that I was taller. That he didn’t have the ability to have that tiny advantage over me. Once upon a time, I had liked how jacked he was.
But that had been once upon a time.
And I remembered now that I had never been crazy about fairy tales in the first place.
And even with those thoughts, I still wasn’t prepared for all that size and mass focused solely on me as he said in a voice that had lost all traces of uncertainty and choking emotion, “I didn’t mean to leave like that. I swear. I didn’t know.”
I didn’t say a word. I wasn’t going to brush this off and make it seem like him leaving or not knowing was not a big deal. But I didn’t need to bring it up every three seconds either, I realized. You didn’t help an injury by aggravating it constantly. And it wasn’t like I was ever going to forget what happened.
Maybe he knew that… maybe he knew it was the best thing to let me keep my silence… because he opened the door then and stepped out. It wasn’t until he turned around and reached inside to grab the handle while I stood there that he said it again, “I’m not leaving, Lenny.”
I wasn’t holding my breath, and I was pretty sure he knew that.
Chapter 8
“You are genuinely pissing me off now. I made it back to Houston, not that you give a shit, but I still need to talk to you. (pause) It’s Lenny.”
I woke up the way I hated the most: jolting myself awake.
One minute, I’d been totally out, and the next second, bam! I was wide awake, staring straight up at the ceiling and listening.
Based on how much sun was coming in through the windows, it had to be at least nine in the morning. Three hours later than I usually woke up. Well, it was more accurate to say it was three hours later than General Mo, the Hungriest Baby in the World, woke me up to feed her. Rolling my head to the side, I peeked at the baby monitor that lived on my nightstand, even though I didn’t need it. Mo might not cry often, but when she was hungry, she was hangry.
She got it from me.
There was no ignoring her or mistaking her usual kitten cries for you better feed me now, lady.
But the baby monitor wasn’t on the nightstand where I knew without a doubt I had left it. That in itself wasn’t weird. Peter and my gramps would creep into my room while I was sleeping to take it sometimes. I never slept with my door closed anymore. Neither did they, at least not all night.
It didn’t take me long to go to the bathroom, do my business, and then drag myself down the stairs, passing by the empty bedrooms in the pajama shirt I had been able to start wearing again since Mo wasn’t breastfeeding anymore and I didn’t have to whip out a boob on call. As comfortable as nursing bras were, I’d been wearing sports bras for so long that nothing else compared to the comfort they brought me. I’d missed them. It wasn’t until I reached the bottom of the stairs with a giant yawn that I knew something was different.
There were noises coming from the living room, which on Sunday was totally normal. Sunday breakfast was the only time we all managed to eat together in the morning. Peter was usually at Maio House by six, and Grandpa tried to sleep in while I got Mo ready for the day and spent some solo time with her. He usually didn’t crawl out of his coffin until after seven.
But it was the familiar but unfamiliar voice I could hear speaking in the living room that had me pausing.
I didn’t have to look at my phone to know it was nine-fifteen in the morning, and I didn’t need a DNA test to know the voice I could hear belonged to the fuckface.
What the hell was he doing here?
We’d agreed to lunch, but I figured that would be around noon.
Four steps later, I stopped at the edge of the wide opening that led into the living room and peeked.
On the floor, two brown-haired men, one with more salt than pepper in it and the other with a fade cut, were kneeling, surrounding a baby kicking two chubby bare legs in the air but also somehow trying to roll over at the same