stared at the girl on the TV screen. She had flawless bronze skin, long dark locks, and a smile that would be visible from space. She giggled nervously at something the prince said.
“When did his drinking get bad?”
I never talked to anyone about Pop’s drinking, other than to tell bar owners to cut him off. Otherwise, people told me all their opinions about Pop and his drinking. Normally I wouldn’t answer, but the tone of Dawson’s question was neutral. “It was always bad. But alcoholics can go in spurts. He’d try to clean up, try to get on top of it, but he never got professional help. The idea of showing up at an AA meeting where people knew him was terrifying.”
“He could’ve gone out of town.”
“That much effort, more than dropping in on a quick meeting in town? It would’ve meant admitting he had a problem.” I ran my lower lip between my teeth. It was freeing to talk about Pop, and I couldn’t believe I was telling Dawson, yet I couldn’t help but feel that he needed to hear it the most. Him and his brothers. The ones Pop had hurt the most. “Then he got sick and the bills piled up higher. What do you do when the thing that hurts you the most is the only thing that makes you feel better?”
I kept my attention on the show, but Dawson’s gaze burned into me. I was exposed. Raw. Telling Pop’s secrets was safer than divulging my own. Like confessing that I was terrified every day that my life would swallow me whole and spit me out—and there’d be no one to find me.
“That’s deep, Cartwright.”
I scowled and flung a throw pillow at him.
He chuckled and plucked it out of the air. “All kidding aside, that sucks. About your dad. For all his faults, I know he really had a thing for Mama.”
Pop had clung to the scorned-lover role like he was on a life raft going over a waterfall. He’d never dated Sarah King. Before he’d ever gotten the nerve to ask out the girl he’d grown up with but whose parents his had fallen out with, Gentry King had swooped in. She’d gotten pregnant and the rest was King’s Creek’s proud history.
Had it not been for those damn mineral rights, Pop probably would’ve asked Sarah out and who knew what life would be like? My mom might’ve met a man who loved and respected her. Instead, she’d been removed from my life as thoroughly as a ruptured appendix.
“Well,” I said, not wanting to let the lighter tone of our conversation die, “your dad had to do something while waiting a couple decades for his new wife to be born, so . . .”
“Bristol Cartwright, did you just diss my dad and his much-younger wife?”
I chuckled. Gentry’s wife had been nothing but nice to me. All the King wives were awesome to me, but then none of them were from around here. “How is Kendall?” I kept my voice light, like I wasn’t invested in the answer. But it wasn’t often someone was nice to me for no reason.
“It’s weird. She’s like a sister, but she’s my stepmom.”
“You have a lot of sisters now.”
His lopsided smile was adorable and my belly flipped. Must be hunger pangs. I wasn’t the type to get all girly over a guy. “They’re great.”
Every single one of them was probably legitimately great. They’d all talked to me at one point or another and none of them had been rude or dismissive. They had to know about me, but they still smiled and said hi when I saw them around.
“The house is sure quiet when they’re not here. It’s weird after all these years.”
“All these years?” I said wryly. “You’re not even twenty-nine.”
“Three months and twenty-three days.”
“You have a countdown?”
His jaw jumped. “Yep.”
Whatever. Age was just a number. I’d felt like I was forty since I was fourteen. We watched the show. Had I said something wrong?
My phone buzzed. Since it wasn’t Dawson telling me a cow was in trouble, I ignored it. I had no one who wanted to get ahold of me.
Dawson didn’t ignore it. “Did you tell Marshall to shove it?”
The same humiliation I’d felt in the hospital flared up. He’d already seen the messages, but I almost spilled the rest of the details. “If you want to know about my dating life, tell me about yours.”
He blew out a breath and ruffled his hair with a hand. The