by Tawna Fenske
“Hey, kiddo, what are you doing up?”
I whip around to see Sean peering down the hallway. In the time it takes for Libby to emerge, I do a fast rewind through the last two minutes of conversation. Pretty sure none of us have said anything too shitty.
Libby trudges sleepily into the room wearing a pair of fuzzy pink pants and a white shirt with cartoon pictures of ducks. Her feet are bare, her hair is rumpled, and she looks so damn adorable my heart gives a painful squeeze.
She does a bleary blink at the table full of men, taking inventory of the strangers before her gaze lands on me. Her face brightens, and she scurries forward, rubbing her eyes.
“I had a dream.” She clambers onto my lap like she belongs there, and my arms go around her by instinct, like they’re thinking the same damn thing.
“A dream, huh?”
She nods, blessedly unworried by the roomful of strange men she’s never seen before. “I was eating clouds because they tasted like cotton candy,” she continues, snuggling against my chest. “And then a dog came and peed on them, and I was sad so I cried, and now I need grape soda.”
Well, shit. I can’t argue with that logic.
Or can I?
“I don’t think you’re supposed to have sugar after bedtime,” I say, pretty sure that’s right. “How about some water?”
“Okay.”
Sean jumps up to go get it, and I nod my thanks as Lib keeps talking. “The bed is really soft, but it would be softer if Long Long Peter slept with me.”
Also, true, and also not a great idea. Maybe my kid instincts aren’t so bad.
“How about another blanket?” I offer. “I’ve got a fuzzy red one my mom gave me when I moved in here. She said everyone who owns a mountain cabin needs a fuzzy blanket.”
“Your mom sounds nice,” she says. “Where’s my mom?”
She sounds more curious than worried, but I keep my voice gentle anyway. “She’s having fun with her friends,” I tell her. “Like I’m having fun with my friends.”
Libby surveys the assembled men, most of whom are studying her like she’s some kind of zoo animal. No, that’s me. They’re looking at me like this is the oddest thing they’ve seen all week.
“Looks good on you,” Jonathan murmurs, meeting my eyes.
Over by the fireplace, James nods. “You’re a natural.”
I try to think of some smartass answer, but I don’t want to get Libby asking questions. She squirms in my lap to look up at me, her hazel eyes nearly melting my heart. “Sing to me?”
“Sing?”
I say it like she’s just asked me to stand up on the table and punch myself in the nuts, and I do my best to backtrack. “Uh, I don’t really know any—”
“Yeah, sing.” Sean grins, getting me back for that bedwetting joke. “What’s that one you taught me that one summer we were out here together?”
Shit, he’s right. There was one summer we wound up visiting Dad at the same time. I was ten, and Sean was maybe eleven, on break from some fancy summer camp. James was there, too, and they both kept yammering on about shit they’d learned at boarding school. I wasn’t jealous, exactly. I just didn’t have much to contribute except some dirty jokes and a few goofy songs I’d learned at school.
“Something about humps,” Sean prompts, and I start to stand so I can punch him.
But Libby claps her hands together and bounces. “Alice the Camel. That’s my favorite song.”
No shit? “Um, wow.” I scrub a hand over my beard. “I’m not sure I remember how—”
“Alice the Camel has—” Lib claps, her small hands smacking together with surprising force. “Ten humps!”
It’s coming back to me now, this silly childhood tune that seems ridiculous now. As a ten-year-old, I probably just liked the excuse to say “hump” without my mom washing my mouth out with soap.
Libby’s still going, and apparently, so is the damned camel.
“…so go, Alice, goooo,” she hoots, really getting into it now. “Alice the camel has—” She stretches up and claps the sides of my face with both hands, shouting the words up into my face. “Nine humps!”
I can’t help it. The kid’s energy is contagious, and so is her joy over this ridiculous song.
“Alice the camel has—” I clap my hands, muscle memory taking me back to the edge of the pond where I taught this to Sean and James so many years ago. They were older than me and laughed their asses off, but I didn’t care. I was so fucking happy to know something they didn’t, even if it was some lame-ass kids’ song.
