For several tense and precarious weeks, I had to stand in solidarity with the man who’d been sleeping with my girl behind my
back each and every time I was out of town. I was pretty sure that the only reason they came clean was because I’d finally decided not to re-up and was on the verge of getting out of the service and returning to civilian life. I had hoped that once I was home more, I could salvage my relationship with her. For once, I wanted something I’d invested a lot of time and effort into to work out. I wasn’t sure we’d ever had a lifetime kind of love, but she was a good girl who was easygoing and never asked too much of me. I liked her more than most and enjoyed coming home to her when I got the chance. Little did I know that my girl was well on her way to moving on without me. Since she came from a military family; she was looking to hook herself to a career military man, which was not me. I never planned to give my entire life to the service. It was a choice I’d made when I felt cornered and saw no other way out. Sure, I appreciated how the Army forced me to grow and taught me more about myself than anything else ever would, but I was not looking for a future of taking orders and constantly moving around.

  My unfaithful girlfriend really couldn’t say who the baby’s father was, but she planned to find out for sure once the little girl was born. Unfortunately, time ran out for all of us to wait and see. I decided to do whatever was in the baby’s best interest and put aside any grievances I had for my former friend as the neonatologist tried to keep the little girl, who was alarmingly premature and suffering from injuries due to the severity of the car accident, alive. I repeatedly heard that everything that could be done to save her was being done, but there was always an undertone that warned I shouldn’t get my hopes up.