Learning Curves - By Elyse Mady Page 0,58
on one stiletto heel, her face a comic mask of shock and horror, her blush two scarlet slashes against her colorless cheeks.
“Uncle Larry!” she croaked. “How—how long…I mean, Brandon and I were just…”
“Talking?”
“Yes, about Leanne,” she lied brazenly. “She’s doing so well at university now, isn’t she? I’m sure she’s got you thank for it.”
Leanne’s father brushed aside the flattery without regard. “You’re a nasty piece of work, Gillian. I’ve always known you to be vain, self-centered and shallow. But until tonight, I never knew what a disgusting excuse for a human being your mother and father raised. I’m glad my daughter is nothing like you.”
Gillian’s face twisted at his damning litany. “You think so, do you? Well, do you know your daughter hired a stripper to come with her tonight? That her ‘boyfriend’ is just some man-whore who fucks women for money?” she said, sailing to the door. At the threshold, she paused. “But don’t worry, Uncle Larry. I won’t tell everyone what a loser you or your daughter are—I’ll let them discover it for themselves.”
And with that, she stalked from the room, leaving the two men standing in silence. Larry stepped to one of the windows, his hands deep in his pockets, and looked out at the clear night sky. Still not looking at Brandon, he spoke.
“Are you?”
Brandon didn’t even try to pretend he didn’t understand the question. “No,” he said, “I’m not. And I never was. But before I hurt my knee, I used to strip for a living. Five nights a week, onstage at the Foxe’s Den.”
“The place on Hunter?”
“Yeah, that’s the one.”
“Probably pretty good money.”
Brandon was surprised by how calm Larry was. He’d just heard his daughter called every name in the book and learned their relationship was built on nothing but lies but he’d yet to raise his voice or even swear. Something else had to be going on. No one could be this calm, this accepting. What the hell was this guy playing at anyway?
“I took off my clothes for money. I sold myself so I could pay for my degrees,” he goaded, his voice full of self-hatred. “I’m a stripper sleeping with your daughter. What do you think about that, Larry?”
He turned and looked at him thoughtfully, waving aside the challenge and answering with a simple question of his own. “Did you really sell yourself?” His voice was so steady some of Brandon’s rage began to ebb.
“No. I really did love it. It wasn’t something I boasted about but I’m not ashamed of what I did.”
“Good,” Leanne’s dad agreed quietly. “Because I don’t think you should be either.”
“You don’t?” Brandon was staggered. He couldn’t actually be having this conversation, could he? He must be dreaming or suffering a brain seizure. Anything but reality.
“Does Leanne know? About your career?”
“Yeah,” he admitted. Oh hell, the guy knew everything else. Why not tell him everything and be done with it. Larry couldn’t make him feel any lower about himself than he did now. “That’s how we met. I was dancing, filling in by doing a last-minute shift when Leanne saw me at the club. We—we hooked up and found out later we both went to Wellington.”
Brandon wheeled around and forced Larry to meet his eyes. What he saw there nearly brought him to tears. And he hadn’t cried since the day his grandmother died and he’d been forced to wait on the porch, hoping against hope the EMTs could rescue the only family he’d ever truly loved.
Larry smiled. A thin smile, the fatigue and strain of the past half hour clear. But his eyes were still kind as they gazed at Brandon steadily. “It’s simple, really. I trust my daughter and I trust her judgment in people. I don’t care what you used to do—or even what you do now—as long as you’re honest with my daughter. If she says you’re someone worth knowing, that you’re someone I should consider a friend, then I will.”
The unadorned statement took Brandon’s breath away. There was so much love, trust and acceptance in that straightforward explanation that his throat tightened with envy. He wanted to cringe at his reaction. How could he possibly be jealous of Leanne, of the wonderful relationship she had with her father? She deserved nothing less. But it didn’t change the fact that the sucking void in his chest throbbed with long dead sensation.
How different would his own life have been if he’d had someone who’d offered him the same unconditional love?
“Come on,” Larry