“—Nine humps.”
A pang of guilt hits me about shouting “hump” in front of a kid, but I think it’s okay in this context. Lib’s having a ball, clapping and singing and smacking her hands in my beard every time she gets to another hump.
The other guys start getting into it, too, whacking their hands on the table and joining the singalong. They’re all wearing dorky grins, and I remember what Brandon said about this being the weirdest guys’ night in history. But he doesn’t seem to mind as he claps and joins the next verse.
“Alice the camel has—” clap! “—six humps.”
Even James loosens his tie and starts nodding his head in time to our tuneless melody. Austin’s taken his phone conversation outside, and I realize I’d forgotten about all of it. The bad guys, the bloodlines, all the reasons I’ve told myself I couldn’t have a wife and family.
In that moment, I almost think I could do it.
“Alice the camel has—” clap! “—no humps, so noooow Alice is a horse!”
All of us finish in a shouted chorus of voices I’m sure they can hear down at the lodge. There’s even a last-second tenor harmony thrown in that I’m pretty sure is James, even though he’s not moving his lips.
When the last note fades, Libby claps her hands together and squeals. “You have to come to my birthday party and sing.”
“Um,” I say, regrouping. “When’s your birthday party?”
“June five,” she reports matter-of-factly.
And just like that, the lump is back in my throat. June fifth. That’s almost three months away.
I’m back in my childhood bedroom, the evening of my eighth birthday. The covers are pulled up to my ears, even though it’s still light outside, and my mother wears a worried look as she comes in to check on me.
“How are you, baby?” She sits on the side of my bed, stroking my hair while I pretend not to cry.
“He said he’d be here,” I sniffle, rubbing my cheek against the soft flannel of my pillowcase. “He said he’d come to my party.”
“I know he did, sweetheart,” she soothes, her voice comforting but not surprised. Not by that point. “Sometimes men are disappointing. Women, too,” she adds quickly as an afterthought, but I know she doesn’t mean it.
Men are the ones who leave people crying. I know that even then.
“My dad promised,” I sniffle, hating myself for crying because I damn sure couldn’t hate him. “Is he not coming because of Joe?”
Joe, that was his name. I’d almost forgotten. My mother’s boyfriend at the time, one of several she had over the years. That was another conversation I’d eavesdropped on, knowing damn well I wasn’t supposed to hear.
“I’m not coming if your damn boyfriend’s going to be there,” my father muttered, pacing in the living room of the small house I shared with my mom.
“That’s your choice, Cort.” My mom was using her calm voice, the one she used with her pre-school students. “But I want you to think very hard about how Mark is going to feel.”
“Think about how I feel,” my father snapped. “How many times do I have to ask you to marry me before you’ll—”
“—ignore my own wishes and give in to yours?” My mom made a tsk sound I recognized from the last time I’d tried to convince her to serve cookies for dinner. “I love you, Cort. I’ll always love you on some level, and I appreciate that you take care of us. But we both know you’ll
never be faithful, and I deserve more than that.”
My father muttered some more choice curses, but even then, I knew my mom was right.
That didn’t make it any easier to have both men—my dad and Joe—fail to show for my party.
I know it’s stupid. I know my fragile, eight-year-old heart should have healed by now, but it wasn’t about the birthday party. It was learning dads could come and go. That mine could vanish in an instant, snatching away everything I believed about my father, about my family, about myself.
Blinking back the memories, I realize Libby’s still looking at me. Her hazel eyes are wide as she waits for an answer.
“Your birthday’s a long ways off,” I tell her, dodging the question like the asshole I am. “A lot can change by then.”
“Not family,” she says. “Family doesn’t change.”
I can’t breathe. I can speak or blink or even swallow. It’s like my whole body is paralyzed, and I don’t know what to do.
It’s Doc Bradley who notices, probably realizing I’m on the brink of some medical meltdown. He stands up and shuffles toward the kitchen, even though it’s the first time he’s set foot in my house. “Who wants more chocolate milk?” he asks.
Libby tears her eyes off me and gives a little squeak of joy. “Yes, please.”
The birthday invitation is forgotten for now, at least by Libby. Not by the asshole who can’t even answer a kid’s innocent question with anything other than bullshit.
“I’ll take some more,” I mumble, nodding my thanks to the doc.
Sean stands up, too, ready to refresh his charcuterie tray, but mostly to escape the awkwardness of the moment. Or maybe that’s my imagination, because he puts a hand on my shoulder and squeezes when he walks past.
I’m still wondering if I should say something to Libby about the birthday thing when Austin walks back into the room. He looks at me, and I can tell something’s wrong. I lift an eyebrow, and he shakes his head. It’s a wordless conversation that translates roughly as “What the fuck?” and “Not now.”
On my lap, Libby yawns. She tries to cover it, but I scoop her into my arms and stand. “Pretty sure you’re supposed to be in bed,” I tell her.
“But my chocolate milk—”
“I’ll bring it to you in just a minute,” I assure her as I carry her down the hall to the guest room.
I start to tap the light switch with my elbow, then notice Chelsea plugged some kind of nightlight thing into the outlet beside the bed. The mom-ness of the gesture is so sweet and thoughtful that my chest fills with the same warm glow pouring from the star-shaped light.
And then I feel like an asshole all over again, because I’d never in a million years think of bringing a nightlight. Or knowing what songs to sing. Or how not to leave a kid crying in six months if things don’t work out between her mom and me.
“There you go,” I tell Libby as I stuff her under the covers and do my best to tuck them up around her face. “Snug as a bug in a rug.”
It’s something my mom used to say to me, and it makes Libby giggle. “Can I have a story?”
“A story?” I fumble though my brain trying to remember one. “Cinderella had this nasty stepmother and evil stepsisters and one day she went to a ball in a pumpkin and lost her shoe but kissed a prince and in the end they got married.”
Libby blinks at me. “That was fast.”
“Yeah.”
“Maybe next time you could use a book?”
Next time? I love this kid’s faith in me. Or in the world at large, as a thing that might not end up disappointing her. “Next time,” I say, wondering if there will be one.
“Good night, Mark.” She stretches her arms up straight, and for a second, I’m not sure what that’s about.
A hug, dumbass.
I lean down to embrace her, breathing in the sweet scent of strawberry shampoo. God, what I wouldn’t do to deserve the kind of unconditional affection this kid doles out like it’s free. Like it’s not the riskiest, scariest thing in the whole damn world.
“Good night.” I breathe the words like a prayer, feeling her go slack in my arms like she’s already drifting off to sleep.
When I draw back, her eyelids flutter closed like they’re weighted by sandbags, and she sinks into that kind of heavy, effortless slumber you can only enjoy when you’re six.
“Sweet dreams,” I whisper, wishing it was really that simple.
Chapter 13
CHELSEA
Bree insists on walking me back to the cabin, even though I see no fewer than three security guards lining the well-lit pathway from the spa to Mark’s place. I wonder if her choice to tag along has something to do with the text she got while we were finishing up our pedicures.
“God, this feels amazing.” Bree rolls her head around on her neck, sighing with pleasure. “I don’t know why I don’t do the massage thing more often.”
“It is pretty nice,” I agree, breathing in huge lungfuls of fresh spring air. The night is crisp and fragrant, with a thick perfume of bitterbrush filling the air. A nighthawk swoops past, chirping its warning to stay the hell away from its babies. I can relate.
“Before I forget, Mark’s birthday is Wednesday,” she says.
“Really?” A ripple of embarrassment moves through me. Shouldn’t a woman know the birthdate of a guy she’s been intimate with? “He never mentioned it.”
“Of course he didn’t,” Bree says, dodging sideways to avoid the spray of a sprinkler. “I’m only telling you because I knew he wouldn’t, and I didn’t want you to feel awkward when people start showing up to surprise him.”
“People?” I glance at Bree, wondering just how many people we’re talking about.
“Okay, don’t tell, but we’re planning a big surprise party,” she says. “His mom’s coming over from Portland, and we’ve hired a bluegrass band to play, and Sean’s got this menu of all his favorite foods. It’s going to be tons of fun, and I hope you can be there.”
Wow. The Bracelyns go all out for birthdays. “Is it a milestone birthday or something?”
She looks at me oddly, and I feel like a total dumbass.
“He’s turning thirty,” she says. “I guess guys don’t make a big deal of it the way women do. He probably thinks we’ve all forgotten. Knowing him, he wouldn’t care at all.”
“Yes, he would.” The words slip out before I can stop them, and I’m as surprised as Bree. “He cares about you guys a lot more than he lets on. Family—it’s really important to him.”
She studies me for a moment, green eyes missing nothing. “You know, you’re right,” she says. “I take it for granted sometimes that we’ve settled into this ready-made family and started a business together. It’s different for Mark than it is for me or Sean or James or the rest of us.”
“How do you mean?”
Bree doesn’t answer right away, and I appreciate that she’s choosing her words carefully. “He grew up really close to his mom,” she says. “The rest of us were packed off to boarding schools and were lucky if we saw our families on holidays. But Mark—he and his mom were tight. Did he tell you he saved her life?”
“What? No!” Should I know this already?
Bree shakes her head, murmuring softly to herself. “I’m not surprised. He’s modest. There was a house fire. He came home to find the whole place up in flames. Ran inside and grabbed his mother, who’d already passed out from smoke inhalation—”
“Jesus.”
“He was sixteen.” Bree says nothing for a moment, letting that sink in. “His birthday, actually. He was coming home from school and—well, I actually don’t know all the details.”
And I knew none of them. Not a single one. “Sounds pretty scary.”
Bree keeps walking, her eyes on the path in front of us. “He’s never said a word about it to any of us. The only reason I know is that Dad told me. He changed the date of my visit that year because Mark had to stay in the hospital. I guess he got a pretty bad bur
n on his chest.”
“That’s what that’s from?”
Bree stops walking and cocks her head at me. “Seen him shirtless, have you?”
Busted.
Wait, no. “We were at the pool together all afternoon.”
“Sure, that’s it.” Bree smirks.
I turn my eyes back on the path ahead, grateful to the darkness for masking my flaming face. “We haven’t slept together, if that’s what you’re thinking.”
“I wasn’t, but thanks for volunteering the info.” She starts walking again. “Not that you need my approval, but you have it. If you’re wondering if the family is cool with Mark dating you, the answer is a resounding ‘hell yes.’”
“Great.” My breath comes out in an unladylike snort. “Now we just need his approval.”
“You think you don’t have it?”
“I’m not sure.” We’re almost to the cabin now, and I slow my pace, not ready to end this conversation. “He’s holding back. I don’t know what it is exactly, but it makes me paranoid.”
“Spoken like a woman who’s been lied to before.”
“Yep.” I bite my lip. “Not that I think he’s lying, exactly. Just—I don’t know. Hiding something, maybe?”
“It’s possible,” Bree muses. “Bracelyns aren’t known for being open and forthright.” She glances at me, green eyes sparking with curiosity. “Any suspicions what it might be?”
I’m trying not to feel depressed by this conversation. Part of me wishes Bree were falling all over herself insisting her brother is a wide-open book. That he couldn’t possibly be shutting me out.
But we both know that’s not the case. “Maybe there’s nothing,” I say. “But I can’t help thinking he’s got some sort of hang-up about family.”
Bree laughs and slings an arm around me. “You’ve met our family,” she says. “It would be a shocker if any of us didn’t have hang-ups related to that.”
Her arm stays looped around my shoulders as we make our way up the steps. That’s when I notice Austin’s truck is still parked out front.
Bree doesn’t knock. Just walks right in, which is either a courtesy to Libby sleeping or a sign that she’s nosy as hell. Either way, I follow her inside, listening for the sound of male voices.